Wind Read online

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  WIND

  By CHARLES L. FONTENAY

  _When you have an engine with no fuel, and fuel without an engine, and a life-and-death deadline to meet, you have a problem indeed. Unless you are a stubborn Dutchman--and Jan Van Artevelde was the stubbornest Dutchman on Venus._

  Jan Willem van Artevelde claimed descent from William of Orange. He hadno genealogy to prove it, but on Venus there was no one who coulddisprove it, either.

  Jan Willem van Artevelde smoked a clay pipe, which only a Dutchman cando properly, because the clay bit grates on less stubborn teeth.

  Jan needed all his Dutch stubbornness, and a good deal of pure physicalstrength besides, to maneuver the roach-flat groundcar across thetumbled terrain of Den Hoorn into the teeth of the howling gale thatswept from the west. The huge wheels twisted and jolted against therocks outside, and Jan bounced against his seat belt, wrestled thesteering wheel and puffed at his _pijp_. The mild aroma ofHeerenbaai-Tabak filled the airtight groundcar.

  There came a new swaying that was not the roughness of the terrain.Through the thick windshield Jan saw all the ground about him buckle andheave for a second or two before it settled to rugged quiescence again.This time he was really heaved about.

  Jan mentioned this to the groundcar radio.

  "That's the third time in half an hour," he commented. "The place tosseslike the IJsselmeer on a rough day."

  "You just don't forget it _isn't_ the Zuider Zee," retorted Heemskerkfrom the other end. "You sink there and you don't come up three times."

  "Don't worry," said Jan. "I'll be back on time, with a broom at themasthead."

  "This I shall want to see," chuckled Heemskerk; a logical reaction,considering the scarcity of brooms on Venus.

  * * * * *

  Two hours earlier the two men had sat across a small table playingchess, with little indication there would be anything else to occupytheir time before blastoff of the stubby gravity-boat. It would be theirlast chess game for many months, for Jan was a member of the Dutchcolony at Oostpoort in the northern hemisphere of Venus, while Heemskerkwas pilot of the G-boat from the Dutch spaceship _Vanderdecken_,scheduled to begin an Earthward orbit in a few hours.

  It was near the dusk of the 485-hour Venerian day, and the Twilight Galealready had arisen, sweeping from the comparatively chill Veneriannightside into the superheated dayside. Oostpoort, established near someoutcroppings that contained uranium ore, was protected from both theDawn Gale and the Twilight Gale, for it was in a valley in the midst ofa small range of mountains.

  Jan had just figured out a combination by which he hoped to cheatHeemskerk out of one of his knights, when Dekker, the _burgemeester_ ofOostpoort, entered the spaceport ready room.

  "There's been an emergency radio message," said Dekker. "They've got apassenger for the Earthship over at Rathole."

  "Rathole?" repeated Heemskerk. "What's that? I didn't know there wasanother colony within two thousand kilometers."

  "It isn't a colony, in the sense Oostpoort is," explained Dekker. "Thepeople are the families of a bunch of laborers left behind when thecolony folded several years ago. It's about eighty kilometers away,right across the Hoorn, but they don't have any vehicles that cannavigate when the wind's up."

  Heemskerk pushed his short-billed cap back on his close-cropped head,leaned back in his chair and folded his hands over his comfortablestomach.

  "Then the passenger will have to wait for the next ship," he pronounced."The _Vanderdecken_ has to blast off in thirty hours to catch Earth atthe right orbital spot, and the G-boat has to blast off in ten hours tocatch the _Vanderdecken_."

  "This passenger can't wait," said Dekker. "He needs to be evacuated toEarth immediately. He's suffering from the Venus Shadow."

  Jan whistled softly. He had seen the effects of that disease. Dekker wasright.

  "Jan, you're the best driver in Oostpoort," said Dekker. "You will haveto take a groundcar to Rathole and bring the fellow back."

  * * * * *

  So now Jan gripped his clay pipe between his teeth and piloted thegroundcar into the teeth of the Twilight Gale.

