Mesmerica - Eric Frank Russell

Mesmerica - Eric Frank Russell, ebook, Temp

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MESMERICA
I had counted on twelve well-earned months amid the
soothingly familiar surroundings of Earth, but this was
another simple. sum that added up wrong. Some infernal
nosey-poke in an observatory saw fit to convince the powers-
that-be that possible pay-dirt existed in the region of
Cassiopeia. Whereupon a fist-full of telegrams went to all
the tried and trusted suckers requesting the pleasure of
their heart's blood.
Mine came at three o'clock in a warm, mellow afternoon
when I was busily occupied rocking on the verandah. Let
me tell you that's no sort of time or place in which to view
with approval an invitation to throw away one's arms and
legs. I felt like telling the bearer where to put his message
except that it wasn't his fault. So I read it and tore it up
and said to hell with it and went on rocking with my eyes
closed. Next day I packed and departed east to swallow the
bait solely because I lacked the moral courage to refuse it.
I hadn't enough guts to be a coward.
So that's why for the umpteenth time I stood by a port
moodily watching a new world swell into gigantic view.
Despite my lack of enthusiasm the sight became so absorbing
that I almost forgot to jump into harness before the
Marathon
played its Flettner trick preparatory to landing.
As it was, I made it in the nick of time. Came the
usual feeling of being turned inside-out and we were there.
My proper post was in the armoury, and there I stayed
while in the main cabin they chose the names of those
whose backsides were to be offered for any alien kicks that
might be coming. After previous experiences there wasn't
quite the same bumptious enthusiasm for hitting the dirt
without care, permission or weapons. Leastways, nobody
beat McNulty to the mark by crawling out through the
tubes this time.
The nearest observation-port framed a mass of vegetable
growths of every imaginable description. They had one
uncommon feature that struck me immediately, namely,
that nothing was tangled around anything else. Tall or
short, slender or wide-spreading, each growth stood in its
own appropriate plot of ground and let a thin spray of
sunlight reach the earth between its neighbours and itself.
A jungle that wasn't a jungle. One could stroll through it
without trouble so far as obstacles to one's feet were
concerned, though there might well be other and more
effective forms of opposition.
Green was the predominant colour with here and there
an odd patch of yellow or brown. The chlorophyll reaction
seems common to vegetation in most parts of the cosmos
where quality of solar radiation favours it. The sun's rays
showed golden where they struck through gaps between
growths. This world's primary closely resembled Old Sol
but was a trifle hotter because a little nearer.
I felt a bit uneasy as I studied the scene outside. This
strange live-and-let-live orderliness of plant-life registered
with an eerie touch of artificiality. I could distinguish no
organised regularity among the growths themselves, no
neat patches of one type or tidy rows of another. Nevertheless
I had a strong impression that they had been cultivated by
some thing or things with ideas radically different
from our own. It looked rather as though an alien agriculturalist
had mooched around with a sack of widely assorted
seeds, setting them at random just as his hand found them,
but carefully spacing them according to each one's individual
need. Like a man planting an oak twenty feet from a cabbage.
Brennand came along, remarked, "There appears to be a
deceitful law governing other worlds, to wit: that they look
completely innocent while making ready to bite your nut
off."
"You think this one is preparing some mayhem?"
"I don't know. But I'll lay no bets on it being a Garden
of Eden."
"Would you bet on it being a garden of some sort?"
"What d'you mean?" He eyed me curiously.
I pointed through the port. "Where's the usual battle for
living-space?"
He had a look outside. "That's an easy one. The ground
is poor hereabouts. It lacks fertility. So growth is sparse."
" How's that for being sparse? " I inquired, indicating a
hairy, cactus-like object half the size of the
Marathon
.
"The stuff grows too haphazardly, anyway," he evaded.
"You don't plant a carrot next to a gooseberry bush."
"Somebody else might."
"Why?
"Oh, heck!" I said, wearily. "Ask a simpler one. Ask
me why I'm here when I could be taking it happily and
comfortably at home."
" I know the answer to that," he gave back. "There's no
morning mail on the
Marathon
."
"So what?"
"Mail contains bills, threatening letters, even irate
missives from plump blondes asking what you're going to
do about it."
"Hah!" I eyed him carefully. "Judging others by yourself,
eh? I've often wondered why you shoot away from
Earth like a guy out of a cold bath. So you're being
hunted?"
"We are not talking about me," he pointed out. "We are
discussing you and your possible motivations. Mine are
simple - I like heavy money. These trips provide it"
A nice retort for that one lay ready on my tongue but
didn't get voiced. Two engineers named Ambrose and
MeFarlane arrived at the armoury and demanded their
stuff."
