"Well, there was the time our crew--before I had retired, of
course--made a crash landing there. We could survive in the vac-suits,
of course, but the _thlomots_ were after us almost at once. They go
mad over plastic. They will eat absolutely any sort of plastic. Our
vac-suits--"
"--were made of plastic," Matilda suggested. She did not understand a
thing he was talking about, but she felt she had better act bright.
"No, no. Must you interrupt? The air-hose and the water feed, these
were plastic. Not the rest of the suit. The point is that half of us
were destroyed before the rescue ship could come, and the remainder
were near death. I owe my life to the mimicry of a _flaak_ from Capella
III. It assumed the properties of plastic and led the _thlomots_ a
merry chase across the frozen surface of D VII. You travel in the Deneb
system now and Interstellar Ordinance makes it mandatory to carry
_flaaks_ with you. Excellent idea, really excellent."
* * * * *
Almost at once, Matilda's educational background should have told her
that Haron Gorka was mouthing gibberish. But on the other hand she
_wanted_ to believe in him and the result was that it took until now
for her to realize it.
"Stop making fun of me," she said.
"So, naturally, you'll see _flaaks_ all over that system--"
"Stop!"
"What's that? Making fun of you?" Haron Gorka's voice had been so
eager as he spoke, high-pitched, almost like a child's, and now he
seemed disappointed. He smiled, but it was a sad smile, a smile of
resignation, and he said, "Very well. I'm wrong again. You are the
sixth, and you're no better than the other five. Perhaps you are even
more outspoken. When you see my wife, tell her to come back. Again she
is right and I am wrong...."
Haron Gorka turned his back.
Matilda could do nothing but leave the room, walk back through the
house, go outside and get into her car. She noticed not without
surprise that the other five cars were now gone. She was the last of
Haron Gorka's guests to depart.
As she shifted into reverse and pulled out of the driveway, she saw
the servant leaving, too. Far down the road, he was walking slowly.
Then Haron Gorka had severed that relationship, too, and now he was all
alone.
As she drove back to town, the disappointment melted slowly away. There
were, of course, two alternatives. Either Haron Gorka was an eccentric
who enjoyed this sort of outlandish tomfoolery, or else he was plainly
insane. She could still picture him ranting on aimlessly to no one in
particular about places which had no existence outside of his mind, his
voice high-pitched and eager.
* * * * *
It was not until she had passed the small library building that she
remembered what she had promised the librarian. In her own way, the
aging woman would be as disappointed as Matilda, but a promise was a
promise, and Matilda turned the car in a wide U-turn and parked it
outside the library.
The woman sat at her desk as Matilda had remembered her, gray,
broom-stick figure, rigid. But now when she saw Matilda she perked up
visibly.
"Hello, my dear," she said.
"Hi."
"You're back a bit sooner than I expected. But, then, the other five
have returned, too, and I imagine your story will be similar."
"I don't know what they told you," Matilda said. "But this is what
happened to me."
She quickly then related everything which had happened, completely and
in detail. She did this first because it was a promise, and second
because she knew it would make her feel better.
"So," she finished, "Haron Gorka is either extremely eccentric or
insane. I'm sorry."
"He's neither," the librarian contradicted. "Perhaps he is slightly
eccentric by your standards, but really, my dear, he is neither."
"What do you mean?"
"Did he leave a message for his wife?"
"Why, yes. Yes, he did. But how did you know? Oh, I suppose he told the
five."
"No. He didn't. But you were the last and I thought he would give you a
message for his wife--"
Matilda didn't understand. She didn't understand at all, but she told
the little librarian what the message was. "He wanted her to return,"
she said.
The librarian nodded, a happy smile on her lips. "You wouldn't believe
me if I told you something."
"What's that?"
"I am Mrs. Gorka."
The librarian stood up and came around the desk. She opened a drawer
and took out her hat and perched it jauntily atop her gray hair. "You
see, my dear, Haron expects too much. He expects entirely too much."
Matilda did not say a word. One madman a day would be quite enough for
anybody, but here she found herself confronted with two.
"We've been tripping for centuries, visiting every habitable star
system from our home near Canopus. But Haron is too demanding. He
says I am a finicky traveler, that he could do much better alone, the
accommodations have to be just right for me, and so forth. When he
loses his temper, he tries to convince me that any number of females of
the particular planet would be more than thrilled if they were given
the opportunity just to listen to him.
"But he's wrong. It's a hard life for a woman. Someday--five thousand,
ten thousand years from now--I will convince him. And then we will
settle down on Canopus XIV and cultivate _torgas_. That would be so
nice--"
"I'm sure."
"Well, if Haron wants me back, then I have to go. Have a care, my dear.
If you marry, choose a home-body. I've had the experience and you've
seen my Haron for yourself."
And then the woman was gone. Numbly, Matilda walked to the doorway and
watched her angular figure disappear down the road. Of all the crazy
things....
Deneb and Capella and Canopus, these were stars. Add a number and you
might have a planet revolving about each star. Of all the insane--
They were mad, all right, and now Matilda wondered if, actually,
they were husband and wife. It could readily be; maybe the madness
was catching. Maybe if you thought too much about such things, such
travels, you could get that way. Of course, Herman represented the
other extreme, and Herman was even worse in his own way--but hereafter
Matilda would seek the happy medium.
And, above all else, she had had enough of her pen pal columns. They
were, she realized, for kids.
* * * * *
She ate dinner in Cedar Falls and then she went out to her car again,
preparing for the journey back home. The sun had set and it was a clear
night, and overhead the great broad sweep of the Milky Way was a pale
rainbow bridge in the sky.
Matilda paused. Off in the distance there was a glow on the horizon,
and that was the direction of Haron Gorka's place.
The glow increased; soon it was a bright red pulse pounding on the
horizon. It flickered. It flickered again, and finally it was gone.
The stars were white and brilliant in the clear country air. That was
why Matilda liked the country better than the city, particularly on a
clear summer night when you could see the span of the Milky Way.
But abruptly the stars and the Milky Way were paled by the brightest
shooting star Matilda had ever seen. It flashed suddenly and it
remained in view for a full second, searing a bright orange path across
the night sky.
Matilda gasped and ran into her car. She started the gears and pressed
the accelerator to the floor, keeping it there all the way home.
It was the first time she had ever seen a shooting star going _up_.