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

or savages. Does not the fact that we ceased hostilities so soon mean anything to you?”

For the first time the stranger’s face changed subtly, and Samms pressed the slight advantage.

“I see it does. Now if you will converse with me mind to mind.⁠ ⁠…” The First Lensman felt for the man’s ego and began to tune to it, but this was too much.

“I will not!” The Black put up a solid block. “I will have nothing to do with your cursed Lens. I know what it is and will have none of it!”

“Oh, what’s the use, Virge!” Kinnison snapped. “Let’s get on with it!”

“A great deal of use, Rod,” Samms replied, quietly. “This is a turning-point. I must be right⁠—I can’t be that far wrong,” and he again turned his attention to the enemy commander.

“Very well, sir, we will continue to use spoken language. I repeat, please come aboard with your ten fellow vice-admirals. You will not be asked to surrender. You will retain your side-arms⁠—as long as you make no attempt to use them. Whether or not we come to any agreement, you will be allowed to return unharmed to your vessels before the battle is resumed.”

“What? Side-arms? Returned? You swear it?”

“As President of the Galactic Council, in the presence of the highest officers of the Galactic Patrol as witnesses, I swear it.”

“We will come aboard.”

“Very well. I will have ten other Lensmen and officers here with me.”

The Boise, of course, inerted first; followed by the Chicago and nine of the tremendous teardrops from Bennett. Port Admiral Kinnison and nine other Lensmen joined Samms in the Boise’s con room; the tight formation of eleven Patrol ships blasted in unison in the space-courtesy of meeting the equally tight formation of Black warships halfway in the matter of intrinsic velocity.

Soon the two little sub-fleets were motionless in respect to each other. Eleven Black gigs were launched. Eleven Black vice-admirals came aboard, to the accompaniment of the full military honors customarily granted to visiting admirals of friendly powers. Each was armed with what seemed to be an exact duplicate of the Patrol’s own current blaster; Lewiston, Mark Seventeen. In the lead strode the tall, heavy, gray-haired man with whom Samms had been dealing; still defiant, still sullen, still concealing sternly his sheer desperation. His block was still on, full strength.

The man next in line was much younger than the leader, much less wrought up, much more intent. Samms felt for this man’s ego, tuned to it, and got the shock of his life. This Black vice-admiral’s mind was not at all what he had expected to encounter⁠—it was, in every respect, of Lensman grade!

“Oh⁠ ⁠… how? You are not speaking, and⁠ ⁠… I see⁠ ⁠… the Lens⁠ ⁠… the Lens!” The stranger’s mind was for seconds an utterly indescribable turmoil in which relief, gladness, and high anticipation struggled for supremacy.

In the next few seconds, even before the visitors had reached their places at the conference table, Virgil Samms and Corander of Petrine exchanged thoughts which would require many thousands of words to express; only a few of which are necessary here.

“The Lens⁠ ⁠… I have dreamed of such a thing, without hope of realization or possibility. How we have been misled! They are, then, actually available upon your world, Samms of Tellus?”

“Not exactly, and not at all generally,” and Samms explained as he had explained so many times before. “You will wear one sooner than you think. But as to ending this warfare. You survivors are practically all natives of your own world. Petrine?”

“Not ‘practically,’ we are Petrinos all. The ‘teachers’ were all in the Center. Many remain upon Petrine and its neighboring worlds, but none remain alive here.”

“Ohlanser, then, who assumed command, is also a Petrino? So hardheaded, I had assumed otherwise. He will be a stumbling-block. Is he actually in supreme command?”

“Only by and with our consent, under such astounding circumstances as these. He is a reactionary, of the old, diehard, war-dog school. He would ordinarily be in supreme command and would be supported by the teachers if any were here; but I will challenge his authority and theirs; standing upon my right to command my own fleet as I see fit. So will, I think, several others. So go ahead with your meeting.”

“Be seated, Gentlemen.” All saluted punctiliously and sat down. “Now, Vice-Admiral Ohlanser.⁠ ⁠…”

“How do you, a stranger, know my name?”

“I know many things. We have a suggestion to offer which, if you Petrinos will follow it, will end this warfare. First, please believe that we have no designs upon your planet, nor any quarrel with any of its people who are not hopelessly contaminated by the ideas and the culture of the entities who are back of this whole movement; quite possibly those whom you refer to as the ‘teachers.’ You did not know whom you were to fight, or why.” This was a statement, with no hint of question about it.

“I see now that we did not know all the truth,” Ohlanser admitted, stiffly. “We were informed, and given proof sufficient to make us believe, that you were monsters from outer space⁠—rapacious, insatiable, senselessly and callously destructive to all other forms of intelligent life.”

“We suspected something of the kind. Do you others agree? Vice-Admiral Corander?”

“Yes. We were shown detailed and documented proofs; stereos of battles, in which no quarter was given. We saw system after system conquered, world after world laid waste. We were made to believe that our only hope of continued existence was to meet you and destroy you in space; for if you were allowed to reach Petrine every man, woman, and child on the planet would either be killed outright or tortured to death. I see now that those proofs were entirely false; completely vicious.”

“They were. Those who spread that lying propaganda and all who support their organization must be and shall be weeded out. Petrine must be and shall be given her rightful place in the galactic fellowship of free, independent, and cooperative worlds. So