frowning.
“No reason why it should, Abna. I intended it exclusively for you.”
“Intended—what?”
“The gas in the store cupboard. Didn’t you notice it when you went to get the food?”
“That tart smell? I thought it was some kind of preserving chemical you’d put in— You mean it—”
“I mean it was lethal gas, released by the action of opening the door. That was why I told you to get the meal. Maybe ‘lethal’ is hardly the term for a man of your constitution, Abna. It won’t kill you, as it would an ordinary man, but it will numb your body and certain areas of your brain. Chiefly those areas connected with the will.”
Abna moved ponderously and sat down with a thump on the wall couch.
“What—what have you done?” he whispered. “You marry me and then kill me.”
“I haven’t done either.” The Amazon rose, tall, majestic, in her black uniform. Her violet eyes were wide and gleaming. “All I have done, Abna, is paralyze every faculty by which you can shield your thoughts from me. Shortly you will be unable to move, but your thoughts will be bare for me to read. Every secret you have ever had will be there for me to take—and your will power being deadened, you will not be able to protect yourself.”
“A she-devil,” Abna muttered, staring at her. “That’s what I have always suspected. Wait a minute! Did you say you didn’t marry me?”
“That’s right. We’re not married. We never shall be.”
“But, the ceremony. The archbishop—!”
“The ceremony was illegal. As for the archbishop, he was a synthetic image of himself, controlled entirely by my will.”
“I don’t—believe it.” Abna got the words out with difficulty.
“No?” The Amazon turned to the switchboard and snapped on the short-wave radio that still gave contact with Earth. After a few moments of sorting out the stations, she tuned in to the midst of a news bulletin.
“...was the marriage of Miss Violet Ray Brant to Abna of Jupiter. It is tragic that the aftermath of the ceremony should be marred by the sudden collapse and death of Dr. Cranton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, but—”
“Satisfied?” the Amazon asked, switching off. “As we passed out into space here, beyond range, my will power over him naturally weakened, until finally it lost its efficiency altogether and the synthetic archbishop just collapsed and became clay. The deception will not be discovered. His body will be examined by his personal doctor, who has been hypnotized by me in such a way that he will not detect the switch and will pronounce the death as due to natural causes, without need for an autopsy. He will be buried with full church ceremony. I stayed at this switchboard as much as I could so the amplifier could carry my will over the gulf. I didn’t want the archbishop—the synthetic one—to collapse too soon. It might have seemed—strange.”
“And the reason for all this double-dealing?” Abna demanded, still fighting with all his giant strength to keep control over his slipping senses.
“I have told you why,” the Amazon answered. “I mean to learn every scientific secret you possess, Abna, and so add your knowledge to my own. I could never have done it without marrying you—or apparently marrying you. Only by marrying you could we be together as we are now, on this supposed honeymoon.”
Abna smiled cynically. “It shouldn’t have been difficult for a woman like you to have pulled this trick without the farce of a supposed marriage.”
“True, but I preferred it this way. I want all the world to believe we are married. I rely a great deal on the mood of the people. They will trust me implicitly if they think I married you; if they knew I had thrown you overboard just to gain more power, they might turn against me. So, let them think our marriage is genuine. I can explain away your disappearance as a space accident. By the time you are found—if you are—my position will be unassailable.”
“Disappearance?”
The Amazon came and seated herself close beside the wall couch where Abna still wrestled with paralysis. There was a triumphant gleam in her violet eyes.
“I’m leaving you on Io, Abna—one of the moons of your own world of Jupiter. The Cosmic Engineers of the Earth government were instructed by me many months ago to come to this moon—and also Ganymede—to adapt them into worlds suitable for colonisation. They could be used as bases from which to mine valuable minerals in the asteroid belt—and the other moons in the Jovian system. It is merely an extension of the same work already being conducted on Mars, so that the colonists there will no longer need to live under protective domes. Following out my own designs, the Engineers buried within each Moon’s core a gravity generator that would enable those bodies to retain an atmosphere. Deep shafts have also been sunk, to release trapped gases. These were mephitic and poisonous, but vast quantities of special bacteria have been released, which will convert it into what will ultimately become a breathable mixture containing high levels of oxygen and nitrogen, and also water. Similarly, certain genetically-engineered vegetation has been introduced that will assist in the process. The cosmic Engineers completed their work some time ago, and have now left. However, the “conversion process” may take several years before the moons are fully fit for colonisation. At the present time, Io is still a desert island of a world, where a man of your super constitution can perhaps still live, but where you will remain until the Engineers return to check on progress, when you may be found if you are still alive. Once I have your secrets, Abna, you cease to be of interest to me.”
Abna could not say any more. He sat motionless, his eyes fixed on her. His mind was alive, his body temporarily dead. With his will suspended, there was nothing he could do to block the mental probing of the woman who sat opposite him.
She worked methodically, making notes, exerting her extraordinary telepathic gifts to the full. An hour passed, perhaps two hours, then she was finished. Abna still sat like a stone image. She knew everything he had ever known, had a complete grasp of every scientific secret. Only his innate metaphysical powers were denied to her, as this gift could not be transferred or learned in so short a time.
Rising, she considered him; then with a sudden effort she heaved his massive form on to her shoulder and carried him to the empty compartment at the tail of the ship, which had been left empty. She laid Abna down on the floor and then spoke. He could hear and see her even though he could not respond.
“The next stop is Io, Abna,” she said. “There we must part. You have still a lot to learn about women—and one woman in particular.”
With that she went out and pushed over the heavy metal clamps. Returning to the control room, she studied again the notes she had made, then satisfied that they were indelibly impressed upon her brain, she set fire to them and turned to the control board.
The Ultra had just cleared the orbit of Mars, and was hurtling through the emptiness of space safely above the plane of the asteroid belt. In eight or nine hours at present speed, the field of mighty Jupiter would be reached, and that of his attendant moons. The Amazon studied the deeps ahead, Jupiter already looming like a tiny ball with flattened poles, his cloud-belts girdling him in dark bands.
Setting the radar alarm, she got up and went to the small chamber that served as her bedroom. She threw herself on the bunk, fully dressed as she was, and lay thinking.
