New Writings in SF 4 - [Anthology] Read online

  The railway decking had not been designed for pedestrian traffic, being mainly of open-span alloy girder, difficult and dangerous to traverse on foot, and necessarily Blick had to shoulder most of the load. Martha experienced difficulty with even one small case over the five and a half kilometre stretch, and finally he took even this from her. Both were aching and exhausted when the ordeal was over.

  At the cabin of Station Fifty-Nine she rested for a time while Blick began to prepare a light meal, for they had neither of them breakfasted. Presently Martha got up and began to prowl around the cabin, examining the personal touches and curios which Blick had added to the structure. Blick was an individualist, moody and uncertain of even himself, and his untidy, enigmatic intelligence and unorthodoxy was everywhere portrayed in the bric-à-brac and sentimental and scientific miscellanea, which he had allowed to spread about his living quarters. Finally, on the desk, she found the frame with the photographs of his wife and children. He saw her looking at it, and took it from her and laid it face down, deliberately. She put it back firmly into its place, and faced him.

  “You know, Blick, that’s the first time I’ve ever seen you even think disloyally towards your wife.”

  He wiped an unruly lock of hair back from his forehead. “It’s a curious thing, Martha, but in all the time I’ve loved you I’ve never even felt disloyal. What I feel for you and what I feel for her are just not the same kind of emotions at all. What’s the expression? ‘When love has changed to kindliness’? That’s all there ever was between her and me—oceans of kindliness. I even thought that was what love was, until I met you.”

  “And you still love me that much?” The question was one of interested compassion.

  Blick nodded. “I may be a bloody fool, but at least I’m a consistent bloody fool.”

  “You shouldn’t go on tormenting yourself, Blick. Time and again I’ve told you to forget me.”

  “Forget?” He smiled wearily. “And just what the hell do you suppose I’ve been trying to do ? My God, if only I could forget you that easily!”

  She scowled and turned to the window. “No, and in a way I’m glad. I can’t forget you either, Blick. It just goes to show that the deserving don’t always get what they think they deserve.”

  * * * *

  On the decking of the raft she looked about in bewilderment at the tanks and the tall columns and the maze of valves and pipework which constituted the installation.

  “What do you do here, anyway, Blick?”

  “We pump up selected metal-bearing liquor streams from the sea, and using ion-exchange techniques we partially separate and then concentrate the metal salt solutions for subsequent metal extraction and refining at Lamedah.”

  “Ah, that accounts for the tank wagons on the railway. What precisely is ion-exchange, anyway?”

  “Nothing new,” said Blick. “It’s been used in regenerable water-softeners for donkey’s years. Basically, the columns are full of minute beads of special resins. These resins are insoluble, but contain free anions or cations, according to type, and these free ions are capable of being exchanged for other ions from a solution with which they are in contact. The process is reversible, so that by suitable chemical treatment the first ions may be replaced in the resin and the ions which the resin has taken up are displaced and can be collected in the form of a salt concentrate.”

  “Whoa!” said Martha. “You’ve got beyond me there. Translation, please.”

  “I’ll give you a simple example,” said Blick, “which will also show why we use the system. This is the copper region of Hebron V, and some of the current streams carry a fairly pure but dilute solution of copper salts in water. Factually, the copper concentration in these streams is so low that to attempt to extract the copper from the stream by the usual methods of cementation or electrolysis would be a costly and inefficient business. But if I pass the dilute liquor through a cation resin column, the copper ions will remain in the resin bed while the radical with which it was combined will pass on out of the column, together with whatever ions the copper has itself displaced—in this case, hydrogen.”

  “I see, so that you finish with a column of resin containing all the copper ions?”

  “Essentially, yes. If I then add fairly strong sulphuric acid to the column, the copper is itself displaced, combines with the sulphate radical, and comes out of the column as a concentrated solution of copper sulphate, in which form it is supremely suitable for electro-refining. The act of passing acid through the column returns the resin to its original form, and the whole cycle is repeated. In the course of electro-refining at Lamedah, even the sulphuric acid is recovered and returned here for re-use, so that material wastage is little. Virtually, we get our copper for little more than the cost of the electricity we use for pumping, transportation and refining.”

  “No wonder Max Colindale can afford such big cigars! Does the process work for any metal?”

  “Most. Different resins are broadly selective to certain groups of ions, and we’re learning how to tailor them for greater selectivity. By careful choice of resin we can isolate and concentrate one metal preferentially to the others, although some mixing does take place, especially when working a contaminated stream.”

  “And you can recover the concentrates merely by regenerating the column?”

  “Mostly. Some, like the one which is receptive almost exclusively to gold, can’t be regenerated, so you recover the gold by burning off the resin. The same applies to the platinum-group specific resins and the newly developed one for the transuranic elements. But generally, regeneration suffices, and you’ve even some choice of regenerant to produce chloride, sulphate or whatever happens to be the most convenient salt form.”

