Read Online The Heaven Makers by Frank Herbert - Free Book Online Page B

say: ‘May I kiss you?’” she said. “And I used to say: ‘I was hoping you’d ask.’”
    Ruth turned, pressed against him, lifted her face. His fears, the vague pressure, all were forgotten as he bent to kiss her. It seemed for a moment that time had moved backward, that Denver, Nev—none of these things had happened. But the warmth of her kiss, the demanding way her body pressed against him—these filled him with a mounting astonishment. He pulled away.
    “Ruth, I…”
    She put a finger against his lips. “Don’t say it.” Then: “Andy, didn’t you ever want to go to a motel with me?”
    “Hell! Lots of times, but…”
    “You’ve never made a real pass at me.”
    He felt that she was laughing at him and this brought anger into his voice. “I was in love with you!”
    “I know,” she whispered.
    “I didn’t want just a roll in the hay. I wanted…well, dammit, I wanted to mate with you, have children, the whole schmoo.”
    “What a fool I was,” she whispered.
    “Honey, what’re you going to do? Are you going to get… a…” He hesitated.
    “A divorce?” she asked. “Of course—afterward.”
    “After the… trial.”
    “Yes.”
    “That’s the trouble with a small town,” he said. “Everyone knows everyone else’s business even when it’s none of their business.”
    “For a psychologist, that’s a very involved sentence,” she said. She snuggled against him and they stood there silently while Thurlow remembered the vague pressure and probed for it in his mind as though it were a sore tooth. Yes, it was still there. When he relaxed his guard, a deep disquiet filled him.
    “I keep thinking about my mother,” Ruth said.
    “Oh?”
    “She loved my father, too.”
    Coldness settled in his stomach. He started to speak, remained silent as his eyes detected movement against the orange glow of clouds directly in front of him. An object settled out of the clouds and came to a hovering stop about a hundred yards away and slightly above their water-tank vantage point. Thurlow could define the thing’s shape against the background glow—four shimmering tubular legs beneath a fluorescing green dome. A rainbow circle of light whirled around the base of each leg.
    “Andy! You’re hurting me!”
    He realized he had locked his arms around her in a spasm of shock. Slowly, he released his grip.
    “Turn around,” he whispered. “Tell me what you see out there against the clouds.”
    She gave him a puzzled frown, turned to peer out toward the city. “Where?”
    “Slightly above us—straight ahead against the clouds.”
    “I don’t see anything.”
    The object began drifting nearer. Thurlow could distinguish figures behind the green dome. They moved in a dim, phosphorescent light. The rainbow glow beneath the thing’s tubular legs began to fade.
    “What’re you looking at?” Ruth asked. “What is it?”
    He felt her trembling beneath his hand on her shoulder. “Right there,” he said, pointing. “Look, right there.”
    She bent to stare along his arm. “I don’t see a thing—just clouds.”
    He wrenched off his glasses. “Here, look through these.” Even without the glasses, Thurlow could see the thing’s outline. It coasted along the edge of the hill-nearer… nearer.
    Ruth put on the glasses, looked where he pointed. “I… a dark blur of some kind,” she said. “It looks like… smoke or a cloud… or… insects. Is it a swarm of insects?”
    Thurlow’s mouth felt dry. There was a painful constricting sensation in his throat. He reclaimed his glasses, looked at the drifting object. The figures inside were quite distinct now. He counted five of them, the great staring eyes all focused on him.
    “Andy! What is it you see?”
    “You’re going to think I’m nuts.”
    “What is it?”
    He took a deep breath, described the object
    “Five men in it?”
    “Perhaps they’re men, but they’re very small. They look no more than three feet tall.”
    “Andy, you’re