The Collected Stories of Vernor Vinge Read Online Free Page A

driver squinted and moved his head from side to side as if to get a better view of Norman. “Say, you’re a monkey.”
    “No,” Norman stated proudly, forgetting his resolution, “I’m a chimpanzee.”
    “A talkin’ monkey,” the driver said almost to himself. “You could be worth plen … wherezhu say you wanna go … Marquette? Sure, hop in. That’s where I’m takin’ this ore.”
    Norman clambered up the entrance ladder into the warm cab. “Oh, thanks a lot.”
    The ore carrier began to pick up speed. The highway had been blasted through greenish bedrock, but it still made turns and had to climb over steep hills.
    The driver was expansive, “Can’t wait to finish this trip. This here is
my las’ run, ya know. No more drivin’ ore fer the government an’ its ‘Public Works Projects.’ I know where to get a couple black market fusion packs, see? Start my own trucking line. No one’ll ever guess where I get my power.” He swerved to avoid a natural abutment of greenish rock that appeared out of the mist, and decided that it was time to turn on his fog lights. His mind wandered back to prospects of future success, but along a different line. “Say, you like to talk, Monkey? You could make me a lot of money, ya know: ‘Jim Traly an’ His Talkin’ Monkey.’ Sounds good, eh?”
    With a start, Norman realized that he was listening to a drunk. The driver’s entire demeanor was almost identical to that of the fiend’s henchman in “The Mores of the Morgue.” Norman had no desire to be a “talkin’ monkey” for the likes of Traly, whose picture he now remembered in Social Security Records. The man was listed as an unstable, low competence type who might become violent if frustrated.
    As the ore carrier slowed for a particularly sharp turn, Norman decided that he could endure the cold of the outside for a few more minutes. He edged to the door and began to pull at its handle. “I think I better get off now, Mr. Traly.”
    The ore carrier slowed still more as the driver lunged across the seat and grabbed Norman by one of the purple suspenders that kept his orange Bermuda shorts up. A full grown chimpanzee is a match for most men, but the driver weighed nearly three hundred pounds and Norman was scared stiff. “You’re staying right here, see?” Traly shouted into Norman’s face, almost suffocating the chimpanzee in alcohol vapor. The driver transferred his grip to the scruff of Norman’s neck as he accelerated the carrier back to cruising speed.
    “CRASHED IN A SHALLOW SWAMP JUST BEYOND THE SECURITY FENCE, SIR.” The young Army captain held a book up to the viewer. “This copy of Asimov was all that was left in the cabin, but we dredged up some other books and a typewriter from the water. It’s only about five feet deep there.”
    “But where did the chim … the pilot go?” Pederson asked.
    “The pilot, sir?” The captain knew what the quarry was but was following the general’s line. “We have a man here from Special Forces who’s a tracker, sir. He says that the pilot left the Cub and waded ashore. From there, he tracked him through the brush to the old Ishpeming-Marquette road. He’s pretty sure that the … um … pilot hitched a ride in the direction of Marquette.” The captain did not mention how surprised the lieutenant from Special Forces had been by the pilot’s tracks. “He probably left the area about half an hour ago, sir.”
    “Very well, Captain. Set up a guard around the plane; if anyone gets
nosy, tell them that ORES has asked you to salvage their crashed Cub. Fly everything you found in the cabin and swamp back to Sawyer and have it sent down here to Files Central.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    Pederson cut the connection and began issuing detailed instructions to his chief aide over another circuit. Finally he turned back to Dunbar. “That chimp is not going to remain one step ahead of us for very much longer. I’ve alerted all the armed forces in the Upper Peninsula