Captain Future 04 - The Triumph of Captain Future (Fall 1940) by Edmond Hamilton Read Free Book Online

commented Otho.
    “But no Martian desert-sand,” Curt finished. He looked at the Brain, a little baffled. “Damned queer! This shows he wasn’t on Mars for a long time. Yet that jewel came from the Machine City. Of course, he may have got the jewel from some fellow-criminal of the syndicate.”
    “Aye, lad,” the Brain rasped in agreement. His lens eyes stared questioningly at Curt. “What’s our plan of action?”
    The red-haired scientific wizard spoke rapidly.
    “We know now we can’t penetrate the Lifewater syndicate disguised as prospective customers. The X-ray spectacles the vendors probably use as routine precaution make that impossible. We’ll have to stake everything on an attempt to find the source of the Lifewater. Is that source the legendary Fountain of Life? I think so. This jewel inscribed with ‘Fountain’ is an arrow pointing that way, So, if we can find the Fountain, we’ll find the Life-lord, somewhere near it. And where he is, Grag will be also — if he’s still alive.”
    “Clear as outer space,” Otho approved. “So we’ve got to find the Fountain, to smash this traffic. And it may be on Mars.”
    “One objection,” rasped the. Brain. “The Lifewater we know now to be radioactive lad. And there’s little radioactive matter of any kind on Mars, That world is too old.”
    “I know,” Curt nodded, his tanned face worried. “But this lead to the Machine City is unmistakable. We must follow it.”
    “We’ve been at the Machine City before and saw no Fountain,” Simon Wright reminded him.
    “We didn’t do more than reconnoiter the city from outside,” Curt replied. “It was too dangerous for idle exploring.”
    “The cursed place will still be dangerous to enter,” Otho said. “Those brainless machine-guards gave me the creeps when I watched them.
    “I think I can devise a way of getting past them,” Captain Future declared. “But there’s no time to be lost. We’ll rocket for Mars at once. But first, let’s discard these Venusian disguises.”
     
    THAT done, they put Wilson Webber’s cadaver in the house with the corpse of the Mercurian. Then Captain Future called the Venus headquarters of the Planet Police to apprise the authorities of the two bodies’ location.
    Finally the Cornet rose through the night. It screamed up over the blinking lights of Venusopolis in a steep slant. With rocket-tubes blasting white fire-trails, the teardrop ship tore out through the cloud layers. Abruptly it burst into the clear, star-jeweled vault of space.
    Otho laid a course for the far red spark of Mars.
    “Good to be out of the clouds and able to see stars again,” called the android from the controls. “Though it seems kind of lonesome without Grag to argue with. Hope the old boys all right,”
    Captain Future smiled to himself a little. Otho was always the same, bickering furiously with Grag whenever they were together, but the first on the trail when the huge robot was in distress.
    Simon Wright turned his gaze toward Curt, from the automatically unreeling micro-film book the Brain was consulting.
    “I’m trying to track down all references to the Fountain of Life legend,” he rasped.
    “Find anything?” Curt asked.
    “Nothing of value. There seem to have been scores of wild stories about the Fountain. Most of them claim that a race of winged people guard it, on whatever world it’s located.”
    “Winged people?” Curt repeated. “Sounds like a superstitious myth. The legends don’t mention which world the Fountain’s on?”
    “No. One story puts it on one world, and the next tale puts it on another world. Nobody was scientifically sure about it.”
    As the Cornet rocketed for Mars, Curt Newton wondered if the Fountain were really mere baseless fable. No, it couldn’t be. The evil Lifewater certainly was no fable, and it surely must come from the legendary Fountain.
    Curt sat brooding, touching the twenty complex strings of his favorite Venusian guitar. But he