The Sex Life of the Gods
changed from one of odd curiosity to one of absolute horror, the kind of
weird horror that can come only from peals of loud, echoing laughter
rolling through the caverns of the mind.
* * * * *
Nick awoke gasping, his fingers knotted in the sheets of the bed and a
cold sweat beading out upon his face. His heart hammered in his chest
like a drum, threatening to leap to his throat at any moment. He looked
around anxiously for Beth, but the silence of the room reminded him that
she had gone back to the city and her job. Dawn was breaking and the dim
light filtered through the unwashed windows. There was little point in
trying to sleep now. Might as well get his clothes on and try to start
unraveling a long thread of odd events.
He pulled on his clothes slowly and slid his feet into his shoes,
wondering where to begin the climb back to himself. It would be bad
enough for an amnesia victim to regain all his memory if given an
unlimited length of time - this way, with people closing in on all
sides, the whole damned thing seemed impossible.
He hooked the last button on his shirt, stuffed it into his pants, and
headed for the kitchen. He warmed up last night's coffee and it tasted
like warm sulfuric acid, but it brought him around to full
consciousness, even if his stomach did object to it.
When he had finished the coffee, he found the library in the den and
began reading a few of the titles; often, he remembered, a lot could be
told from a man by his reading habits. There were books by Bridgeman,
Zaindenburg and Loomis, almost everything on the shelves pertained to
art in some form or another - except for the last row. There were about
fifteen science fiction volumes, mostly collections of short stories,
from Asimov to A.E. van Vogt. He had a fleeting idea to start reading
the stuff in an effort to determine whether or not his strange dreams
came from somewhere within the pages, then he rejected it. It would take
a hell of a long while to even skim through that mass of literature and
he didn't have the time.
He shoved a copy of H. Beam Piper back onto the shelf and straightened.
To hell with it. He had the whole house to search, before he started
fumbling through something as far out as science fiction. He started
rummaging through the various rooms of the place with systematic
carefulness. Hoping...
When he finished the search, it was noon. He knew a lot about the cabin,
but damned little about himself. The cramped, dismal attic contained
what was left of pictures, odd bits of furniture and clothes after the
local field mice and porcupines had their annual convention up there.
The three bedrooms revealed nothing except the usual gear to be found in
any bedroom, and of the downstairs section of the place, only the art
studio and the combination den-library was of interest. And even these
places shed no light upon the ghost of the man that haunted him. The
studio contained all of the trappings of an artist, even though it was
in rather battered up shape, and the den was a wall to wall replica of
what a woodsman might have owned. There were the books, the stuffed
heads and, of course, the guns.
The rack, on the far side of the room, contained a table with bullet
loading equipment scattered around it, with cans of DuPont powder on the
floor. Above it, in the gun rack were the weapons - enough to hold off a
small revolution. There were two handguns and three rifles and a
shotgun. He looked them over.
A Smith and Wesson .38, model 36 and a Ruger Blackhawk .44 Magnum that
looked like the old peacemaker model. One of the rifles was a Marlin
saddle carbine, model 336 and the other was a Winchester African rifle
with a .458 bore. The last gun on the rack was a Stevens .410 single
barrel shotgun. Nick grinned at the arsenal and took the .44 magnum down
from the rack to clean it. It wasn't in too bad of shape, even for as
long as it had remained idle; even the western style holster and gunbelt
contained enough oil to make them pliable.
He slipped the magnum into the holster and buckled the gunbelt about his
waist, letting it hang a little on the right side. To hell with it, he
thought. If those two characters show up now, at least I'll have an
edge. He pulled five .44 Special slugs from the belt and loaded the
weapon, being careful to see that the hammer hung on the empty chamber.
Then he decided to see how good he was.
Where the hill rose sharply for a small distance behind the house, Nick
found a good area where he could test his marksmanship. He lined up five
cans, a few feet apart, at the base of the rise and snapped off five
fast shots at them as quick as the single action would operate. Either
amnesia had nothing to do with a man's gun knowledge, or he was a
natural. All five cans were blown to hell and sent skittering against
the side of the hill. Stunned, but satisfied, he reloaded the revolver
and dropped it back into the holster.
He prowled the grounds about the cabin with the aimlessness of a man
looking for something but not sure what. Beyond the lawn furniture and
the shed that contained his tools, the only other interesting thing was
the creek. A fast running little stream, barely a foot deep but filled
with numerous little holes that bragged of trout. He walked along the
gurgling water for a ways, then he went back to the house, still unsure
of what to do.
He went back to the cabin and shoved the door open and stopped dead!
She was just like the painting. Her raven black hair hung loose and free
while, beneath the scant confines of the shorts and halter, the warm
flesh rose and fell temptingly. Nick stood there, unable to say a word.
It was Janet and the light in her eyes made him wonder what kind of a
guy he'd been more than ever. She gave a little gasp of pure pleasure
and flung herself into his arms, planting the ripe sweetness of her lips
squarely on his.
"Janet," he managed, but she had a strangle hold on him.
CHAPTER NINE
"Russian?" Brice asked, looking at Sam Morgan.
