ASTEROID OF THE DAMNED

By DIRK WYLIE

Somewhere on that asteroid of sin lurked the crime king of the Universe.

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Summer 1942. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

"Sorry, son," MacCauley said with the barrel-scrapings of his patience. "I said no and I meant it. I haven't got anything to give you. Now please stop waggling at me and go."

The excited glitter of the Palladian's luminiferous eyes died dispiritedly. MacCauley turned his back on the slight-bodied asterite and rapped his thumbnail against his drained glass. The bartender, a heavy and humorous man, expertly refilled Mac's glass with oily, musky, milk-white synthetic liquor and said: "This Kiddie bothering you? Scat, you, or I'll see that you never get into this place again."

Mac shrugged as he watched the stripling strain to catch the bartender's meaning by reading his lips, then mournfully disappear. "No more than they all do," he answered. "What's the matter with them, anyhow? They're positively nutty on the subject of money."

The bartender shook his head and snatched a quick drag on a smoldering cigar-stub. Replacing it on a ledge, he said: "Not money so much. You couldn't bribe a Kiddie with a certified check for a couple of billion dollars. They're not bright, exactly; they don't regard paper as worth anything. It's metal they want. If it happens to be precious, that's all right, but any kind of metal will do. What they're really crazy about, of course, is silver and copper. They'll do just about anything for it, including murder and treason."

Mac, listening too intently, gulped a bit more of his drink than even his spaceman's gullet could take. When the red-hot lava stopped strangling him and he could see once more through the streaming fountains that had been his eyes, he managed to choke out: "What do they want it for? Do they eat it?"

The bartender laughed. "Nah. They don't really eat anything. They drink some kind of stuff they find in the rocks—like they used to find petroleum, on Earth. Radioactive, this stuff is. That's all they need to live on. They don't breathe at all. You can see that; they don't even have a mouth or a real nose, just a sort of trunk that they drink through.... Wait a minute. Be back."

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