[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.]
There was nothing special about the little man who came into Larry's
place, unless it might have been his air of vague familiarity and the
mixed expression on his face. He looked disgusted and defensive and at
the same time a little resentful, with a dash of something else thrown
in which none of us recognized until later.
I'd have mistaken him for another reporter from the _Advertiser_
across the street if the five newsmen already at the bar hadn't given
each other a blank look that meant only one thing: none of them knew
him. Neither did Larry, who was trying to bring in the first broadcast
from Mars on the television set bracketed to the wall over his whiskey
stock, and who wasn't pleased at having his little after-hours party
crashed.
"The bar's closed," Larry said. His tone didn't invite argument. "City
ordinance. No customers after 1:00 a.m."
The little man looked at the clock, which said 3:15, and then at the
front windows which were shuttered tight. Then he looked at the six of
us sitting at the bar with our drinks.
"I'll have bourbon and water," he said. He sat down at the end of the
bar on the stool next to mine and looked at his reflection in the
mirror without approval.
Larry got the look that bartenders get with troublesome customers.
"The bar's closed," he said again. "It's a city--"
"Water on the side," the little man said. "Don't mix it."
Abe Marker, who does sports for the _Advertiser_, got up and checked
the front-door lock. The thumb-catch hadn't been thrown, so Abe put it
on and came back to the bar.
"Nobody else will wander in," he said. "Make with the t-v, Larry.
You're holding up the show."
Larry looked stubborn.
"It's after 1:00 a.m.," he said. "And that door was supposed to be
locked. There's a city ordinance--"
"You're breaking it already," the little man said, looking at us. He
didn't seem angry, just weary and disgusted. "Not that I give a damn.
All I want is a bourbon and water."
"Better give it to him, Larry," Willard Saxton said from down the bar.
Willard is the _Advertiser's_ science editor and is an authority on the
planets, especially Mars. "He'll probably turn you in if you throw him
out."
Larry muttered and looked mulish, but he rang up the little man's money
and gave him a bourbon and water. The little guy drank it and looked
at himself in the bar mirror with an expression that was just short
of being a sneer. Larry grunted and went back to fiddling with the
television set.
Abe Marker came over and sat down on the stool to my left.
"They're doing this all over town tonight," he said, explaining to the
little man across me. "The bars have to observe curfew as usual, but
most of them are letting a few regular customers stay late to see the
Marscast. Everybody is anxious to know what Colonel Sanderson and his
crew found up there, so--"
"They're going to be disappointed," the little man said. He sounded
sour but positive. "Mars ain't what people think it is, not by a hell
of a sight. It stinks."
We all looked up at that, and somebody snickered.
"Have you been to Mars, sir?"
The little man didn't seem to mind when we laughed.
"Maybe," he said, and shoved his shot glass forward. "Another bourbon,
bartender."
* * * * *
The station announcer came on screen then and told us what we already
knew, that contact with Colonel Sanderson's party was delayed because
of transmission difficulties. The Sanderson expedition would leave Mars
for Earth in two more days, when the current opposition was completed,
but in the meantime the program sponsors appreciated the interest shown
by their public and would relay the broadcast to us as soon as contact
was established.
A film cartoon featuring a lizard named Freddie came on next, and Larry
turned down the sound so he could hear orders for refills. The little
man drank his bourbon and water and sneered at his reflection in the
mirror; none of us paid him any further attention, but talk started up
again along the bar.
Somebody at the other end asked how long it took a television signal
to travel across all that space, and choked on his drink when Willard
Saxton told him.
"My God," he said when he stopped coughing. "You mean Mars is so far
away it takes three minutes just to _see_ it?"
All of us laughed at that but Larry and the little man at the end of
the bar.
"What I'm wondering," somebody else said, "Is how the colonel and his
boys feel after breathing nothing but canned air for a year."
"Maybe the air up there is better than our scientists think," Abe
Marker said. He winked at us and looked at the little man on my right.
"How about it, friend? Is the air good on Mars?"
"Breathable, but not good," the little guy said. "It smells like dead
fish."
Silence fell along the bar while we waited for a straight man to raise
his head.