Jupiter Equilateral

: Gold In The Sky

For a moment, Major Briarton just stared at him. Then he was on his

feet, shaking his head as he came around the desk. "Tom, use your head,"

he said. "It's as much of a shock to me as it is to you, but you can't

afford to jump to false conclusions...."



Tom Hunter looked up bitterly. "He's dead, isn't he?"



"Yes, he's dead. He must have died the instant of the explosion...."



"You mean you don't know?"



"I wasn't there at the time it happened, no."



"Then who was?"



* * * * *



Major Briarton spread his hands helplessly. "Nobody was. Your father was

alone. From what we could tell later, he'd left the Scavenger to land

on one of his claims, using the ship's scooter for the landing. He was

on the way back to the Scavenger when the rear tank exploded. There

wasn't enough left of it to tell what went wrong ... but it was an

accident, there was no evidence to suggest anything else."



Tom looked at him. "You really believe that?"



"I can only tell you what we found."



"Well, I don't believe it for a minute," Tom said angrily. "How long

have you and Dad been friends? Twenty years? Twenty-five? Do you really

think Dad would have an accident with a mining rig?"



"I know he was an expert engineer," the major said. "But things can

happen that even an expert can't foresee, mining in the Belt."



"Things like a fuel tank exploding? Not to Dad, they would never happen.

I don't care what anybody says...."



"Easy, Tom," Greg said.



"Well, I won't take it easy. Dad was too careful for something like that

to happen. If he had an accident, somebody made it happen."



Greg turned to the major. "What was Dad doing out there?"



"Mining."



"By himself? No crew at all?"



"No, he was alone."



"I thought the regulations said there always had to be at least two men

working an asteroid claim."



"That's right. Your father had Johnny Coombs with him when he left Sun

Lake City. They signed out as a team ... and then Johnny came back to

Mars on the first shuttle ship."



"How come?"



"Not even Johnny knows. Your father just sent him back, and there was

nothing we could do about it then. The U.N. has no jurisdiction in the

belt, unless a major crime has been committed." Major Briarton shook his

head helplessly. "If a man is determined to mine a claim all by himself

out there, he can find a dozen different ways to wiggle out of the

regulations."



"But Dad would never be that stupid," Greg said. "If he was alone when

it happened, who found him?"



"A routine U.N. Patrol ship. When Roger failed to check in at the

regular eight-hour signal, they went out to see what was wrong. But by

the time they reached him, it was too late to help."



"I just don't get it," Greg said. "Dad had more sense than to try to

mine out there all by himself."



"I know," the major said. "I don't know the answer. I had the Patrol

ship go over the scene of the accident with a comb after they found what

had happened, but there was nothing there to find. It was an accident,

and that's that."



"What about Jupiter Equilateral?" Tom said hotly. "Everybody knows they

were out to get Dad ... why don't you find out what they were doing

when it happened, bring them in for questioning...."



"I can't do that, I haven't a scrap of evidence," the major said

wearily.



"Why can't you? You're the Mars Coordinator, aren't you? You act like

you're scared of them."



Major Briarton's lips tightened angrily. "All right, since you put it

that way ... I am scared of them. They're big, and they're powerful.

If they had their way, there wouldn't be any United Nations control on

Mars, there wouldn't be anybody to fight them and keep them in check.

There wouldn't be any independent miners out in the Belt, either,

because they'd all be bought out or dead, and Earth would pay through

the nose for every ounce of metal that they got from the Asteroid Belt.

That company has been trying to drive the U.N. off Mars for thirty

years, and they've come so close to it that it scares me plenty." He

pushed his chair back sharply and rose to his feet. "And that is

exactly why I refuse to stir up a mess over this thing, unhappy as

it is, without something more than suspicions and rumors to back me

up ... because all Jupiter Equilateral needs is one big issue to make us

look like fools out here, and we're through."



He crossed the room to a wall cabinet, opened it, and pulled out a

scarred aluminum box. "We found this in the cabin of the Scavenger. I

thought you boys might want it."



They both recognized it instantly ... the battered old spacer's pack

that Roger Hunter had used for as long as they could remember. It seemed

to them, suddenly, as if a part of him had appeared here in the room

with them. Greg looked at the box and turned away. "You open it," he

said to Tom in a sick voice.



There was nothing much inside ... some clothing, a pipe and tobacco

pouch, a jack knife, half a dozen other items so familiar that Tom could

hardly bear to touch them. At the bottom of the pack was the heavy

leather gun case which had always held Roger Hunter's ancient .44

revolver. Tom dropped it back without even opening the flap. He closed

the box and took a deep breath. "Then you really believe that it was an

accident and nothing more?" he said to the major.



Major Briarton shook his head. "What I think or don't think doesn't make

any difference. It just doesn't matter. In order to do anything, I've

got to have evidence, and there just isn't any evidence. I can't even

take a ship out there for a second look, with the evidence I have, and

that's all there is to it."