"Where are the others?" I inquired, handing out
needlers; first-aid packs, emergency rations and so forth.
"There aren't any others."
"Mean to say McNulty is sending out only the pair of
you?"
"That's right. Two can handle a lifeboat."
"The old boy is cautious," Brennand commented." He
becomes jumpier every trip.
"You fellows want spacesuits?"
"No." Ambrose nodded toward the port. "It's thirteen
pounds and has a faint fragrance of old goat, but it's
healthy."
"So that's what I've been smelling all along." I jerked
a suitably contemptuous thumb toward Brennand. "I
thought it was him."
"You thought it was
he
," said Brennand. "Where's
your grammar? "
McFarlane, a thin, wiry, ginger-haired individual, strapped
on his needler, flexed his arms, invited, "In case I don't
come back does anyone want to kiss me goodbye?" Then
he made a face, said, "Oh, well ---" and stamped out.
A couple of minutes later the lifeboat blew free, shot
westward and hammered into the distance. I could hear
the faraway noise of it for quite a time after it had gone
from sight.
Mooching along to see Steve Gregory, I found him squatting
in his cubby-hole and sucking his teeth.
"Anything doing, Steve?"
He ran a dismal eye over his instruments. "All I get is
a sizzle-pop." Then he gestured toward a thick book lying
near his right hand. " According to this Radio Koran it is
the characteristic discharge of a sun called Zem 27,
presumably the one burning outside."
"Nothing else?"
"Nary a thing:' Bending forward, he flipped a switch,
spoke toward a box. "Speak up, lifeboat we want to hear
from you."
A squeaky voice I couldn't recognise as either Ambrose's
or McFarlane's answered, "Forty-four west and eight
thousand up."
"See anything?"
"Nothing remarkable."
"Okay. Listening out." He leaned back. "I was under
the delusion that my last trip was my last trip. I was all
set to take it easy and bake my corns on the stove."
"Same here," I said. Maybe there's a curse on me. I
oughtn't have grabbed that guppy's opal."
"What guppy's opal? " He perked up, raised his eyebrows.
"Never mind. I've a dirty deed contaminating my past."
"Who hasn't? " he retorted. "Back in the good old days
on Venus I traded my birth certificate for a ---"
Something dinged amid his dials and meters. He flipped
a switch.
A voice said a bit louder than before, "Lifeboat here.
Seventy west and four thousand up. Circling over a large
lake. There's what looks like an encampment on the shore."
"Stand by a moment." Steve worked another switch, said
to his mike, "Captain, I've got Ambrose on. He thinks he's
found local life."
"Put him through to me," McNulty ordered.
Steve made the connection. We could hear ensuing
conversation through the intercom.
"What is it, Ambrose?"
"A camp on the shore of a lake."
"Ah! Who or what is occupying it?"
"Nobody," said Ambrose.
"Nobody? You mean it's deserted?"
"Wouldn't go so far as to say that, but that's how it looks
from up here. There are about a hundred small pyramidical
huts arranged in four concentric circles. Can't see anything
moving around between them." A pause, followed by; "How
about us landing and taking a closer look, Captain?"
McNulty didn't like it. The long silence showed him to be
mulling it over. Undoubtedly he was trying to think up a
way of getting the suggested closer look without going
closer to get it. I've never known a man so unwilling to
place bets on anything but a one hundred per cent
certainty. Finally his voice sounded with reduced volume
as he spoke in an aside to someone else.
"They want to land. What d'you think of it?"
"Nothing ventured, nothing gained," answered Jay Score's
deep tones.
"Yes, I suppose so, but" Another pause, then he
came louder over the intercom. "Look, Ambrose, is there
room for the
Marathon
to sit in that place?"
"Not without burning ten acres of bush or flattening half
the huts."
"Humph!" I'll tell you what : try zooming close over the
roofs a couple of times. That ought to bring them out
running."
Ambrose sighed and said; "Okay, Captain; we'll try it -
but I don't think there's anyone in the place to be brought
out" Silence for a long while before he came back with,
"No soap."
"They didn't appear?"
"No. We almost brushed the roofs off and our air-blast
shook the entire place. It's empty."
"Very well, then. Make your landing and see what you
can discover but be mighty careful:" His tones drifted away
again as he continued, "I tell you, Jay, that after this trip
some other commander can"
Steve cut the switch, said, " He's got the same trouble as
you and me. He's hankering for the Upsydaisy and the
regular Venus-run. We were in a nice comfortable rut
there."
"Somebody has to do the heroics," I said.
"I know, I know. But the glory ought to be shared
around. It can come one way too often."
He scowled at his instruments and Ambrose's voice came
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