Classic Audiobook Collection - Let em Breathe Space by Lester del Rey ~ Full Audiobook [scifi]

Episode Date: February 23, 2023

Let em Breathe Space by Lester del Rey audiobook. Genre: scifi On the way to Saturn, the space freighter Wahoo is packed far beyond anything it was built to carry. Dr. Pietro's expedition has crammed nineteen people into a ship designed for a handful, and five months of recycled air, bad food, and constant proximity have turned ordinary irritations into open hostility. Narrated by Paul Tremaine, the journey quickly becomes more than a test of engineering and endurance when small mishaps start to look like sabotage. A poisoned atmosphere and failing hydroponics threaten the crew's most basic lifelines, and a sudden death makes it clear that the danger is not only mechanical. Trapped in a sealed world where every breath is accounted for, Tremaine must cut through rivalries, paranoia, and the crew's fraying nerves to figure out who is turning the mission into a nightmare. Let 'Em Breathe Space! blends classic space adventure with a tightly wound, closed-room mystery, asking how quickly civility collapses when survival depends on the people you can no longer trust. For ad-free listening try our premium subscription Chapters (Approximate) (00:00:00) Chapter 01 (00:23:16) Chapter 02 (00:48:48) Chapter 03 (01:16:02) Chapter 04 (01:41:25) Chapter 05 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Let them breathe space by Lester Del Rey, Chapter 1. Eighteen men and two women in the closed world of a spaceship for five months can only spell tension and trouble. But in this case, the atmosphere was literally poisoned. Five months out from Earth we were halfway to Saturn and three-quarters of the way to murder. At least I was. I was sick of the feuding, the worries, and the pettiness of the unethers. other nineteen aboard, my stomach heaved at the bad food, the eternal smell of people, and the constant sound of nagging and complaints. For ten lead pennies I'd have gotten out into space and tried

walking back to earth. Sometimes I thought of doing it without the pennies. But I knew I wasn't that tough in spite of what I looked. I'd been built to play fullback, and my questionable brunette beauty had been roughed up by the explosion years before, as thoroughly as Doc fighting on all the planets could have done. But sometimes I figured all that meant was that there was more of me to hurt, and that I'd had more experience screaming when the Anodyne ran out. Anyhow, whole wheat pancakes made with sourdough for the night's morning running, was too damned much.

I felt my stomach heave over again, took one whiff of the end. imitation maple syrup, and shove the mess back fast while I got up faster. It was a mistake. Phil Riggs, our scrawny half-pint meteorologist, grinned nastily, and reached for the plate. Smatter, Paul, don't you like your breakfast? It's good for you. Whole wheat contains bran, the staff of life. Man, after that died of bleaked paste. There's one guy like that in every bun.

The cook was mad at us for griping about his coffee, so our group of scientists on this cock-eyed Saturn expedition were getting whole wheat flour as punishment, while Captain Mueller probably sat in his cabin chuckling about it. In our agreement there was a clause that we could go over Mueller's head on such things with a unanimous petition, but Riggs had spiked that. The idiot liked bran in his flour. even for pancakes. Or else he was putting on a good act for the fun of watching the rest of us suffer. You can take your damned whole wheat and stuff it, I started. Then I shrugged and dropped it. There were enough feuds going on aboard the cranky old Wahoo.

Seeing Jenny this morning, Phil? He studied me insolently. She told Doc Napier she had some stuff growing in hydroponics she wanted to look at. You're wasting your time on that babe, boy. Thanks for nothing, I muttered at him, and got out before I really decided on murder. Jenny Sanderson was our expedition biologist. A natural golden blonde, just chin high on me and cute enough to earn her way through a Ph.D. doing modeling. She had a laugh that would melt a brass statue in which she used too much on Doc Napier,

on our chief and even on grumpy old Captain Mueller, but sometimes she used it on me when she wanted something. And I never did have much use for a girl who was the strong independent type where there was a man to do the dirty work, so that was okay. I suppose it was natural, with only two women among eighteen men for months and months, but right then I probably liked Doc Napier less than the captain even. I pulled myself away from the corridor to hydroponics, started for observation, and then went on into the cubbyhole they gave me for a cabin. On the Wahoo, all a man could do was sleep or sit around and think about murder.

Well, I had nobody to blame but myself. I'd asked for the job when I first heard Dr. Pietro had collected funds and priorities for a trip to study Saturn's rings at close hand. and because I'd done some technical work for him on the moon, he figured he might as well take me as any other good all-round mechanic and technician. He hadn't asked me, though, that had been my own stupid idea. Paul Tremein, self-cure expert. I'd picked up a nice phobia against space when the superliner Lorelei Elu cracked up with 400 passengers on my first watch as second engineer.

I'd gotten free and into a suit, but after they rescued me, it had taken two years on the moon before I could get up nerve for the shuttle back to Earth. And after eight years home I should have let well enough alone. If I'd known anything about Pietro's expedition, I'd have wrapped myself in my phobia and loved it. But I didn't know then that he'd done well with priorities and only fair with funds. The best he could afford was the rental of the old Earth-Mars Venus Triangle Freighter. Naturally, when the Waho's crew heard they were slated for what would be at least three years off Earth without fancy bonus rates, they quit. Since nobody else was sign on, Pietro had used his priorities to get an injunction that forced them back aboard.

He'd stuffed extra oxygen, water, food, and fertilizer on top of her regular supplies. then filled her holes with some top-level fuel he'd gotten from a government assist, and set out. And by the time I found out about it, my own contract was iron-bound, and I was stuck. As an astrophysicist, Pietro was probably tops. As a man to run the lunar observatory he was a fine executive. But as a man to head up an expedition into deep space, somebody should have given him back his teething ring.

Not that the Wahoo couldn't make the trip with a new fuel. She'd been one of the early survey ships before they turned her into a freighter. But she was meant for a crew of maybe six on trips of a couple of months. There were no game rooms, no lounges, no bar or library. Nothing but what had to be. The only thing left for most of us aboard was to be. to develop our hatreds of the petty faults of the others. Even with a homogenous and willing crew,

it was a perfect setup for cabin fever, and we were as heterogeneous as they come. Naturally, the crew hated the science boys, after being impressed into duty, but also took it out on the officers. The officers felt the same about both other groups. And the scientists hated the officers and crew for all the inconveniences of the old Wahoo.

Me? I was in no man's land, technically in the science group, but without a pure science degree. I had an officer's feeling left over from graduating as an engineer on the ships, and I looked like a crewman. It cured my phobia, all right.

After the first month out, I was too disgusted to go into a fear funk, but I found out it didn't help a bit to like space again, and no, I'd stay washed up as a spaceman. We'd been jinxed from the start. Two months out the whole crew of scientists came down with something Doc Napier finally diagnosed as food poisoning. Maybe he was right, since our group ate in our own mess hall,

and the crew and officers, who didn't eat with us, didn't get it. Our astronomer Bill Sanderson almost died. I'd been lucky, but then I never did react to things much. There were a lot of other small troubles, but the next major trick had been fumes from the nuclear generators getting up into our quarters. It was always our group that had the trouble. If Eve Nolan hadn't been puttering with some of her trick film at the time,

she and Walt Harris had the so-called night shift, and seen them blacken, we'd have been dead before they discovered it. And it took us two weeks of bunking with the sullen crew and decontamination before we could pick up life again. Engineer Wilcox had been decent about helping with it, blaming himself. But it had been a mess. Naturally, there were dark hints that someone was trying to get us. But I couldn't see any crewman wiping us out just to return to Earth, where our contract, with its completion clause, would mean he wouldn't have a dime coming to him. Anyhow, the way things were going, we'd all go berserk before we reached Saturn.

The lunch gong sounded, but I let it ring. Bullard would be serving us whole wheat biscuits and soup made out of beans he let's soak until they turn sour. I couldn't take any more of that junk the way I felt then. I heard some of the men going down the corridor, followed by a confused rumble of voices. Then somebody let out a yell. Hey, Rube! That meant something. The old yell spacemen had picked up from corny people to rally their kind around against the foe.

And I had a good idea of who was the foe. I heard the yell bounce down the passage again and the slam of answering feet. Then the gravity feel went off, or rather was cut off. We may have missed the boat in getting anti-gravity if there is such a thing, but our artificial gravity is darn near foolproof. It was ten years since I moved in free fall, but space tech had done a good job of training good habits. I got out of my bunk, hit the corridor,

with a handout, bounced, kicked, and dove toward the mess hall without a falter. The crewmen weren't doing so well, but they were coming up the corridor fast enough. I could have wrung Mueller's neck. Normally in case of trouble, cutting gravity is smart. But not here, where the crew already wanted a chance to commit made him, and had more experience than the scientists. Yet surprisingly, when I hit the mess hall ten feet ahead of the decade. hands, most of the scientists were doing all right.

Hell, I should have known Pietro, Sanderson, and a couple others would be used to no gravity. In astronomical work you cut your eye-teeth on that. They were braced around the cook, who huddled back in a corner, while our purser-steward Sam was still singing for help. The fat face of the cook was dead white. Bill Sanderson, looking like a slim blonde ballet dancer and muscle like an appellate, patchy expert, had him in one hand and was stuffing the latest batch of whole wheat biscuits down his throat.

Bill's sister Jenny was giggling excitedly and holding more biscuits. The deck-hands and Grundy, the mate, were almost at the door, and I had just time enough to slam it shut and lock it in their faces. I meant to enjoy seeing the cook taken down without any interruption. Sam let out a final yell, and Bullard broke free, making a mess of it without weight. He was sputtering on bits of the biscuit. Hal Lomax reached out a big hand, stained with the chemicals that had been his life's work, and pushed the cook back.

And suddenly, fat little Bullard switched from quaking fear to a blind rage. The last of the biscuits sailed from his mouth, and he spat at half. You damn highfalutin' black devil. You, you sneering at my cooking. I'm a white man I am. I don't have to work for no black knit. I reached him first, even though Sam started for him then. You can deliver a good blow in free fall if you know how.

