[Illustration]
It all began on a Saturday night at _The Space Room_. If you've seen
any recent Martian travel folders, you know the place: "A picturesque
oasis of old Martian charm, situated on the beauteous Grand Canal in
the heart of Marsport. Only half a mile from historic Chandler Field,
landing site of the first Martian expedition nearly fifty years ago in
1990. A visitor to the hotel, lunch room or cocktail lounge will
thrill at the sight of hardy space pioneers mingling side by side with
colorful Martian tribesmen. An evening at _The Space Room_ is an
amazing, unforgettable experience."
Of course, the folders neglect to add that the most amazing aspect is
the scent of the Canal's stagnant water--and that the most
unforgettable experience is seeing the "root-of-all-evil" evaporate
from your pocketbook like snow from the Great Red Desert.
We were sitting on the bandstand of the candle-lit cocktail lounge.
Me--Jimmie Stanley--and my four-piece combo. Maybe you've seen our
motto back on Earth: "The Hottest Music This Side of Mercury."
But there weren't four of us tonight. Only three. Ziggy, our bass
fiddle man, had nearly sliced off two fingers while opening a can of
Saturnian ice-fish, thus decreasing the number of our personnel by a
tragic twenty-five per cent.
Which was why Ke-teeli, our boss, was descending upon us with all the
grace of an enraged Venusian vinosaur.
"Where ees museek?" he shrilled in his nasal tenor. He was almost
skeleton thin, like most Martians, and so tall that if he fell down
he'd be half way home.
I gulped. "Our bass man can't be here, but we've called the Marsport
local for another. He'll be here any minute."
Ke-teeli, sometimes referred to as Goon-Face and The Eye, leered
coldly down at me from his eight-foot-three. His eyes were like black
needle points set deep in a mask of dry, ancient, reddish leather.
"Ees no feedle man, ees no job," he squeaked.
I sighed. This was the week our contract ended. Goon-Face had
displayed little enough enthusiasm for our music as it was. His
comments were either, "Ees too loud, too fast," or "Ees too slow, too
soft." The real cause of his concern being, I suspected, the
infrequency with which his cash register tinkled.
"But," I added, "even if the new man doesn't come, _we're_ still here.
We'll play for you." I glanced at the conglomeration of uniformed
spacemen, white-suited tourists, and loin-clothed natives who sat at
ancient stone tables. "You wouldn't want to disappoint your customers,
would you?"
Ke-teeli snorted. "Maybe ees better dey be deesappointed. Ees better
no museek den bad museek."
Fat Boy, our clarinetist who doubles on Martian horn-harp, made a
feeble attempt at optimism. "Don't worry, Mr. Ke-teeli. That new bass
man will be here."
"Sure," said Hammer-Head, our red-haired vibro-drummer. "I think I
hear him coming now."
Suspiciously, Ke-teeli eyed the entrance. There was only silence. His
naked, parchment-like chest swelled as if it were an expanding
balloon.
"Five meenutes!" he shrieked. "Eef no feedle, den you go!" And he
whirled away.
We waited.
Fat Boy's two hundred and eighty-odd pounds were drooped over his
chair like the blubber of an exhausted, beach-stranded whale.
"Well," he muttered, "there's always the uranium pits of Neptune.
Course, you don't live more than five years there--"
"Maybe we could make it back to Lunar City," suggested Hammer-Head.
"Using what for fare?" I asked. "Your brains?"
Hammer-Head groaned. "No. I guess it'll have to be the black pits of
Neptune. The home of washed-up interplanetary musicians. It's too
bad. We're so young, too."
The seconds swept by. Ke-teeli was casting his razor-edged glare in
our direction. I brushed the chewed finger nails from the keyboard of
my electronic piano.
Then it happened.
* * * * *
From the entrance of _The Space Room_ came a thumping and a grating
and a banging. Suddenly, sweeping across the dance floor like a cold
wind, was a bass fiddle, an enormous black monstrosity, a refugee from
a pawnbroker's attic. It was queerly shaped. It was too tall, too
wide. It was more like a monstrous, midnight-black hour-glass than a
bass.