  Den Hoorn was a comparatively flat desert sweep that ran along thewestern side of the Oost Mountains, just over the mountain fromOostpoort. It was a thin fault area of a planet whose crust waspeculiarly subject to earthquakes, particularly at the beginning and endof each long day when temperatures of the surface rocks changed. On theother side of it lay Rathole, a little settlement that eked a precariousliving from the Venerian vegetation. Jan never had seen it.

  He had little difficulty driving up and over the mountain, for the Dutchsettlers had carved a rough road through the ravines. But even the2-1/2-meter wheels of the groundcar had trouble amid the tumbled rocksof Den Hoorn. The wind hit the car in full strength here and, though thebody of the groundcar was suspended from the axles, there was constantdanger of its being flipped over by a gust if not handled just right.

  The three earthshocks that had shaken Den Hoorn since he had beendriving made his task no easier, but he was obviously lucky, at that.Often he had to detour far from his course to skirt long, deep cracks inthe surface, or steep breaks where the crust had been raised or droppedseveral meters by past quakes.

  The groundcar zig-zagged slowly westward. The tattered violet-and-indigoclouds boiled low above it, but the wind was as dry as the breath of anoven. Despite the heavy cloud cover, the afternoon was as bright as anEarth-day. The thermometer showed the outside temperature to havedropped to 40 degrees Centigrade in the west wind, and it was stillgoing down.

  Jan reached the edge of a crack that made further progress seemimpossible. A hundred meters wide, of unknown depth, it stretched out ofsight in both directions. For the first time he entertained seriousdoubts that Den Hoorn could be crossed by land.

  After a moment's hesitation, he swung the groundcar northward and racedalong the edge of the chasm as fast as the car would negotiate theterrain. He looked anxiously at his watch. Nearly three hours had passedsince he left Oostpoort. He had seven hours to go and he was still atleast 16 kilometers from Rathole. His pipe was out, but he could nottake his hands from the wheel to refill it.

  He had driven at least eight kilometers before he realized that thecrack was narrowing. At least as far again, the two edges came together,but not at the same level. A sheer cliff three meters high now barredhis passage. He drove on.

  * * * * *

  Apparently it was the result of an old quake. He found a spot whererocks had tumbled down, making a steep, rough ramp up the break. Hedrove up it and turned back southwestward.

  He made it just in time. He had driven less than three hundred meterswhen a quake more severe than any of the others struck. Suddenly behindhim the break reversed itself, so that where he had climbed up comingwestward he would now have to climb a cliff of equal height returningeastward.

  The ground heaved and buckled like a tempestuous sea. Rocks rolled andleaped through the air, several large ones striking the groundcar withominous force. The car staggered forward on its giant wheels like adrunken man. The quake was so violent that at one time the vehicle washurled several meters sideways, and almost overturned. And the windsmashed down on it unrelentingly.

  The quake lasted for several minutes, during which Jan was able to makeno progress at all and struggled only to keep the groundcar upright.Then, in unison, both earthquake and wind died to absolute quiescence.

  Jan made use of this calm to step down on the accelerator and send thegroundcar sp
eeding forward. The terrain was easier here, nearing thewestern edge of Den Hoorn, and he covered several kilometers before thewind struck again, cutting his speed down considerably. He judged hemust be nearing Rathole.

  Not long thereafter, he rounded an outcropping of rock and it lay beforehim.

  A wave of nostalgia swept over him. Back at Oostpoort, the power wasnuclear, but this little settlement made use of the cheapest, mostobviously available power source. It was dotted with more than a dozenwindmills.

  Windmills! Tears came to Jan's eyes. For a moment, he was carried backto the flat lands around 's Gravenhage. For a moment he was atow-headed, round-eyed boy again, clumping in wooden shoes along theedge of the tulip fields.

  But there were no canals here. The flat land, stretching into thedarkening west, was spotted with patches of cactus and leather-leavedVenerian plants. Amid the windmills, low