As this went on, the rant turning from a monologue into a duet when Mr Hardcastle, who disliked having his hospitality spurned, not to mention a natural objection to getting a face-full of mixed whisky, soda and spit, let alone seeing one of his best crystal tumblers bite, as it were, the dust, started to upbraid his guest, which only made things worse, for there was nothing the Engineer liked better than a chance to have a good row about one of his hobby horses, Clarissa Bertram decided to take pity on the (as she thought) poor, lonely small green person, who was (as she thought) looking so pathetic and lost with nobody was speaking to him. Of course, he was actually looking pathetic and lost because he had thought they were there to size up Mr Hardcastle as a possible candidate for their services, not to reprimand him for his attitude to issues of human health (a subject that had never been of very great interest to the small green person, who found humans, on the whole, pretty boring), but Clarissa wasn’t to know that, so tapping him gently on the arm, she said “I’m sorry, we weren’t introduced properly Mr, er, well actually I don’t know your name.” “That,” replied the small green person, “Is because I don’t have one. Members of my species don’t need names, you see because...” but Clarissa interrupted, saying “Gosh, I had no idea things were so different in Wales. So what can I call you, then?” The small green person wasn’t sure what to say: most people called him ‘Science officer’, apart from the Admiral, and what she called him (‘Wankstain’) wasn’t really something he wished to share, so he just sat there with his mouth opening and closing, trying to think of something plausible, until Clarissa got bored and said “Well, anyway, Rachel” (indicating the other young woman) “and I were just talking about the new star; weren’t we Rachel?”
Rachel concurred and then Clarissa was off again: “It’s so beautiful, isn’t it, the way it hangs up there in the sky, hovering over us like a great glowing light.” Of course, she was being poetic, but the small green person wasn’t to know that (for he was a Science Officer, and he didn’t do poetry), so he said “But that’s nonsense” and while Clarissa drew in a shocked breath and gazed at him in awe (for she was not used to men paying sufficient attention to her to actually condemn what she said as being nonsense; usually they just laughed and ignored her or told her she’d grow out of that kind of thing once she’d got a husband and some children) he continued “Anybody who knows anything about celestial mechanics, and who doesn’t, ought to know that a star can only appear to be fixed above a point on the planetary surface if it’s above one of the rotational poles, and I can assure you, Madam, that we are not at one of them.” Clarissa didn’t know what to say: she was still marvelling at the amazing experience of being taken seriously, but Rachel Hardcastle, who was not conflicted by strange emotions, felt able to stick her oar in and say “What about the Star of Bethlehem, then?” Clarissa recovered nicely, and, apparently purely be chance, allowing one of her hands to come to rest on the strangely polydactyloid hand of the small green person, wittered “Yes, indeed, I was thinking how lovely it was that we have this new star of ours now, and can experience for ourselves what it was like back in those ancient times.” The small green person was now deeply confused, as well as disturbed by the uncalled for physical contact. As he said, “I have a perfect memory, and I don’t remember any star called Bethlehem. There’s Betelgeuse, and Beta Draconis, but no Bethlehem. So which star is this you are speaking of?” Now it was Clarissa’s turn to be deeply confused, for as she put it “But surely you know the Nativity story?” it being inconceivable to her that, even in Wales, people could be so astoundingly ignorant as to not have had the whole thing drummed into them at Sunday School. However, the small green person was adamant. “There are four billion people on this planet of yours,” he said, “and you can scarcely expect me to know the life history of all of them. It’s quite bad enough” he added, “when her ladyship insists on sharing the latest birth memories her shrink has recovered for her, without being expected to know about any more.”