His teeth against my knuckles stopped my leap, and the back of his head bounced off the wall. He was unconscious as he drifted by us, moving up. My knuckle stung, but it had been worth it. Anyhow, Jenny's look more than paid for the trouble. The door shattered then, and the big hulk of mate Grundy tumbled in, with the two duck-hands and the pair from the engine-room behind him. Sam let out a yell that sounded like a protest,

and they headed for us just as gravity came on. I pull myself off the floor and out from under Bullard to see the stout, oldish figure of Captain Mueller standing in the doorway, with engineer Wilcox slouched easily beside him, looking like the typical natty space officer you see on television. Both held gas guns. All right, break it up, Mueller ordered. You men, get back to your work. And you, Dr. Pietro, my contract calls for me to deliver you to Saturn's moon.

But it doesn't forbid me to haul you the rest of the way in Arons. I won't have this aboard my ship." Pietro nodded, his little gray goate bobbing, his lean body coming upright smoothly. Quite right, Captain. Nor does it forbid me to let you and your men spend the sixteen months on the moon, where I command, in Arons. Why don't you ask Sam what happened before you make a complete fool of yourself, Captain Mueller? Sam gulped and looked at the crew, but apparently Peter.

Pietro was right. The little guy had been completely disgusted by Bullard. He shrugged apologetically. Bullard insulted Dr. Lomax, sir. I yelled for someone to help me get him out of here, and I guess everybody got mixed up when gravity went off, and Bullard cracked his head on the floor. Just a misunderstanding, sir. Muler stood there, glowering at the cut on my knuckles, and I could feel him aching for a good excuse to make his threat a reality. But finally he grunted and swung on his heel, ordering the crew with him. Grundy threw us a final grimace and skulked off behind him. Finally there was only Wilcox, who grinned, shrugged, and shut the door quietly behind him.

And we were left with the mess freefall had made of the place. I spotted Jenny heading across the room, carefully not seeing the fatuous glances Pietro was throwing her way, and I swung in behind. She nodded back at me, but headed straight for Lomax, with an odd look on her face. When she reached him, her voice was low and businesslike. Hal, what did those samples of Hendricks's show up? Hendricks was the farmer, in charge of the hydroponics, that turned the carbon dioxide we breathed out back to oxygen, and also gave us a bit of fresh vegetables now and then.

Technically he was a crewman, just as I was a scientist, but actually he felt more like one of us. Lomax looked surprised. What samples, Jenny? I haven't seen Hendricks for two weeks. You—she stopped, bit her lip and frowned. She swung on me. Paul, have you seen him? I shook my head.

Not since last night. He was asking Eve and Walt to wake him up early then. That's funny. He was worried about the plants yesterday and wanted Hal to test the water and chemical fertilizer. I looked for him this morning, and when he didn't show up, I thought he was with you, Hal. And the plants are dying. All of them? The half-smile wiped off Hal's face.

and I could feel my stomach hit my insteps. When anything happens to the plants in the ship, it isn't funny. She shook her head. No, about a quarter of them. I was coming for help when the fight started. They're all bleached out, and it looks like, like, chromosome. That really hit me. They developed the stuff to fight off fungus on Venus,

where one part and a billion did the trick. But it was tricky stuff. One part in ten million would destroy the chlorophyll in plants in about twenty hours, or the hemoglobin in blood in about fifteen minutes. It was practically a universal poison. He started for the door, then stopped. He glanced around the room, turned back to me, and suddenly let out a healthy bellow of seeming amusement.

Ginny's laugh was right in harmony. I caught the drift and tried to look as if we were up to some monkey business as we slipped out of the room. Nobody seemed suspicious. Then we made a dash for hydroponics toward the rear of the ship. We scrambled into the big chamber together and stopped. Everything looked normal among the rows of plant-filled tanks, pipes, and equipment. Ginny let us down one of the rows and around a bin. The plants in the rear quarter weren't sick.

They were dead. They were bleached to a pale yellow like boiled grass and limp. Nothing would save them now. I'm a biologist, not a botanist, Jenny began. Hal grunted sickly. Yeah, and I'm not a life hormone expert, but there's one test we can try. He picked up a pair of rubber gloves from a rack and pulled off some wilting stalks. From one of the healthy tanks he took green leaves.

He mashed the two kinds together on the edge of a bench and watched. If it's chromosome, they've developed an enzyme by now that should eat the color out of those others. In about ten seconds, I noticed the change. The green began to bleach before my eyes. Jenny made a sick sound in her throat and stared at the rows of healthy plants. I checked the valves, and this sick section, is isolated. But if chromosome got into the chemicals.

Better get your spectro-analyser out, Hal, while I get Captain Mueller. Paul be a dear and find Hendricks, will you? I shook my head and went further down the rows. No need, Jenny, I called back. I pointed to the shoe I'd seen sticking out from the edge of one of the tanks. There was a leg attached. I reached for it. But Lomax shove me back.

Don't. The enzymes and the corpse are worse than the poison, Paul. Hands off. He reached down with the gloves and heaved. It was Hendricks all right. A corpse with a face and hands as white as human flesh could ever get. Even the lips were bleached out. Ginny moaned.

The fool! The stupid fool! He knew it was dangerous without gloves. He suspected chromosome, even though none's supposed to be on board, and I warned him— "'Not against this you didn't,' I told her. I dropped to my knees and took another pair of gloves. Hendricks had rolled under my grasp. The skull was smashed over the left eye as if someone had taken a side-swipe at Hendricks with a hammer.

No fall had produced that. You should have warned him about his friends. Must have been killed, then dumped in here. Murder! Hal bit the word out and disgust. You're right, Paul. Not too stupid a way to dispose of the body either. In another couple of hours he'd have started dissolving in that stuff,

and we'd never have guessed it was murder. That meant this poisoning of the plants wasn't an accident. Somebody poisoned the water, then got worried when there wasn't a report. poured on the plants. Must have been someone who thought it worked faster on plants than it does. So he came to investigate, and Hendricks caught him fooling around, so he got killed. But who?

Ginny asked. I shrugged sickly. Somebody crazy enough or desperate enough to turn back that he'll risk our air and commit murder. You'd better go after the captain while Hal gets his test equipment. I'll keep watch here. It didn't feel good in hydroponics after they left. I looked at those dead plants, trying to figure whether there were enough left to keep us going.

I studied Hendricks' body, trying to tell myself the murderer had no reason to come back and try to get me. I reached for a cigarette, and then put the pack back. The air felt almost as close as the back of my neck felt tense and unprotected, and telling myself it was all imagination didn't help, not with what was in that chamber to keep me company. End of Chapter 1 Chapter 2 of Let Em Breathe Space by Lester Del Rey.

This Libri Vox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 2 Mueller's face was like an iceberg when he came down, but only after he saw Hendricks. Before then I'd caught the fat moon-calf expression on his face, and I'd heard Jenny giggling. Damn it! They'd taken enough time. Hal was already back fussing over things with the hunk of tin and lenses he treated like a newborn baby. Doc Napier came in behind them, but separately.

I saw him glance at them and look sick. Then both Mueller and Napier began concentrating on business. Napier bent his nervous, bony figure over the corpse and stood up almost at once. Murder all right. So I guess, Dr. Napier, Mueller growled heavily at him. Wrap him up and put him between holes to freeze. We'll bury him when we land. Tremaine, give me a hand with it, will you?

I'm not a laborer, Captain Mueller, Napier protested. I started to tell him where he could get off, too. But Jenny shook her head at us. Please. Can't you see Captain Mueller is trying to keep too many from knowing about this? I should think you'd be glad to help. Please? Put that way, I guess it made sense.

We found some rubber sheeting in one of the lockers and began wrapping Hendricks in it. It wasn't pleasant since he was beginning to soften up from the enzymes heat absorbed. How about going ahead to make me? make sure no one sees us, I suggested to Ginny. Mueller opened his mouth, but Ginny gave one of her quick little laughs and opened the door for us. Doc looked relieved. I guess he was trying to kid himself. Personally, I wasn't a fool. I was just hooked. I knew perfectly well she was busy playing us off against one another, and probably having a good time balancing the books. But hell, that's

the way life runs. Get Pietro up here, Mueller fired after us. She laughed again and nodded. She went with us until we got to the tween-holes, lock, then went off after the chief. She was back with him just as we finished stuffing Hendricks through and sealing up again. Mueller grunted at us when we got back, then turned to Lomax again. The big chemist didn't look happy. He spread his hands toward us and hunched his shoulders.

A fifty times overdose of chromosome in those tanks. Fortunately, none in the others. And I can't find a trace of it in the fertilizer chemicals or anywhere else. Somebody deliberately put it into those tanks. Why, Pietro asked. We'd filled him in with the rough details, but it still made no sense to him. "'Suppose you tell me, Dr. Pietro,' Mueller suggested. "'Cromoone is the poison most people never heard of.

"'One of the new scientific nuisances.' Pietro straightened and his goatee bristled. "'If you're hinting—I am not hinting, Dr. Pietro. "'I am telling you that I'm confining your group to their quarters "'until we can clean up this mess, "'distill the water that's contaminated and replant. "'After that, if an investigation, shows nothing I may take your personal bond for the conduct of your people.

Right now, I'm protecting my ship. But Captain, Jenny, began. Mueller managed to smile at her. Oh, not you, of course, Jenny. I'll need you here. With Hendricks gone, you're the closest thing we have to a former now. Captain Mueller, Pietro said sharply. Captain, in the words of the historical novelists,

drop dead. Dr. Sanderson, I forbid you to leave your quarters as long as anyone else is confined to his. I have ample authority for that. Under emergency powers, Mueller spluttered over it, and Pietro jumped in again before he could finish. Precisely, Captain, under emergency situations, when passengers aboard a commercial vessel find indications of total irresponsibility or incipient insanity on the part, of the ship's officer. They are considered correct and assuming command for the time needed to protect themselves. We were poisoned by food prepared in your kitchen and were nearly killed by radioactivity

through a leak in the engine room, and no investigation was made. We are now confronted with another situation aimed against our welfare, as the others were wholly aimed at us. And you choose to conduct an investigation against our group only. My only conclusion is that you wish to confine us to quarters so we cannot find your motives for this last outrage. Paul, will you kindly relieve the captain of his position? They were both half right and mostly wrong. Until it was proved that our group was guilty, Mueller couldn't issue an order that was

obviously discriminatory and against our personal safety in case there was an attack directed on us. He'd be mustered out of space and into the lunar cells for that. But on the other hand, the safety for passengers clause Pietro was citing, applied only in the case of overt, direct, and physical danger by an officer to normal passengers. He might be able to weasel it through a court, or he might be found guilty of mutiny. It left me in a pretty position. Jenny fluttered around.

