The Makeshift Rocket

by Poul Anderson

  ‘Ooooh!’ said Sarmishkidu. ‘No, wait, wait, wait, ach, wait just one moment! We are not qualified spacemen anyhow so O’Toole does not accept us for a crew.’

  ‘I t’ought dat over,’ said Herr Syrup, ‘and checked in de law books to make sure. In an emergency like dis, de highest ranking officer available, me, can deputize non-certified personnel, and dey vill have regular spacemen’s standing vile de situation lasts. O’Toole vill eider have to let me raise ship vit’ you two or else release two of my shipmates.’

  ‘Then you will take us along?’ pounced Emily.

  Herr Syrup shrugged. He might as well have a crew worth looking at. ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘You is velcome.’

  Sarmishkidu rolled his eyes uneasily. ‘Better I stay on de ground. I got mine business to look after.’

  ‘Oh, nonsense!’ said Emily. ‘If I go, we just about have to have a Martian for a chaperone, not that I don’t trust Mr. Syrup because he really is a sweet old gentleman – oh, I’m sorry, Mr. Syrup, I didn’t mean to make you wince – well, I mean to say, of course I’ll have to go aboard without letting Father know or he would forbid me, but why distress the old dear afterward with the thought that even if I liberated Grendel I compromised my reputation? I mean, he is the vicar, you know, and it’s been hard enough for him, my bringing home Duncanite teachings from Miss Carruthers’ Select School for Young Ladies on Wilberforce. Though I didn’t learn about it in class but from a lecture in the town hall which I happened to attend, and – And your tavern business, Mr. Sarmishkidu, isn’t worth tuppence if we don’t get rid of the Erse before vacation season begins, so won’t you please come, there’s a dear, or else I’ll ask all my young men friends never to come in here again.’

  Sarmishkidu groaned.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Herr Syrup halted his bicycle and Herr von Himmelschmidt untied his tentacles from around the baggage rack. A small bright sun shone through small bright clouds on Grendel’s spaceport, the air blew soft and sweet, and even the old Mercury Girl looked a trifle less discouraged than usual. Not far away a truckload of Erse soldiers was bowling toward the geegee site to work, and however much one desired to throw them off this planetoid, one had to admit their young voices soared miraculously sweet.

  ‘—Ochone! Ochone! the men of Ulster cry.

  Ochone! Ochone! The lords an ladies weepin’!

  Dear, dear the man that nivver, nivver more shall be. Hoy, there, Paddy, see the colleen, ah, the brave broight soight iv her, whee-ee-whee-ew!’

  The sentry at the ship berth slanted his rifle across Herr Syrup’s path. ‘Halt,’ he said.

  ‘Vat?’ asked the engineer.

  ‘Or I shoot,’ explained the guard earnestly.

  ‘Vat is dis?’ protested Herr Syrup. ‘I got a right on my own ship. I got de General’s written permission, by yiminy, to take her up.’

  ‘That’s as may be,’ said the guard, hefting his weapon, ‘but I’ve me orders too, which is that ye’re not trusted an’ ye don’t go aboard till your full crew an’ the riprysintative of the Shamrock League is here.’

  ‘Oh, vell, if dat is all,’ said Herr Syrup, relieved, ‘den here comes Miss Croft now, and I see a Erser beside her too.’

  Still trailed by a receding tide of whistles, Emily came with long indignant strides across the concrete. She bore an outsize picnic basket which her green-clad escort kept trying to take for her. She would snatch it from him, stamp her foot, and try to leave him behind. Unfortunately, he was so big that her half-running pace was an easy amble for him.

  Sarmishkidu squinted. ‘By all warped Riemannian space,’ he said at last, ‘is that not Major McConnell?’

  Herr Syrup’s heart hit the ground with a dull thud.

  ‘Ah, there, greetin’s an’ salutations!’ boomed the large young man. ‘An’ accept me congratulations, sir, on choosin’ the loveliest crew which ivver put to sky! Though truth ’tis, she might be just a trifle friendlier. Ah, but once up among the stars, who knows what may develop?’

  ‘You don’t mean you ban our guard?’ choked Herr Syrup.

  ‘Yes. An’ ’tis guardsmanlike I look, eh, what?’ beamed Rory McConnell, slapping the machine pistol and trench knife holstered at his belt, the tommy gun at his shoulder, and the rifle across his fifty-kilo field pack.

  ‘But you ban needed down here!’

  ‘Not so much, now that we’re organized an’ work is proceedin’ on schedule.’ McConnell winked. ‘An’ faith, when I heard what crew yez would have, sir, why, I knew at once where me real obligations lay. For ’tis five years an’ more that me aged mither on Caer Dubh has plagued me to marry, that she may have grandchilder to brighten her auld age; so I am but doin’ me filial duty.’ He nudged Herr Syrup with a confidential thumb.

