Ole Doc Methuselah Part 3

"For, let us say, twenty thousand dollars," said Ole Doc, "I would be willing-"

"My dear fellow," said Blanchard, "twenty thousand dollars would not be enough to buy the piping system which we have installed."

Ole Doc shrugged. "Then I suppose that's all there is to it," he said.

Captain Blanchard's hands did a particularly spasmodic bit of twitching. "Oh no it isn't," he said, "oh no indeed.

I'm sure that we might be able to come to some sort of an understanding on this. Ah . . . perhaps forty thousand dollars-"

"No, twenty thousand is all the cash I have," said Ole Doc.

"Why then this is very simple; if you give us your note of hand for, let us say, twenty thousand dollars at proper interest and cash to the sum of twenty thousand dollars, we can arrange the matter right here. I have the power of attorney you know to sign for all these things for Mr.

Elston."

"Done," said Ole Doc, and felt himself seized immediate- ly by the eager Blanchard who pumped his hand so hard that he nearly broke the wrist bones. The clerk was now thoroughly pop-eyed. And he was all thumbs and blots as he attempted to make out the papers for the transaction.

But finally his difficulties were dispensed with and Ole Doc, signing the name of William Jones and paying across the proper sums and notes found himself the possessor, proud owner and manager of the water works of Junction City.

Blanchard seemed to be anxious to depart immediately and left Ole Doc to his own devices. For some hours the doctor wandered through the city looking in at the tem- porary dwellings, watching men struggle to raise out of second-hand materials livable or usable establishments. He

patted children on the head, diagnosed to himself various diseases and deformities, and was generally a Haroun al Rachid.

Hope was the prevailing emotion and there was not a man there who did not consider himself a potential mil- lionaire to such a degree that they were giving each other notes of hand payable thirty days hence to enormous sums. But so far as actual cash was concerned, from what Ole Doc could glean, there remained but a few dollars in the whole town. The rest, he correctly judged was safely drowned in the depths of Edouard Blanchard's safe. The town was restricted between a river and a ridge and every inch of ground between these natural boundaries was deeded to someone other than Edouard Blanchard as Ole Doc, later in the afternoon, ascertained after a short session with the clerk. He was forced to waken the clerk several times during his inspection of the books. That gentleman was happily asleep when some of the ledgers not generally opened were closely inspected.

Ole Doc stood in the sunlight for a while, thoughtful, barely avoiding a blaster fight which broke out in a swill parlor. Finally he understood that Edouard Blanchard probably intended to leave the area for good before an- other dawn came.

Ole Doc had for some time been aware of shadowing of the Morgue. But before he went back to his ship he decided to take an unusual step.

This did not consume many minutes for there were only five s.p.a.ce vessels in the crude port and all of these had come from more or less regular runs amongst known systems. His business transacted he went back to the golden vessel.

That evening, after a pleasant dinner over which Miss Elston graciously presided, Ole Doc and Hippocrates left the ship on an expedition. They had reached the bottom of the ladder when Ole Doc turned to his slave.

"Hippocrates, over there on the left you behold some trees. Under them you will find a Martian. You will make a wide circuit and come up upon him while I distract his attention from in front. Without injury to the fellow you will hold him and make him prisoner. We will then put him away safely in the Morgue and go about our busi- ness."

Dart, squirming and shuddering a little bit in the cold, and perhaps with a premonition that he should not expect

the evening to deliver anything but evil, suddenly felt himself struck solidly and expertly from behind. As he went down he half drew a blaster but there was no chance to use it. Dreaming peacefully of his beloved ca.n.a.ls he was carried back to the ship and consigned to an escape- proof compartment.

In a businesslike way then Hippocrates picked up his burden and trudged after Ole Doc around the outskirts of the town toward the higher level of ground where the river had been diverted into three reservoirs which provided the water supply.

