Cancer World Read online

operation. There are laws againstwhat you want me to do for you."

  Greg stared at the tie he had finally pulled loose. "But I can't waitsix months," he said helplessly. "If Dora gets sent to Mars alone, youknow what will happen as well as I do. Deported people are automaticallydivorced from their husbands and wives on Earth. They have to marryagain as soon as possible on Mars. The women need someone to supportthem and their kids, the men need the women to run the houses upthere...."

  The woman straightened her face with an effort, took off the white robe,and tossed it on the floor. Then she unlocked the door and returned toher office. Dr. Haskett turned his back on Greg, saying, "I'm afraidthere's nothing I can do for you, sir."

  * * * * *

  Greg drove from the rundown district faster than the law allowed. Didthe ordinary man on the street submit calmly when this happened to hiswife or did he have contacts that Greg had never known?

  Still, it seemed unlikely that many persons could escape the law. Everynation on Earth cooperated to send cancerous persons to Mars, not onlyto breed the disease out of Earth, but to relieve the tremendouspressure of a growing population. The effort was succeeding, even thoughit was taking much of Earth's resources to send the people and suppliesto Mars, even though the project had delayed the opening of colonizationon a real paradise planet, Venus.

  Pulling into the apartment's parking cell, Greg rode the elevator to hisfloor.

  The apartment was dark and silent. A single lamp glowed faintly on theliving room desk, and then he saw the note beside the viewphone.

  "I didn't exactly lie about the date of my passage," the note said, "butI misled you. The children and I went at noon today. It's the best way.We couldn't stand the torture of a week, so I asked for immediatepassage. Try to smuggle through a message to the children and me lateron, but don't try to do anything more dangerous. I pray that someday thelaws will change and we'll see each other again." There were a few morelines of writing, but they had been carefully scratched out. Dora'ssignature, barely recognizable in its shakiness, was at the bottom ofthe paper....

  * * * * *

  The smoke in the tavern was too thick to permit easy breathing. But Greghad been choking somewhere deep inside before he had wandered into theplace. He placed his glass carefully over the well in the counter,pressed the stud at the edge of the counter, and watched the mixed drinksquirt up through the patent bottom of the glass. There was a slightclick as the bottom tightened automatically, the price appeared on theinset beside the stud, and Greg drank. Then he put down the glass, awarethat the man beside him was studying him intently.

  "There comes a time," the man said carefully, "when the fingers refuseto clench the glass with sufficient resistance. At that point, you beginto pass out." The stranger raised his glass with only slight effort, andwatched Greg apply time and thought to the same procedure.

  "You remind me of the way some doctors talk," Greg said.

  "I never forget a patient," the stranger said, peering intently at Greg,"and you aren't one of mine, even though you're not quite sober enoughto look natural. But people tell me that all doctors act somewhat alike,even when they aren't very good doctors." He drained his glass with onegulp.

  "My wife was sent to Mars," Greg blurted the words out. He turned to thestranger.

  "There must be some way I can bring her back!"

  "Don't proposition me, fellow," the strange doctor said, blinking butkeeping his eyes boring into Greg's face. "You're talking to the wrongperson, if you want one of those little operations."

  Greg shook his head. "I thought of that. I went to one doctor. He toldme the scar wouldn't heal for six months.... She'll be married again bythat time."

  The stranger pursed his lips thoughtfully for a moment. Then he lookedaway from Greg and began to speak lowly, as if he were talking tohimself.

  "I've run across other people in your situation. Space freighters goclose to Mars' surface and parachute equipment down. The passenger shipsstay further away and send people down in little auxiliary ships. I'venever heard of anyone smuggling himself to Mars, you understand, but ifyou tried to--"

  "What I want is a freighter that actually will land on Mars."

  "You won't find any," the doctor said. "It takes too much fuel to takeoff again. This way, they can carry twice as much load, by just circlingthe planet close to the surface." He stopped, looked at Gregquizzically. "Funny thing about cancer--you study it since you learnedthe bad news? No? Well, the cure is something like the disease thesedays. Cancer is caused by cells that are harmful to the other cells inthe body and grow too fast. So we're deporting people who might beharmful to other people by propagating the disease. Then there'smetastasis."

  "What's that?"

  "Metastasis--the migration of cancer cells. They move from one part ofthe body to the other."

  "Like we're moving people to Mars?" Greg laughed tiredly and started toget up.

  "Take it easy, bud." A hand was on Greg's shoulder, and the doctor'svoice was in his ear. "We've all got troubles. Look up this guy, if youreally want to do something about the wife and kids." A hand slipped acard into Greg's pocket.

  * * * * *

  "What can you do?" The recruiting officer eyed Greg suspiciously.

  "Anything." Greg spoke slowly, his eyes on the officer. "A fellow gaveme this card, and told me I could get work on a freighter at thisaddress."

