Astounding Science Fiction (UK Edition) — page 28: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

26 money. But the slide was slow, and con- trolled, and manipulated only for the pur- pose of selling short. Terran Electric stock eventually remained in the hands of King- man’s crowd, though its value was lessened. I. C. Preferred hit four hundred and sixty-eight, and hovered. It vacillated around that point for another hour, and the market closed at four hundred and sixty-nine and three-eighths. Kingman looked at his watch and smiled. He reached forth and cut the dinning sound of the cacophony with a vicious twist of the gain knob. Silence reigned in the spaceship; grand, peaceful silence. Kingman, his nerves frayed by the mental activity, and the brain- addling music-from-nowhere, took a hot shower and went to bed. He locked the panel of the control room — first, however. He wanted no engineer tinkering with his pet relay. Cartright came into Channing’s living room with a long face. “It’s bad,” he said. “Bad.” “What’s bad?” “Oh I, like the rest of the fools, got caught in his trap.” ““Who’s trap?” “The wild man who is trying to rock Interplanetary Communications on its axis.” “Well, how?” “They started to buy like mad, and I held out. Then the thing dropped a few points, and I tried to take a bit of profit, so that we could go on bolstering the market. They grabbed off my stock, and then, just like that! the market was on the way up again and I couldn’t find more than a few odd shares to buy back.” “Don’t worry,” said Channing, “I don’t think anybody is big enough to really damage us. Someone is playing fast and loose, making a killing. When this is over, we'll still be in business.” “I know, Don, but whose business will it be? Ours, or theirs?” “Is it that bad?” ! “I’m afraid so. One more flurry like to- day, and they'll be able to tow Venus Equilateral out and make Mars Equilateral out of it, and we won’t be able to say a word.” “Hm-m-m. You aren’t t beaten?” “Not until the last drop. I'm not brag- ging when I say that I’m as good an oper- ator as the next. My trouble today was not being a mind reader. I'd been doing all right, so far. I’ve been letting them ride it up and down with little opposition, and ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION taking off a few here and there as I rode along. Guessing their purpose, I could count on their next move. But this banging the market sky-high has me stumped, or had me stumped for just long enough for me to throw our shirt into the ring. They took that quick—our shirt, I mean.” “That’s too bad. What are you leading up to.” “There are a lot of unstable stocks that a guy could really play hob with; therefore their only reason for picking on J. C. is to gain control!” “Pirates?” “Something like that.” “Weil,” said Channing in a resigned voice, “about all we can do is to do our best and hope we are smart: enough to outguess ‘em. That’s your job, Cartright. A long time ago I. C. made their decision concerning the executive branch of this company, and they elected to run the joint with technical men. The business aspects and all are under the control of men who know what they’re fighting. We hire business men, just like business men hire engineers, and for the Opposite purpose. You’re the best we could get, you know that. If those guys get Venus Equilateral, they'll get you too. But if you do your best and fail, we can’t shoot you in the back for it. We'll all go down to- gether. So keep pitching, and remember that we're behind you all the way!” “Can we float a bit of a loan?” “Sure, if it’s needed. I'd prefer Inter- planetary Transport if theyll do business with us. We’ve been in the way of helping them out a couple of million dollar losses; they might be anxious to reciprocate.” “O.K., I have your power of attorney anyway. If I get in a real crack, I'll scream for I. T. to help. Right?” “Right.” | Cartright left, and as he closed the door, Channing’s face took on a deep, long look. He was worried. He put his head between his hands and thought himself into a tight circle from which he could not escape. He did not hear Walt Franks enter behind Arden and Christine. “Hey!” said Walt. bear glad tidings!” Channing looked up. “Spill,” he said with a glum smile. “I could use some glad tidings right now.” “The lab just reported that that hunk of copper wire was impure. Got a couple of traces of other metals in it. They’ve been concocting: other samples with more and comiclooks “Why the gloom? I (©