Read American Science Fiction Five Classic Novels 1956-58 for Free Online

conjugate-brother Rrringlath certainly knows that old ’Griil went in that door and failed to come out. He will tip off the nosies. Conjugate-brother is a relationship so close that we will never understand it, since we don’t reproduce by fission.”
    I didn’t care whether Martians reproduced like rabbits or the stork brought them in a little black bag. The way he told it I could never go back to Earth, and I said so. He shook his head. “Not at all. Leave it to me and we will slide you back in as neatly as we slid you out. Eventually you will walk off that field or some other field with a gate pass which shows that you are a mechanic who has been making some last-minute adjustment—and you’ll have greasy coveralls and a tool kit to back it up. Surely an actor of your skill can play the part of a mechanic for a few minutes?”
    “Eh? Why, certainly! But——”
    “There you are! You stick with ol’ Doc Dak; he’ll take care of you. We shuffled eight guild brothers in this current caper to get me on Earth and both of us off; we can do it again. But you would not stand a chance without voyageurs to help you.” He grinned. “Every voyageur is a free trader at heart. The art of smuggling being what it is, we are all of us always ready to help out one another in a little innocent deception of the port guards. But a person outside the lodge does not ordinarily get such co-operation.”
    I tried to steady my stomach and think about it. “Dak, is this a smuggling deal? Because——”
    “Oh no! Except that we are smuggling you .”
    “I was going to say that I don’t regard smuggling as a crime.”
    “Who does? Except those who make money off the rest of us by limiting trade. But this is a straight impersonation job, Lorenzo, and you are the man for it. It wasn’t an accident that I ran across you in that bar; there had been a tail on you for two days. As soon as I hit dirt I went where you were.” He frowned. “I wish I could be sure our honorable antagonists had been following me , and not you.”
    “Why?”
    “If they were following me they were trying to find out what I was after—which is okay, as the lines were already drawn; we knew we were mutual enemies. But if they were following you , then they knew what I was after—an actor who could play the role.”
    “But how could they know that? Unless you told them?”
    “Lorenzo, this thing is big, much bigger than you imagine. I don’t see it all myself—and the less you know about it until you must, the better off you are. But I can tell you this: a set of personal characteristics was fed into the big computer at the System Census Bureau at The Hague and the machine compared them with the personal characteristics of every male professional actor alive. It was done as discreetly as possible but somebody might have guessed—and talked. The specifications amounted to identification both of the principal and the actor who could double for him, since the job had to be perfect .”
    “Oh. And the machine told you that I was the man for it?”
    “Yes. You—and one other.”
    This was another good place for me to keep my mouth shut. But I could not have done so if my life had depended on it— which in a way it did. I just had to know who the other actor was who was considered competent to play a role which called for my unique talents. “This other one? Who is he?”
    Dak looked me over; I could see him hesitate. “Mmm— fellow by the name of Orson Trowbridge. Know him?”
    “ That ham!” For a moment I was so furious that I forgot my nausea.
    “So? I hear that he is a very good actor.”
    I simply could not help being indignant at the idea that anyone should even think about that oaf Trowbridge for a role for which I was being considered. “That arm-waver! That wordmouther!” I stopped, realizing that it was more dignified to ignore such colleagues—if the word fits. But that popinjay was so conceited that—well, if the role called for him