  The man glanced at the card and shrugged. "Sign this." He shoved adogeared form toward Greg. The table shook slightly as a spaceshipblasted off. Greg signed, glancing over the form.

  "This isn't a contract," he said, handing it back. "It's just a releasefor you in case something happens to a crew member."

  "So we aren't running pleasure trips or slumming expeditions for richguys. You were born yesterday if you don't know the freighters are alittle dangerous. We don't know how much money we'll make out of a tripuntil we've made it. So we can't settle on any pay now."

  "Get me onto the surface of the planet and you get my services free thewhole trip out," Greg said. "Isn't that fair enough?"

  "So you want to hop out before the return trip?" The agent's facedarkened. "Just when you've started to learn something usefulaboardship?" A man standing at the door started to move slowly towardthem.

  "I've changed my mind." Greg got up, turned, and suddenly an armencircled his throat. He twisted fiercely, uselessly, while therecruiting officer pulled a cloth-covered tube from the desk drawer. Theword _shanghai_ flashed into Greg's mind, an instant before the leadpipe smashed down against his skull.

  * * * * *

  Someone was shaking Greg, trying to dislodge his consciousness from theblack, cramped niche into which it was wedged. The hand at his shouldergripped hard, shook roughly, and a voice was bellowing into Greg's ears.Greg moved a hand, experimentally. Instantly he was jerked upright.

  "Time to get to work," the voice rumbled loudly. "Let's get this show onthe road. My name's Moore. What's yours?"

  Greg poked with stiff fingers at his eyes. Light blinded him. He was ina small room that might have been an overgrown closet. He sat on thelower half of a two-tier bunk. There was a webbing of ropes at the otherside, and a couple of small lockers around the other sides. The handthat had been shaking him belonged to a giant blond fellow who mighthave been in his forties.

  "Feel better?" The blond giant steadied Greg in a sitting position.

  "What's this all about?" Greg felt for the lump on his head.

  "Well, they haven't told me about you," the fellow grinned, "but I canguess. When someone starts to ask about a berth on a freighter, theyfigure that he's either a potential crew member or a spy. Either way,they figure they'd better take him aboard. I got took just the same way,ten years ago. I'm not sorry now. It's a pretty good life."

  "Look, I've got some money." Greg struggled to his feet. "Who can I seeto get out of here?"


  "Too late," Moore said. "We've blasted off. You've been out cold for twodays. Don't you feel the ship?"

  Greg sat down again, and suddenly he felt better. After all wasn't he onhis way to Mars, where he had wanted to go all along? He could worryabout smuggling himself onto the planet later, when they started to tossout the cargo....

  Moore introduced him to his duties in the hours that followed, and laterjoined him in their tiny cabin.

  "You'll have to take the upper bunk as soon as you feel better," Moorewarned. "I got seniority, you know."

  "Maybe I won't be around long. How do you go about skipping ship atdelivery point?"

  "It can be done if you've got the money," Moore said. "They run theseboats to make money and they aren't particular about where the moneycomes from. They never are sure what sort of a price they can get forthe refrigeration equipment and dehumidifiers and stuff."

  "Refrigeration--dehumidifiers?" Greg stared at Moore. "Are they crazy?Mars is the last place in the world to dispose of stuff like that!"

  "Mars? Who said anything about Mars, bud?" Moore looked at himcuriously. "They need that stuff on Venus, because it gets hot and dampthere in the summer time. We're going to Venus, my friend!"

  The words stunned Greg's mind. "But my wife and kids were sent to Mars,and if I'm heading for Venus it'll be too late--"

  "But you ought to have known that these birds only go to Venus--" Moorebegan. Greg didn't give him a chance to finish, rising abruptly andrunning from the cabin.

  All the fear, worry and despair that he had felt since Dora's check daytransmuted magically into an alloy of anger and hatred against anyauthority.

  He searched for the officers' quarters, his feet stamping loudly againstthe metal flooring, the noise thrusting new aches into his head, theaches in his head increasing his fury.

  Hopelessly lost after a moment, he opened one door and caught a glimpseof inferno and the insulation-clad men who tended the propulsion units.Twice he blundered into the space between the outer and inner hulls onthe wrong side of the ship. One panel in the wall that looked like adoor proved to be the lid for a viewer that gave a fantasticallybeautiful image of the stars and planets outside the ship. He hadwandered into a storeroom when a voice came from behind him:

  "Getting thirsty again?"

  "Where's the captain?" Greg yelled back. The man who had called to himstraightened from behind a row of boxes.

  "Last time I saw you, you were more interested in drinks than in thecaptain."

  * * * * *

  Greg looked hard at muscular fingers, and the ghost image of a bar backon Earth materialized for an instant in the stockroom around the man. Itwas the doctor who had given him instructions on how to find thefreighter recruiting office!

