A Coffin for Jacob
By EDWARD W. LUDWIG
Illustrated by EMSH
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Galaxy Science Fiction May 1956.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
With never a moment to rest, the pursuit
through space felt like a game of hounds
and hares ... or was it follow the leader?
Ben Curtis eased his pale, gaunt body through the open doorway of theBlast Inn, the dead man following silently behind him.
His fear-borne gaze traveled into the dimly illumined Venusian ginmill. The place was like an evil caldron steaming with a brew whoseingredients had been culled from the back corners of three planets.
Most of the big room lay obscured behind a shimmering veil of tobaccosmoke and the sweet, heavy fumes of Martian Devil's Egg. Here andthere, Ben saw moving figures. He could not tell if they were Earthmen,Martians or Venusians.
Someone tugged at his greasy coat. He jumped, thinking absurdly that itwas the dead man's hand.
"Coma esta, senor?" a small voice piped. "Speken die Deutsch?Desirez-vous d'amour? Da? Nyet?"
Ben looked down.
The speaker was an eager-eyed Martian boy of about ten. He was likea red-skinned marionette with pipestem arms and legs, clad in a tornskivvy shirt and faded blue dungarees.
"I'm American," Ben muttered.
"Ah, buena! I speak English tres fine, senor. I have Martianfriend, she tres pretty and tres fat. She weigh almost eightypounds, monsieur. I take you to her, si?"
Ben shook his head.
He thought, I don't want your Martian wench. I don't want your opiumor your Devil's Egg or your Venusian kali. But if you had a drug that'dbring a dead man to life, I'd buy and pay with my soul.
"It is deal, monsieur? Five dollars or twenty keelis for visitMartian friend. Maybe you like House of Dreams. For House of Dreams—"
"I'm not buying."
The dirty-faced kid shrugged. "Then I show you to good table,—tresbien. I do not charge you, senor."
The boy grabbed his hand. Because Ben could think of no reason forresisting, he followed. They plunged into shifting layers of smoke andthrough the drone of alcohol-cracked voices.
They passed the bar with its line of lean-featured, slit-eyedEarthmen—merchant spacemen.
They wormed down a narrow aisle flanked by booths carved from Venusianmarble that jutted up into the semi-darkness like fog-blanketedtombstones.
Several times, Ben glimpsed the bulky figures of CO2-breathingVenusians, the first he'd ever seen.
They were smoky gray, scaly, naked giants, toads in human shape.They stood solitary and motionless, aloof, their green-lidded eyesunblinking. They certainly didn't look like telepaths, as Ben had heardthey were, but the thought sent a fresh rivulet of fear down his spine.
Once he spied a white-uniformed officer of Hoover City's SecurityPolice. The man was striding down an aisle, idly tapping his neuro-clubagainst the stone booths.
Keep walking, Ben told himself. You look the same as anyone elsehere. Keep walking. Look straight ahead.
The officer passed. Ben breathe