Adjusting the plastic helmet over his head, Carson stepped up close to Astro and Tom and spoke confidently. "It's very simple."
"Whew!" exclaimed Tom. "I thought we'd have to go fumbling around."
Carson pointed through the darkness. "Follow this lane straight down until you come to a large repair lock. There's a space freighter on the maintenance cradle outside. You can't miss it. Turn left and follow a trail to the base of the canyon wall. There are jungle creepers and vines growing up the side and you can climb them easily."
Tom nodded and repeated the directions, then turned to Astro. "Maybe you'd better stay here, Astro. I can make it alone."
"No." Connel spoke sharply from the doorway. "Astro speaks Venusian. If you're stopped, he can speak for you. You'd give yourself away."
"Very well, sir," said Tom. "I guess that is best. Ready to go, Astro?"
"Ready," replied the big cadet.
"Good-by, Major," said Tom, reaching into the doorway to shake hands with Connel. "I'll try my best."
"It's a matter of life and death, Tom." Connel's voice was low and husky. "Not our lives, or the lives of a few people, but the life and death of the Solar Alliance."
"I understand, sir." Tom turned to Astro and the two cadets marched off quickly.
They had no difficulty finding the giant ship on the cradles outside the repair shop and quickly turned toward the base of the cliff. Twenty minutes later they had left the center of activity and were close to the canyon wall. They were congratulating themselves on their luck in not being stopped or questioned when suddenly they saw a guard ahead of them on sentry duty.
"Ill take care of him," whispered Astro. "You hide here in the shadows, and when I whistle, you start climbing. Then I'll cover you from there until you get to the top. Got it?"
"Right!" The two cadets shook hands briefly. Each knew that there was no need to speak of their feelings. "Take care of Roger," said Tom. "We don't know how badly he's been injured."
"I'll see to him," said Astro. "Watch me now and wait for my whistle." He turned away and then paused to call back softly, "Spaceman's luck, Tom."
"Same to you, Astro," replied Tom, and then crouched tensely in the shadows.
The big cadet walked casually toward the sentry, who spotted him immediately and brought his gun up sharply, calling a challenge in the Venusian tongue.
"A friend," replied Astro in the same dialect.
The sentry lowered the gun slightly. "What are you doing out here?" he asked suspiciously.
"Just taking a walk," said Astro. "Looking for something."
"What?" asked the sentry.
"Trying to make a connection."
"A connection? What kind of connection?"
"This kind!" said Astro suddenly, chopping the side of his hand down on the sentry's neck, between the helmet and his uniform collar.
The sentry fell to the ground like a poleaxed steer and lay still. Astro grinned, then turned and went whistling off into the darkness. Twenty feet away Tom heard the signal and hurried to the base of the cliff. He grabbed a thick vine and pulled himself upward, hand over hand. Halfway up he found a small ledge and stopped to rest. Below him, he could see Astro hurrying back toward the center of the base. The dim lights and the distant hum of activity assured him that so far his escape was unnoticed. He resumed his climb, and fifteen minutes later the curly-haired cadet stood on the canyon rim. After another short rest he turned and plunged into the jungle.
Tom knew that as long as he kept the planet of Earth over his right shoulder, while keeping the distant star of Regulus ahead of him, he was traveling in the right direction to Sinclair's plantation. He stopped to check his bearings often, occasionally having to climb a tree to see over the top of the jungle. He ignored the threat of an attack by a jungle beast. For some reason it did not present the danger it had when he had first entered the jungle, seemingly years before. Under pressure, the cadet had become skilled in jungle lore and moved with amazing speed. He kept the blaster ready to fire at the slightest movement, but fortunately during the first night he encountered nothing more dangerous than a few furry deerlike animals that scampered behind him off the trail.
Morning broke across the jungle in a sudden burst of sunlight. The air was clear and surprisingly cool, and Tom felt that he could make the Sinclair plantation by nightfall if he continued pushing full speed ahead.
He stopped once for a quick meal of the last of the synthetics that he had stuffed in his pocket from his shoulder pack, and then continued in a steady, ground-eating pace through the jungle. Late in the afternoon he began to recognize signs of recent trail blazing, and once he cut across the path Astro had made. He wondered if the trail was one Astro had cut while he was lost, or previously. He finally decided to go ahead on his own, since he had managed to come this far without the aid of any guide markers.
As the darkening shadows of night began to spread over the jungle the young cadet began to worry. He had been allowed thirty-six hours to make it back to the Polaris, communicate with Commander Walters, and tell him the position of the base, and Tom had to allow time for the Solar Guard fleet to assemble and blast off, so that it would arrive at the base at exactly noon on the next day. He had to reach the Sinclair plantation before nightfall or the fleet would never make it.
Suddenly to his left he heard a noisy crashing of underbrush and the roar of a large beast. Tom hesitated. He could hide; he could fight; or he could break to his right and try to escape. The beast growled menacingly. It had picked up his scent. Tom was sure it was a large beast on the prowl for food, and he decided that he could not waste time hiding, or risk being injured in a battle with the jungle prowler. He quickly broke to his right and raced through the jungle. Behind him, the beast picked up the chase, the ground trembling with its approach. It began to gain on him. Tom was suddenly conscious of having lost his bearings. He might be running away from the clearing!
Still he ran on, legs aching and lungs burning. He charged through the underbrush that threatened any moment to trip him. When he was almost at the point of complete exhaustion, and ready to turn and face the beast behind him, he saw something that renewed his spirit and sent new strength through his body. Ahead through the vines and creepers, the slender nose of the Polaris was outlined against the twilight sky.
