First Lensman, E. E. Smith [top 100 novels of all time .txt] 📗

He had a panel with about a million meters and gauges on it; he scanned and measured every individual component element of my brain. Then he made a pattern, on a milling router just about as complicated as his panel. From there on, of course, it was simple⁠—just like a dentist making a set of china choppers or a metallurgist embedding a test-section. He snapped a couple of sentences of directions at me, and then said ‘Scram!’ That’s all.”

“Sure that was all?” Costigan asked. “Didn’t he add ‘and stay scrammed’?”

“He didn’t say it, exactly, but the implication was clear enough.”

“The one point of similarity,” Jill commented. “Now you, Jack. You have been looking as though we were all candidates for canvas jackets that lace tightly up the back.”

“Uh-uh. As though maybe I am. I didn’t see anything at all. Didn’t even land on the planet. Just floated around in an orbit inside that screen. The thing I talked with was a pattern of pure force. This Lens simply appeared on my wrist, bracelet and all, out of thin air. He told me plenty, though, in a very short time⁠—his last word being for me not to come back or call back.”

“Hm⁠ ⁠… m⁠ ⁠… m.” This of Jack’s was a particularly indigestible bit, even for Jill Samms.

“In plain words,” Costigan volunteered, “we all saw exactly what we expected to see.”

“Uh-uh,” Jill denied. “I certainly did not expect to see a woman⁠ ⁠… no; what each of us saw, I think, was what would do us the most good⁠—give each of us the highest possible lift. I am wondering whether or not there was anything at all really there.”

“That might be it, at that.” Jack scowled in concentration. “But there must have been something there⁠—these Lenses are real. But what makes me mad is that they wouldn’t give you a Lens. You’re just as good a man as any one of us⁠—if I didn’t know it wouldn’t do a damn bit of good I’d go back there right now and.⁠ ⁠…”

“Don’t pop off so, Jack!” Jill’s eyes, however, were starry. “I know you mean it, and I could almost love you, at times⁠—but I don’t need a Lens. As a matter of fact, I’ll be much better off without one.”

“Jet back, Jill!” Jack Kinnison stared deeply into the girl’s eyes⁠—but still did not use his Lens. “Somebody must have done a terrific job of selling, to make you believe that⁠ ⁠… or are you sold, actually?”

“Actually. Honestly. That Arisian was a thousand times more of a woman than I ever will be, and she didn’t wear a Lens⁠—never had worn one. Women’s minds and Lenses don’t fit. There’s a sex-based incompatibility. Lenses are as masculine as whiskers⁠—and at that, only a very few men can ever wear them, either. Very special men, like you three and Dad and Pops Kinnison. Men with tremendous force, drive, and scope. Pure killers, all of you; each in his own way, of course. No more to be stopped than a glacier, and twice as hard and ten times as cold. A woman simply can’t have that kind of a mind! There is going to be a woman Lensman some day⁠—just one⁠—but not for years and years; and I wouldn’t be in her shoes for anything. In this job of mine, of.⁠ ⁠…”

“Well, go on. What is this job you’re so sure you are going to do?”

“Why, I don’t know!” Jill exclaimed, startled eyes wide. “I thought I knew all about it, but I don’t! Do you, about yours?”

They did not, not one of them; and they were all as surprised at that fact as the girl had been.

“Well, to get back to this Lady Lensman who is going to appear some day, I gather that she is going to be some kind of a freak. She’ll have to be, practically, because of the sex-based fundamental nature of the Lens. Mentor didn’t say so, in so many words, but she made it perfectly clear that.⁠ ⁠…”

“Mentor!” the three men exclaimed.

Each of them had dealt with Mentor!

“I am beginning to see,” Jill said, thoughtfully. “Mentor. Not a real name at all. To quote the Unabridged verbatim⁠—I had occasion to look the word up the other day and I am appalled now at the certainty that there was a connection⁠—quote; Mentor, a wise and faithful counselor; unquote. Have any of you boys anything to say? I haven’t; and I am beginning to be scared blue.”

Silence fell; and the more they thought, those three young Lensmen and the girl who was one of the two human women ever to encounter knowingly an Arisian mind, the deeper that silence became.

IV

“So you didn’t find anything on Nevia.” Roderick Kinnison got up, deposited the inch-long butt of his cigar in an ashtray, lit another, and prowled about the room; hands jammed deep into breeches pockets. “I’m surprised. Nerado struck me as being a B.T.O.⁠ ⁠… I thought sure he’d qualify.”

“So did I.” Samms’ tone was glum. “He’s Big Time, and an Operator; but not big enough, by far. I’m⁠—we’re both⁠—finding out that Lensman material is damned scarce stuff. There’s none on Nevia, and no indication whatever that there ever will be any.”

“Tough⁠ ⁠… and you’re right, of course, in your stand that we’ll have to have Lensmen from as many different solar systems as possible on the Galactic Council or the thing won’t work at all. So damned much jealousy⁠—which is one reason why we’re here in New York instead of out at the Hill, where we belong⁠—we’ve found that out already, even in such a small and comparatively homogeneous group as our own system⁠—the Solarian Council will not only have to be made up mostly of Lensmen, but each and every inhabited planet of Sol will have to be represented⁠—even Pluto, I suppose, in time. And by the way, your Mr. Saunders wasn’t any too pleased when you took Knobos of Mars and DalNalten of Venus away from him and made Lensmen out