"But you think that maybe it wasn't an accident, just the same," Tom

pursued.



The major hesitated. Then he shook his head again. "I'm sorry, but I've

got to stand on what I've said. And I think you'd better stand on it,

too. There's nothing else to be done."



* * * * *



It should have been enough, but it wasn't. As Tom Hunter walked with his

brother down the broad Upper Ramp to the business section of Sun Lake

City, he could not shake off the feeling of helpless anger, the growing

conviction that Roger Hunter's death involved something more than the

tragic accident in space that Major Briarton had insisted it was.



"He didn't tell us everything he knew," Tom said fiercely. "He didn't

say everything he wanted to say, either. He doesn't think it was an

accident any more than I do."



"How do you know, are you a mind reader?"



"No."



"Well, Dad wasn't a superman, either. He was taking an awful risk,

trying to work a mining rig by himself, and he had a bad break. Why do

you have to have somebody to blame for it?"



"Keep talking," Tom said. "You'll convince yourself yet."



Greg just jammed his hands in his pockets, and they walked in silence

for a moment.



For Tom and Greg Hunter, Sun Lake City had always been home. Now they

walked along the Main Concourse, Tom with the aluminum box under his

arm, Greg with his own spacer's pack thrown over his shoulder. They

didn't talk; rather than being drawn closer by the news of the tragedy,

it seemed that they had drawn farther apart, as though the one common

link that had held them together had suddenly been broken.



Finally Tom broke the silence. "At least there's one thing we can do,"

he said. "I'm going to call Johnny Coombs."



He shortly found a phone booth and dialed a number. Johnny had been a

friend of the family for years; he and Roger Hunter had been partners in

many mining ventures in the Asteroid Belt before Roger had taken his

position with Jupiter Equilateral. If Johnny had any suspicions that

Roger Hunter's accident had been more than an accident, he certainly

would not hesitate to voice them....



After a dozen rings, Tom hung up, tried another number. There was no

answer there, either. Frowning, Tom rang the city's central paging

system. "Put in a personal call for Johnny Coombs," he said when the

"record" signal flashed on. "Tell him to contact the Hunters when he

comes in. We'll be at home...."



They resumed their silent walk. When they reached H wing on the fourth

level, they turned right down an apartment corridor, and stopped in

front of a familiar doorway. Tom pressed his palm against the

lock-plate, and the door swung open.



It was home to them, the only home they had ever known. Soft lights

sprang up on the walls of the apartment as the door opened. Tom saw the

old bookcases lining the walls, the drafting-board and light at the far

end of the room, the simple chairs and dining table, the door which led

into the bedroom and kitchen beyond. The room had the slightly

disheveled look that it had had ever since Mom had died ... a slipper on

the floor here, a book face down on the couch there....



It looked as though Dad had just stepped out for an hour or so.



Tom was three steps into the room before he saw the visitor.



The man was sitting comfortably in Roger Hunter's easy chair, a short,

fat man with round pink cheeks that sagged a little and a double chin

that rested on his neck scarf. There were two other men in the room,

both large and broad-shouldered; one of them nodded to the fat man, and

moved to stand between the boys and the door.



The fat man was out of his seat before the boys could speak, smiling at

them and holding out his hand. "I wanted to be sure to see you before

you left the city," he was saying, "so we just came on in to wait. I

hope you don't mind our ... butting in, so to speak." He chuckled,

looking from one twin to the other. "You don't know me, I suppose. I'm

Merrill Tawney. Representing Jupiter Equilateral, you know."



Tom took the card he was holding out, looked at the name and the tiny

gold symbol in the corner, a letter "J" in the center of a triangle. He

handed the card to Greg. "I've seen you before," he told the fat man.

"What do you want with us?"



Tawney smiled again, spreading his hands. "We've heard about the

tragedy, of course. A shocking thing ... Roger was one of our group so

recently. We wanted you to know that if there is anything at all we can

do to help, we'd be only too glad...."



"Thanks," Greg said. "But we're doing just fine."



Tawney's smile tightened a little, but he hung onto it. "I always felt

close to your father," he said. "All of us at Jupiter Equilateral did.

We were all sorry to see him leave."



"I bet you were," Greg said, "he was the best mining engineer you ever

had. But Dad could never stand liars, or crooked ways of doing

business."



One of the men started for Greg, but the fat man stopped him with a wave

of his hand. "We had our differences of opinion," he said. "We saw

things one way, your father saw them another way. But he was a fine man,

one of the finest...."



"Look, Mr. Tawney, you'd better say what you came to say and get out of

here," Greg said dangerously, "before we give your friends here

something to do."



"I merely came to offer you some help," Tawney said. He was no longer

smiling. "Since your father's death, you two have acquired certain

responsibilities. I thought we might relieve you of some of them."



"What sort of responsibilities?"



"You have an unmanned orbit-ship which is now a derelict in the Asteroid

Belt. You have a scout-ship out there also. You can't just leave them

there as a navigation hazard to every ship traveling in the sector.