The fiddle was not unaccompanied as I'd first imagined. Behind it,
streaking over the floor in a waltz of agony, was a little guy, an
animated matchstick with a flat, broad face that seemed to have been
compressed in a vice. His sandcolored mop of hair reminded me of a
field of dry grass, the long strands forming loops that flanked the
sides of his face.
His pale blue eyes were watery, like twin pools of fog. His
tightfitting suit, as black as the bass, was something off a park
bench. It was impossible to guess his age. He could have been anywhere
between twenty and forty.
The bass thumped down upon the bandstand.
"Hello," he puffed. "I'm John Smith, from the Marsport union." He
spoke shrilly and rapidly, as if anxious to conclude the routine of
introductions. "I'm sorry I'm late, but I was working on my plan."
A moment's silence.
"Your plan?" I echoed at last.
"How to get back home," he snapped as if I should have known it
already.
Hummm, I thought.
My gaze turned to the dance floor. Goon-Face had his eyes on us, and
they were as cold as six Indians going South.
"We'll talk about your plan at intermission," I said, shivering. "Now,
we'd better start playing. John, do you know _On An Asteroid With
You_?"
"I know _everything_," said John Smith.
I turned to my piano with a shudder. I didn't dare look at that
horrible fiddle again. I didn't dare think what kind of soul-chilling
tones might emerge from its ancient depths.
And I didn't dare look again at the second monstrosity, the one named
John Smith. I closed my eyes and plunged into a four-bar intro.
Hammer-Head joined in on vibro-drums and Fat Boy on clarinet, and
then--
My eyes burst open. A shiver coursed down my spine like gigantic mice
feet.
The tones that surged from that monstrous bass were ecstatic. They
were out of a jazzman's Heaven. They were great rolling clouds that
seemed to envelop the entire universe with their vibrance. They held a
depth and a volume and a richness that were astounding, that were like
no others I'd ever heard.
First they went _Boom-de-boom-de-boom-de-boom_, and then,
_boom-de-de-boom-de-de-boom-de-de-boom_, just like the tones of all
bass fiddles.
But there was something else, too. There were overtones, so that John
wasn't just playing a single note, but a whole chord with each beat.
And the fullness, the depth of those incredible chords actually set my
blood tingling. I could _feel_ the tingling just as one can feel the
vibration of a plucked guitar string.
I glanced at the cash customers. They looked like weary warriors
getting their first glimpse of Valhalla. Gap-jawed and wide-eyed, they
seemed in a kind of ecstatic hypnosis. Even the silent, bland-faced
Martians stopped sipping their wine-syrup and nodded their dark heads
in time with the rhythm.
I looked at The Eye. The transformation of his gaunt features was
miraculous. Shadows of gloom dissolved and were replaced by a
black-toothed, crescent-shaped smile of delight. His eyes shone like
those of a kid seeing Santa Claus.
We finished _On An Asteroid With You_, modulated into _Sweet Sally
from Saturn_ and finished with _Tighten Your Lips on Titan_.
We waited for the applause of the Earth people and the shrilling of
the Martians to die down. Then I turned to John and his fiddle.
"If I didn't hear it," I gasped, "I wouldn't believe it!"
"And the fiddle's so old, too!" added Hammer-Head who, although sober,
seemed quite drunk.
"Old?" said John Smith. "Of course it's old. It's over five thousand
years old. I was lucky to find it in a pawnshop. Only it's not a
fiddle but a _Zloomph_. This is the only one in existence." He patted
the thing tenderly. "I tried the hole in it but it isn't the right
one."
I wondered what the hell he was talking about. I studied the black,
mirror-like wood. The aperture in the vesonator was like that of any
bass fiddle.
"Isn't right for what?" I had to ask.
He turned his sad eyes to me. "For going home," he said.
Hummm, I thought.
* * * * *
We played. Tune after tune. John knew them all, from the latest pop
melodies to a swing version of the classic _Rhapsody of The Stars_. He
was a quiet guy during the next couple of hours, and getting more than
a few words from him seemed as hard as extracting a tooth. He'd stand
by his fiddle--I mean, his _Zloomph_--with a dreamy expression in
those watery eyes, staring at nothing.
But after one number he studied Fat Boy's clarinet for a moment. "Nice
clarinet," he mused. "Has an unusual hole in the front."
Fat Boy scratched the back of his head. "You--you mean here? Where the
music comes out?"