"Really a wonderful place for your health. Dry, thin air, nice and cool
at night. And beautiful! From Marsport you can see low-slung mountains
in the distance, dunes of soft, red sand stretching out to them. If
I were you, Bob, I'd forget all about the Ozarks and sign up on the
rocket."
"There ain't any rockets going to Mars," McCleary said obstinately.
"Isn't," I corrected. "I mean, there is. Besides, McCleary, just
because you never heard of something doesn't mean it doesn't exist."
"The government's still working on V-2," McCleary said flatly. "They
haven't even reached the moon yet."
I sighed softly, acting disgusted at having to deal with somebody as
stupid as McCleary. "Mac, that's the government and besides they're
dealing with military rockets. And did you ever hear of the government
perfecting something before private industry? Who perfected the
telephone, the radio, television? The government? No, private industry,
of course! Private industry has always been ahead of the government on
everything, including rockets. Get on the stick, Mac."
McCleary started in on his lettuce leaf again, looking very shrewd.
"How come I never heard of it before now?" he asked, springing the
clincher argument.
"Look, Mac, this is relatively new. The company's just starting, can't
afford to take full-page ads and that sort of thing. Just give 'em
time, that's all. Why, a couple of years from now you'll be spending
your vacation on Venus or Jupiter or some place like that. From now on
California and the Bahamas will be strictly old hat."
McCleary looked half-believing.
"Where'd you get your tickets?"
I waved vaguely in the direction of downtown. "Oh, there must be at
least a couple of agencies downtown. Might even be able to find them in
the phone book. Look under _Interplanetary Rocket Lines_ or something
like that. You might have a little difficulty, of course. Like I say,
they're not too well advertised."
McCleary was about to say something more, but then the one o'clock bell
rang and we went back to the office grind.
* * * * *
Well, McCleary didn't say anything more about it the next day, even
though we'd throw in a chance comment about Mars every now and then, as
if it were the most natural thing in the world, but Mac didn't rise to
the bait. We gradually forgot about it.
The next couple of weeks came and went and then my two weeks in August.
Like I said before, my vacation dough had gone to pay the doctor, so I
stayed at home and watered the begonias.
The Monday morning after vacation, we were all back in the office, if
anything looking more fagged than we had when we left. When lunch time
rolled around, Donley and Young and I piled our lunches on Donley's
desk--his desk was near a window on the north side of the building
so we could get the breeze--and talked about what we had done during
vacation.
McCleary ambled up and like it usually does after McCleary comes
around, the conversation just naturally died down. After a two minute
silence I finally took the hook.
"Okay, Mac," I said, "I know you're just dying to tell us. Where did
you go?"
He almost looked surprised. "To Mars," he said, like he might have said
Aunt Minnie's.
The three of us looked blank for a minute and then we caught on. It
took us a while to recover from laughing and my sides were still aching
when I saw McCleary's face. It definitely had a hurt look on it.
"You don't think I did," he accused us.
"Oh, come off it, McCleary," I said crossly. "A gag's a gag, but it can
be carried too far. Where'd you go? California, Oregon, some place like
that?"
"I said I went to Mars," McCleary repeated hotly, "and I can prove it!"
"Sure," I said. "Like I can prove the world's flat and it's supported
by four elephants standing on a turtle's back like the old Greeks...."
I cut off. McCleary had thrown a couple of pasteboards on the desk and
I picked them up. The printing on it was like you see on a Pullman
ticket. It said something about a roomette, first-class passage on the
_Martian Prince_, for $154.75, and there was even a place where they
had the tax figured. In two blanks at the top of the ticket, they had
it filled out to _E. C. McCleary and wife_. The bottom half was torn
off, just like they do with train tickets.
"Very clever," I said, "but you shouldn't have gone to all that trouble
to have these printed up."
McCleary scowled and dropped a little bunch of kodachrome slides on the
desk. I took one and held it up to the light. It showed Mac and his
wife mounted on something that looked like a cross between a camel and
a zebra. They were at the top of a sand dune and in the distance you
could see the towers of a city. The funny thing was the towers looked a
little--but not much--like minarets and the sand dunes were colored a
beautiful pink.
I passed it on to Donley and Young and started leafing through the
rest. They were beautiful slides. McCleary and spouse in front of
various structures in a delicately tinted marble and crystal city.
McCleary in a pink-and-black boat on a canal that looked as wide as the
Mississippi. McCleary standing on a strangely carved sandstone parapet,
admiring a sunset caused by a sun looking half as big as ours. And
everywhere were the dunes of pink sand.
"Pictures can be faked, Mac," I said.
He looked hurt and got some things out of his desk--a sateen pillow
with scenes like those on his snapshots, an urn filled with pink sand,
a tiny boat like a gondola, only different, a letter opener made out
of peculiar bubbly pink glass. They were all stamped "Souvenir of
Mars" and that kind of junk you don't have made up for a gag. I know
mass-produced articles when I see them.
"We couldn't afford the first-class tour," McCleary said expansively,
"but I figure we can cover that next year." He turned to me puzzledly.
"I asked the passenger agent about the _Princess of Mars_ and he said
he had never heard of the ship. And it's Mars City, not Marsport.
Couldn't understand how you made a mistake."
"It was easy," I said weakly. I pointed to the pasteboard ducats.
"Where'd you get these, Mac?"
He waved generously in the direction of downtown. "Like you said,
there's a couple of agencies downtown...."
* * * * *
You know, sometimes I think we misjudged McCleary. It takes a while to
get to know a guy like Mac. Maybe his Louie _is_ brighter than Johnny,
and maybe his chugmobile _is_ something terrific.
For the last few years, all on account of Mac, my two weeks in August
have really been well spent Beautiful! Why, from Mars City you can
see low-slung mountains in the distance and dunes of soft, red sand
stretching out to them. And the sunsets when you're standing on the
parapets of that delicate crystal city.... And, man, fishing in the
Grand Canal....
How do you get to Mars? There's probably a couple of agencies in your
own town. You can look them up in your phone book under "Vacation at
the Planets of Pleasure" or something like that. They might be a little
difficult to find, though.
You see, they're not very well advertised yet.