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_A trumpet-tooter in love can be a wonderful sight, if Local 802
will forgive our saying so; when extraterrestrials get involved
too--oh brother! V. R. Francis, who lives in California and has
previously appeared in men's magazines, became 21 and sold to
FANTASTIC UNIVERSE all in the same week._
the
flying
cuspidors
_by ... V. R. Francis_
This was love, and what could be done about it?
It's been happening to guys for a long time, now.
Hotlips Grogan may not be as handsome and good-looking like me or as
brainy and intellectual, but in this fiscal year of 2056 he is the
gonest trumpet-tooter this side of Alpha Centauri. You would know what I
mean right off if you ever hear him give out with "Stars Fell on Venus,"
or "Martian Love Song," or "Shine On, Harvest Luna." Believe me, it is
out of this world. He is not only hot, he is radioactive. On a clear day
he is playing notes you cannot hear without you are wearing special
equipment.
That is for a fact.
Mostly he is a good man--cool, solid, and in the warp. But one night he
is playing strictly in three or four wrong keys.
I am the ivory man for this elite bunch of musicians, and I am scooping
up my three-dee music from the battered electronic eighty-eight when he
comes over looking plenty worried.
"Eddie," he says, "I got a problem."
"You got a problem, all right," I tell him. "You are not getting a job
selling Venusian fish, the way you play today."
He frowns. "It is pretty bad, I suppose."
"Bad is not the word," I say, but I spare his feelings and do not say
the word it is. "What gives?"
He looks around him, careful to see if anybody in the place is close
enough to hear. But it is only afternoon rehearsal on the gambling ship
_Saturn_, and the waiters are busy mopping up the floor and leaning on
their long-handled sterilizers, and the boys in the band are picking up
their music to go down to Earth to get some shut-eye or maybe an atomic
beer or two before we open that night.
Hotlips Grogan leans over and whispers in my ear. "It is the thrush," he
says.
"The thrush?" I say, loud, before he clamps one of his big hands over my
kisser. "The thrush," I say, softer; "you mean the canary?"
He waves his arms like a bird. "Thrush, canary--I mean Stella
Starlight."
For a minute I stand with my mouth open and think of this. Then I rubber
for the ninety-seventh time at the female warbler, who is standing
talking to Frankie, the band leader. She is a thrush new to the band and
plenty cute--a blonde, with everything where it is supposed to be, and
maybe a little extra helping in a couple spots. I give her my usual
approving once-over, just in case I miss something the last ninety-six
approving once-overs I give her.
"What about her?" I say.
"It is her fault I play like I do," Hotlips Grogan tells me sadly. "Come
on. Leave us go guzzle a beer and I will tell you about it."
Just then Frankie comes over, looking nasty like as usual, and he says
to Grogan, "You are not playing too well today, Hotlips. Maybe you hurt
your lip on a beer bottle, huh?"
As usual also, his tone is pretty short on sweetness and light, and I do
not see why Grogan, who looks something like a gorilla's mother-in-law,
takes such guff from a beanpole like Frankie.
But Grogan only says, "I think something is wrong with my trumpet. I
have it fixed before tonight."
Frankie smirks. "Do that," he says, looking like a grinning weasel. "We
want you to play for dancing, not for calling in Martian moose."
Frankie walks away, and Hotlips shrugs.
"Leave us get our beer," he says simply, and we go to the ferry.
We pile into the space-ferry with the other musicians and anyone else
who is going down to dirty old terra firma, and when everybody who is
going aboard is aboard, the doors close, and the ferry drifts into
space. Hotlips and I find seats, and we look back at the gambling ship.
It is a thrill you do not get used to, no matter how many times you see
it.
The sailor boys who build the _Saturn_--they give it the handle of
_Satellite II_ then--would not know their baby now, Frankie does such a
good job of revamping it. Of course, it is not used as a gambling ship
then--at least not altogether, if you know what I mean. Way back in 1998
when they get it in the sky, they are more interested in it being useful
than pretty; anybody that got nasty and unsanitary ideas just forgot
them when they saw that iron casket floating in a sky that could be
filled with hydrogen bombs or old laundry without so much as a four-bar
intro as warning.
Frankie buys _Satellite II_ at a war surplus sale when moon flights
become as easy as commuters' trips, and he smoothes out its shape so it
looks like an egg and then puts a fin around it for ships to land on.
After that, it does not take much imagination to call it the _Saturn_.
Then he gets his Western Hemisphere license and opens for business.
My daydreaming stops, for suddenly Hotlips is grabbing my arm and
pointing out the window.
"What for are you grabbing my arm and waving your fist at the window,
Hotlips?" I inquire politely of him.
"Eddie," he whispers, all nervous and excited from something, "I see
one."