  “It seems incredible,” said Martha, “that just a few tubes and pumps can do all that.”

  “That’s only the start,” said Blick. “We’re working now on using selective ion-exchange membranes coupled with electro-osmosis and electrochromatographic techniques to provide a complete separation of any elements present in a solution. The process is analogous to the one we suspect occurs deep in the ocean belts, the natural mechanism which produces the metal streams from the mineral mixture of the ocean. If we bring it off, we’ll be able to design one plant which can take the mixed mineral liquor and split it down completely into its separate pure salts. No more hunting for reasonable concentration metal streams— just sit back and keep pumping.”

  “You love this work, don’t you, Blick?” said Martha, caught by his enthusiasm.

  Blick shrugged. “It’s an outlet,” he said. “Something on which to sublimate your energies when you can’t get what you want. And you do know what I want.”

  She frowned and turned back a little.

  “You’re not being very fair to me, Blick.”

  “I know,” said Blick. “Sometimes I even surprise myself. I wasn’t built to handle emotions as big as this. I never quite know the correct way to respond.”

  “You’re very sweet,” she said. “Especially when you’re looking so lost. If I ever do change my mind I’ll be sure to let you know.”

  “You know I’ve no power at all to resist you ?”

  “That’s why I’m trying to be strong for both of us. You can’t jeopardize your family’s whole future, Blick, for a few hours pleasure. You’d never cease hating yourself and me. It’s far too great a risk for so small a return, however much desired.”

  “Don’t get me wrong,” said Blick. “Except when I’m doing a tour of duty here, I am starved for neither love, affection nor sex. I lead a normal, happy, married life, and even if I didn’t there’d be a lot more gratifying ways of spending a leave than pining after you. But my private and permanent hunger is more specific: I need you, and you alone, and there’s nothing and nobody else can satisfy that craving. You do more to me with a word or a smile than can anyone else by any human act. Thirsting for you isn’t a whim, it’s a primary fact of life.”

  Taking out a pack
et of cigarettes, she took one for herself and tossed one to him. Blick produced a match. She steadied his hand with hers as he gave her a light, holding it just a little tighter and just a little longer than necessary. He held on to the match ruefully until the flame was licking at his fingers, pretending not to notice the hurt until at last he was forced to let the match drop.

  “Burned my damn fingers!” he complained lightly. The joke was an old and private one, but still worth a wry smile. She stepped back and tossed her head amusedly.

  “What would you expect if you persist in playing with fire?”

  He looked at her with an expression halfway between passion and misery. “Fire,” he said. “You don’t know just how apt that word is. Martha, just for once can’t we ... ?”

  “No, Blick. Not even once. If a real affair between us ever got started we’d both get in so deep we’d neither of us be able to pull out again. You’re already too far involved emotionally to have responsible regard for the consequences, and once I’d got you I’d never let you go again. I couldn’t. In love I need security—for want of a better phrase—a sense of permanency. I need to give as well as take, and Blick, darling, I’ve so terribly much to give!”

  He looked at her wildly for a second or two.

  “Then give!” he said. “Please, darling ... !”

  “No, Blick. It wouldn’t be fair to her or them. One day perhaps I’ll get the better of my conscience, but until then...”

  “But where’s the harm? We’re alone and likely to remain so for some time. Nobody’s ever to know.”

  “We’d know,” said Martha. “You and I. Isn’t that enough?”

  “Damn!” said Blick. “In all my life I’ve never heard of anything quite so bloody—mature!”

  * * * *

  Then came the days of waiting; the seemingly endless scanning of the line, trying the ‘plex, hoping for the impossible sound of engines of skimmer or cushion-craft or boat. Despite their rationing, the food was completely gone on the tenth from the day the train had been due, and the last miserable crumbs were consumed at breakfast.

  The next few days were agony until the pangs of hunger subsided into the emptiness of continued starvation. For Martha the ordeal was hard, since she had little enough reserves to meet a continuing lack of food. For Blick it was a major hell, for, although he was in better shape to meet the deprivation, his mental anguish at seeing Martha suffering carved deeply into his emotional make-up and woke him in the night with sad, gaunt fears.

  And no help came.

  For nine more days they were completely without food —nine days so eternally alike in the wretchedness of watching and waiting and hungering that it was difficult to separate them one from the other even in retrospect. Then Blick broke out of his semi-introspective study with a remarkable attitude of purpose.

  “It’s no good, Martha. We’ve got to get away from here somehow. I’ve no doubt they’re doing their best at Base, but they’re certainly now waiting on equipment from Delta Five and seven days time is the minimum time in which it can arrive. You can then add several more days to that before they can get through to us. We aren’t going to be in very good shape by that time, especially you. It’s a risk I daren’t take.”

  “How about walking down the line as far as we can ?”

  “Walking’s not possible on some of the sections, and anyway, it can’t solve a thing unless we can cross the break. I don’t fancy struggling a hundred and fifty kilometres in our present condition just to have that point underscored. And here we do have shelter, water and a few facilities we won’t find in many places down the line.”