Now, now, she began. I cut her off. Shut up, Jenny, and you two damned fools cool down. Damn it, we've got an emergency here, all right. We may not have airplants enough to live on. Pietro, we can't run this ship, and neither can Mueller get through what's obviously a mess that may call for all our help by confound.

finding us. Why don't you two go off and fight it out in person?" Surprisingly Pietro laughed. I'm afraid I'd put up a poor showing against the Captain Paul. My apologies, Captain Mueller. Mueller hesitated, but finally took Pietro's hand and dropped the issue. "'We've got enough plants,' he said, changing the subject. We'll have to cut out all smoking and other waste of air, and I'll need Jenny to work the hydroponics,

any help she requires. We've got to get more seeds planted and fast. Better keep word of this to ourselves. We— A shriek came from Jenny then. She'd been busy at one of the lockers in the chamber. Now she began ripping others open and pawing through things inside rubber gloves. Captain Mueller!

The seeds! The seeds! Hal took one look, and his face turned gray. "'chromoone,' he reported. "'Every bag of seed has been filled with a solution of chromosome. "'They're worthless.' "'How long before the plants here will seed?' "'Muller asked sharply.

"'Three months,' Jenny answered. "'Captain Mueller, what are we going to do?' The dower face settled into grim determination. "'The only sensible thing. "'Take care of these plants, conserve the air, squeeze by until we can recede. And, Dr. Pietro, with your permission, we'll turn about for earth at once. We can't go on like this. To proceed would be to endanger the life of every man aboard. Please, Danton, Ginny put her hand on Pietro's arm. I know what all this means to you,

but Pietro shook her off. It means the captain's trying to get out of the expedition again. It's five months back to Earth, more by the time we kill Velocity. It's the same to Saturn. And either way, in five months, we've got this fixed up, or we're helpless. Permission to return refused, Captain Mueller. Then, if you'll be so good as to return to your quarters, Mueller said, holding himself back with an effort that turned his face red, we'll start cleaning this up. And not a word of this. Napier, Lomax, Pietro, and I went back to the scientist's quarters, leaving Mueller and

Ginny conferring busily. That was at fifteen o'clock. At sixteen o'clock, Pietro issued orders against smoking. Dinner was at eighteen o'clock. We sat down in silence. I reached from my plate without looking, and suddenly little filled. Riggs was on his feet raving. "' Whole wheat!

Nothing but whole wheat bread! I'm sick of it. Sick, I won't!' "'Sit down,' I told him. I'd bitten into one of the rolls on the table. It was white bread, and it was the best the cook had managed so far. There was corn instead of baked beans, and he'd done a fair job of making a meatloaf. Stop making a fool of yourself, Phil.

He slumped back, staring at the white bun into which he'd bitten. Sorry, sorry. It's this air, so stuffy. I can't breathe. I can't see right. Pietro and I exchanged lances, but I guess we weren't surprised. Among intelligent people, on a ship of that size, secrets wouldn't keep. They'd all put bits together and got part of the answer.

Pietro shrugged, and half stood up to make an announcement. "'Beg pardon, sirs.' We jerked our heads around to see Bullard standing in the doorway. He was scared stiff, and his words got stuck in his throat. Then he found his voice again. I heard as how Hendricks went crazy and poisoned the plants, and went and killed himself, and we'll all die if we don't find some trick. And what I want to know, please, sirs, is—or what you're saying right?

and you know all kinds of tricks and can you save us because I can't go on like this not knowing and hearing them talking outside the gallery and none of them telling me. Lomax cut into his flood of words. You'll live, Bullard. Farmer Hendricks did get killed in an accident to some of the plants, but we've still got air enough. Captain Mueller has asked the help of a few of us, but it's only a temporary emergency. Bullard stared at him, and slowly some of the fear left his face, though not all of it. He turned and left with a curt bow of his head, while Pietro added a few details that

weren't exactly lies to Lomax's hasty cover-up, along with a grateful glance at the chemist. It seemed to work for the time being, at least enough for Riggs to begin making nasty remarks about cooked paste. Then the tension began to build again. I don't think any of the crew talked to any of our group, and yet there seemed to be a chain of rumor that exchanged bits of information. Only the crew could have seen the dead plants being carried down to our refuge breakdown plant, and the fact it was chromosome poisoning must have been deduced from a description by some of our group.

At any rate, both groups do all about it. it and a little bit more as was usual with rumors by the second day muller should have made the news official but he only issued an announcement that the danger was over when Peters our radio man navigator found Sam and Phil Rigg smoking and dressed them down it didn't make Mueller's words seem too convincing I guessed that Mueller had other things on his mind at least he wasn't in his cabin much and I didn't see Ginny for two whole days. My nerves were as jumpy as those of the rest.

It isn't too bad, cutting out smoking. A man can stand imagining the air is getting stale. But when every unconscious gesture towards cigarettes that aren't there, remind him of the air, and when every imagined stale stench makes him want a cigarette to relax, it gets a little rough. Maybe that's why I was in a completely. completely rotten mood when I finally did spot Ginny going down the passageway, with the tight

overall she was wearing, emphasizing every motion of her hips. I grabbed her and swung her around. "'Hi, stranger? Got time for a word?' She sort of brushed my hand off her arm, but didn't seem to mind it. "'Why, I guess so, Paul.' A little time. Captain Mueller is watching the ponics.

"'Good,' I said, trying to. to forget Mueller. Let's make it a little more private than this, though. Come on in." She lifted an eyebrow at the open door of my cabin, made with a little giggle, and stepped inside. I followed her and kicked the door shut. She reached for it, but I had my back against it. Paul, she tried to get around me, but I wasn't having any.

I pushed her back on to the only seat in the room, which was the bunk. She got up like a spring uncoiling. Paul Tremaine, you open that door. You know better than that. Paul, please. What makes me any different than the others? You've spent plenty of time in Mueller's cabin, and you've been in Pietro's often enough. Probably Doc Napier's too.

Her eyes hardened, but she decided to try the patient and reason with the child line. That is different. Captain Mueller and I have a great deal of business to work out. Sure, and he looks great in lipstick. It was a shot in the dark, but it went home. I wished I'd kept my darn mouth shut. Before I'd been suspecting it. Now I knew.

She turned pink and tried to slap me, which won't work when the girl is sitting on a bunk, and I'm on my feet. You mind your own business. I'm doing that. Generations should stick together, and he's old and enough to be your father." She leaned back and studied me, then she smiled slowly, and something about it made me sick inside.

I like older men, Paul. They make people my own age seem so callow, so unfinished. It's so comforting to have mature people around. I always did have an electra complex." The Greeks had plenty of names for a kid, I told her. Don't get me wrong. If you want to be a slut, that's your own business. But when you pull the innocent act on me and then fall back to Southmore psychology,

this time she stood up before she slept. Before her hand stung my face, I was beginning to regret what I'd said. Afterwards, I didn't give a damn. I picked her up off the floor, slapped her soundly on the rump, pulled her tight against me and kissed her. She tried scratching my face, then went passive and wound up with one arm around my neck, and the other in the hair at the back of my head. When I finally put her down, she sank back onto the bunk, breathing heavily.

Why, Paul! And she reached out her arms as I came down to meet them. For a second the whirl looked pretty good. Then a man's hoarse scream cut through it all, with the sound of heavy steps in panic flight. I jerked up. Ginny hung on. Paul, Paul.

But there was the smell of death in the air suddenly. I broke free and was out into the corridor. The noise seemed to come from the shaft that led to the engine room and I jumped for it while I heard door slam. This time there was a commotion like a wet sack being tossed around in a pentagon steel barrel. and another horse screamed a cut off in the middle to a gargling sound. I reached the shaft and started down the center rail, not bothering with the hand-grips.

I could hear something rustle below, followed by silence, but I couldn't see a thing. The lights had been cut. I could feel things poking into my back before I landed. I always get the creeps when there's death around, and that last sound had been just that. somebody's last sound. I knew somebody was going to kill me before I could find the switch. Then I stumbled over something and my hair stood on end. I guess my own yell was pretty horrible.

It scared me worse than I was already. But my fingers found the switch somehow and the light flashed on. Sam lay on the floor with blood still running from a wide gash across his throat. A big kitchen knife was still stuck in one end of the horrible wound, and one of his fingers was half-slice off where the blade of a switch-blade shiv had failed on him and snapped back. Something sounded above me and I jerked back. But it was Captain Mueller coming down the rail. The man had obviously taken it all in on the way down.

He jerked the switch-blade out of Sam's death grasp and looked at the point of the knife. There was blood further back from the cut finger, but none on the point. Damn, Mueller tossed it down and disgust. If he'd scratched the other man, we'd have had a chance to find who it was. Tremaine, have you got an alibi? I was with Jenny, I told him, and watched his eyes begin to hate me. But he nodded. We picked Sam up together and lugged his body up to the top of the shaft,

where the crowd had collected. Pietro, Peters, the cook, Grundy, and Lomax were there. Beyond them, the dark-haired, almost masculine head of Eve Nolan showed, her eyes studying the body of Sam as if it were a negative in her darkroom. As usual, Bill Sanderson was as close to her as he could get. But there was no sign now of Jenny. I glanced up the corridor but saw only Wilcox and Philips, Riggs, with Walt Harris trailing them, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

Mueller moved directly to Pietro. Six left in my crew now, Dr. Pietro. First Hendricks, now Sam. Can you still say that the attack is on your crew when mine keep being killed? This time, sir, I demand— Give them hell, Captain. Ape-man Grundy broke in. Cut the fancy stuff and let's get the damn.

and murdering rats. Mueller's eyes quartered him, spitted his carcass, and began turning him slowly over a bed of coals. Mr. Grundy, I am master of the Wahoo. I fail to remember asking for your piratical advice. Dr. Pietro, I trust you will have no objections

if I ask Mr. Peters to investigate your section and group thoroughly. Not at all, Captain Mueller, Piotr answered. I trust Peters, and I feel sure you'll permit me to delegate Mr. Tremaine to inspect the remainder of the ship? Mueller nodded currently. Certainly.

