by Anthology
"Shall we go?" Maria asked. "This is giving me—what do you say?—the creeps."
"It's crazy!" Ken exclaimed with a burst of feeling. "It shows what ignorance of something new and strange can do. One feebleminded, old woman can infect a whole crowd with her crazy superstitions, just because they don't know any more about this thing than she does!"
"It's more than that," said Maria quietly. "It's the feeling that people have always had about the world they find themselves in. It doesn't matter how much you know about the ocean and the winds and the tides, there is always a feeling of wonder and fear when you stand on the shore and watch enormous waves pounding the rocks.
"Even if you know what makes the thunder and the lightning, you can't watch a great storm without feeling very small and puny."
"Of course not," Ken said. "Astronomers feel all that when they look a couple of billion light-years into space. Physicists know it when they discover a new particle of matter. But they don't go around muttering about omens and signs. You can feel the strength of natural forces without being scared to death.
"Maybe that's what marks the only real difference between witches and scientists, after all! The first scientist was the guy who saw fire come down from the sky and decided that was the answer to some of his problems. The witch doctor was too scared of both the problem and the answer to believe the problem could ever have a solution. So he manufactured delusions to make himself and others think the problem would just quietly go away. There are a lot of witch doctors still operating and they're not all as easy to recognize as Granny Wicks!"
They reached Ken's car, and he held the door open for Maria. As he climbed in his own side he said, "How about coming over to my place and having a look at the comet through my telescope? You'll see something really awe-inspiring then."
"I'd love to. Right now?"
"Sure." Ken started the car and swung away from the curb, keeping a careful eye on the road, watching for any others like Dad Martin.
"Sometimes I think there will be a great many things I'll miss when we go back to Sweden," Maria said thoughtfully, as she settled back in the seat, enjoying the smooth, powerful ride of Ken's souped-up car.
Ken shot a quick glance at her. He felt a sudden sense of loss, as if he had not realized before that their acquaintance was strictly temporary. "I guess a lot of people here will miss the Larsens, too," he said quietly. "What will you miss most of all?"
"The bigness of everything," said Maria. "The hundreds and hundreds of miles of open country. The schoolboys with cars to cover the distance. At home, a grown man is fortunate to have one. Papa had a very hard time owning one."
"Why don't you persuade him to stay here? Mayfield's a darn good place to live."
"I've tried already, but he says that when a man is grown he has too many things to hold him to the place he's always known. He has promised, however, to let me come back if I want to, after I finish the university at home."
"That would be nice." Ken turned away, keeping his eyes intently on the road. There was nothing else he could say.
He drove slowly up the long grade of College Avenue. His family lived in an older house a block below the brow of College Hill. It gave a pleasant view of the entire expanse of the valley in which Mayfield was situated. The houses of the town ranged themselves in neat, orderly rows below, and spread out on the other side of the business section. In the distance, north and south, were the small farms where hay and dairy stock and truck crops had been raised since pioneer times.
"I'll miss this, too," said Maria. "It's beautiful."
Ken wasn't listening to her, however. The car had begun to sputter painfully as it took the curve leading off the avenue to Linwood Street where Ken lived. He glanced at the heat indicator. The needle was almost at the boiling point.
"For Pete's sake! The water must have leaked out of the radiator."
Ken pulled the car to the curb in front of the house and got out, leaving the engine idling. He raised the hood and cautiously turned the radiator cap with his handkerchief. A cloud of steam shot out, but when he lifted the cap the water was not quite boiling, and there was plenty of it.
Maria came up beside him. "Is something wrong?"
"You've got me there. The radiator's clean. The pump isn't more than two months old. I checked the timing last Saturday. Something's gone sour to make her heat up like that."
From across the street, his neighbor, Mr. Wilkins, approached with a grin. "Looks like the same thing hit us both. Mine started boiling as I came up the hill tonight. It's got me stumped."
"The circulation must be clogged," said Ken. "Either that or the timing has slipped off. That's all it could be."
"Those were my ideas, too. Both wrong in my case. Let me know if you get any other bright ones." He moved off with a pleasant wave of his hand.
"It will cool," said Ken to Maria. "By the time you're ready to leave I'll be able to drive you home."
"I wouldn't want you to damage your car. I can walk."
"We'll see."
He led her around the house. In the center of the backyard loomed the high, round dome of his amateur observatory. It was Ken's personal pride, as well as that of the members of the Mayfield High Science Club, who had helped build the shell and the mountings. The club used it every Thursday night when the seeing was good.
Ken had ground the precision mirror alone. He had ground his first one, a 4-inch glass, when he was a Boy Scout. Three years later he had tackled the tremendous job of producing a 12-inch one. Professor Douglas of the physics department at the college had pronounced it perfect.
Ken opened the door and switched on the light inside the dome. "Don't mind the mess," he said. "I've been taking photographs of the comet for the last month."
To Maria, who was used to the clutter of a laboratory, there was no mess. She admired the beauty of the instrument Ken and his friends had built. "Our university telescope isn't any better," she said.
"You can't tell by the plumbing," Ken laughed. "Better take a look at the image before you pass judgment."
