“Provided it was not cut off entirely,” Ken interjected rather unkindly.
“True. Now you blow up the story that kept him scared of really exploring the planet, and at the same time give him a tool for getting what he wants from the inhabitants by threats and force. If you had any ideas in mind at all, they seem to have flopped badly.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that. You saw the way Drai was feeling when he left the ship.”
“Oh, yes, he was regretting the wasted years and the money that went with them, I suppose. That won’t last much longer; he’s been mooning for days now. Then he’ll—” Ken had been thinking furiously as the mechanic delivered his gloomy discourse; now he interrupted abruptly.
“Then he’ll be too late to do anything. Feth, I want you to take me on trust for a while. I promise you won’t miss your sniff. I’m going to be very busy in the air lock for at least a couple of hours, I imagine. Lee is still aboard. I want you to find him, and keep him occupied in any way you see fit for at least that length of time. I don’t want him to see what I’m doing. You have known him longer than I, and can figure out something to interest him. Just don’t kill him; we’re going to need him later.”
Feth looked at the scientist for several seconds, obviously doubtful. Ken wisely said nothing more, letting him fight his own battle with a perfectly natural fear. He was pleased but not too surprised when the mechanic finally said, “All right,” and disappeared toward the control room. Ken waited a moment; then, reasonably sure of not being interrupted, he closed the inner door of the air lock, donned a regular space suit, and set briskly to work. He was rather regretful of the need for sacrificing some of his living specimens, but he consoled himself with the thought they could easily be replaced later. Then, too, the vivarium he had to use was the one containing only a few plants— the fire had interrupted before the human children had made much progress with it. That was foresight, not good fortune; he had had to decide which of them he was going to use, before he had left the planet.
In the control room, Feth did not find his task too difficult. He was not on the best of terms with the pilot, but had never held toward him the blazing hatred he had felt toward his chief. Lee was not particularly scrupulous, as he had shown in the past, but Feth knew of nothing in his record to call forth whole-souled detestation. In consequence, there was nothing strange in the mechanic’s entering the control room and settling down for a talk. The pilot was reading, as usual when off duty; to his question concerning Ken’s whereabouts, the mechanic responded that he was “fooling with his vegetables in the air lock.”
“Why does he have to use the lock for a laboratory?” the pilot asked plaintively. “I’ve already told him it’s bad practice. He’s got a lab in the station — why doesn’t he take them there?”
“I guess he figures if a refrigerator breaks down he can pump the air out of the lock and have a chance of the specimen’s lasting until he can make repairs,” Feth replied. “I imagine you’d have to ask him, to be really sure. I wouldn’t worry — there are just the three of us aboard, and those cases aren’t too big to get around if your engines start to get out of hand.” The pilot grunted, and returned to his reading; but one eye flickered occasionally to the board of telltale lights. He knew when Ken evacuated the lock and opened the outer door, but apparently did not consider it worth while to ask why. Feth, as a matter of fact, did not know either; he was wondering a good deal harder than Lee. Fortunately the pilot was used to his taciturnity and habitual glumness of expression, or his attitude might have aroused suspicion. It was, as a matter of fact, his awareness of this fact that had caused Ken to refrain from telling his whole plan to Feth. He was afraid the mechanic might look to happy to be natural.
The next interruption caused the pilot to put down his book and rise to his feet. “What’s that fool doing now?” he asked aloud. “Drilling holes in the hull?” Feth could understand the source of his worry; the outer door of the air lock had been closed again, and pressure had returned to normal some time before — but now the pressure was dropping rapidly, as though through a serious leak, and air was being pumped into the chamber. The outer door was still closed.