Hippocrates was under a double burden, the sack which he carried on his back and the burden which lay in his mind. As they made their way through the night, the heavy little being shaking the solid ground of Spico with every step no matter how light he intended it and Ole Doc regarding the stars with a musing eye, Hippocrates rattled off the code from start to finish. Then he began again.

Soon, newer arguments for sanity occurred to him and he started to quote at length:

On Woman

The stronger the woman The safer the man As he ventures afar On the s.p.a.ces that span

For love may be lovely In summer's soft haze And days may be sweeter When fond pa.s.sions blaze

But far out on Astri

With light frying hot

Adventure can't live

When there's naught in the pot

Her sweet curling ringlets Can't warm you at night And the dew in her eyes May but lead you to fight

No! Take woman stronger Then Vega's bright blare For then you live longer Yea, live to get there!

(Tales of the s.p.a.ce Rangers)

Hippocrates finished this quotation with considerable satisfaction which lasted only long enough to see that Ole Doc hadn't even heard it. He glumly subsided, despairing, for there was no mistaking the elasticity of Ole Doc's step, nor the softness of his eye.

It was a beautiful night. Spico's several moons made the ground iridescent and played in triangular patterns upon the reservoirs. Ole Doc was very cheerful. "Now there,"

he said, "dump a third of that sack in each one of these and back we'll go."

It was not until now that Hippocrates gave way to the most gloomy forebodings. He had seen Ole Doc busy with his tubes. He had seen this white powder gushing out into the sacks but he had not a.s.sociated it with the population of Junction City. Even if his reasoning powers might be feeble it took no great effort on his part to see that Ole Doc fully intended to poison every person there. Hippoc- rates hesitated.

He was trembling, so great was the effort to disobey Ole Doc. He had no conversation to match his feelings about this. He could only look mutely, appealingly, and stand still.

"Go ahead," said Ole Doc. And then, focusing more closely upon his slave he suddenly realized that that being was considerably afraid.

Hippocrates tried to begin the Universal Medical Code once more but failed.

Although it greatly taxed his strength Ole Doc picked up the bag and began the task himself. The white powder went instantly into solution and one could see it spreading far out across the reservoir in the moonlight. When he had treated all three of the repositories he gave the empty sack back to Hippocrates. Such was the manner of the giving that Ole Doc's anger was clearly demonstrated in it.

All the way back to the Morgue Hippocrates lagged behind, head heavy against his barrel chest, gypsum tears dripping slowly onto his doublet. It was the first time Ole Doc had ever been angry with him.

The strains of various instruments and occasional shouts came on the night wind from the more lawless quarter of Junction City. Closer at hand a camp fire burned and about it cl.u.s.tered the flame-bathed faces of pioneers. They

listened to a faint and plaintive Magri song which hung over them like some sad ghost of night.

Ole Doc pa.s.sed close to the group but paused to listen to the woman who sang. In his present mood he could understand the notes if not the words of the melody. They called before his eyes the cascades of bright hair which he supposed waited for him over at the Morgue. A wind was blowing softly from Spico's white plains but there was a chill in it and those about the fire huddled closer. They listened in deeper silence.

An eager-faced young Earthman noticed Doc and made way for him in the circle. Doc stumbled against the hydrant which studded this as well as every other lot in Junction City. These people had no home he observed nor lumber with which to build one. They were living instead on the bare ground using blanket screens to protect their dressing. There were several children sprawled even now outside the ring and one of them whimpered and a woman went to it.

The song was done and the young man offering his tobacco to Ole Doc said with a smile of cameraderie, "Where's your lot stranger? Close by?"

"Pretty close," said Ole Doc.

"How many in your party?" said the young man.

"Just myself and a slave."

A woman near by leaned over with a laugh, "Well, a young fellow like you," she said, "is going to need help when it comes to putting his house together. Why don't you come and help us and then when you get ready we'll help you?"

The young man laughed, several of the others joining in. "That's a fair bargain," he said. "There are fourteen of us and only two of you. That's a pretty good ratio."