Skilfully, he swung the long tube around to the direction of the comet. With the fine controls he centered the cross hairs of the eyepiece on the blazing object in the sky.
"It's moving too fast to stay in range very long," he said.
Maria stepped to the observer's position. She gasped suddenly at the image of the fiery monster hovering in the sky. Viewing the comet along the axis of the tail, as the Earth lay at the edge of it, an observer's vision was like that of a miniature, flaming sun with an offcenter halo of pulsing, golden light.
To Maria, the comet seemed like something living. Slow, almost imperceptible ripples in the glowing scarves of light made them sway as if before some mighty, cosmic wind in space.
"It's beautiful," Maria murmured, "but it's terrible, too. No wonder the ancients believed comets brought evil and death upon the Earth. I could almost believe it, myself!"
Chapter 2.
Breakdown
Ken Maddox could not remember a time when he had not wanted to become a scientist. Maybe it started when his father first invited him to look through a microscope. That was when he was a very small boy, but he could still remember the revelation of that experience. He remembered how it had seemed, on looking away from the lens, that the whole world of normal vision was only a fragment of that which was hidden behind curtains and shrouds and locked doors. Only men, like his father, with special instruments and wisdom and knowledge, could ever hope to understand the world of the unknown, which the ordinary person did not even suspect.
Now, at sixteen, Ken was tall, with black hair that had an annoying curl to it. He was husky enough to be the main asset of the football squad of Mayfield High School in his senior year. He knew exactly where he was going and what he was going to do. He would be one of those men who lived beyond the mere surface of the world, and who would seek to understand its deep and hidden meanings.
Ken thought of this as he
watched Maria at the telescope. What a difference between knowing the comet as this instrument showed it, and with the knowledge revealed by modern astronomy, and knowing it as the average person in Mayfield did.
Ken and Maria stayed in the observatory until the comet had almost disappeared below the horizon. Mrs. Maddox brought a snack of sandwiches and punch.
"I always do this when I see the observatory dome open," she said, smiling. "I never know when Ken's going to quit his stargazing and come in for the night."
"We're about through, Mom. I'll drive Maria over to her place and be back in a little while."
"I'm going to loan him the stamps," Maria said.
Mrs. Maddox looked at Ken in mock severity. "You mean you forgot again?"
"No—I remembered," Ken said lamely. "After the post office closed, that is. Anyhow, Maria has plenty."
"Well," said Mrs. Maddox, "I know who's going to have to mail my invitations if they're ever to get out in time for the party!"
After he and Maria had finished the snack, Ken started his car again. The engine had cooled to normal temperature, but he watched the indicator closely as he drove. Nothing seemed right about the action of the car. The engine had turned over sluggishly when he pressed the starter button, as if the battery were almost dead. Now it lugged heavily, even when going downhill.
"The whole thing's haywire," Ken said irritably. "It acts like the crankcase is full of sand or something."
"Let me walk the rest of the way," said Maria. "You take the car back, and I'll bring the stamps over on my way to school in the morning."
"No, we're almost there. Nothing much more could go wrong than already has."
When they reached Maria's place they found Professor and Mrs. Larsen sitting on the porch.
"We've been watching the comet," Maria said excitedly. "Ken let me look at it through his telescope."
"A remarkable event," said Professor Larsen. "I feel very fortunate to be alive to witness it. My generation hasn't had this kind of privilege before. I was a child when Halley's comet appeared."
"I've been trying to tell Maria what a lucky break this is, but she agrees with Granny Wicks," said Ken.
"Oh, I do not!" Maria snapped.
"Granny Wicks?" Professor Larsen inquired. "Your grandmother?"
"No." Ken tried to cover the professor's lack of familiarity with American idioms. "She's just the town's oldest citizen. Everybody likes her and calls her Granny, but her mind belongs to the Middle Ages."
"You hear that, Papa?" cried Maria. "Her mind belongs to the Middle Ages, and he says I'm like Granny Wicks!"
Maria's mother laughed gently. "I'm sure Ken didn't mean your mind is of the Middle Ages, too, dear."
Ken flushed. "Of course not. What I mean is that Granny Wicks thinks the comet is something mysterious and full of omens, and Maria says she sort of thinks the same about it."
"I didn't say anything about omens and signs!"
"Well, except for that…."
"Except for that, I suppose we are all in agreement," said Professor Larsen slowly. He drew on his pipe and it glowed brightly in the darkness. "The whole universe is a terrible place that barely tolerates living organisms. Almost without exception it is filled with great suns that are flaming, atomic furnaces, or dead cinders of planets to which a scrap of poisonous atmosphere may cling. Yes, it is indeed a great miracle that here in this corner of the universe conditions exist where living things have found a foothold. We may be glad that this is so, but it does not pay man to ever forget the fierceness of the home in which he lives. Earth is merely one room of that home, on the pleasant, sunny side of the house. But the whole universe is his home."
"That's the thing I've been trying to say," Ken answered. "We can know this without being afraid."
Maria's father nodded. "Yes. Fear is of no use to anyone. Awe, respect, admiration, wonder, humility—these are all necessary. But not fear."