Until the madman is found, we are all in danger. And unless he is found, I insist I must protect my crew and my ship by turning back to earth. I cannot permit that, sir. Your permission for that was not requested, Dr. Pietro. Yes, Bullard? The cook had been swarming and muttering to himself for minutes. Now he darted out toward Grundy and his finger pointed at Lomax.

He'd done it. I seen him. Kill the only friend I had he did. Then went by my galley end, and he grabbed my big knife, that one there, and he killed Sam. You're sure it was Lomax? Muehler asked sharply. Sure, I'm sure. Sam, he was acting queer lately. He was worried.

Told me he saw something, and he was going to know for sure. He borrowed my switchblade knife that my wife gave me, and he went out looking for something. Then I heard him a-running, and I looked up, and there was this guy chasing him. Sure, I seen him with my own eyes. Eve Nolan chuckled, throatily, throwing her mannish-cut hair back from her face. She was almost pretty with an expression on her countenance, even if it was amused. disgust. Captain Mueller, that's a nice story.

But Dr. Lomax was with me in my dark room, working on some spectro-analysis slides. Bill Sanderson and Phil Riggs were waiting outside for us, and Mr. Peters saw us come out together when we all ran down here. Peters nodded. Mueller stared at us for a second, and the hunting lust died out of his eyes, leaving them blank and cold. He turned to Bullard. Bullard, an explanation might make me reduce your punishment.

If you have anything to say, say it now. The cook was gibbering and actually drooling with fear. He shook and sweat popped out all over him. My knife. I had to say something. They stole my knife. They wanted it to look like I'd done it. God, Captain, you'd have done the same.

Can't punish a man for trying to save his life. I'm a good man I am. Can't whip a good man. Can't give him twenty-five lashes with the wire, Mr. Grundy. Muehler said flatly. Pietro let out a shriek on top of the cooks. He started forward, but I caught him. Captain Mueller's right, I told him.

On a spaceship the full crew is needed. The brig is useless, so the space-enabling charter recognizes flogging. Something is needed to maintain discipline. Pietro dropped back reluctantly, but Lomax faced the captain. The man is a coward, hardly responsible, Captain Mueller. I'm the wounded party in this case, but it seems to me that hysteria isn't the same thing as maliciousness. Suppose I ask for clemency? Thank you, Dr. Lomax.

Mueller said, and actually look relieved. Make it ten lashes, Mr. Grundy. Apparently no real harm has been done, and he will not testify in the future. Grundy began dragging, Bullard out, muttering about damn fool ground-lobbers always sticking their noses in. The cook caught at Lomax's hand on the way, literally slobbering over it. Lomax rubbed his palm across his thigh, looking embarrassed. Mueller turned back to us. Very well.

Mr. Peter will begin investigating the expedition staff and quarter. Mr. Tremaine will have free run over the rest of the ship. And if the murderer is not turned up in 48 hours, we head back to Earth. Pietro started to protest again, but another scream ripped down the corridor, jerking us all around. It was Jenny running toward us. She was breathing hoarsely as she nearly crashed into Dr. Pietro. Her face was white and sick, and she had to try to try. twice before she could speak.

The plants! She gasped out. Poison! They're dying! End of chapter two. Chapter 3 of Let Em Breathe Space by Lester Del Rey. This Librivox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 3.

It was chromosome again. Mueller had kept most of the gang from coming back to hydroponics, but he, Jenny, Pietro, Wilcox, and myself were enough to fill the room with a smell of sick fear. Now, less than half of the original space was filled with healthy plants. Some of the tanks held plants already dead, and others were dying as we watched. Once beyond a certain stage, the stuff acted almost instantly. For hours there was only a slight indication of something wrong, and then suddenly there were the dead bleached plant.

Wilcox was the first to speak. He still looked like some Natalie-dressed hero of a space cereal, but his first words were ones that could never have gone out on a public broadcast. Then he shrugged. They must have been poisoned while we were all huddled over Sam's body. Who wasn't with us? Nonsense, Pietro denied. This was done at least 18 hours ago, maybe more.

We'd have to find who was around. then. Twenty hours are as little as twelve, Jenny amended. It depends on the amount of the dosage to some extent, and—she almost managed to blush. Well, there have been a lot of people around. I can't even remember. Mr. Grundy and one of the men, Mr. Wilcox, Dr. Napier, oh, I don't know." Muehler shook his head in heavy agreement. Naturally, we have a lot of work to do here. After word got around about Hendricks, we didn't try to conceal much. It might have happened when someone else was watching, too. The important thing, gentlemen, is that now we don't have reserve enough to carry us to Saturn.

The plants remaining can't handle the air for all of us, and while we ship some reserve oxygen, he let it die in a distasteful shrug. At least this settles one thing. We have no chance. choice now but to return to Earth. Captain Mueller. Pietro bristled quickly. That's getting to be a monomania with you.

I agree. We are in grave danger. I don't relish the prospect of dying any more than you do, perhaps less in view of certain peculiarities. But it's now further back to Earth than it is to Saturn. And before we can reach either, we'll either have new plants or we'll be dead. "'Some of us will be dead, Dr. Pietro,' Wilcox amended it. "'There are enough plants left to keep some of us breathing indefinitely.'

Pietro nodded. "'And I suppose, in our captain's mind, that means the personnel of the ship can survive. Captain Mueller, I must regard your constant attempt to return to Earth as highly suspicious in view of this recurring sabotage of the expedition. someone here is apparently either a complete madman or so determined to get back that he'll resort to anything to accomplish his end, and you have been harping on returning over and over again. Mueller bristled, and his big heavy fist tightened. Then he drew himself up to his full dumpy height.

Dr. Pietro, he said stiffly, I am as responsible to my duties as any man here, and my duties involve protecting the life of every man and woman on board. If you wish to return, I shall be most happy to submit this to a formal board of inquiry. I—' Just a minute, I told them. You two are forgetting that we've got a problem here. Damn it, I'm sick of this fighting among ourselves. We're a bunch of men in a jam, not two camps at war now. I can't see any reason why Captain Mueller would want to return that badly."

Mueller nodded slightly. "'Thank you, Mr. Tremaine. However, for the record, and to save you trouble investigating there is a good reason. My company is now building a super-aliner. If I were to return within the next six months, they'd promote me to captain of that ship. A considerable promotion, too.' For a moment, his honesty seemed to soften. Pietro. The scientist mumbled some sort of apology and turned to the plants.

But it bothered me. If Mueller had pulled something, the smartest thing he could have done would be to have said just what he did. Besides, knowing that Pietro's injunction had robbed him of a chance like that was enough to wrinkle in any man's guts and make him work up something pretty close to insanity. I marked it down in my mental files for the investigation I was supposed to make, but let it go for the moment. Mueller stood for a minute longer, thinking darkly about the whole situation. Then he moved towards the entrance to hydroponics and pulled out the ship speaker-mic. All hands and passengers will assemble in hydroponics within five minutes, he announced.

He swung toward Pietro. With your permission, doctor, he said caustically. The company assembled later looking as sick as the plants. This time Mueller was hiding nothing. He outlined the situation fully. Maybe he shaded it a bit to throw suspicion on our group, but in no way we could pin down. Finally, he stated flatly that the situation meant almost certain death

for at least some of those aboard. From now on there'll be a watch kept. This is close to everyone except myself, Dr. Piotr, Mr. Peters, and Dr. Jenny Sanderson. At least one of us will be here at all times, equipped with gas guns. Anyone else is to be killed on setting foot inside this door. He swung his eyes over the group. Any objections? Grundy stirred uncomfortably. I don't go for them science guys up here. It takes a crazy man to do a thing like this, and everybody knows.

Steve Nolan laughed roughly. Everybody knows you've been swearing you won't go the whole way, Grundy. These jungle tactics should be right up your alley. That's enough, Mueller cut through the beginnings of the hassle. I trust those I appointed, at least more than I do the rest of you. The question now is whether to return to Earth at once or to go on to Saturn. We can't radio for help for months yet. We're not equipped with sharp beams.

We're low-powered and we're off the lanes where Earth's pickups hunt. Dr. Pietro wants to go on, since we can't get back within our period of safety. I favor returning, since there is no proof that this danger will end with this outrage. We've agreed to let the result of a vote determinate. Wilcox stuck up a casual hand, and Mueller nodded to him. He grinned amiably at all of us. There's a third possibility, Captain. We can reach Jupiter in about three months if we turn now.

It's offside, but closer than anything else. From there, on a fast liner, we can be back on Earth in another ten days. Mueller calculated while Peters came up to discuss it. Then he nodded. Saturn or Jupiter, then. I'm not voting, of course. Bullard is disqualified to vote by previous acts. He drew a low moan from the sick figure of Bullard for that, but no protest.

Then he nodded. All those in favor of Jupiter, your right hands, please. I counted them, wondering why my own hand was still down. It made some sort of sense to turn aside now. But none of our group was voting, and all the others had their hands up except for Dr. Napier. Seven, Mueller announced. Those in favor of Saturn? Again, Napier didn't vote.

I hesitated, then put up my hand. It was crazy, and Pietro was a fool to insist. But I knew that he'd never get another chance if this failed, and eight, Mulder counted. He sighed, then straightened. Very well, we go on. Dr. Pietro, you will have my full support from now on. In return, I'll expect every bit of help in meeting this emergency. Mr. Tremaine was correct.

We cannot remain camps at war. Pietro's goatee bobbed quickly, and his hand went out. But while most of the scientists were nodding with him, I caught the dark scowl of Grundy and heard the mutters from the deck hands and the engine men. If Mueller could get them to cooperate, he was a genius. Pietro faced us, and his face was serious again. We can hasten the seating of the panes,

plants a little, I think, by temperature and light and dark cycle manipulations. Unfortunately, these aren't sea algae plants, are we being comparatively little trouble? That was my fault in not converting. We can, however, step up their efficiency a bit, and I'm sure we can find some way to remove the carbon dioxide from the air. How about oxygen to breathe? Peter asked. That's the problem, Pietro admitted. I was wondering about electrolyzing water.

Wilcox bobbed up quickly. Can you do it on AC current? Lomax shook his head. It takes DC. Then that's out. We run on 220 AC. And while I can rectify a few watts, it wouldn't be enough to help. No welders, except monotomic hydrogen torches even.