Now, Clarissa had no idea what the last bit meant, except possibly that Lady Diana Prestbury had a more outré lifestyle than she had previously thought, which was an exciting piece of gossip to salt away for future use, but not very salient to the current conversation, the key point of which being the small green person’s admission that he knew naught of the Nativity. So obviously, there was only one path open to her: she told him, staring deep into his yellowish eyes while she did so. And almost immediately she ran into problems because he had difficulty with the whole concept of ‘Our Lord’, insisting that there wasn’t anybody of that description within six light-years (whatever they were) and did she mean the Admiral? When she tried to explain that no, Our Lord was greater than any Admiral, and had power over all mankind, the power to punish sin and forgive penitents, the whole discussion just got more involved because the small green person insisted that that was precisely what the Admiral did, so that must be who she meant, and if so, when had she met her? Clarissa, feeling her sanity beginning to wobble on its pedestal, decided to just jump to the story proper, going through the whole thing with the annunciation (“There, I told you it was the Admiral,” said the small green person, “She really goes for the young, innocent type”), the trip to Bethlehem (“But I told you, there’s no such place”), the manger, the shepherds and “the great star which brought Magi, wise men from abroad to the bed-side of our Saviour” as she triumphantly rounded the whole thing off.
Of course, from the perspective of the small green person, hearing Clarissa talk about wise people coming from far away in a star, there was one very obvious interpretation to place on her tale. It was not the one Clarissa would have chosen, not even one she would have thought possible, but then she was not a small green person and a Science Officer to boot, and so she didn’t understand why her (as she thought) tale of Christmas joy and God’s love for mankind should make him (the small green person, that is, not God) so very nervous that he might even be said to be on the verge of panic. She was about to enquire as to what might be the matter, when the small green person leaped from his seat, turned to the Engineer and cried out “We’re in trouble; they’re onto us; we’ve got to get out of here!” Unfortunately for the small green person, the Engineer was giving Mr Hardcastle a graphic description of what cirrhosis did to the liver and was far too busy to pay attention to his colleague. Unfortunate for the small green person, but fortunate for Clarissa, for on hearing this nice man threaten to leave when they were only just beginning to get acquainted she had felt all miserable inside. As it is, she rose and, daringly, took the opportunity to stand almost touching the small green person, saying “Oh dear, what’s the matter, did I upset you?” He, opting for damage control, given that instant flight was clearly not an option, said “These wise men; you know who they were, don’t you?” and she said “Of course, they came to see the one who was sent to us from above.” This, of course, made the small green person even more convinced that Clarissa knew more that she ought: if she knew that people came from above then he needed to neutralise this risk to the mission as quickly as possible. The time for pretence was past. “So you see,” he said, “that means it wasn’t a star at all; it must have been the ship they came in.” Clarissa laughed happily: so that was why he was confused. “Don’t be silly,” she said, “everybody knows they came on camels.” “Well, maybe it was a Camel Class ship”, said the small green person, “but that doesn’t change the fact that what you call a star was their ship.” “But,” said Clarissa, who was getting pretty confused by this herself now, “they couldn’t have come in a ship, because they were in the middle of the desert. And anyway, ships float in the sea, not in the air. Oh, wait a minute,” she added, a sudden brainwave hitting her, “do you mean an airship?” That wasn’t quite what the small green person had meant, but he felt that it would do as, at least, a first approximation to the truth he was trying to impart, so he nodded and said “Yes, that’s it, an airship. And if you think about it, as we’re on a rota
ting ball, a star couldn’t keep up with one place, could it? It would have to be a ship in orbit? You know, like the Moon? You understand that, don’t you?”