Disregarding the beast behind him, he plunged through the last few feet of jungle undergrowth and raced into the clearing around the Sinclair home. Behind him, the beast suddenly stopped growling, and when Tom reached the air lock of the Polaris, he saw that the beast had turned back, reluctant to come out of the protection of the jungle.
Tom pulled the air-lock port open and was about to step inside when he heard a harsh voice coming from the shadow of the port stabilizer.
"Just stop right where you are!"
Tom jerked around. Rex Sinclair stepped out of the shadow, a paralo-ray gun in his hand.
"Mr. Sinclair!" cried Tom, suddenly relieved. "Boy, am I glad to see you!" He jumped to the ground. "Don't you recognize me? Cadet Corbett!"
"Yes, I recognize you," snarled Sinclair. "Get away from that air lock or I'll blast you!"
Tom's face expressed the confusion he felt. "But, Mr. Sinclair, you're making a mistake. I've got to get aboard and warn--" He stopped. "What's the idea of holding a paralo ray on me?"
"You're not warning anybody!" Sinclair waved the gun menacingly. "Now get over to the house and walk slowly with your hands in the air or I'll freeze you solid!"
Stunned by this sudden turn of events, Tom turned away from the air lock. "So you're one of them, too," said Tom. "No wonder we were caught in the jungle. You knew we were looking for the base."
"Never mind that," snapped Sinclair. "Get into the house and make it quick!"
The young cadet walked slowly toward the house. He saw the charred remains of the burned outbuildings and nodded. "So it was all an act, eh? You had your buildings burned to throw us off the track. Small price to pay to remain in the confidence of the Solar Guard."
"Shut up!" growled Sinclair.
"You might be able to shut me up, but it'll take a lot more than a bunch of rabble rousers to shut up the Solar Guard!"
"We'll see," snapped Sinclair.
They reached the house and Tom climbed the steps slowly, hoping the planter would come close enough for a sudden attack, but he was too careful. They moved into the living room and Tom stopped in surprise. George Hill and his wife were tied hand and foot to two straight-backed chairs.
Tom gasped. "George! Mrs. Hill!"
George Hill strained against his bonds and mumbled something through the gag in his mouth, but Tom couldn't understand what he was trying to say. Mrs. Hill just looked at the planter with wide, frightened eyes. The cadet whirled around angrily. "Why, you dirty little space rat!"
Sinclair didn't hesitate. He squeezed the trigger of his paralo-ray gun and Tom stiffened into rigidity.
The planter dropped the ray gun into a chair and leisurely began to tie the hands and feet of the immobilized cadet.
"Since you can hear me, Corbett," said Sinclair, "and since you are powerless to do anything about what I'm about to tell you, I'm going to give you a full explanation. I owe it to you. You've really worked for it."
Unable to move a muscle, Tom nevertheless could hear the planter clearly. He mentally chided himself at his stupidity in allowing himself to be captured so easily.
Sinclair continued, "My original invitation to you and your friends, to use my home as a base for your hunting operations was sincere. I had no idea you were in any way connected with the investigation the Solar Guard was planning to make into the Nationalist movement."
Tom was completely bound now, and the planter stepped back, picked up the ray gun, and flipping on the neutralizer, released the cadet from the effects of the ray charge. Tom shuddered involuntarily, his nerves and muscles quivering as life suddenly flowed into them again. He twisted at the bonds on his wrists, and to his amazement found them slightly loose. He was sure he could work his hands free, but decided to wait for a better opportunity. He glanced at the clock on the wall near by and saw that it was nine in the evening. Only fifteen hours before the Solar Guard must attack!
Sinclair sat down casually in a chair and faced the cadet. George and Mrs. Hill had stopped struggling and were watching their employer.
"Do you know anything about the bomb we found on the Polaris on our trip to Venus?" asked Tom.
"I planned that little surprise myself, Corbett," said Sinclair. "Unfortunately our agents on Earth bungled it."
"It seems to me that was pretty stupid. There would have been another man sent in Major Connel's place, and we were warned that something big was in the wind."
"Ah, quite so, Corbett," said Sinclair. "But the destruction of the Polaris would have caused no end of speculation. There would have been an investigation which would have temporarily removed the spotlight from the Nationalist movement. That would have given us ample time to complete our preparations for the attack."
"Then you knew," said Tom bitterly, "when Major Connel, Roger, Astro, and I left here that we were going to be captured."
"Well, that was one of the details of the final plan. Personally, I hoped that you and your nosy major would meet a more dramatic and permanent end in the jungle."
"What are you going to do with us?" asked Tom, glancing at George and his wife. "And what do Mr. and Mrs. Hill have to do with your scheme?"
"Unfortunately they discovered who I am, and of course had to be taken care of. As to your eventual disposition, I haven't had time to think about that."
"Well, you'd better start thinking," said Tom. "And you'd better do a good job when you attack the Solar Guard. Perhaps you don't know it, Sinclair, but the whole pattern of the Solar Guard is one of defense. We do not invite attack, but are prepared for it. And we have the power to counterattack!"
"When we get through with your Solar Guard, Corbett," sneered Sinclair, "there won't be anything left but smoldering heaps of junk and the dead bodies of stupid men!"
The buzz of a teleceiver suddenly sounded in another part of the house and Sinclair left the room quickly. When he was sure the planter was out of earshot, Tom turned to George and whispered, "I think I can work my hands loose. Where can I find a ray gun?" George began to mumble frantically but Tom couldn't understand him, and the sound of returning footsteps silenced Hill. The planter strode back into the room, hurriedly putting on the green uniform of the Nationalists. "I've just received word of a speed-up in the preparations for our attack," he said. "Soon, Corbett--soon you will see what will happen to the Solar Guard!"