Pietro looks sicker than before. He'd obviously been counting on that. But he turned to Bullard. How about seeds? We had a crop of tomatoes a month ago, and from the few I had, they're all seed. Or any left? Bullard rocked from side to side, moaning. Oh, dead! We're all going to be dead.

I told him, I did. You take me out there. I'll never get back. I'm a good man I am. I wasn't never meant to die way out here. I—I—he gulped. And suddenly screamed. He went through the door at an awkward shuffle heading for his galley. Mueller shook his head and turned toward me.

Check up, will you, Mr. Tremaine? And I suggest that you and Mr. Peters start your investigation at once. I understand that chromosome would require so little hiding space that there's no use searching for it. But if you can find any evidence, report it at once. Peters and I left. I found the galley empty. Apparently Bullard had gone to lie on his stomach in his bunk and nurse his terror. I found the freezer compartments, though, and the tomatoes.

There must have been a bushel of them. But Bullard had followed his own peculiar tastes. From the food he served he couldn't stand fresh vegetables, and he cooked the tomatoes down thoroughly and run them through the dehydrator before packing them away. It was a cheerful supper that one. Bullard had half-recovered, and his fear was driving him to try to be nice to us. The selection was good, beyond the inevitable baked beans, but he wasn't exactly a chef at best, and his best was far behind him.

Mueller had brought Wilcox, Napier, and Peters down to our mess with himself to consolidate forces, and it seemed that he was serious about cooperating, but it was a little late for that. Overhead, the fans had been stepped up to counteract the effect of staleness our minds supplied. But the whine of the motors kept reminding us our days were counted. Only Jenny was normal. She sat between Mueller and Pietro, where she could watch my face and that of Napier, and even her giggles had a forced sound. There were all kinds of things we could do, in theory.

But we didn't have that kind of equipment. The plain fact was that the plants were going to lose the battle against our lungs. The carbon dioxide would increase, speeding up our breathing and making us all seem to suffocate. The oxygen would grow thinner and thinner once our supplies of bottle gas ran out, and eventually the air wouldn't support life. It's sticky and hot, Ginny complained suddenly. I stepped up. the humidity and temperature controls, I told her. She nodded in quick comprehension, but I went on

for Mueller's benefit, trying to give the plants the best growing atmosphere. We'll feel just as hot and sticky when the carbon dioxide goes up anyhow. It must already be up, Wilcox said. My two canaries are breathing faster. Canaries, Mueller said. He frowned, though he must have known of them. It was traditional to keep them in the engine room, though the reason behind it had long since been lost. Better kill them, Mr. Wilcox. Wilcox jerked and his face paled a bit. Then he nodded, yes, sir. That was when I got scared.

The idea that two birds' breathing could hurt our chances put things on a little too vivid a basis. Only Lomax seemed unaffected. He shoved back now and he shoved back now. stood up. Some tests I have to make, Captain. I have an idea that might turn up the killer among us. I had an idea he was bluffing, but I kept my mouth shut. A bluff was as good as anything else, it seemed. At least it was better than anything I seemed able to do. I prowled over the ship, sometimes meeting Peters doing the same, but I couldn't find a bit of evidence. The crewmen sat watching with hating eyes, and probably,

Probably the rest of the board hated and feared us just as much. It wasn't hard to imagine the man who was behind it all, deciding to wipe one of us out. My neck got a permanent crimp from keeping one eye behind me, but there wasn't a shred of evidence I could find. In two more days we began to notice the stuffiness more. My breathing went up enough to notice. Somehow I couldn't get a full breath. the third night, I woke up in the middle of my sleep with the feeling something was sitting

on my chest. But since I had taken to sleeping with the light on, I saw that it was just the stuffiness that was bothering me. Maybe most of it has been psychological up until then, but that was the real thing. The nice part of it was that it wouldn't be sudden. We'd have days to get closer and closer to death, and days for each one to realize a little Lomore that every man who wasn't breathing would make it that much easier for the rest of us. I caught myself thinking of it when I saw Bullard or Grundy.

Then trouble struck again. I was late getting to the scene this time down by the engine room. Mueller and Bill Sanderson were ahead of me trying to separate Hal Lomax and Grundy, and not doing so well. Lomax brought up a haymaker as I arrived and started to shout something, but Grundy was out of Mueller's grasp and up swinging a wrench. It connected with a dull thud, and Lomax hit the floor, unconscious. I picked Grundy up by the collar of his jacket, heaved him around and against a wall,

where I could get my hand against his esophagus, and start squeezing. His eyeballs popped, and the wrench dropped from his hands. When I get mad enough to act that way, I usually know I'll regret it later. This time it felt good all the way. But Mueller pushed me aside, waiting until Grundy could breathe again. All right, Mueller said. I hope you've got a good explanation before I decide what to do with you. Grundy's eyes were slitted as if he'd been taking some of the Venus drugs.

But after one long, hungry look at me, he faced the captain. Yes, sir. This guy came down here ahead of me. Didn't think nothing of it, sir, but when he was... When he started fiddling with a panel there, I got suspicious. He pointed to the external control panel for the engine room to be used in case of accidents. With all that's been going on, how'd I know but maybe he was going to dump the fuel? And then I seen he had keys.

I didn't wait, sir. I jumped him, and then you come up. Wilcox came from the background and dropped beside the still figure of Lomax. He opened the man's left hand and pulled out a bunch of keys examining them. "'Engine keys, Captain Mueller. "'Hey, it's my set. "'He must have lifted them from my pocket. "'It looks as if Grundy's found our killer.'

"'Or Lomax found him,' I pointed out. "'Anybody else see this start, "'or know that Lomax didn't get those keys away from Grundy "'when he started trouble?' "'Why, you,' Grundy began. "'But Wilcox cut off his run. "'It was a shame. "'I still felt like Prundy.

pushing the man's Adam Zapple through his medulla oblongata. Locked them both up until Dr. Lomax comes to, Bueller ordered, and send Dr. Napier to take care of him. I'm not jumping to any conclusions. But the look he was giving Lomax indicated that he'd already pretty well made up his mind, and the crew was positive. They drew back sullenly, staring at us like animals, studying a human hunter, and they didn't like it when Peters took Grundy to lock him into his room.

Mueller finally chased him out and left Wilcox and me alone. Wilcox shrugged Riley, brushing dirt off his too clean uniform. While you're here, Tramaine, why not look my section over? You've been neglecting me. I'd borrowed Mueller's keys and inspected the engine room from top to bottom the night before, but I didn't mention that. I hesitated now. To a man who grew up to be an engineer and who'd now gotten over his psychosis against space

too late to start over, the engines were things better left alone. Then I remembered that I hadn't seen Wilcox's quarters since he had the only key to them. I nodded and went inside. The engines were old and the gravity generator was one of the first models, but Wilcox knew his business. The place was slick enough, and there was the good thing. clean smell of metal working right. I could feel the controls in my hands, and my nerves itched as I went about making a

perfunctory token examination. I even opened the fuel lockers and glanced in. The two crewmen watched with hard eyes, slidded as tight as grundies, but they didn't bother me. Then I shrugged and went back with Wilcox to his tiny cabin. I was hit by the place before I got inside. Tiny, yes, but fairly. but fixed up like the dream of every engineer.

Clean, neat, filled with books and luxuries. He even had a tape player I'd seen on sale for a trifle over $3,000. He turned it on, letting the opening bars of Hayden's Oxford Symphony come out. It was a bioral, ultra-fidelity job, and I could close my eyes and feel the orchestra in front of me. This time I was thorough, right down the line from the cabinets that held luxury food and wine to the little drawer where he kept his dress suit studs. They might have been rutiles, but I had a hunch they were genuine cat's eyes.

He laughed when I finished and handed me a glass of the first decent wine I tasted in months. Even a small ozenator to make the air seem more breathable and a dehumidifier, germane, I like to live decently. I started saving my money once with the idea of getting a ship of my own. There was a real dream in his eyes for a second. Then he shrugged, but the ships got bigger and more expensive, so I decided to live. At forty I've got maybe twenty years ahead here, and I mean to enjoy it.

And, well, there are ways of making a bit extra. I nodded. so it's officially smuggling to carry a four-ounce mortian fur to earth or it's worth a fortune considering the legal duty but most officers did it now and then he put on sebelius's fourth while i finished the wine if this mess is ever over paul or you got a chance drop by he said i like a man who knows good things and i like your reaction when you spotted that heiden for homen's recording muller pretends to know music but he likes the flashiness of moldware hell i'd cut my eye-teeth on that stuff my father had been first violinist in an orchestra and had considered me a traitor when i was born without perfect pitch we talked about sabelli for a while before I left to go out into the stinking rest of the ship. Grundy was sitting before the engine, staring at them. Wilcox had said the big ape liked to watch them move,

but he was supposed to be locked up. I stopped by Lomax's door. The shutter was open, and I could see the big man writhing about, but he was apparently unconscious. Napier came back from somewhere and nodded quickly. Concussion, he said. He's still out, but it shouldn't be too serious. Grundy's loose.

I'd expect it surprised, but there was none. Why? He shrugged. Mueller claimed he needed his mate free to handle the crew, and there was no place the man could go. I think it was because the men are afraid they'll be outnumbered by your group. His mouth smiled, but it was suddenly bitter. Jenny talked Pietro into agreeing with Mueller.

Mess was on when I read. reached the group. I wasn't hungry. The wine had cut the edge from my appetite, and the slow increase of poison in the air was getting me, as it was the others. Sure, carbon dioxide isn't a real poison, but no organism can live in its own waste all the time. I had a rotten headache. I sat there playing a little game I'd invented, trying to figure which ones I'd eliminate if some had to die. Jenny laughed up at Mueller, and I added him to the list. Then I changed it and put her in his place. I was getting sick of the little witch, though I knew it would be different if she'd been

laughing up at me. And then, because of the sick-calf look on Bill Sanderson's face as he stared at Eve, I added him, though I'd always liked the guy. Eve, surprisingly, had as many guys after her as Jenny, but she didn't seem interested. Or maybe she did. She'd pulled her hair back and put on a dress that made her figure look good. Either flattery was working or she was entering into the last day's feeling most of us had. Napier came in and touched my shoulder.

Lomax is conscious, and he's asking for you, he said, too low for the others to hear. I found the chemist conscious all right, but sick and scared. His face winced under all the bandages as I opened. the door. Then he saw who it was and relaxed. "'Paul, what happened to me?' "'The last I remember is going up to see that second batch of plants poisoned. But, well, this is something I must have got later.' I told him as best I could. But don't you remember anything?'

