Clifford D. Simak

“I am pleased to meet you, Mr. Marmaduke,” said Maxwell, speaking slowly, the only way he could, since his lips had become, like the rest of him, slightly stiff and frozen.

“And I you, Professor.”

“How did you know who I was?” asked Maxwell. “You seemed to have no doubt at all. You knew, of course, I’d be coming down the hall.”

“Of course,” the Wheeler said.

Now Maxwell could see the creature a bit more clearly, the bloated body supported on two wheels, the lower part of the body gleaming and twisting like a pail of worms.

“You are Nancy ’s guest?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Mr. Marmaduke, “certainly I am. The guest of honor, I believe, at this gathering she has.”

“Then, perhaps, you should be out with the other guests.”

“I pleaded tiredness,” said Mr. Marmaduke. “A slight prevarication, I must admit, since I am never tired. So I went to rest a while-”

“And to wait for me?”

“Precisely,” said Mr. Marmaduke.

Nancy, Maxwell thought. No, Nancy, he was sure, wasn’t in on it. She had a frothy brain and all she cared about were her everlasting parties and she’d be incapable of any kind of intrigue.

“There is a subject we can talk about,” said Mr. Marmaduke, “with some profit, I presume, to the both of us. You are looking for a buyer, I believe, for a large commodity. I might have some passing interest in that commodity.”

Maxwell moved back a step and tried to find an answer. But there was no ready answer. Although he should have known, he told himself, or at least have suspected.

“You say nothing,” said Mr. Marmaduke. “I cannot be mistaken. You are, without fail, the agent for the sale?”

“Yes,” said Maxwell. “Yes, I am the agent.”

There was no use denying it, he knew. Somehow or other, this creature in the room knew about the other planet and the hoard of knowledge. And he might know the price as well. Could it have been the Wheeler, he wondered, who had made the offer for the Artifact?

“Well, then,” said Mr. Marmaduke, “let us proceed immediately to business and a discussion of the terms. Not forgetting, in the course of it, to mention the commission that will be coming to you.”

“I am afraid,” said Maxwell, “that is impossible at the moment. I do not know the terms. You see, I was first to find a potential buyer and then-”

“No trouble whatsoever,” said Mr. Marmaduke, “for I have the knowledge that you lack. I am acquainted with the terms.”

“And you will pay the price?”

“Oh, without any question,” said the Wheeler. “It will take just a little time. There are certain negotiations which must be terminated. Once those are done, you and I can complete all business and the matter will be done, without any fuss or trouble. The only thing, it would appear to me, is a determination of the commission which you will have earned so richly.”

“I would imagine,” said Maxwell bleakly, “that it might be a good commission.”

“We had in mind,” said Mr. Marmaduke, “of naming you-shall we say librarian?of the commodity we purchase. There will be much to do working out the various commodities and codifying them. For work of this sort we will need a creature such as you, and I imagine that you might find the work highly interesting. And the salary-Professor Maxwell, we pray you name the salary and the conditions of employment.”

“I would have to think about it.”

“By all means,” said Mr. Marmaduke. “In a procedure such as this, a little thought is good. You will find us most disposed to generosity.”

“That’s not what I meant,” said Maxwell. “I’ll have to think about the deal. Whether I’d be willing to arrange a sale for you.”

“You doubt, perhaps, our worthiness to purchase the commodity?”

“That might be it,” said Maxwell.

“Professor Maxwell,” said the Wheeler, “it would be advisable for you to lay aside your doubts. It is for the best that you entertain no doubt of us at all. For we are most determined that we shall obtain what you have to offer. So, in the best of grace, you should deal with us.”

“Whether I want to or not?” asked Maxwell.

“I,” said Mr. Marmaduke, “would have not put it quite so bluntly. But you state it most correctly.”

“You are not in the best position,” Maxwell told him, “to speak in that tone of voice.”

“You are not aware of the position that we hold,” the Wheeler said. “Your knowledge goes out to only a certain point in space. You cannot know what lies beyond that point.”

There was something in the words, something in the way that they were said, that sent a chill through Maxwell, as if from some unknown quarter of the universe a sharp, frigid blast of wind had blown through the room.

Your knowledge goes only to a certain point in space, Mr. Marmaduke had said, and what lay beyond that point? No one could know, of course, except that in certain areas beyond the shadowy frontier of man’s probing it was known the Wheelers had staked out an empire. And seeping across that frontier came horror stories, such tales as any frontier might inspire, stemming from man’s wonder concerning that unknown which lay just a little way ahead.