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The Dust of Death

Like all reat Llewes, Ed of the pleasure it would give hireat Llewes

No man who did not work for Lleould quite understand the feeling Llewes (rew, almost unconsciously, to think it was Great, with a capital G) was Everyreat prober into the unknown: both relentless' and brilliant, neither giving up in the face of failure nor ever at a loss for a new and enious attack

Lleas an organic cheht the Solar System to the service of his science It was he who first used the Moon for large-scale reactions to be run in vacuu water or liquid air, depending on the ti new and wonderful when carefully designed apparatus was set floating freely in orbits about space stations

But, truth to tell, Lleas a credit stealer, a sin alive So up apparatus on the Lunar surface; a forgotten technician had designed the first self-contained space reactor Somehow both achievements became associated with the name of Llewes

And nothing could be done An eer would lose his recommendation and find it difficult to obtain another job His unsupported word against that of Lleould be worth nothing

On the other hand, those who rerace and a recommendation were sure of future success

But while they stayed, they at least enjoyed the dubious pleasure of voicing their hatred a themselves

And Edmund Farley had full reason to join theest satellite, where he had singlehanded-aided by robots only-set up equip ately of hydrogen and e to deal with, and Uranus and Neptune were still too expensively far Titan, however, was Mars-size, sh to retain a en-methane atmosphere

Large-scale reactions could proceed there easily in the hydrogen atmosphere, where on Earth those saned and redesigned and endured Titan for half a year and had co data Yet soin to coether as a Llewes achievement

The others syed their shoulders, and bade him welcome to the fraternity Farley tensed his acne-scarred face, brought his thin lips together, and listened to the others as they plotted violence

Jim Gorham was the most outspoken Farley rather despised him, for he was a 'vacuum man' who had never left Earth

Gorhaular habits, you see You can rely on him

For instance, look at the way he insists on eating by himself He closes his office at twelve sharp and opens it at one sharp Right? No one goes into his office in that interval, so poison has plenty of time to work'

Belinsky said dubiously, 'Poison?'

'Easy Plenty of poison all over the place You naot it Okay, then Llewes eats one Swiss cheese on rye with a special kind of relish knee-deep in onions We all know that, right? After all, we can smell him all afternoon and we all remember the miserable howl he raised when the lunchroo No one else in the place will ever touch the relish, so poison in it will hit only Llewes and no one else'

It was all a kind of lunchtime make-believe, but not for Farley Grimly, and in earnest, he decided to murder Llewes

It becaht of Llewes dead, of hihtfully his for thoseacross frozen ammonia to remove products and set up new reactions in the thin, chill winds of hydrogen and methane

But it would have to be so which couldn't possibly harm anyone but Llewes That sharpened the s on Llewes' at, low room, isolated from the rest of the laboratories by cement blocks and fireproof doors No one but Llewes ever entered, except in Llewes' presence and with his permission Not that the room was ever actually locked The effective tyranny Llewes had established'Do Not Enter' and signed with his initials, more of a barrier than any lock except where the desire for murder superseded all else

Then what about the at, his al with the equipment itself, unless it were unusually subtle, would certainly be detected

Fire then? The atmosphere room contained inflammable materials and to spare, but Llewes didn't ser of fires No one took greater precautions against one

Farley thought impatiently of the eance; the thief playing with his little tanks of en where Farley had used it by the cubic mile Llewes for the little tanks and fame; Farley for the cubic miles and oblivion

All those little tanks of gas; each its own color; each a synthetic atas in red cylinders and methane in striped red and white, athe aten in brown cylinders and carbon dioxide in silver for the atmosphere of Venus The yellow cylinders of coen, where Earthly cheh A parade of the rainbow, each color dating back through centuries of convention

Then he had the thought It was not born painfully, but came all at once In one moment it had all crystallized in Farley's mind and he knehat he had to do

Farley waited a painful month for September i8th, which was Space Day It was the anniversary of ht and no one would be working that night Space Day was, of all holidays, the

one ful to the scientist in particular and even the dedicated Lleould bemerry then

Farley entered Central Organic Laboratories-to use its official title-that night, certain he was unobserved The labs weren't banks or ht watchattitude toward their jobs

Farley closed the main door carefully behind him and moved slowly down the darkened corridors toward the atht, a sht in an art-supply store at the other end of town three weeks before He wore gloves

His greatest difficulty ca the atmosphere rooeneral forbiddenness of murder Once in, however, once past the mental hazard, the rest was easy

He cupped the flashlight and found the cylinder without hesitation His heart was beating so as almost to deafen him, while his breath came quickly and his hand trembled

He tucked the flash under his arm, then dipped the tip of the artist's brush into the black dust Grains of it adhered to the brush and Farley pointed it into the nozzle of the gauge attached to the cylinder It took eons-long seconds for that tre tip to enter the nozzle

Farley ain, and inserted it once more in the nozzle He repeated it over and over, almost hypnotized by the intensity of his own concentration Finally, using a bit of facial tissue daan to wipe off the outer rim of the nozzle, enormously relieved that the job was done and he'd soon be out

It was then his hand froze, and the sick uncertainty of fear surged through hi to the floor

Fool! Incredible andI Under the stress of his e cylinder!