"'Not a thing about that. It's the same as Napier told me, and I've been trying to remember, Paul. You don't think... I put a hand on his shoulder and pushed him back gently. Don't be a damn fool, Hal. I know you're no killer. But somebody is, Paul. Somebody tried to kill me when I was unconscious. He must have seen my reaction. They did, Paul. I don't know how I know. Maybe I almost came, too. But somebody tried to poke a stick through the door with a knife on it. They want to kill me. I tried to calm him down until Napier came and gave him a sedative. The doctor seemed as sick about Hell's inability to remember as I was,

though he indicated it was normal enough in concussion cases. So is hallucination, he added. He'll be all right tomorrow. In that, Napier was wrong. When the doctor looked in on him the next time, the big chemist lay behind a door that had been pried open with a long galley knife through his heart. On the bloody sheet, his finger had traced something in his own blood.

It was... But the last S was blurred, and there was nothing more. End of Chapter 3. Chapter 4 of Let Em Breathe Space by Lester Del Rey. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 4 I don't know how many were shocked at Hal's death or how many looked around and counted one less pair of lungs. He'd never been one of the men I'd envy the air he used, though, and I think most felt the same.

For a while we didn't even notice that the air was even thicker. Phil Riggs broke the silence following our inspection of Lomax's cabin. That damned bullard! I'll get him! I'll get him. as sure as he got how. There was a rustle among the others and a suddenly crystallized hate on their faces. But Muleu's harsh shout, cut through the babble that began, and rose over even the anguished shrieking of the cook.

Shut up, the lot of you! Bullard couldn't have committed the other crimes. Any one of you is a better suspect. Stop sniveling, Bullard. This isn't a lynching mob, and it isn't going to be one. "'What about Grundy?' Walt Harris yelled. Wilcox pushed forward. Grundy couldn't have done it.

He's the logical suspect, but he was playing rummy with my men. The two engine men nodded agreement, and we began filing back to the mess hall with the exception of Bullard, who shoved back into a niche trying to avoid us. Then, when we were almost out of his sight, he let out a shriek and came blubbering after us. I watched them put Hal Lomax's body through the tween-holes lock and turned toward the engine room. I could use some of that wine, just as the ship could have used a train detective. But the idea of watching helplessly while the engines purred along to remind me I was just a handyman for the rest of my life, got mixed up with the difficulty of breathing the stale air, and I started to turn back.

My head was throbbing, and for two cents I'd have gone out between the hulls beside Lomax and the others, and let the foul air spread out there and freeze. The idea was slow coming. Then I was running back toward the engines. I caught up with Wilcox before he went into his own quarters. Wilcox! He swung around casually, so it was me in motioned inside. How about some Bartok, Paul?

Or would you rather soothe your nerves with some first-rate bucks to hewed organ? Damn the music, I told him. I've got a wild idea to get rid of this carbon dioxide, and I want to know if we can get it working with what we've got. He snapped to attention at that. Halfway through my account, he fished around and found a bottle of arminac. I get it. If we pipe our air through the passages between the holes on the shadow side, it will lose its heat in a hurry, and we can regulate its final temperature by how fast we pipe it through,

just keep it moving enough to reach the level where carbon dioxide freezes out, but the oxygen stays a gas. Then pass it around the engines. We'll have to cut out the normal cooling setup. But that's okay. Warm it up. Sure, I've got equipment enough for that. We can set it up in a day.

Of course, it won't give us any more oxygen, but we'll be able to breathe with. what we have. To success, Paul. It was surprising how much easier the air got to breathe after we'd double-checked the idea. In about 15 minutes we were all milling around in the engine room while Wilcox checked through equipment. But there was no question about it. It was even easier than we thought. We could simply bypass the cooling unit, letting the engine housing stay open to the between-hull section. then it was simply a matter of cutting a small opening into that section at the other end of the ship and installing a sliding section to regulate the amount of air flowing in. The exhaust from the engine heat pumps was reversed and run out through a hole hastily knocked in the side of the wall.

Naturally we let it flow too fast at first. Space is a vacuum, which means it's a good insulator. We had to cut the air down to a trickle. Then Wilcox ran into trouble because his engines wouldn't cool with that amount of air. He went back to supervise a patched-up job of splitting the coolers into sections, which took time. But after that, we had it. I went through the hatch with Mueller and Pietro. With air there, there was no need to wear spacesuits.

But it was so cold that we could take it only for a minute or so. That was long enough to see a faint, fine mist of dry, ice snow falling. It was also long enough to catch a glimpse of the three bodies there. I didn't enjoy that, and Pietro gasped. Mueller grimaced. When we came back, he sent Grundy in to move the bodies to a hull section where our breathing air wouldn't pass over them. It wasn't necessary, of course, but somehow it seemed important. By lunch the air seemed normal. We shipped only pure oxygen at about three pounds pressure, instead of loading it with a lot of useless nitrogen, with the carbon dioxide cut back to normal levels.

It was as good as ever. The only difference was that the fans had to be set to blow in a different pattern. We celebrated, and even Bullard seemed to have perked up. He dug out pork chops and almost succeeded in making us cornbread out of some coarse flour I saw him pouring out of the food chopper. He had perked up enough to bewail the fact that all he had was canned spedity. instead of turnip greens. But by night, the temper had changed, and the food indicated it again.

Bullard's cooking was turning into a barometer of the psychic pressure. We'd had time to realize that we weren't getting something for nothing. Every molecule of carbon dioxide that crystallized out took two atoms of oxygen with it, completely out of circulation. We were also losing water vapor, we found. Normally any one of our group knew enough science to know that the water would fall out before the carbon dioxide. But we hadn't thought of it. We took care of that, however, by having Wilcox welled in a baffle that kept a section where the water condensed,

separate from the carbon dioxide snowfall. We could always shovel out the real ice, and meantime the ship's controls, restored the moisture to the air easily enough. But there was nothing we could do. about the oxygen. When that was gone, it stayed gone. The plants still took care of about two-thirds of our waste, but the other third was locked out there between the hulls.

Given plants enough, we could have thought it out and let them reconvert it. A nice idea, except that we had to wait three months to take care of it, if we live that long. Bullard's cooking began to get worse. Then suddenly we got one good meal. Eve Nolan came down the passage to announce that Bullard was making cake with frosting, canned huckleberry pie, and all the works. We headed for the mess hall fast. It was the cook's masterpiece.

Mueller came down late, though, and regarded it doubtfully. There's something funny, he said as he settled down beside me. Jenny had been surrounded by Napier and Pietro. Bullard came up babbling a few minutes ago. I don't like it. Something about eating hearty because he'd saved us all forever and ever. He told me the angels were on our side because a beautiful angel with two halos came to him and his sleep and told him how to save us.

I chased him back to the galley, but I don't like it. Most of them had already eaten. least half of the food, but I saw Mueller wasn't touching his. The rest stopped now as the words sank in and Napier looked shocked. "'No,' he said, but his tone wasn't positive. He's a weakling, but I don't think he's insane. Not enough to poison us.' There was that food poisoning before, Pietro said suddenly.

"'Paul, come along and don't eat anything until we come back.' "'We broke the record getting to the galley. "'There Bullard sat, beaming happily, "'eating from a huge plate piled with the food he had cooked. "'I checked on it quickly, and there wasn't anything he'd left out. "'He looked up, and his grin widened foolishly. "'Hi, Docs,' he said, "'Yes, sir, I knowed you'd be coming.

"'It all came to me in a dream. Look, just like my wife twenty years ago she did, with green and yellow halos. And she told it to me. Told me I'd been a good man and nothing was going to happen to me. Not the good old Emery Bullard. Had it all figured out. He speared a big forkful of food and crammed it into his mouth, munching noisily. Had it all figured out.

Popcorn, best damn popcorn you ever saw. Kind they raised not fifty. miles from where I was born. You know, I didn't used to like you guys, but now I love everybody. When we get to Saturn, I'm going to make up for all the times I didn't give you popcorn. We'll pop and we'll pop, and we'll pop. And beans, too. I used to hate beans.

Always beans on a ship. But now we're saved, and I love beans. He stared after us, half coming out of his seat. Hey, Docs, ain't you going to let me tell you about it? it? Later, Bullard, Pietro called back. Something just came up. We want to hear all about it. Inside the mess hall, he shrugged. He's eating the food himself. If he's crazy, he's in a happy stage of it. I'm sure he isn't trying to poison us. He sat down and began eating without any hesitation. I didn't feel as sure and suspected he didn't. But it was too late to back out.

Together we summarized what he told us while Napier puzzled over it. Finally the doctor shrugged. Visions, euphoria, disconnection with reality. Apparently something of a delusion that he's to save the world. I'm not a psychiatrist, but it sounds like insanity to me. Probably not dangerous. At least while he wants to save us, we won't have to worry about the food. Still, Wilcox molded over and resumed the eating.

he had neglected before. Grundy claimed he'd been down near the engine room, tried to get permission to pop something in the big pile. I thought Grundy was just getting his stories mixed up, but... Popcorn! I'll have him locked in his cabin, Mueller decided.

He picked up the nearest handset, saw that it was to the galley, and switched quickly. Grundy, lock, bullered up, and no rough stuff this time. Then he turned to Napier. Dr. Napier, you'll have to see him and find out what you can. I guess there's a primitive fear of insanity in most of us. We felt sick. Beyond the nagging worry about the food.

Napier got up at once. I'll give him a sedative. Maybe it's just nerves, and he'll snap out of it after a good sleep. Anyhow, your mate can stand watching. Who can cook? Mueller said. His eyes swung down the table toward Jenny. I wondered how she'd get out of that.

Apparently she'd never told Mueller about the scars she still had from the spilled grease and how she'd never forgiven her mother or been able to go near a kitchen sense. But I should have guessed. She could remember my stories, too. Her eyes swung up toward mine, pleadingly. Eve Nolan stood up suddenly. "'I'm not only a good cook, but I enjoy it,' she stated flatly. and there was disgust in the look she threw at Jenny.

She swung toward me. How about it, Paul? Can you wrestle the big pots around for me? I used to be a short-order cook when I was finishing school, I told her. But she'd ruined the line. The grateful look and laugh from Ginny weren't needed now. And curiously I felt grateful to Eve for it. I got up and went after Napier.

