Jack of No Trades Part 3

Goil said to me in a low, ominous voice, "I am invested with certain Company powers out here, and I intend to use them fully. I intend to continue with this investigation in spite of any opposition you give me. Pending on the outcome, Mr. Orrin and Mr. Weston, you are both relieved of your positions as of now--say for mismanagement of personnel and company property.

"Mr. Maloon, I am placing you under station arrest by authority of my position, and because of your admission of theft. Pay and allowances for all of you are suspended as of today.

"That's all. Please leave."

w.i.l.l.y was the first to leave, with his head hanging low in shame.

Orrin left next, with fury shining plainly from his eyes. I lingered until w.i.l.l.y had left. Then I closed the door and swung around to face Goil.

Goil was looking at me peculiarly. He said, "I told you to go, Weston."

"I will," I said. "But first I want to tell you something."

"When I want to hear your side of the story, I'll ask you for it,"

Goil said nastily.

"It won't wait," I said in a new voice that caused Goil to look at me closely. "I want to tell you now while we are alone."

Goil's eyes narrowed. "Weston, anything you have to say one way or the other I'll use against you later. Anything you want to say to save your own skin just won't do any good."

I became suddenly infuriated. I stepped forward and slammed my fist on the desk top and said in a low, poisonous voice, "Goil, you've shoved your prying nose into something you know very little about. You're jumping to conclusions about something you know only part of. Now I'm forced to reveal certain facts which you shouldn't be knowing. And I'm going to tell you here and now whether you want to listen or not!"

Goil had reddened and risen from his chair. But I towered over him threateningly and he dropped back in his chair in quiet incense.

"That's better," I said, somewhat cooled off. "Now listen. What I have to say may seem incredible to you. Hear me out, then speak your piece.

And I think I can prove what I say to your satisfaction. In any event, I hope I can trust your confidence on this. You'll understand what I mean by the time I'm finished.

"First, w.i.l.l.y did take the energizer and the generator. 'Steal,' if you wish to say so. I knew it. Orrin, nor anyone else knows it though.

Second, those are not the only things he has taken. Third, his taking things like that has been happening all the time he has been here. It happened before he got here, wherever he was.

"He is not a kleptomaniac. He steals, not because he has a compulsion to do so, nor for economic gain, but for a more important reason."

Goil said, "Stop beating around the bush. If you think you have something to say, go ahead and say it."

"I'm trying to," I said. "But it's not something easily explained.

"w.i.l.l.y is nothing but a great big rabbit's foot."

"_What?_"

"Mr. Goil, w.i.l.l.y is the exact opposite of an accident p.r.o.ne. w.i.l.l.y is a safety p.r.o.ne. No accidents involving personal injury ever happen when he is around. Not even minor ones."

Goil looked hostilely skeptical at me. "I seem to recall some accident reports you sent in. You signed them yourself, I believe, as safety officer."

"That's right," I said feeling foolish. "But they were falsified reports. And I've requisitioned medical supplies too, that were never needed."

"Now why would you want to do a thing like that?" asked Goil in a tone cold with obvious disbelief, and the tenor of humoring a madman.

"To keep reports and consumption statistics where they belong," I answered.

"I'm more than just an employee of the Company. I'm also a research psychologist. And I'm studying w.i.l.l.y. I'll admit that through influence and other ways I got w.i.l.l.y and me a job out here isolated with a relatively small group doing rather dangerous work, normally.

That was planned. It's easier to study him this way. I can prove this, of course."

"How do you know for certain w.i.l.l.y is a safety p.r.o.ne?"

"Through non-accident statistics where he has worked."

Goil removed a small pen knife from his pocket, opened the blade, and drew it across the back of his hand. The cut bled. He said, "Look. I'm injured."

I shook my head. "You are injured, but it's not the same thing. It was not an accident."

Goil stood up. "I've heard enough of your gibberish. w.i.l.l.y is a thief and you are a pathological liar. What you have just told me is pure fantasy, a yarn concocted to try to protect you and w.i.l.l.y. I have little doubt but what you really believe it yourself. Mr. Weston, you are a sick man."

"I told you it would sound incredible.

"w.i.l.l.y only steals or alters the normal sequence of events so that accidents involving human injury won't happen. Sometimes his behavior patterns are simple, sometimes complex. But always--always the synergism, syndrome, or whatever you want to call it, is the same. I have a file of tape recordings I can let you hear, and incident histories--"

"Which may very well be considered part of _your_ syndrome," said Goil. "Mr. Weston, you are either the system's boldest liar, or you are sick. You can't really expect me to believe all that garbage, now can you?"

"With that unimaginative type mind you seem to have, Mr. Goil, no, I don't expect you to believe. But it was worth a try. w.i.l.l.y is up to something big right now, and if you interrupt it, there is no telling what will happen."

"We'll find out," Goil said, "for I expect to find out what this is all about. Now if you'll leave--"

I spun on my heel, angry at Goil's intolerant stupidity. I whipped open the door and slammed it shut behind me. Then I stormed to my quarters where I broke open a fresh bottle of Scotch. I downed a couple of quick shots then nursed a third, thinking about the time out near Jupiter when w.i.l.l.y had rigged up a still and brewed some powerful concoction. He had insisted that we all sample it, and everyone had, just to please w.i.l.l.y (they thought!) and had all gotten roaring drunk.

And had safely pa.s.sed through one of those plague areas that come up once in a century out of who knows where to decimate any population that happens to be in the way.

We had made an emergency landing at another mining station. We had walked through the corridors and rooms looking for desperately needed parts and supplies, and had tried to count the dead until the task became too sickening, exposed in every possible way to the voracious microorganisms that had killed every being aboard. But none of us had gotten even a headache. We found our parts and took off again.

w.i.l.l.y never made any more of that brew.

I wondered often what could have been in that stuff to make it such a powerful antibiotic.

I had been early in the process of studying w.i.l.l.y then and had not had foresight enough to keep a sample of that brew. I had lost one chance right then to add materially to the medical knowledge of humanity. And now that stupid Gar Goil was on the point of interrupting all further research.

For the next ten minutes I considered ways I could get Goil near an airlock so I could shove him through, sans suit, and with enough velocity so that he would end up somewhere in the Coal-sack region.

But I gave up the idea, conceding that it would be impossible; somewhere along the line w.i.l.l.y would prevent it.

I took one more Scotch and went to bed. All night long I crossed and recrossed the threshold of sleep, my mind filled with methods of studying and a.n.a.lyzing the intricacies of w.i.l.l.y's behavior; trying to discover any common factors so that others of his genre could easily be discovered and put to work and their by-products salvaged.

The following day was dismal to me. I avoided everybody possible so I wouldn't take my troubles out on them. And I avoided Goil in particular, for another reason. I even ate late so I could eat alone.

Just about the time I finished, Artie's voice came over the system, saying: