The Blue Behemoth
Copyright© 2024 by Leigh Brackett
Chapter 2
Kanza the Martian croaker, was bending over me when I woke up. His little brown face was crinkled with laughter. He’d lost most of his teeth, and he gummed thak-weed. It smelt.
“You pretty, Mis’ Jig,” he giggled. “You funny like hell.”
He slapped some cold greasy stuff on my face. It hurt. I cursed him and said, “Where’s Shannon? How is he?”
“Mis’ Bucky okay. You save life. You big hero, Mis’ Jig. Mis’ Gow come nickuhtime get snakes. You hero. Haw! You funny like hell!”
I said, “Yeah,” and pushed him away and got up. I almost fell down a couple of times, but presently I made it to the mirror over the washstand—I was in my own cell—and I saw what Kanza meant. The damned snakes had done a good job. I looked like I was upholstered in Scotch plaid. I felt sick.
Bucky Shannon opened the door. He looked white and grim, and there was a big burn across his neck. He said:
“Beamish is here with his lawyer.”
I picked up my shirt. “Right with you.”
Kanza went out, still giggling. Bucky closed the door.
“Jig,” he said, “those vapor worms were all right when we went in. Somebody followed us down and let them out. On purpose.”
I hurt all over. I growled, “With that brain, son, you should go far. Nobody saw anything, of course?” Bucky shook his head.
“Question is, Jig, who wants to kill us, and why?”
“Beamish. He realizes he’s been gypped.”
“One hundred U.C.’s,” said Bucky softly, “for a few lousy swampedge mining camps. It stinks, Jig. You think we should back out?”
I shrugged. “You’re the boss man. I’m only the guy that beats off the creditors.”
“Yeah,” Bucky said reflectively. “And I hear starvation isn’t a comfortable death. Okay, Jig. Let’s go sign.” He put his hand on the latch and looked at my feet. “And—uh—Jig, I...”
I said, “Skip it. The next time, just don’t trip me up, that’s all!”
We had a nasty trip to Venus. Gertrude kept the brute tank on edge, and Gow, on the rare occasions he came up for air, went around looking like a disaster hoping to happen. To make it worse, Zurt the Jovian strong-man got hurt during the take-off, and the Mercurian cave-cat had kittens.
Nobody would have minded that, only one of ‘em had only four legs. It lived just long enough to scare that bunch of superstitious dopes out of their pants. Circus people are funny that way.
Shannon and I did a little quiet sleuthing, but it was a waste of time. Anybody in the gang might have let those electric worms out on us. It didn’t help any to know that somebody, maybe the guy next to you at dinner, was busy thinking ways to kill you. By the time we hit Venus, I was ready to do a Brodie out the refuse chute.
Shannon set the crate down on the edge of Nahru, the first stop on our itinerary. I stood beside him, looking out the ports at the scenery. It was Venus, all right. Blue mud and thick green jungle and rain, and a bunch of ratty-looking plastic shacks huddling together in the middle of it. Men in slickers were coming out for a look.
I saw Beamish’s sleek yacht parked on a cradle over to the left, and our router’s runabout beside it. Bucky Shannon groaned.
“A blue one, Jig. A morgue if I ever saw one!”
I snarled, “What do you want, with this lousy dog-and-pony show!” and went out. He followed. The gang was converging on the lock, but they weren’t happy. You get so you can feel those things. The steamy Venus heat was already sneaking into the ship.
While we passed the hatchway to the brute tank, I could hear Gertrude, screaming.
The canvasmen were busy setting up the annex, slopping and cursing in the mud. The paste brigade was heading for the shacks. Shannon and I stood with the hot rain running off our slickers, looking.
I heard a noise behind me and looked around. Ahra the Nahali woman was standing in the mud with her arms up and her head thrown back, and her triangular mouth open like a thirsty dog. She didn’t have anything on but her blue-green, hard scaled hide, and she was chuckling. It didn’t sound nice.
You find a lot of Nahali people in side-shows, doing tricks with the electric power they carry in their own bodies. They’re Venusian middle-swampers, they’re not human, and they never forget it.
Ahra opened her slitted red eyes and looked at me and laughed with white reptilian teeth.
“Death,” she whispered. “Death and trouble. The jungle tells me. I can smell it in the swamp wind.”
The hot rain sluiced over her. She shivered, and the pale skin under her jaw pulsed like a toad’s, and her eyes were red.
“The deep swamps are angry,” she whispered. “Something has been taken. They are angry, and I smell death in the wind!”
She turned away, laughing, and I cursed her, and my stomach was tight and cold. Bucky said,
“Let’s eat if they have a bar in this dump.”
We weren’t half way across the mud puddle that passed as a landing field when a man came out of a shack on the edge of the settlement. We could see him plainly, because he was off to one side of the crowd.
He fell on his knees in the mud, making noises. It took him three or four tries to get our names out clear enough to understand.
Bucky said, “Jig—it’s Sam Kapper.”
We started to run. The crowd, mostly big unshaken miners, wheeled around to see what was happening. People began to close in on the man who crawled and whimpered in the mud.
Sam Kapper was a hunter, supplying animals to zoos and circuses and carnivals. He’d given us good deals a couple of times, when we weren’t too broke, and we were pretty friendly.
I hadn’t seen him for three seasons. I remembered him as a bronzed, hard-bitten guy, lean and tough as a twist of tung wire. I felt sick, looking down at him.
Bucky started to help him up. Kapper was crying, and he jerked all over like animals I’ve seen that were scared to death. Some guy leaned over and put a cigarette in his mouth and lighted it for him.
I was thinking about Kapper, then, and I didn’t pay much attention. I only caught a glimpse of the man’s face as he straightened up. I didn’t realize until later that he looked familiar.
We got Kapper inside the shack. It turned out to be a cheap bar, with a couple of curtained booths at the back. We got him into one and pulled the curtain in a lot of curious faces. Kapper dragged hard on the cigarette. The man that gave it to him was gone.
Bucky said gently, “Okay, Sam. Relax. What’s the trouble?”
Kapper tried to straighten up. He hadn’t shaved. The lean hard lines of his face had gone slack and his eyes were bloodshot. He was covered with mud, and his mouth twitched like a sick old man’s.
He said thickly, “I found it. I said I’d do it, and I did. I found it and brought it out.”
The cigarette stub fell out of his mouth. He didn’t notice it. “Help me,” he said simply. “I’m scared.” His mouth drooled.
“I got it hidden. They want to find out, but I won’t tell ‘em. It’s got to go back. Back where I found it. I tried to take it, but they wouldn’t let me, and I was afraid they’d find it...”
He reached suddenly and grabbed the edge of the table. “I don’t know how they found out about it, but they did. I’ve got to get it back. I’ve got to...”
Bucky looked at me. Kapper was blue around the mouth. I was scared, suddenly. I said, “Get what back where?”
Bucky got up. “I’ll get a doctor,” he said. “Stick with him.” Kapper grabbed his wrist. Kapper’s nails were blue and the cords in his hands stood out like guy wires.
“Don’t leave me. Got to tell you—where it is. Got to take it back. Promise you’ll take it back.” He gasped and struggled over his breathing.
“Sure,” said Bucky. “Sure, well take it back. What is it?”
Kapper’s face was horrible. I felt sick, listening to him fight for air. I wanted to go for a doctor anyway, but somehow I knew it was no use. Kapper whispered,
“Cansin. Male. Only one. You don’t know...! Take him back.”
“Where is it, Sam?”
I reached across Bucky suddenly and jerked the curtain back. Beamish was standing there. Beamish, bent over, with his ear cocked. Kapper made a harsh strangling noise and fell across the table.
Beamish never changed expression. He didn’t move while Bucky felt Kapper’s pulse. Bucky didn’t need to say anything. We knew.
“Heart?” said Beamish finally.
“Yeah,” said Bucky. He looked as bad as I felt. “Poor Sam.”
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