The Sentinel - Arthur C. Clarke [50]
The cargo was being trans-shipped and the other two tugs were climbing up from the great blinding crescent of Venus while McNeil retraced the events of the last few weeks and the mate made surreptitious notes.
He spoke quite calmly and impersonally, as if he were relating some adventure that had happened to another person, or indeed had never happened at all. Which was, of course, to some extent the case, though it would be unfair to suggest that McNeil was telling any lies.
He invented nothing, but omitted a good deal. He had had three weeks in which to prepare his narrative and he did not think it had any flaws . . .
Grant had already reached the door when McNeil called softly after him, “What’s the hurry? I thought we had something to discuss.”
Grant grabbed the doorway to halt his headlong flight. He turned slowly and stared unbelievingly at the engineer. McNeil should be already dead—but he was sitting quite comfortably, looking at him with a most peculiar expression.
“Sit down,” he said sharply—and in that moment it suddenly seemed that all authority had passed to him. Grant did so, quite without volition. Something had gone wrong, though what it was he could not imagine.
The silence in the control room seemed to last for ages. Then McNeil said rather sadly, “I’d hoped better of you, Grant.”
At last Grant found his voice, though he could barely recognize it.
“What do you mean?” he whispered.
“What do you think I mean?” replied McNeil, with what seemed no more than mild irritation. “This little attempt of yours to poison me, of course.”
Grant’s tottering world collapsed at last, but he no longer cared greatly one way or the other. McNeil began to examine his beautifully kept fingernails with some attention.
“As a matter of interest,” he said, in a way that one might ask the time, “when did you decide to kill me?”
The sense of unreality was so overwhelming that Grant felt he was acting a part, that this had nothing to do with real life at all.
“Only this morning,” he said, and believed it.
“Hmm,” remarked McNeil, obviously without much conviction. He rose to his feet and moved over to the medicine chest. Grant’s eyes followed him as he fumbled in the compartment and came back with the little poison bottle. It still appeared to be full. Grant had been careful about that.
“I suppose I should get pretty mad about this whole business,” McNeil continued conversationally, holding the bottle between thumb and forefinger. “But somehow I’m not. Maybe it’s because I never had many illusions about human nature. And, of course, I saw it coming a long time ago.”
Only the last phrase really reached Grant’s consciousness.
“You—saw it coming?”
“Heavens, yes! You’re too transparent to make a good criminal, I’m afraid. And now that your little plot’s failed it leaves us both in an embarrassing position, doesn’t it?”
To this masterly understatement there seemed no possible reply.
“By rights,” continued the engineer thoughtfully, “I should now work myself into a good temper, call Venus central, and denounce you to the authorities. But it would be a rather pointless thing to do, and I’ve never been much good at losing my temper anyway. Of course, you’ll say that’s because I’m too lazy—but I don’t think so.”
He gave Grant a twisted smile.
“Oh, I know what you think about me—you’ve got me neatly classified in that orderly mind of yours, haven’t you? I’m soft and self-indulgent, I haven’t any moral courage—or any morals for that matter—and I don’t give a damn for anyone but myself. Well, I’m not denying it. Maybe it’s ninety percent true. But the odd ten percent is mighty important, Grant!”
Grant felt in no condition to indulge in psychological analysis, and this seemed hardly the time for anything of the sort.