The dark complected Fed pulled the mangled cigar from his mouth and
pointed it toward the twisted wreckage. On the far side, Cartwell and
Dickson were looking it over.
"Why not?" Morgan asked.
"It seems outlandish, somehow."
Morgan grinned, his peg-like teeth flashing. "You small town cops are
good. I won't take that from you. But you look at everything from a
local viewpoint. In our business, you broaden, you might say.
"Look at the facts, Nolan. The Defense boys spotted the thing up north.
Radar locked on it and gave it a speed of over two thousand miles per.
So it crashes and we find no wings, no tail assembly ... and I have the
hunch that the damned thing ran on nuclear power."
"Atomic?" Nolan whispered, amazed. While the Federal cop talked about
nuclear power and fantastic speeds, all Brice could think of was the
watch he'd found at the scene. How the hell could an artist learn to
pilot a thing like that in a mere thirteen months, and what the hell was
behind it all. "You mean, atomic power?"
Morgan nodded. "See that funnel shaped gismo over there, with the round
ball-like affair?" He was pointing to what was probably the tail of the
ship, at least it was not the section that had absorbed the smash into
the ground.
Nolan nodded.
"That's a nuclear reactor," Sam went on. "Uncle Sam doesn't have
anything in the air with that kind of power. I think we're testing a few
engines, but nothing flying yet."
"Then it is Russian?"
"That's my guess. No other country would build it. Oh, Great Britain
could, but if it was one of theirs, they would have plastered the red
and blue targets on it. Offhand, it looks to me like a glorified version
of the old U-2 thing, only on their side."
Brice didn't answer. He stared at the wreckage as though it were some
sort of demon, while a million thoughts burst in his brain. Nick Danson
was in this? He flew it? Where did he get it? How did he get it? Was it
Russian? Was Nick a Russian spy?
He tried to cover the amazement on his face by lighting a cigarette.
"How come it didn't develop into a pint sized Hiroshima, if it has
atomic power in it?"
Morgan grinned at him, as though he was a kid. "I said it was powered by
atomic energy, not atomic bombs. There's a kind of difference in..."
"Hey, Sam! C'mere!"
Both of the men turned to look across the twisted mass of wreckage to
where Cartwell and Dickson were standing. The blond Fed was holding up a
piece of the wreckage and his face glowed with excitement that he didn't
try to cover.
"C'mon, Nolan," Sam grinned. "Let's go see what my buddy dug up ... I'll
bet its a Russian manufacturer's trade mark."
They skirted the wreck and trotted up to where Cartwell stood with the
piece of metal. "Russian, huh?" asked Sam.
"Russian, hell," Cartwell snorted. "It looks like a cross between
Chinese and Arabic."
Sam took the piece and looked at it, the cigar clamped belligerently in
his jaws. After a tense moment, he grunted noncommittally and passed the
thing to Nolan Brice.
He knew nothing of Russian, Chinese or Arabic, but he knew what Chinese
characters looked like. The imprinted marks on the metal bore a certain
resemblance to the Chinese language, but yet were not the same. It
consisted of strange marks that were like nothing Brice had ever seen
before.
"There are similar markings on the control panel," Dickson said into the
silence.
"Crap," Sam Morgan snorted. "I say Russian. How about you, partner?"
Cartwell furled his blond brows. "I think I'd rather let an expert look
this piece over before I make any kind of guess as to where that wreck
flew from." He turned to Nolan. "Where can we find an expert, Brice?"
"Everett College would be the only place I know of."
"Okay, we'll give them a try. Where's Lieutenant Peters?"
Morgan jerked a thumb over his shoulder toward the other side of the
clearing. "Over there," he said, "dressing down one of his Weekend
Warriors."
"Sam. How about going over and remind him to keep any characters off the
site. I have a horror of having the news boys scoop us on this."
Sam nodded and took off to talk with the Army. Dickson looked at
Cartwell.
"Anything for me?" he asked.
"No. Just continue with your investigators. You can make the
arrangements about having this thing hauled down to Everett, but check
with me before you do. Okay?"
Dickson nodded.
"C'mon, Brice," Cartwell said. "Let's get Morgan and find out what the
college professors can tell us about this screwy thing."
They wrapped the piece of metal in Cartwell's jacket and the three of
them headed through the forest toward the road in the valley.
* * * * *
Professor Nichols was a wisp of a man who peered at them through small,
bright eyes nearly hidden in fleshy folds. Although his body was about
the shortest Brice had ever seen on a man, the brain beneath his crop of
white hair had made him a giant. A linguist all his life, Professor
Nichols spoke a dozen languages fluently, in addition to reading and
writing them. Brice knew him by reputation and grinned at him as he came
into the empty Dean's office.
"Gentlemen?" He favored them with a smile. "I'm Nichols. Doctor Bendtolz
said you wanted to speak with me."
Brice introduced himself and the Federal men and, after a round of
handshaking, Cartwell handed the chunk of metal to the professor.
"We'd like to know about the writing, Professor," Sam put in.
Nichols examined the etching on the metal for some time before he looked
up. His small eyes searched their faces in turn, then he smiled thinly
as though witnessing a very bad gag.
"Are you gentlemen playing some sort of joke?" he asked.