I found him in Bullard's little cubbyhole of a cabin. He must have chased Grundy off, and now he was just drawing a hypo out of the cook's arm. It'll take the pain away, he was saying softly, and I'll see that he doesn't hit you again. You'll be all right now, and in the morning I'll come and listen to you. Just go to sleep. Maybe she'll come back and tell you more. He must have heard me since he signaled me out with his hand, and backed out quietly himself still talking. He shut the door and clicked the lock.

Bullard heard it, though. He jerked to a sitting position and screamed, No, no, he'll kill me. I'm a good man. He hunched up on the bed, forcing the sheet into his mouth. When he looked up a second later, his face was frozen in fear, but it was a desperate calm kind of fear. He turned to face us, and his voice raised to a full shout with every word as clear as he could make it.

All right! Now I'll never tell you the secret. Now you can all die without air. I promise I'll never tell you what I know. He fell back, beating at the sheet with his hand and sobbing hysterically. Napier watched him. Poor devil, the doctor said at last. Well, in another minute the shot will take effect.

Maybe he's lucky. He won't be worrying for a while, and maybe he'll be rational tomorrow. All the same, I'm going to stand guard until Mueller gets someone else here. I decided I kept remembering Lomax. Napier nodded, and half an hour later Bill Sanderson came to take over the watch. Bullard was sleeping soundly. The next day, though, he woke up to start moaning and writhing again, but he was keeping his word.

He refused to answer any questions. Napier looked worried as he reported he'd given the cook another. a shot of sedative. There was nothing else he could do. Cooking was a relief in a way. By the time Eve and I had scrubbed all the pots into what she considered proper order, located some of the food lockers, and prepared and served a couple of meals. Weed evolved a smooth system that settled into a routine with just enough work

to keep our minds off the dwindling air in the tanks. In anything like a kitchen, she lost most of her mannish poise and turned into a live efficient woman, and she could cook. First thing I learned, she told me. I grew up in a kitchen. I guess I'd never have turned to photography if my kid brother hadn't been using our sink for his dark room. Wilcox brought her a bottle of his wine to celebrate her first dinner.

He seemed to want to stick around, but she chased him off after the first drink. We saved half the bottle to make a sauce the next day. It never got made. Mueller called a council of war, and his face was pinched and old. He was leaning over Ginny as Eve and I came into the mess hall. Oddly she seemed to be trying to buck him up. He got down to the facts as soon as all of us were together. Our oxygen tanks are empty, he announced.

They shouldn't be, but they are. Someone must have sabotaged them before the plants were poisoned and done it so the dials wouldn't show it. I just found it out when the automatic switch to a new tank failed to work. We now have the air in the ship, and no more. Dr. Napier and I have figured that this will keep us all alive with the help of the plants for no more than 15 days. I am open to any suggestions. There was silence after that while it soaked in. Then it was broken by a thin scream from Phil Riggs.

He slumped into a seat and buried his head in his hands. Pietro put a hand on the man's thin shoulders. Captain Mueller, kill him! It was Grundy's voice, bellowing sharply. Let them breathe space. They got us into it. We can make out with the plants left. It's obvious.

ship muller had walked forward now his fist lashed out and Grundy crumpled he lay still for a second then got to his feet unsteadily Jenny screamed but Mueller moved steadily back to his former place without looking at the mate grundy hesitated fumbled in his pocket for something and swallowed it captain sir his voice was lower this time yes mr grundy how many of us can live off the plants? Ten, perhaps eleven. Then... Then give us a lottery. Pietro managed to break in over the yells of the rest of the crew. I was about to suggest calling for volunteers, Captain Mueller.

I still have enough faith in humanity to believe... You're a fool, Dr. Pietro. Mueller said flatly. Do you think Grundy would volunteer, or Bullard? But thanks for clearing the air. and admitting your group has nothing more to offer. A lottery seems to be the only fair system. He sat down heavily.

We have tradition on this. In an emergency such as this, death lotteries have been held and have been considered legal afterwards. Are there any protests? I could feel my tongue thicken in my mouth. I could see the others stare about, hoping someone would object,

wondering if this could be happening. But nobody answered, and Mueller nodded reluctantly. A working force must be left. Some men are indispensable. We must have an engineer, a navigator, and a doctor. One man skilled with engine room practice and one with deckwork must remain. And the cook goes, Grundy yelled. His eyes were intent and slid it again. Some of the group nodded, but Mueller brought his fist.

down on the table. This will be a legal lottery, Mr. Grundy. Dr. Napier will draw for him. And for myself, Napier said, it's obvious that ten men aren't going on to Saturn. You'll have to turn back or head for Jupiter. Jupiter, in fact, is the only sensible answer. And a ship can get along without a doctor that long when it has to.

I demand my right to the draw. Mueller only shrugged and laid down the rules. They were simple enough. He would cut drinking straws to various lengths, and each would draw one. The two deck hands would compare theirs, and the longer would be automatically safe. The same for the pair from the engine room. Wilcox was safe. Mr. Peters and I will have one of us eliminated, he added quietly.

In an emergency, our abilities are sufficiently alike. The remaining group would have their straws measured, and the seven shortest ones would be chosen to remove themselves into a vacant section between holes without air within three hours, or be forcibly placed there. The remaining ten would head for Jupiter, if no miracle, remove the danger in those three hours. Peters got the straws, and Mueller cut them and shovel them. There was a sick silence that let us hear the sounds of the scissors. with each snip. Mueller arranged them, so the visible ends were even. Ladies first, he said, there was no expression on his face or in his voice.

Ginny didn't giggle, but neither did she balk. She picked a straw and then shrieked faintly. It was obviously a long one. Eve reached for hers, and Wilcox yelled suddenly. Captain Mueller, protest, protest. You're using all-long, strong strong. straws for the women. He had jumped forward and now struck down Muda's hand, proving his point. You're quite right, Mr. Wilcox, Mewa said woodenly. He dropped his hand toward his lap and came up

with a group of the straws that had been cut, placed there somehow without our seeing it. He'd done a smooth job of it, but not smooth enough. I felt some of you would notice it, but I also felt that gentlemen would prefer to see ladies given the usual courtesies. He re-shoveled the assorted straws and then paused. Mr. Tremaine, there was a luxury liner named the Lorelei Elou, with an assistant engineer by your name, and I believe you shown a surprisingly familiarity with certain customs of space. A few days ago, Jenny mentioned something that jogged my memory.

Can you still perform the duties of an engineer? Wilcox had started to protest at the delay. Now shock ran through him. He stared unbelievingly from Mueller to me and back while his face blanched. I could guess what it must have felt like to see certain safety cut to a 50% chance, and I didn't like the way Mueller was willing to forget until he wanted to take a crack at Wilcox for punishment. But—'

"'I can,' I answered. And then, because I was sick inside myself for cutting under Wilcox, I managed to add, But I—I waive my chance at immunity. Not accepted, Mulder decided. Jenny, will you draw? It was pretty horrible. It was worse when the pairs compared straws.

The animal feelings were out in the open then. Finally, Mueller, Wilcox, and two crewmen dropped out. The rest of us went up to measure our straws. It took no more than a minute. I stood staring down at the ruler, trying to stretch the tiny thing I'd drawn. I could smell the sweat rising from my body, but I knew the answer. I had three hours left. Riggs, Oliver, Nolan, Harris, Tremaine, Napier, and Grundy, Mueller announced.

A yell came from Grundy. He stood up with the engine man named Oliver, and there was a gun in his hand. No damned big brains kicking me off my ship, he yelled. You guys know me. Hey, Rube! Oliver was with him, and the other three of the crew sprang into the group. I saw Mueller duck a shot from Grundy's gun and leap out of the room. Then I was in it, heading for Grundy.

Beside me, Peters was trying to get a chair broken into pieces. I felt something hit my shoulder, and the shock knocked me downward, just as a shot whistled over my. my head. Gravity cut off. Someone bounced off me. I got a piece of the chair that floated by, found the inn cracked and sharp, and tried to spin towards Grundy, but I couldn't see him. I heard Eve's voice yell over the other shouts. I spotted the plate coming for me, but I was still in mid-air. It came on steadily, edge-on, and I felt it break against my forehead. Then I blocked out.

End of Chapter 4 Chapter 5 of Let Em Breathe Space by Lester Del Rey. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 5 The last chapter I had the granddaddy of all headaches when I came to. Doc Napier's face was over me and Jenny and Mueller were working on Bill Sanderson.

There was a surprisingly small and painful lump on my head. Pietro and Napier's face. helped me up, and I found I could stand after a minute. There were four bodies covered with sheets on the floor. Grundy, Phil Riggs, Peters, and a deckhand named Storm, Napier said. Mueller gave us a whiff of gas, and not quite in time. Is the time up? I asked. It was the only thing I could think of.

Pietro shook his head sickly. Lottery is off. Muter says we'll have to hold another, since Storm and Peters was supposed to be safe, but not until tomorrow. Eve came in then, lugging coffee. Her eyes found me, and she managed a brief smile. I gave the others coffee, she reported to Mueller. They're pretty subdued now.

Mutiny! Mueller helped Jenny's brother to his feet and began helping him toward the door. Mutiny and I have to swallow that. Pietro watched him go. and handed Eve back his cup. And there's no way of knowing who was on which side. Dr. Napier, could you do something? He held out his hands that were shaking, and Napier nodded.

I could use a sedative myself. Come on back with me. Eve and I wondered back to the kitchen. I was just getting my senses back. The damn stupidity of it all. And now it would have to be done over. Three of us still had a little. to have our lives snuffed out so the others could live, and we all had to go through hell again

to find out which. Eve must have been thinking the same. She sank down on a little stool, and her hand came out to find mine. "'For what? Paul? For what?' Paul, whoever poisoned the plants, knew it would go this for. He had to.

What's to be gained? Particularly when he'd have to go through all this, too. He must have been crazy. Bullard couldn't have done it, I said slowly. Why should it be Bullard? How do we know he was insane? Maybe when he was shouting that he wouldn't tell, he was trying to make a bribe to save his own life.

