Harry spent three years in space waiting
to get home to Earth--and his family. They were
waiting for him too--that is, for his corpse....
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
April 1954
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Captain Greene shook his shaggy head and studied Allerton with patient
eyes. "You're making a mistake," he said. "You'll be back."
The inside of the spaceship was quiet now, not with the silence of the
tomb, but with the silence of barely inaudible echoes as if Allerton
might still be able to hear the crew clomping about the companionways
on metal-shod feet if only he knew how to listen. He buried the notion
under the sweet anticipation of homecoming and said, "I don't think so,
Captain. This is what I want, right here." He tapped the comforting
bulk of his wallet, bulging the metallic cloth of his tunic.
He was a gaunt, comical figure of a man, so long and lean that he
stooped slightly at the waist and again at the shoulders, with a long,
down-tipped nose which almost seemed to meet the thin-lipped mouth as
he spoke. "What about you, Captain?" he said. He was still savoring the
joy of his own return, letting it build up inside him like a slow fire
fanned by barely enough air to keep it kindled. He hardly cared whether
Captain Greene disembarked or not, but the captain's unexpected lack
of enthusiasm was a splendid counter-point for his own emotions and he
wanted to wring every last drop of joy from his homecoming. "All the
men are gone," he went on. "This is Earth, Captain."
"I don't leave the ship much these days, Allerton. I've got to complete
the log, you know, then do a little advance astronauting for the trip
out. Anyway, none of the others are spacemen, Allerton. An old spacedog
like me can smell 'em a mile away--the real ones. You've got the
makings, all right."
"You won't see me aboard the _Eros_ again, though. I grew up in the
depression of the eighties, Captain. What I'm looking for is security.
I've got it right here--enough to start a business of my own and give
my kid the kind of education he needs these days. Three years is a
long time, but I tried to be a good spaceman."
"You were the best."
"Those kids running around after adventure, they'll be back. They're
made for this life. They're too young and having too much fun to start
thinking much about security. But now, you take me...."
"You'll have to make the decision yourself," Captain Greene
admitted, leaning back comfortably with a cigar and reaching for his
leather-bound log, his stubby fingers almost caressing the leaves with
a love nurtured on long familiarity. "We blast off in a week," he said.
"Enough time for you to decide, I guess."
"But I've already decided, sir." Allerton turned to go, stooping
forward even more than usual to fit through the low doorway which, like
anything else in the tight confines of a spaceship, was not made to
accommodate his gangling figure.
"Well, don't forget this. You're wrong about the others. They're not
for space, not the way you are. It's a common misconception. Good luck,
Allerton."
But Allerton was already on his way down the companionway with its
ghost-noises which he no longer could hear. He wondered what it really
took to make a man happy, truly happy over a sustained period. The
flitting stolen moments of a spaceman's life, he knew, could never be
for him. Yet outside the rain drummed down drearily on the gray apron
of the landing pit and washed over Allerton with an ineffable sadness.
* * * * *
The reporters were waiting for him down below, huddled together under a
bobbing sea of umbrellas. He failed to understand why anyone should be
waiting in the rain like that.
"I'm from the _Star-Herald_," one of the umbrella-shrouded faces told
him, the voice steady and without highlight, like the rain. "Have you
heard the news yet?"
"News?" demanded Allerton as he went down the ramp to the apron and was
soon swallowed up by the sea of umbrellas.
"You're Allerton, aren't you?"
An aisle was cleared as Allerton drew a slicker from his duffle and
pulled it across his shoulders. Flash-cameras glared briefly against
the dusky sky, making him blink his eyes uncomfortably.
"Yes, I'm Allerton, but I haven't heard any news."
It was a woman's voice this time, sharp and precise as a pencil point.
"The _Eros_ was gone for three years, Mr. Allerton, on a one year
trip. Sixteen months ago you were presumed to be lost. You were legally
dead a year ago."
"Here I am," said Allerton foolishly. "Here we are." He wished they
would all go away so he could check in at the administration building.
He thought that the copter-cabs might be grounded by the low ceiling
and realized his homecoming, two years tardy, would be delayed still
further because it would take him hours to get home to his wife and
son. "We had some trouble in the Jovian Moons," he said unnecessarily,
for the rest of the crew must have made that fact known by now.
"Really, I'm no hero."
It had been largely through Allerton's efforts, as noncommissioned
officer in charge of maintenance and repair, that the _Eros_ had
been able to blast off from Io at all. It was a moment he had not
considered, this hero's welcome. His picture and the story of his
exploits might appear on the video newscasts even before he reached
Nancy and the boy. But now that he had stooped low to be included
in the protection of the umbrellas, he could see the faces of the
reporters.
This was no hero's welcome. Allerton waited for what was to come with
a growing sense of the ridiculous. He had been almost ready to sign
autographs.
"Hasn't anyone told you your wife has re-married, Mr. Allerton?"
The rain marched across the umbrellas with incessantly scurrying feet.
The space below them was heavy with cigarette smoke, like a small,
poorly-ventilated room, and with the muted sound of many voices, keyed
low--anxious but objective. Allerton could almost see the scores of
pencils, ready to pounce upon the blank pages of the ruled pads and
scribble his name across the hemisphere, the world.
"What are you telling me?" demanded Allerton. He had heard. Even now
the words were etching themselves in his brain, stirring old memories,
conjuring impossible visions. This was the sort of thing you saw on the
video-casts and tch-tch'd about, then went upstairs with your wife and
took her in your arms and thought, are the people that happens to real?