Clarissa was struck dumb. Not only had this amazing small green person taken her seriously, but now he was actually asking her to use her intellect. This had never happened to her before; men assumed that because she was young and female she was just a mindless potential baby-making machine, and they were more likely to be concerned about her pedigree, as if she were a stock beast they were haggling over at the cattle market, than her mind or anything else which truly identified her as an individual and not just something produced out of a mould. Even her fiancée, though she told herself she loved him dearly, treated her as if she were somehow generic, and, if he had to refer to it at all, treated her going to Cambridge and her mathematical studies there as a bit of a joke, something she would have to grow out of before settling down to the serious business of managing his house and bearing his heirs. But this small green person, though rather odd in that most of the people she had met before had somewhat fewer fingers, and more in the way of a nose, and a pinkish rather than a greenish complexion, wanted to reason with her; he did not treat her intellect as something somehow distasteful, but was demanding that she use it. She was positively smitten, and began to wish she had chosen to wear something a bit more revealing when getting dressed this morning. Her functional blouse, long skirt and flat, sensible shoes seemed, suddenly, quite inappropriate for the occasion. However, necessity was the mother of invention, and so, surreptitiously undoing a couple of buttons, she took in a deep breath, leaned towards the small green person to make sure he got a good view of what was thereby revealed, and said, breathily, “But how could it stay still? The Moon goes round and round, like we go round the Sun.” He was disconcerted at having these heaving (and, to him, hideous) mounds of flesh revealed unto him, but, being a scientist, was able to focus on the key point, which was that she was finally showing some sign of understanding, albeit flawed, so he said “Oh I’m sure you can calculate for yourself the parameters needed for an orbital period to match a planet’s rotational period.”
That did it; Clarissa was in love. Screw David Barton. Had he ever expressed confidence in her ability to solve complex equations? No, he had just laughed at her for going to Cambridge and made cruel jokes about it with his dim-witted friends. Had he ever thought of talking to her as if she were his intellectual equal, or, more likely, superior? No, he had just made it quite clear that there was something not quite nice about her being ‘brainy’. Had he ever turned pale (how was she to know it was with loathing?) at the mere touch of her flesh and sight of her womanly glories? No, he’d completely ignored her, at least in her opinion, rather good figure, and even had the nerve to point out that flat-chested freak Anne Beaconsfield as a ‘pretty girl’. In fact, now she came to think about it, Clarissa realised that before today, the only person who had ever reacted positively to her appearance was Lydia Marsden’s maid, and though what they had done together that special afternoon, while Lydia was downstairs writing poetry about suicide as was her wont, had been very pleasant, it was nothing, repeat nothing, compared to the pure bliss that filled Clarissa now, as she realised that finally she had found the one. Yes: she had to be with this small green person, no matter what it took. And that meant she had to prove herself to him, to show that she was worthy of his love. So, grasping a piece of paper and a pencil (and in the process taking the opportunity to undo all her remaining buttons), she leaped to work and, after mere minutes produced an equation of such crystalline beauty that even the small green person, when she shyly proffered him the paper bearing it, found it in himself to smile, despite being unable to avoid seeing more of her female, human anatomy than had been brought to his attention since the time that the Admiral had ordained it to be ‘dress down Friday’ and turned up on the bridge in the nude (and he had been carried out, in a faint, mere seconds later, so clearly Clarissa was growing on him, after all). “Well done,” he said, “you may have some merit after all, despite your unfortunate species.”
This was music to Clarissa’s ears (apart from the bit about the unfortunate species, which she simply didn’t understand, apart from possibly being an assertion, with which she now fully agreed, that people like Gerald Marsden and David Barton were a blot on the face of humanity), but there was something she had to know: was this to be her one and only meeting with her new love? Were they to be forever separated after this brief encounter? Was she to be left to pine and try to make do with one of the various County Males of her acquaintance, with nothing to brighten her life save the occasional tumble with Lydia Marsden’s maid, and joining Lydia in writing lugubrious poetry? Or was this only the beginning of a new and glorious phase of her existence in which she could find true happiness and fulfilment? She had to know, so she asked the obvious question: “When can I see you again?” and then stood, waiting on his answer with glittering eye, parted lips and bared bosom, a vision of beauty to all save the one person she currently cared most about. “Well,” replied