There are also a few mining claims which aren't going to be of much

value to you now."



"I see," Greg said. "Are you offering to buy Dad's mining rig?"



"Well, I doubt very much that we'd have any use for it, as such. But we

could save you the trouble of going out there to haul it in."



"That's very thoughtful," Greg said. "How much are you offering?"



Tom looked up in alarm. "Wait a minute," he said. "That rig's not for

sale...."



"How much?" Greg repeated.



"Forty thousand dollars," Merrill Tawney said. "Ship, rig and claims.

We'll even pay the transfer tax."



Tom stared at the man, wondering if he had heard right. He knew what

Roger Hunter had paid for the rig; he had been with Dad when the papers

were signed. Tawney's offer was three times as much as the rig was

worth.



But Greg was shaking his head. "I don't think we could sell at that

price."



The fat man's hands fluttered. "You understand that those ships are

hardly suited to a major mining operation like ours," he said, "and the

claims...." He dismissed them with a wave of his hand. "Still, we'd want

you to be happy with the price. Say, forty-five thousand?"



Greg hesitated, shook his head again. "I guess we'd better think it

over, Mr. Tawney."



"Fifty thousand is absolutely the top," Tawney said sharply. "I have the

papers right here, drawn up for your signatures, but I'm afraid we can't

hold the offer open."



"I don't know, we might want to do some mining ourselves," Greg said.

"For all we know, Dad might have struck some rich ore on one of those

claims."



Tawney laughed. "I hardly think so. Those claims were all Jupiter

Equilateral rejects. Our own engineers found nothing but low grade ore

on any of them."



"Still, it might be fun to look."



"It could be very expensive fun. Asteroid mining is a dangerous

business, even for experts. For amateurs...." Tawney spread his hands.

"Accidents occur...."



"Yes, we've heard about those accidents," Greg said coldly. "I don't

think we're quite ready to sell, Mr. Tawney. We may never be ready to

sell to you, so don't stop breathing until we call you. Now if there's

nothing else, why don't you take your friends and go somewhere else?"



The fat man scowled; he started to say something more, then saw the look

on Greg's face, and shrugged. "I'd advise you to give it some careful

thought," he said as he started for the door. "It might be very foolish

for you to try to use that rig."



Smiling, Greg closed the door in his face. Then he turned and winked at

Tom. "Great fellow, Mr. Tawney. He almost had me sold."



"So I noticed," Tom said. "For a while I thought you were serious."



"Well, we found out how high they'd go. That's a very generous outfit

Mr. Tawney works for."



"Or else a very crooked one," Tom said. "Are you wondering the same

thing I'm wondering?"



"Yes," Greg said slowly. "I think I am."



"Then that makes three of us," a heavy voice rumbled from the bedroom

door.



* * * * *



Johnny Coombs was a tall man, so thin he was almost gangling, with a

long nose and shaggy eyebrows jutting out over his eyes. With his rudely

cropped hair and his huge hands, he looked like a caricature of a

frontier Mars-farmer, but the blue eyes under the eyebrows were not

dull.



"Johnny!" Tom cried. "We were trying to find you."



"I know," Johnny said. "So have a lot of other people, includin' your

friends there."



"Well, did you hear what Tawney wanted?"



"I'm not so quick on my feet any more," Johnny Coombs said, "but I got

nothin' wrong with my ears." He scratched his jaw and looked up sharply

at Greg. "Not many people nowadays get a chance to bargain with Merrill

Tawney."



Greg shrugged. "He named a price and I didn't like it."



"Three times what the rig is worth," Coombs said.



"That's what I didn't like," Greg said. "That outfit wouldn't give us a

break like that just for old times' sake. Do you think they would?"



"Well, I don't know," Johnny said slowly. "Back before they built the

city here, they used to have rats getting into the grub. Came right down

off the ships. Got rid of most of them, finally, but it seems to me

we've still got some around, even if they've got different shapes now."

He jerked his thumb toward the bedroom door. "In case you're wondering,

that's why I was standin' back there all this time ... just to make sure

you didn't sell out to Tawney no matter what price he offered."



Tom jumped up excitedly. "Then you know something about Dad's accident!"



"No, I can't say I do. I wasn't there."



"Do you really think it was an accident?"



"Can't prove it wasn't."



"But at least you've got some ideas," Tom said.



"Takes more than ideas to make a case," he said at length. "But there's

one thing I do know. I've got no proof, not a shred of it, but I'm sure

of one thing just as sure as I'm on Mars." He looked at the twins

thoughtfully. "Your dad wasn't just prospecting, out in the Belt. He'd

run onto something out there, something big."



The twins looked at him. "Run onto something?" Greg said. "You mean...."



"I mean I think your dad hit a Big Strike out there, rich metal, a real

bonanza lode. Maybe the biggest strike that's ever been made," the miner

said slowly. "And then somebody got to him before he could bring it in."