Reunion on Ganymede

'Listen, senator,' he pleaded, 'don't be a damn fool all your life. We're running you for president two years from now and you need them Martian votes. You can pick up plenty of them by going out to Ganymede and dedicating this battle monument. You can say some nice things about the Martians and then, quick, before the Earth boys get mad at you, you can say something nice about the Earth. And then you can praise the bravery of the men who fought in the battle and then, just to quiet down the pacifists, praise the forty years of peace we've had. And if you do that you'll make everybody happy and everyone will think you are on their side. You'll get a lot of votes.'

'But I don't want to go,' protested the senator. 'I won't go. You can't bulldoze me.'

Izzy spread his hands.

'Listen, senator,' he said. 'I'm your manager, ain't I? Have I ever done anything but good for you? Didn't I take you out of a one-horse county seat and make you one of the biggest men of your day?'

'Well,' said the senator, 'I have done well by myself, if I do say so. And part of the credit goes to you. I hate to go to Ganymede. But if you think I should make — '

'Fine,' said Izzy, rubbing his hands together. Til fix it all up for you. I'll give the newspaper boys some interviews. I'll have the best ghost writer fix you up a speech. We'll get a half million votes out of this trip.'

He eyed Senator Brown sternly.

'There's just two things you've got to do,' he warned.

'What's that?'

'Learn your speech. I don't want you forgetting it like you did the time you dedicated the communications building on the moon. And leave that damn candid camera at home.'

Senator Brown looked unhappy.

Ganymede was plunging into Jupiter's shadow. For a time 'night' would fall upon the satellite. Part of the time Europa would be in the sky, but Europa's light would do little more than make the shadows of the surface deeper and darker.

'Spike' Cardy waited for Ganymede to swing into the shadow. For Spike was going to do something that no man had ever done before He was going to escape from Ganymede prison, from this proud Alcatraz of Space, whose warden boasted that no man had ever left its dome alive until his time was served.

But Spike was leaving before his time was served. He was going to walk out the northwest port and disappear into the Ganymedean night as completely as if he had been wiped out of existence. It was all planned. The planning had been careful and had taken a long time. Spike had waited until he was sure there was no chance for slip-up.

The plan had cost money, had called for pressure being exerted in the right spots, had called for outside assistance that was hard to get. But what others had failed to do, Spike Cardy had done. For was he not the old Spike Cardy of space-racket fame? Had he not for years levied toll upon the interplanetary lines? Were not his men still levying toll on the ships of space? Spike Cardy was tops in gangdom and even now his word was law to many men.

Spike waited until the guard paced past his cell. Then he moved swiftly to his bunk, mounted it and grasped the almost invisible wire of thin spun glass which was tied to one of the ventilator grids. Swiftly, but carefully, he hauled in the wire, taking care to make no noise. At the end of the wire, where it had hung down the ventilator pipe, was a flame pistol.

Like a cat stalking for a kill, Spike moved to the heavily barred cell door. He thrust the pistol inside his shirt and slumped against the bars. He heard the guard returning on his beat.

Spike whimpered softly, as if he were in great pain. The guard heard the sound, his footsteps quickened.

'What's the matter, Cardy? You sick?' asked the guard.

The gangster chief reached a feeble hand through the bars, clutching wildly at the guard's shoulder. The guard leaned nearer. Cardy's left hand moved like a striking snake, the steel fingers closing around the man's throat. At the same instant the flame pistol, its charge screwed down to low power and a pencil point in diameter, flashed across the space between Cardy's shirt and the guard's heart. Just one little burst of white-hot flame, expertly aimed. Just one little chuckle out of the heat gun, like a man might chuckle at a joke. That was all.

The guard slumped closer against the bars. The death-clutch on his throat had throttled down his outcry. Anyone looking at the scene would have thought he was talking to the prisoner.

Cardy worked swiftly. It was all planned out. He knew just what to do.

His right hand tore the ring of keys from the dead man's belt. His fingers found the correct key, inserted it in the lock. The cell door swung open.

Now was the one dangerous point in the whole plan. But Cardy did not falter.

Swiftly he swung the door open and dragged the guard inside. He would have to take the chance no one would see.

Working deftly, he stripped the dead man's trousers off, slipped them on; ripped the coat from his back and donned it. The cap next and the guard's flame pistol.