The Stoker and the Stars Read online

wasn't carrying a weapon ofany kind. He was walking casually, taking his time.

  Mac and I had almost reached him when a Jek with insignia on hiscoveralls suddenly jumped down from his lift and came forward to meethim. It was an odd thing to see--the stoker, and the Jek, who did notstand as tall. MacReidie and I stepped back.

  The Jek was coal black, his scales glittering in the cold sunlight, hishatchet-face inscrutable. He stopped when the stoker was a few pacesaway. The stoker stopped, too. All the Jeks were watching him and payingno attention to anything else. The field might as well have been emptyexcept for those two.

  "They'll kill him. They'll kill him right now," MacReidie whispered.

  They ought to have. If I'd been a Jek, I would have thought that uniformwas a death warrant. But the Jek spoke to him:

  "Are you entitled to wear that?"

  "I was at this planet in '39. I was closer to your home world the yearbefore that," the stoker said. "I was captain of a destroyer. If I'd hada cruiser's range, I would have reached it." He looked at the Jek."Where were you?"

  "I was here when you were."

  "I want to speak to your ship's captain."

  "All right. I'll drive you over."

  The stoker nodded, and they walked over to his vehicle together. Theydrove away, toward the Jek ship.

  "All right, let's get back to work," another Jek said to MacReidie andmyself, and we went back to unloading cargo.

  * * * * *

  The stoker came back to our ship that night, without his duffelbag. Hefound me and said:

  "I'm signing off the ship. Going with the Jeks."

  MacReidie was with me. He said loudly: "What do you mean, you're goingwith the Jeks?"

  "I signed on their ship," the stoker said. "Stoking. They've got amicro-nuclear drive. It's been a while since I worked with one, but Ithink I'll make out all right, even with the screwball way they've gotit set up."

  "Huh?"

  The stoker shrugged. "Ships are ships, and physics is physics, no matterwhere you go. I'll make out."

  "What kind of a deal did you make with them? What do you think you're upto?"

  The stoker shook his head. "No deal. I signed on as a crewman. I'll do acrewman's work for a crewman's wages. I thought I'd wander around awhile. It ought to be interesting," he said.

  "On a Jek ship."

  "Anybody's ship. When I get to their home world, I'll probably ship outwith some people from farther on. Why not? It's honest work."

  MacReidie had no answer to that.

  "But--" I said.

  "What?" He looked at me as if he couldn't understand what might bebothering me, but I think perhaps he could.

  "Nothing," I said, and that was that, except MacReidie was always asourer man from that time up to as long as I knew him afterwards. Wetook off in the morning. The stoker had already left on the Jek ship,and it turned out he'd trained an apprentice boy to take his place.

  * * * * *

  It was strange how things became different for us, little by littleafter that. It was never anything you could put your finger on, but theJeks began taking more goods, and giving us things we needed when wetold them we wanted them. After a while, _Serenus_ was going a littledeeper into Jek territory, and when she wore out, the two replacementslet us trade with the Lud, too. Then it was the Nosurwey, and otherpeople beyond them, and things just got better for us, somehow.

  We heard about our stoker, occasionally. He shipped with the Lud, andthe Nosurwey, and some people beyond them, getting along, going to allkinds of places. Pay no attention to the precise red lines you see onthe star maps; nobody knows exactly what path he wandered from people topeople. Nobody could. He just kept signing on with whatever ship wasgoing deeper into the galaxy, going farther and farther. He messed withgreen shipmates and blue ones. One and two and three heads, tails, sixlegs--after all, ships are ships and they've all got to have somethingto push them along. If a man knows his business, why not? A man can liveon all kinds of food, if he wants to get used to it. And any nontoxicatmosphere will do, as long as there's enough oxygen in it.

  I don't know what he did, to make things so much better for us. I don'tknow if he did anything, but stoke their ships and, I suppose, fix themwhen they were in trouble. I wonder if he sang dirty songs in that badvoice of his, to people who couldn't possibly understand what the songswere about. All I know is, for some reason those people slowly begantreating us with respect. We changed, too, I think--I'm not the sameman I was ... I think--not altogether the same; I'm a captain now, withmaster's papers, and you won't find me in my cabin very often ...there's a kind of joy in standing on a bridge, looking out at the starsyou're moving toward. I wonder if it mightn't have kept my old captainout of that place he died in, finally, if he'd tried it.

  So, I don't know. The older I get, the less I know. The thing peopleremember the stoker for--the thing that makes him famous, and, I think,annoys him--I'm fairly sure is only incidental to what he really did. Ifhe did anything. If he meant to. I wish I could be sure of the exactanswer he found in the bottom of that last glass at the bar before heworked his passage to Mars and the _Serenus_, and began it all.

  So, I can't say what he ought to be famous for. But I suppose it'senough to know for sure that he was the first living being ever totravel all the way around the galaxy.

  THE END

  Transcriber's Note:

  This etext was produced from _Astounding Science Fiction_ February 1959. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note.

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