the small green person, “We really aren’t planning to stay very long” and even he, with his limited understanding of human physiognomy could tell that something was wrong, for Clarissa’s face fell as she filled with woe surpassing all bounds, so he continued “But it’s nothing for you to be unhappy about. You see we’re looking for somebody, and we haven’t found them yet. We thought it would be Mr Hardcastle, but,” he glanced across to where Mr Hardcastle was threatening to give the Engineer a good thumping and the Engineer was asking if he’d like to see what it felt like to be separated into his component molecules very, very slowly, while Gerald Marsden sat collapsed in a chair making friends with a whisky bottle, “I don’t, somehow think it’s him we want, after all. So we’ll have to stay until we find whoever it is.” This, of course, cheered up Clarissa no end: maybe her small green person was leaving, but it wasn’t immediate. Indeed, she saw the possibility for a cunning scheme, so she asked “Oh, is there anything I can do to help you find them?” her idea being that (a) this would mean they would have to spend lots of time together, and (b) she could misdirect them as much as possible to put off the fearful day long enough for the small green person to acknowledge his fate and agree to make himself hers. This was, of course, unknown to the small green person, who merely saw it as further evidence that Clarissa was nowhere near so irritating as most of her species, so he smiled again and said “Well yes, perhaps you could. We’re looking for somebody particularly intelligent, with a powerful mathematical brain, who has some kind of connection to Mr Hardcastle and...” he tailed off, for as he had been speaking the penny had suddenly dropped that the person they were looking for was standing right before him. Mentally shaking himself for being so slow, he looked into Clarissa’s beautiful, emotion-racked face and said “I don’t suppose you’d like to come along with us would you?” Clarissa was overjoyed; this was more than she could possibly have hoped for, and so, without, even for a moment, thinking that properly she should say something along the lines of “You must ask papa and mama”, she flung her arms around him with such force that, what with him being small and her being somewhat Junoesque, they ended up on the floor together (which he didn’t enjoy much), kissed him (which he didn’t enjoy much either) and said “Oh yes, please, take me away from these people, my darling.” And it was at this point, before any of the other people in the room had time to more than register these strange events, that the maid entered and announced “Mr David Barton.”
David was indubitably shocked to see his fiancée showing her corsetry together with an unseemly amount of what it constrained, with her skirt hooked up indecently round her knees, straddling a small green person whom she was kissing with an enthusiasm she had never brought to their chaste embraces. And, being an English County Male, he never for one moment thought that perhaps the reason said embraces had always seemed rather, well, dull was because he hadn’t encouraged her to remove her blouse, pull up he
r skirt and straddle him while covering him with burning kisses, and that possibly if he had their relationship might be in a better state of health. Of course not, for no English County Male could possible conceive that behind the facade of a Decent County Maiden there might be a woman who wanted a good time. Clearly his Clarissa had been corrupted, and David knew just whom he should blame: it was all down to this unseemly friendship of hers with that terrible nouveau riche Hardcastle chap. And so, rather than pulling Clarissa to her feet and showing her that he could do whatever the small green person could and then some, David turned on Mr Hardcastle and said “Sir, explain yourself!” which caused no end of consternation. The Engineer and Mr Hardcastle, who had been in the final stages of planning a duel (cosh versus molecular disruptor) were caught on the hop and, as is generally the way, sensing somebody intent on interfering with their quarrel, immediately formed an offensive alliance against the intruder. “Explain what, may I ask?” said Mr Hardcastle, and the Engineer added, “Yeah, who do you think you are, asking for explanations?” David was undaunted; he knew he was better than these people: his Norman blood told him so (and one can’t exactly expect intelligence of somebody who thinks with his blood-stream, after all). So, he stood firm and said “What, Sir, have you done thus to corrupt my betrothed?” pointing at the Clarissa / small green person imbroglio (Clarissa had by now lost her skirt and was moaning “Take me!” over and over while dry-humping the rather disoriented small green person, who replied “Yes, of course, but we’ve got to find her ladyship first”, confusing Clarissa no end, as she wasn’t aware of having proposed a threesome, and she wasn’t sure she liked Lady Diana that much anyway). Mr Hardcastle, however, knew that solid worth outweighed Norman blood, so he said “I don’t really see it as anything to do with me, what the young lady wants to do.” The Engineer agreed, “It looks to me,” he said, “As if she’s just found somebody she likes more than you. Shame really, given he’s not exactly equipped to satisfy her” he added, meditatively.
The New Star Page 3