He snatched up the flash, put it out, and, his heart thuly, listened for any noise

In the continuing dead silence, he regained a portion of his self-control, and screwed himself to the realization that what could be done once could be done again If the wrong cylinder had been taht one would take two minutes more

Once again, the brush and the black dust came into play At least, he had not dropped the vial of dust; the deadly, burning dust This tiht one

He finished, wiping the nozzle again, with a badly tre hand His flash then played about quickly and rested upon a reagent bottle of toluene That would do He unscrewed the plastic cap, splashed some of the toluene on the floor, and left the bottle open

He then stu as in a drea house and the safety of his own roohout

He disposed of the facial tissue he had used to wipe the nozzles of the gas cylinders by cra it into the flash-disposal unit It vanished into molecular dispersion So did the artist's brush that followed

The vial of dust could not be so gotten rid of without adjustments to the disposal unit he did not think it safe to make He would walk to work, as he often did, and toss it off the Grand Street bridge

Farley blinked at hi and wondered if he dared go to work It was an idle thought; he didn't dare not go to work Hethat would attract attention to him on this day of all days

With grayish desperation, he worked to reproduce norness thatand he walked to work It was only a flicking et rid of the vial It made a tiny splash in the river, filled ater, and sank

He sat at his desk, later thatat his hand computer Now that it had all been done, would it work? Llewes nore the smell of toluene Why not? The odor was unpleasant, but not disgusting Organic chemists were used to it

Then, if Lleere still hot on the trail of the hydro-genation procedures Farley had brought back froas cylinder would be put into use at once It would have to be With a day of holiday behind hiet back to work

Then, as soon as the gauge cock was turned, a bit of gas would spurt out and turn into a sheet of flame

If there were the proper quantity of toluene in the air, it would turn as quickly into an explosion-- So intent was Farley in his reverie that he accepted the dull boom in the distance as the creation of his own hts, until footsteps thudded by

Farley looked up, and out of a dry throat, cried, 'What- what-'

'Dunno,' yelled back the other 'So in the atmosphere room Explosion Hell of a mess'

The extinguishers were on and men beat out the flames and snatched the burned and battered Llewes out of the wreckage He had the barest flicker of life left in him and died before a doctor had time to predict that he would

On the outskirts of the group that hovered about the scene in gririsly curiosity stood Edlisten of perspiration on his face did not, at that moment, mark him as different from the rest He tottered back to his desk He could be sick now No one would remark on it

But so the load began to lighten Accident was accident, wasn't it? There were occupational risks all che with inflammable compounds No one would question the matter

And if anyone did, how could they possibly trace anything back to Edh nothing had happened

Nothing? Good Lord, the credit for Titan would now be his He would be a great ht he slept

Jim Gorham had faded a bit in twenty-four hours His yellow hair was stringy and only the light color of his stubble masked the fact that he needed a shave badly

'We all talked murder,' he said

H Seton Davenport of the Terrestrial Bureau of Investigation tapped one finger against the desktop htly that it could not be heard He was a stocky man with a firm face and black hair, a thin, prominent nose made for utility rather than beauty, and a star-shaped scar on one cheek

'Seriously?' he asked

'No,' said Gorha his head violently 'At least, I didn't think it was serious The schemes ild: poisoned sandwich spreads and acid on the helicopter, you know Still, someone must have taken the matter seriously after all The madman! For what reason?'

Davenport said, 'Froe because the dead man appropriated other peoples' work'

'So what,' cried Gorhaed for what he did He held the entire teaether

He was its ress and got the grants Hewas the one who got permission to set up projects in space and send men to the Moon or wherever He talked spaceship lines and industrialists into doing anic'

'Have you realized all this overnight?'

'Not really I've always known this, but what could I do? I've chickened out of space travel, found excuses to avoid it

I was a vacuum man, who never even visited the Moon The truth was, I was afraid, and even more afraid to have the others think I was afraid' He virtually spat self-contempt

'And now you want to find someone to punish?' said Davenport 'You want to make up to the dead

Llewes your criainst the live one?'

'No! Leave psychiatry out of this I tell you it is ot to be You didn't knoes The man was a monomaniac on safety No explosion could possibly have happened anywhere near hied'

Davenport shrugged 'What exploded, Dr Gorhaanic compounds of all sorts-benzene, ether, pyridine-all of them inflammable'

'I studied chemistry once, Dr Gorham, and none of those liquids is explosive at room temperature as I remember There has to be soht'

'How did that happen?'

'I can't iine There were no burners in the place and no matches Electrical equipment of all sorts was heavily shielded Even little ordinary things like clamps were speciallyalloys Llewes didn't smoke and would have fired on the spot anyone who approached within a hundred feet of the rooarette'

'What was the last thing he handled, then?'

'Hard to tell The place was a shambles'