  "So you're the one who had me shanghaied to Venus!" Greg sprang at theman, fists flying.

  The doctor ducked. Greg sprawled clumsily at the opposite wall, thrownoff balance by the slighter gravity maintained in the ship. He startedto rise, then dropped to his knees as knife-like pain shot through hisankle. The doctor stood over him with that strange half-smile.

  "You shouldn't be angry. You wanted transportation, didn't you?" Hekneeled to look at Greg's ankle and the pain conquered Greg's impulse tosmash a fist into his face.

  "Exactly what I wanted," Greg answered bitterly. "Of course I wanted toget shanghaied on a freight headed for Venus while my family's on Mars!"

  "I think it's just a sprain, not a break," the doctor said, running afinger over the swelling ankle. "But we'd better take a picture. Comeon." He hoisted Greg to a standing position with unexpected strength,and walked him out of the storeroom to his cabin. Medical equipmentlined the room.

  "Did it ever occur to you that someday you're going to get the lawbooksthrown at you?" Greg asked, quietly but with hatred. "They stoppedtolerating this sort of thing centuries ago."

  The doctor laughed. "Fine talk from a man who tried to smuggle himselfon Mars."

  "You don't have any proof. I don't even know your name."

  "It's Coleridge. You can put doctor in front of it, too. I really didstudy and get a diploma. Then I decided I could have more fun out inspace than in some stuffy office back on Earth. Maybe you'd enjoy thissort of life, too, if you haven't congealed completely." He sat Gregbefore a small X-ray machine.

  "I've always wanted to spend the rest of my life fighting dinosaurs onVenus while my family is on Mars and my career is on Earth." Greg saidacidly.

  "You know very well there aren't any dinosaurs on Venus," Coleridgereplied mildly. "It's practically perfect as a planet, with a fewgadgets to keep things dry and cool." He looked straight at Greg. "Youknow it's the most desirable planet in the system but they'vediscouraged emigration because they need the spaceships to handle thecancer colonies on Mars. It's only tramp freighters like this that canget away with trips to Venus." He pulled the film from its fixing bathand squinted at it. "Not a sign of a fracture."

  * * * * *

  Greg began to wonder what Coleridge was leading up to. Everything hesaid appeared to be a case of diverting attention from Greg's problem bytalking about Venus' merits. He decided to play along until he foundout.

  "You think I could find something to keep myself occupied on Venus?"

  "Sure, they need smart men, and you can tell the employment agenciesthat your wife and kids are on the way."

  Greg stared at him, feeling the torment return.

  Coleridge grinned. "Haven't you ever put two and two together about thepopulation figures?"

  "You mean there's a chance for my family to get from Mars to Venus?"

  "Look. You remember that they started to send people from Earth to Marsa century ago, because the population had overgrown Earth. Emigrationhas gone on all that time, millions of people have been sent to Mars,and once they get there they have children and raise families just asthey would do on Earth. Now, if you weren't a lawyer, always splittinghairs and quibbling, you'd have guessed long ago what other intelligentpeople sooner or later realize. Mars is smaller than Earth, only part ofit is warm enough for Earthmen--so Mars got overpopulated, too, a fewyears back.

  "Remember what I told you in the bar about metastasis? I thought you'dcatch on then, when I tried to draw an analogy about migrating cancercells and migrating people.

  "They've been afraid to tell people on Earth the real situation, becauseVenus has been held up for so long as the second Eden where we'll alllive as soon as the cancer problem is licked. But actually, they've hadto ship new arrivals on Mars off to Venus in recent years, becausethere's no more room on Mars. I suppose they'll break the news to Earthsome of these days, formally. If you were closer to the grapevine, youprobably would have heard the rumor long ago."

  Greg sat there gaping at Coleridge. Finally he asked, in humbled tones:"If Venus is such a paradise, how come you don't drop off there and staythere yourself?"

  "Well," the doctor said, beginning to put away his equipment, "I've beenthinking of it, but I wanted to save up some money first, and thisseemed to be about the best way to do it. It's a little more humane thanthe way some doctors do, implanting cancer conditions into people whohave to undergo operations to get themselves deported. Of course, it's alittle more uncertain.

  "For instance," he said, eyeing Greg sharply, "now that you have thatbum ankle, I could probably tell the captain that you'll be no good as acrew member, and I could have you dumped overboard when we begin tocircle Venus. That way you wouldn't have done a thing illegal and you'dhave a clean slate to meet your family a few days later."

  Greg rubbed the lump on his head, gingerly flexed his sore ankle,remembered the emotions of the past three or four days, and then reachedfor his check book.

  "I think I'm beginning to understand," Greg smiled. "Got a pen?"

  THE END

  * * * * *

  Transcriber's note.

  This etext was produced from Imagination
May 1954. Extensive research didnot uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication wasrenewed.

  * * * * *