Maybe he's as scared as we are. Maybe he was making sense all along if we'd only listen to him. She stood up and started back toward the lockers, but I caught her hand. "'Eve, he wouldn't have done it, the killer, if he'd had to go through the lottery. He knew he was safe. That's the one thing we've been overlooking. The man to suspect is the only man who could be sure he would get back.

My God, we saw him juggle those straws to save Jenny. He knew he'd control the lottery.' She frowned. But Paul, he practically suggested that. lottery. Grundy brought it up, but he was all ready for it. The frown vanished, then returned. But I still can't believe it. He's the one who wanted to go back all the time. He kept insisting on it, but he had to get back without violating his contract. I grabbed her hand and started toward the nose of the ship, justifying it to her as I went. The only man with a known

motive for returning, the only one completely safe, and we didn't even think of it. She was frowning, but I wasn't wasting time. We came up the corridor to the control room. Ahead, the door was slightly open, and I could hear a mutter of Jenny's voice. Then there was the tired rumble of Mueller. I'll find a way, baby. I don't care how close they watch. We'll make it work. Pick the straw with the cramp in the end. I can do that, even if I can't. push one out further again. I tell you nothing's going to happen to you. But Bill, she began.

I hit the door, slamming it open. Mueller sat on a narrow couch with Ginny on his lap. I took off for him, not wasting a good chance when he was handicapped. But I hadn't counted on Jenny. She was up and her head banged into my stomach before I knew she was coming. I felt the wind knocked out, but I got her out of my way to look up into the the muzzle of a gun in Mueller's hands. "'You'll explain this, Mr. Tremaine,' he said coldly.

"'In ten seconds, I'll have an explanation or a corpse.' "'Go ahead,' I told him. "'Shute, damn you. "'You'll get away with this, too, I suppose. "'Mutiny or something. "'And down in that rotten soul of yours, "'I suppose you'll be gloating at how you made fools of us. "'The only man on board who was safe even from a lottery.

and we couldn't see it. Jenny, I hope you're happy with this butcher. Very happy. He never blinked. Say that about the only safe man aboard again, he suggested. I repeated it with details. But he didn't like my account. He turned to Eve and motioned for her to take it up.

She was frowning harder, and her voice was uncertain, but she summed up our reasons quickly enough. And suddenly, Mueller was on his feet. Mr. Tremaine, for a damned idiot, you have a good brain. You found the key to the problem even if you couldn't find the lock. Do you know what happens to a captain who permits a death lottery, even what I call the legal one? He doesn't captain a liner. He shoots himself after he delivers his ship if he's wise.

Come on, we'll find the one indispensable man. You stay here, Jenny. You too, Eve. Jenny whimpered but stayed. Eve followed, and he made no comment. And then it hit me. The man who had thought he was indispensable and hence safe, the man I'd naturally known in the back of my head could be replaced,

though no one else had known it until a little while ago. He must have been sick when you ran me in as a ringer. I said as we walked down toward the engine hatch, but why? "'I've just had a wild guess as to part of it,' Mueller said. Wilcox was listening to the books hued when we shoved the door of his room open, and he had his head back and eyes closed. He snapped to attention and reached out with one hand toward a drawer beside him. Then he dropped his arm and stood up to cut off the tape player.

"'Mr. Wilcox,' Mueller said quietly, holding the gun firmly on the engineer. Mr. Wilcox, I've detected evidence of some of the Venus drugs on your two assistants for some time. It's rather hard to miss the signs in their eyes. I've also known that Mr. Grundy was an addict. I assumed that they were getting it from him naturally, and as long as they performed their duties I couldn't be choosy on an old ship like this. But for an officer to furnish such drugs and to serve them, smuggle them from Venus for sale to other planets is something I cannot tolerate.

It will make things much simpler if you will surrender those drugs to me. I presume you keep them in those bottles of wine you bring aboard. Wilcox shook his head slowly, settling back against the tape machine. Then he shrugged and bowed faintly. The Kianti, sir? I turned my head toward the bottles, and Eve started forward. Then I yelled as Wilcox. shoved his hand down toward the tape machine.

The gun came out on a spring as he touched it. Mule was shot once, and the gun missed Wilcox's fingers as the engineer's hand went to his hip, where the blood was flowing. He collapsed into the chair behind him, staring at the spot stupidly. I cut my teeth on tough ships, Mr. Wilcox, Mueller said savagely. The man's face was white, but he nodded slowly, and a weak grin came into his lips.

Maybe you didn't exaggerate those stories at that. He could seat it slowly. I take it I drew a short straw? Very short. It wasn't worth it. No profit from the piddling sale of drugs is worth it. There's a group of strings inside the number one fuel logger, Wilcox said between his teeth. The numbness was wearing off and the shattered bones in his hip were beginning to

eat at him. Paul, pull up one of the packages and bring it here, will you? I found it without much trouble, along with the whole row of others. Fine cords cemented to the sides of the locker. The package I drew up weighed about ten pounds. Wilcox opened it and scooped out a thimble full of greenish powder. He washed it down with wine. Fatal, Mueller asked. The man nodded. in that dosage after a couple of hours. But it cuts out the pain. Ah, better already.

I won't feel it. Captain, I was never pitilin. Your ship has been the sole source of this drug to Mars since a year or so after I first shipped on her. There are about 700 pounds of pure stuff out there. Grundy and the others would commit public murder. daily rather than lose a few ounces a year I gave them. Imagine what would happen when Pietro conscripted the Wahoo and no drugs arrived.

The addicts found out no more is coming, they look for the peddlers, and they start looking for their suppliers. He shrugged. There might have been time and ways if I could have gotten the ship back to Earth or Jupiter. It might have been recommissioned into the Earth more. Mars Venus run even. Pietro's injunction caught me before I could transship, but with another chance I might have gotten the stuff to Mars in time.

Well, it was a chance I took. Satisfied? Eve stared at him with horrified eyes. Maybe I was looking the same. It was plain enough now. He'd planned to poison the plants and drive us back. Murder of Hendricks had been a blunder when he'd thought it wasn't working properly. What about Sam? I asked.

Blackmail. He was too smart. He'd been sure Grundy was smuggling the stuff and raking off from him. He didn't care who killed Hendricks as much as how much Grundy would pay to keep his mouth shut. With murder around, he figured Grundy'd get rattled. The fool did, and Sam smelled bigger stakes. Grundy was bait to get him down near here. I killed him. And Lomax?

I don't know. Maybe he was bluffing. But he kept going from room to room with pocketfuls of chemicals, making some kind of tests. I couldn't take a chance of his being able to spot chromosome, so I had Grundy give him my keys and tell him to go ahead, then jump him. And after that, when he wasn't quite killed, they'd been forced to finish the job. Wilcox shrugged again. I guess it got out of hand.

I'll make a tape of the whole story for you, Captain, but I'd appreciate it if you'd get Napier down here. This is getting pretty messy. He's on the way, Eve said. We hadn't seen her call, but the doctor arrived almost immediately afterwards. He sniffed the drug and questioned us about the dose Wilcox had taken. Then he nodded slowly. About two hours, I'd say.

No chance at all to save him. The stuff is absorbed almost at once and begins changing to something else in the blood. I'll be responsible if you want. Mulder shrugged. I suppose so. I'd rather deliver him in irons to a jury, but, well, we still have a lottery to hold. It jerked us back to reality sharply. Somehow I'd been fighting off the facts, figuring that finding the cause would end the results.

But even with Wilcox out of the picture, there were twelve of us left, an air for only ten. Wilcox laughed abruptly. A favor for a favor. I can give you a better answer than a lottery. Popcorn, Bullard! Eve slapped her head with her palm. Captain, give me the master key. She snatched it out of his hand and was gone at a run.

Wilcox looked disappointed and then grinned. Popcorn and beans, I overlooked them myself. We're a bunch of city hicks. But when Bullard forgot his fears in his sleep, he remembered the answer, and God had so messed up with his dream and his new place as a hero that my complaint tipped the balance. Grundy put the fear of his God into him then, and you didn't get it.

Captain, you don't dehydrate beans and popcorn. They come that way naturally. You can't can them either if you're saving weight. They're seeds. Put them in tanks and they grow. He leaned back, trying to laugh at us, as Napier finished dressing his wound. Bullard knows where the lockers are,

and corn grows pretty fast. It'll carry you through. Do I get that favor? It's simple enough. just to have Beethoven's knife on the machine, and for the whole damn lot of you to get out of my cabin and let me die in my own way. Mueller shrugged, but Napier found the tape and put it on.

I wanted to see the louse punished for every second of worry, for Lomax and Hendricks, even for Grundy, but there wasn't much use in vengeance at this point. You're to get all this, Paul, Wilcox said as we got ready to leave. "'Captain. "'Everything here goes to Tremaine. "'I'll make a tape on that, too. "'But I wanted to go to a man

"'who can appreciate Holman's conducting.' "'Muller closed the door. "'I guess it's yours,' he admitted. "'Now that your head engineer here, Mr. Tremaine, "'the cabin is automatically yours. "'Take over. "'And get that junk in the fuel locker cleaned out. "'Except enough to keep your helpers going.

"'They'll need it, and we'll need their work.' "'I'll clean out his stuff at the same time. I said, I don't want any part of it. He smiled then, just as Eve came down with Bullard and Pietro. The fat cook was sobered, but already beginning to fill with his own importance. I caught snatches as they began to discuss Bullard's knowledge of growing things. It was enough to know that we'd all live, though it might be tough for a while. Then Mueller gestured upward.

You've got to reduce staff, Dr. Pietro. Do you intend going on to Saturn? "'We'll go on,' Pietro decided. "'And Mueller nodded. "'They turned and headed upwards. "'I stood staring at my engines. "'One of them was a touch out of phase, and I went over and corrected it. "'They'd be mine for over two years, and after that I'd be back on the lists.'

Eve came over beside me and studied them with me. Finally, she sighed softly. "'I guess I can see why you feel that. way about them, Paul, she said, and I'll be coming down to look at them. But right now, bullets too busy to cook, and everyone's going to be hungry when they find out we're saved. I chuckled and felt a relief wash over me, finally. I dropped my hand from the control and caught hers, a nice, friendly hand. But at the entrance I stopped and looked back toward the cabin where Wilcox lay. I could just make out the second movement of the night.

beginning. I could never stand the cheap blatancy of Holman's conducting. End of Chapter 5. End of Let Em Breathe Space by Lester Del Rey.