"Mrs. Allerton was married again ten months ago. In an interview this
morning she said she was glad you were alive but loved her husband,
her new husband I mean, that is, the man she married because she
thought you were dead." It was the girl-reporter again, the brittle,
pencil-point quality gone from her voice.
Allerton subdued a wild impulse to say something flippant. Suddenly, it
was as if he had indeed died out there in space and now he was a ghost,
coming home to haunt people who wanted only to forget. The reporters
expected him to say something, though. Tell them that he had spent
three years in space, hating every minute of it, to find security for
his family? Tell them he had risked his life to repair the ship on Io
because if he failed the government insurance would provide for his
family? Tell them he was now dead, really dead as Nancy had thought,
and they were wasting their time interviewing a ghost?
"Have you any plans, Mr. Allerton?"
"I'm sorry, I didn't hear you." The rain had slackened. He heard his
own heart, hammering in his throat and ears.
"What are your plans for the future, Mr. Allerton? Are you going to
contest the marriage legally? Will you see your wife at all?"
"I don't know," said Allerton mechanically. "I don't know. I don't
know. I don't know." He pushed his way through the crowd of reporters,
a tall but stooped figure, averting his eyes from the umbrella ribs.
He had been married to Nancy only six months before shipping out, had
received word about the birth of their son at the last mail-station on
Ceres. If she sought the same security he wanted, he could not find it
in his heart to condemn her. He was dead. He had been waiting to live
all his life, but now he was dead.
* * * * *
"All right, spacer. On your feet. We're closing."
His bleary eyes squinted. _It was Johnny this and Johnny that and
Johnny_ ... Kipling? Someone?
"We got nothing against spacers here, only when we close, we close.
I'll make you something to eat if you want, but that's it."
"No. No, thank you."
"A bit too much to drink, eh?"
"I'll be O.K. I'm sorry if I--"
"Forget it. Here, let me help you to the door. Easy, now."
He was outside, the duffle balanced on his lean shoulder, the misty
drizzle chilling him at once, the wet sidewalk casting his reflection
and alternately swallowing and elongating his shadow as he made his way
down the street past the spaced lamplights.
Sooner or later, he would see her. He had to see her and the child, who
was now almost three years old. But what did you do, walk in the front
door and say hello Mrs. (name of new husband), I'm the man you used
to be married to? Perhaps, he thought, you wrote a letter instead, a
dear-John in reverse. But that way you did not get to see the boy.
Certainly, you saw none of your old friends. Tough luck, old fellow.
Something about more fish in the sea. Pat your back and introduce you
to two or three one-tracked-minded bachelor girls as the conquering
hero from Io and other faraway places. And you did not even venture
into the old neighborhood until you were ready for the quick sally, the
first visit to Nancy and the boy (and the new husband?) and departure.
Nancy loved her husband, the girl-reporter said. Nancy had loved him.
Simple logic: Nancy loved husbands, present tense. Security. What he
sought. Safe in a circumscribed world, in comfortable, middle-class
conformity, free and clear of all intrusions except the mortgage and
the payments on the new copter and scraped knees for junior.
He wondered how many bars he had visited, starting with the spaceport
administration building. There was a hazy recollection of copter-cabs
and surface-cabs, of smiling, vapid faces and other smiling faces,
not vapid, when the video-cast appeared on a television screen in
one of the bars and there he was, squinting against the flash-camera
glare, the rain seeping through the roof of umbrellas and rolling down
his long, gaunt face and off the thin, long, drooping nose. And then
someone recognized him or he recognized himself and drunkenly announced
his identity, he wasn't sure which, and someone had bought drinks for
everyone celebrating Allerton's return to blessed bachelorhood and they
all had a fine old time except Allerton who had soon taken his leave
and another cab and another bar.
Now the streets were familiar. There was the long, low bulk of the
pie-wedge supermarket, big and wide in front and tapering in the rear,
with great sweep of thermo-glass window staring at him and reflecting
him in the lamplight so he could stare at himself.
And there was the schoolyard playground, deserted now, the swings
wet and the teeter-totters dripping and the slicky-slide glistening.
What does a man think about when he's out in space and knows he
probably won't return? thought Allerton. About slicky-slides and a boy
hollering in glee with an unknown voice out of an unknown face. And
there were the apartment buildings, flanking their courtyard with
the look of solid strength that only brick can give in this age of
glass and plaster. He wondered if Nancy still had their old Republic
family-copter parked on the roof near the television antenna, and then
it suddenly occurred to him that Nancy might not be living here at all.
He wouldn't visit her, not yet. It was curiosity and not longing which
made him enter the courtyard and the lobby of the second building on
the left, past the dark, perfectly-cropped rows of California privet
which in another few months would lose their glossy leaves to the
coming of winter.
The illuminated dial of his wrist-watch told him it was 0230, hardly
the time to go calling on a woman and her new husband and a child
he had never seen. But there was the name, his name, opposite the
apartment number on the call-phone. Allerton, with a hyphen after
it, and the name Chambers. The widow Allerton lived here with her
new husband, the legally declared widow Allerton who probably still
received some mail and some callers under the old name but would one
day soon be able to take Allerton and the hyphen out and leave Chambers
alone. Nancy Chambers, his wife.
He pressed the buzzer and then drew back, startled. He was about
to leave the lobby and run out between the rows of privet and keep
on running when he heard his wife's voice, metallically, over the
call-phone. "Yes? Who is it?"
He walked back and stared at the rows of names and buzzers. "Harry," he
said.