Elizabeth Chater
The Treasure of Mars
Elizabeth Chater
Smashwords Edition
Published by Chater Publishing
“The Treasure of Mars” Copyright 1957 Elizabeth Chater
Originally published in Fantastic Universe Magazine under the name Lee Chaytor
Cover image by olly
Cover image by Michael Rosskothen
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This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to people living or dead is purely coincidental.
Chater Publishing would like to thank Jerry Chater for transcribing the following document.
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The Treasure of Mars
The creature who staggered into Hell’s Oven—the Hottest Little Town on Earth: Population 13—might have been human once. Oveners are used to seeing some pretty grim-looking things wander or crawl or creep in off the Badlands. When I first spotted this guy he was headed into town along the main and only street, which used to be the highway before the town got bypassed with the new Super-speedway. He was lurching and dragging his feet as if he was still ankle-deep in desert sand. Right opposite Doc Strood’s Medical Center and General Store, the stranger pitched forward onto his face, twitched a couple of times, and then lay still.
Everybody in Hell’s Oven knows what to do when some poor guy loses a round to the desert. I limped toward the latest victim as fast as was wise in 117 degrees of heat, trying to focus on him as I came; and considering that I was well hung over for the first time in a year, I didn’t do too badly. Tell you the truth, I didn’t feel so steady myself, what with Jace Denhet’s sour wine churning inside me, and me needing a shot of Doc’s “medicine” so bad. And I still had to explain the hangover to Clare.
Clare is my boss. She owns the only lunchroom in miles and the only clean motel, and me, if she wants me—which she doesn’t seem to. I sometimes feel like telling her that since she saved my life, she has an obligation. Then I look into those deep, steady gray eyes and see the pity in them, and I keep quiet.
Those eyes of hers were the first thing I saw, when I came to on the floor of Clare’s lunchroom the day I lost my bout with Ole Man Desert.
“Feeling better now?” Clare was saying, balancing my head in the crook of her warm, soft arm and holding a glass of cool water to my lips.
When I had drunk, “Where am I?” I said. Original thinker, that’s me every time.
Clare smiled. “You’re in Hell’s Oven.” Then, reassuringly, “Don’t worry. That’s just the name of the place. I found you out on the road.”
It came back to me. I was Bill Wallbridge, and I was just out of two years in a POW camp in Korea and my girl hadn’t waited and neither had my boss, so I just kept going when I got off the plane—drifting, drinking, losing my job, and hitchhiking to a new place . . . walking to the nearest exit till I dropped, apparently.
I remember I tried to tell Clare some of this—my name and the fact that I needed a job where there weren’t many people, when there came a pounding of heavy feet on the porch of the lunchroom and the door slammed open.
So I cringed into a ball right there on the floor. If you have been an uncooperative prisoner and been given the full treatment for two years, it’s automatic to protect as many vital organs as you can when the heavy boots come stamping in. Of course Clare couldn’t have been aware of my reasons. The big hulk in the doorway didn’t care. He just stood there, loose lipped and laughing, with his bold small eyes taking me in, and the girl on the floor beside me.
“Playing games?” he said.
Clare rose hastily. She didn’t wait for me to speak. “This poor fellow crawled in off the desert. Go and get Doc, will you please, Doubles?”
He didn’t answer her for a minute, just stood grinning and watching her till her cheeks got red.
“I asked you to bring the doctor here. This man is ill.”
Doubles kept looking at her for a little longer, then he turned without a glance at me and went out of the lunchroom. I tried to get up. Clare’s eyes were on me, troubled and disappointed. I shrugged. What was the use of trying to explain what two years of the Hole and boots and bamboo canes and magotty food can do to a man? But there was one thing I had to do. Before this doctor came and went through my stuff.
I reached inside my shirt and fumbled for my wallet. It was gone! Clare followed my gesture. She smiled and took something out of the pocket of her crisp white apron.
“Is this what you’re looking for? I found it on the road beside you.”
It was my wallet. When I shed my coat the day before, back there in the desert somewhere, I’d evidently had sense enough to transfer my wallet. Now I waved her hand away. “Use the money as long as it lasts, to pay for my keep. But burn the newspaper clippings, will you? I don’t want anyone to see them. Not even you.”
She frowned a little. I guess she was wondering if I was an escaped criminal. I didn’t want her to read those clippings—it might look like a bid for sympathy, and besides, that “hero” stuff didn’t fit in with the job of crawling I’d done when the guy Doubles stamped in. Anyway, Clare made up her mind. In my favor.
“No one shall see them. I promise. Now relax till Doc comes,” and her firm brown hands were on my arm, gently guiding me to a chair. That’s Clare. The money in my wallet didn’t last any longer than Doc’s first visit—he said I needed shots to kill the pain of the leg the guards broke and didn’t bother to set. He asked me how I got all the scars and why I hadn’t had my leg attended to, but I didn’t say. I wasn’t about to cry on anybody’s shoulder. When Clare saw where my money went, she offered me a job helping around her place. She didn’t like Doc and I think she was afraid of Doubles, but she went against their advice and hired me.
She’s been paying me more than I’m worth to do the cleanup jobs around the lunchroom and the motel. I sweep Doc’s store out and run errands for him, too. He’s got an eye for cheap labor, and besides he wanted to sell me some more shots of that medicine that killed the pain and made me forget. So I got what I wanted when I started drifting—easy work, no need to think, no need to talk to people. I limped around in the clear quiet heat of the little desert town, and kept out of Doubles’ way, and fell in love with a girl who pitied me.
Until lately, I was contented enough. Then Doc began to raise his price for the medicine I was spending my wages on, and without it, I began to lay awake nights with the pain gnawing on my leg. It got so bad that a couple of nights ago I bartered my watch for a jug of Jace Denhet’s home brew. Jace owns the garage where Doubles works. I’d been sleeping it off in a shed behind the garage—having sense enough not to let Clare see me like that. I knew I’d have some explaining to do to Clare, but right now all I wanted was a barrel of water to drink and soak my head in. And right then—as I stood weaving in the hot afternoon sunlight—was when I spotted the character staggering in off the desert.
I thought I knew how the guy felt, having done the same thing myself, so I made my way toward him where he sprawled in the road. He was game, give him credit. As I came up to him, he pulled his face up off the road and began to crawl forward on his hands and knees. Right then, I began to like him. You have to respect a guy who won’t give up.
I bent over to pick him up—and got my first shock. In all that heat, this character had on a fur coat! I shook my head to clear it and only blurred my eyes worse. Maybe he’d bailed out of one of those high-flying experimental jobs. Pilots have to wear some funny-looking suits to protect them from the cold and speeds. It figured. There was a big box like a walkie-talkie on his back. I went on my knee to scoop him up in my arms—he was a little guy. Second shock.
He came up like when you heave on a full barrel and it turns out to be empty. I almost reared over backwards. Then I got a look at his face. Third and worst shock. If I’d seen that mug last night, I’d have sworn off, sure. His skin was a shiny bronze with purple undertones like bruises all over it. It was drawn skull-tight, so tight that the lipless mouth pulled away from his teeth and his nose was two round holes. His eye sockets were perfectly round and sunken.
I closed my own eyes and swayed a little. The motion seemed to revive my passenger. From somewhere inside that barrel chest came a humming sound, aimless, vaguely pleasant; and then—
“Hic!”
“Brother, you’re tight!” I muttered, trying to grin. I sure must have been soaked, for my hallucinations to be drunk!