Maria turned from the group. "I'll bring the stamps, Ken," she said.
"Won't you come in and have some cake?" Mrs. Larsen asked.
"No, thanks. Mother fed us before we left my place. I'm afraid I couldn't eat any more."
In a moment Maria was back. "Here are two whole sheets," she said. "I hope that will be enough."
"Plenty. I'll see you get repaid tomorrow. Good night, everybody."
"Good night, Ken."
He moved down the walk toward his car and got in. When he pressed die starter button the engine groaned for a few seconds and came to a complete stop. He tried again; there was only a momentary, protesting grind.
Ken got out and raised the hood and leaned over the engine in disgusted contemplation. There was no visible clue to the cause of the trouble.
"Is your battery dead?" Professor Larsen called.
"No. It's something else." Ken slammed the hood harder than he had intended. "I'll have to leave it here overnight and pick it up in the morning."
"I can push you home with my car, or at least give you a ride."
"No, please don't bother," Ken said. "I'll tow it home with Dad's car tomorrow. I'd just as soon walk, now. It's only a few blocks."
"As you wish. Good night, Ken."
"Good night, Professor."
* * * * *
Ken's clock radio woke him the next morning. He reached over to shut off the newscast it carried. There was only one item any commentator talked about now, the comet. Ken wondered how they could get away with a repetition of the same thing, over and over, but they seemed able to get an audience as long as they kept the proper tone of semi-hysteria in their voices.
As his hand touched the dial to switch it off, something new caught Ken's attention. "A curious story is coming in from all parts of the country this morning," the announcer said. "Auto mechanics are reporting a sudden, unusually brisk business. No one knows the reason, but there seems to be a virtual epidemic of car breakdowns. Some garagemen are said to be blaming new additives in gasoline and lubricating oil. It is reported that one major oil company is undertaking an investigation of these charges, but, in the meantime, no one really seems to have a good answer.
"In connection with the comet, however, from widely scattered areas comes the report that people are even blaming these engine failures on our poor, old comet. In the Middle Ages they blamed comets for everything from soured cream to fallen kingdoms. Maybe this modern age isn't so different, after all. At any rate, this comet will no doubt be happy to get back into open space, where there are no Earthmen to blame it for all their accidents and shortcomings!"
Ken switched off the radio and lay back on the pillow. That was a real choice one—blaming the comet for car breakdowns! Page Granny Wicks!
The breakdowns were curious, however. There was no good reason why there should be a sudden rash of them. He wondered if they had actually occurred, or if the story was just the work of some reporter trying to make something out of his own inability to get into a couple of garages that were swamped by the usual weekend rush. This was most likely the case.
However it didn't explain why his own car had suddenly conked out, Ken thought irritably. He'd have to get it over to Art Matthews' garage as soon as school was out.
At school that morning there was little talk of anything but the comet. After physics class, Ken was met by Joe Walton and three other members of the science club, of which Ken was president.
"We want a special meeting," said Joe. "We've just had the most brilliant brainstorm of our brief careers."
"It had better be more brilliant than the last one," said Ken. "That drained the club treasury of its last peso."
"I was watching the comet last night, and I began to smell the dust of its tail as the Earth moved into it…."
"You must have been smelling something a lot more powerful than comet dust."
"I said to myself—why don't we collect some of that stuff and bottle it and see what it's made of? What do you think?" Joe asked eagerly.
Ken scowled. "Just
how many molecules of material from the comet's tail do you think there are in the atmosphere over Mayfield right now?"
"How do I know? Six—maybe eight."
Ken laughed. "You're crazy, anyway. What have you got in mind?"
"I'm not sure," Joe answered seriously. "We know the comet's tail is so rarefied that it resembles a pretty fair vacuum, but it is composed of something. As it mixes with the atmosphere we ought to be able to determine the changing makeup of the air and get a pretty good idea of the composition of the comet's tail. This is a chance nobody's ever had before—and maybe never will again, until we go right out there in spaceships—being right inside a comet's tail long enough to analyze it!"
"It sounds like a terrific project," Ken admitted. "The universities will all be doing it, of course, but it would still be a neat trick if we could bring it off. Maybe Dad and Professor Larsen will have ideas on how we could do it."
"We ought to be able to make most of the equipment," said Joe, "so it shouldn't be too expensive. Anyway, we'll have a meeting then, right after school?"
"Yes—no, wait. The engine in my car conked out. I've got to go over to Art's with it this afternoon. You go ahead without me. Kick the idea around and let me know what's decided. I'll go along with anything short of mortgaging the football field."
"Okay," said Joe. "I don't see why you don't just sell that hunk of junk and get a real automobile. You've got a good excuse now. This breakdown is a good omen!"
"Don't talk to me about omens!"
* * * * *
Art Matthews had the best equipped garage in town, and was a sort of unofficial godfather to all the hot-rodders in the county. He helped them plane the heads of their cars. He got their special cams and carburetor and manifold assemblies wholesale, and he gave them fatherly advice about using their heads when they were behind the wheel.
Ken called him at noon. "I've got troubles, Art," he said. "Can I bring the car over after school?"