  “So what’s the use of talking about getting away?” Lack of sustenance was a condition now bringing her consistently to the verge of anger. She regretted her tone almost immediately, knowing Blick’s resourcefulness and his tendency never to engage in idle discussion. But Blick was unmoved.

  “We could do it in a boat,” he said. “The drift is correcting back to North, so the current across Anapolis is probably submerging again, but slowly. If the trend continues, the drift will be almost straight and continuous from here to base waters in a few days’ time.”

  “That won’t do us much good without a boat. Are you sure we can’t free one of the rafts?”

  “Not a hope. I’ve spent days trying just that. They’re on welded chain and chain-anchored right down to the bedrock. Even if I had the tools, I still couldn’t get one free because the lugs are below the water-line. Nobody but a well-equipped diver could hope to release one. No, the answer is a boat.”

  “So where do you propose to get a boat, Blick?” Despite herself, she felt the intolerance returning.

  “We make one,” said Blick. “I’m not very sure how at the moment, but there just has to be a way, and if there is, I’ll find it. I tried to cut open a storage tank, but with the tools available, it’s completely hopeless. Nothing that’s loose or unscrews is the slightest use, and the only things promising are welded down. So what I need is a way of constructing a boat without tools and without any raw materials. And this I have to achieve in a few days or watch you starve to death.”

  She looked at him appealingly. “Don’t torture yourself, Blick. You’ve done everything humanly possible. Succeed or not, you’re still the most wonderful person I’ve ever known.”

  “And while we’re still in the mood for compliments, did I ever tell you I think you’re the most marvellous creature in the universe?”

  “Often.”

  “That’s what I thought,” said Blick sadly. “Hell, that I should ever be able to forget you!”

  For a long moment their eyes met, then he went out of the door stroking his chin thoughtfully. A few moments later, he was back, excited at a new idea.

  “Martha, did you have any wax up at Station Sixty ?”

  “Wax ? Yes, there’s about a hundred kilos up there as it happens. I spent the spring making mock nests to encourage mating in some of the local fauna.”

  “A hundred kilos should do it easily. I’m going to get it down here, I’ll be back in about five hours.”

  “Carrying a hundred kilos of wax?”

  “It’ll float,” said Blick. “I’ll bale it up and drop it over the edge on a line and tow it.”

  “Yes—you would! What are you up to, Blick? This isn’t the mating season, even for the locals.”

  “Perhaps not,” said Blick. “I’d not given their personal troubles a thought, but I’ve just realized I do have almost all the raw materials I need to build a boat.”

  “You have?”

  “Yes,” said Blick. “Copper sulphate solution—thousands of gallons of it.”

  “I may be a bit dense,” said Martha, “but I don’t see how you can build a boat. “

  “Wax,” said Blick. “That’s the thing I need. Look, I’ve got to hurry if I’m to get it down here before nightfall.”

  “If you think you can build a boat out of wax you’re crazy.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of trying it,” said Blick. “I’ll explain it all later.” He turned to go.

  “Blick!”

  “Yes?”

  “Take care of yourself, darling. We couldn’t bear to lose you.”

  * * * *

  She regarded the wax critically. “I still don’t see what you’re going to do with it.”

  “I’m going to mould the hollow form of a boat, a mould in which the boat is to be made.”

  She shrugged. “I suppose you know what you’re doing.”

  “I’m doing the only thing I see possible, Martha. Now roll up your sleeves and lend me a hand. This boat is going to take days to make and we don’t have many days in which to make it.”

  The morning was a dull, orange overcast, and the primary sun was visible only as a dull, red-tinged glow against the featureless pattern of sky. There was no great warmth n the day. She picked up a block of wax and examined it. It was unyielding and brittle.

  “You can’t work this stuff, Blick.
Not without heating it.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of trying to,” said Blick, infuriatingly. He was busy marking measurements on the decking. “Get yourself a few plastic buckets and put a block of wax in each, and then stand them in one of the low tanks along the front there. A little water and some concentrated sulphuric acid mixed in the tank will give us all the heat we need.”

  “You think of everything, don’t you? Are you always so damn clever?”

  “Except at love,” said Blick.

  She went away quietly, in search of buckets.

  By mid-day enough of the wax was softened for the work to begin. Martha learned to operate the appropriate water and acid valves on the tank and kept the flow of preheated wax blocks moving. Blick, with an assortment of unorthodox tools, deftly worked the blocks together and slowly built up the mould shape, burnishing the inside surface by rubbing, in order to make a smooth and waterproof seal. Occasionally, he passed a thin wire from inside to outside and sealed it into place. She watched his quick, capable hands with fascination as they rapidly acquired new skills in this unfamiliar craft, and knew then just how much meaning and expression Blick was capable of transmitting by a single grasp of the hand. The idea made her own hands tremble, even more than the reaction to hunger.