  When the engineer had been picked up, dusted off, and apologized to, he objected: ‘But does your chief, O’Toole, know you ban doing dis? I t’ought he would not like you associating vit’ us.’

  ‘O’Toole is somewhat of a fanatic,’ admitted McConnell, ‘but he gave me this assignment whin I asked for it. For ye understand, sir, he is not easy in the heart of him, as long as ye are in orbit with any chance whatsoever to quare his plans. So ’tis happiest he’ll be, the soonest ye’ve finished your repairs an’ returned here. Now I am certificated more as a pilot an’ navigator than an injineer, but ye well know each department must be able to handle the work of t’other in emergency, so I will be able to give yez skilled assistance in your task. I’ve enough experience in geegees to know exactly what ye’re doin’.’

  ‘Guk,’ said Sarmishkidu.

  ‘What?’ asked McConnell.

  ‘I said, “Guk,”’ answered Sarmishkidu in a chill voice, ‘which was precisely my meaning.’

  ‘All aboard!’ bawled the Erseman, and went up the berth ladder two rungs at a time.

  Emily hung back. ‘I couldn’t do anything about it,’ she whispered, white-faced. ‘He just insisted. I mean, I even hit him on the chest as hard as I could, and he grinned, you have to admit he’s as strong as Herakles and if he would only study classical dance to improve his gait he would be nearly perfect’ She flushed. ‘Physically, I mean, of course! But what I wanted to say is, shall we give up our plan?’

  ‘No,’ said Herr Syrup glumly, ‘ve ban committed now. And maybe a chance comes to carry it out. Let’s go.’ He took his bicycle by the seat bar and dragged it up into the ship. No Dane is ever quite himself without a bicycle, though it is not true that all of them sleep with their machines. Fewer than ten percent do this.

  He had been prepared to pilot the Girl into orbit himself, which was not beyond his training; but McConnell did it with so expert a touch that even the transition from geegee field to free fall was smooth. Once established in path, Herr Syrup jury-rigged a polarity reverser in the ship’s propulsive circuits, to furnish weight again inside the hull. It was against regulations, since it immobilized the drive; and, of course, it lacked the self-adjustment of a true compensator. But this was a meteor-swept region, so there was no danger in floating inert; and, though neither spacemen nor asterites mind weightlessness per se, an attractive field always simplifies work. No one who has not toiled in free fall, swatting gobs of molten solder from his face while a mislaid screwdriver bobs off on its own merry way, has experienced the full perversity of matter.

  ‘Ve can turn off de pull ven ve vish to test repairs,’ said Herr Syrup.

  Rory McConnell looked around the crowded engine room and the adjacent workshop. ‘I envy yez this,’ he said, with a bare touch of wistful ness. ‘’Tis spaceships are me proper place, an’ not all this hellin’ about wi’ guns an’ drums.’

  ‘Er – ja! Herr Syrup hesitated. ‘Vell, you know, dere is really no reason to bodder you vit’ de yob in here. Yust leave me to do it alone and – hm – ja,’ he finished in a blaze of genius, ‘go talk at Miss Croft.’

  ‘Oh, I’ll be doin’ that, all right,’ grinned McConnell, ‘but I’d not be dallyin’ about all t
he time whin another man was laborin’. No, I’ll sweat over that slut of a machine right along wi’ yez, Pop.’ He raised one ruddy eyebrow above a wickedly blue sidelong glance. ‘Also, I’ll not be makin’ of unsubstantiated accusations, but ’tis conceivable ye might not work on it yourself at all, at all, if left alone. Some might even imagine ye – oh – makin’ a radio to call his bloody majesty. So, just to keep evil tongues from waggin’, we’ll retain all electrical equipment in here, an’ here I meself .will work an’ sleep. Eh?’ He gave Herr Syrup a comradely slap on the back.

  ‘Gott in Himmel!’ yelped Sarmishkidu from the passageway outside. ‘What exploded in there?’

  An arbitrary pattern of watches had been established to give the Mercury Girl some equivalent of night and day. After supper, which she had cooked, Emily Croft wandered up to the bridge while Sarmishkidu was simultaneously washing the dishes and mopping the galley floor. She stood gazing out the viewports for a long time.

  Only feebly accelerated by Grendel’s weak natural gravity, the ship would take more than a hundred hours to complete one orbit. At this distance, the asteroid filled seven degrees of sky, a clear and lovely half-moon, though only approximately spherical. On the dark part lay tiny twinkles of light, scattered farms and hamlets, the starlit sheen of Lake Alfred the Great. The town, its church on the doll-like edge of naked-eye visibility, its roofs making a ruddy blur, lay serene a bit west of the sunset line: tea time, she thought sentimentally, scones and marmalade before a crackling fire, and Dad and Mum trying not to show their worry about her. Then, dayward, marched the wide sweep of fields and woods under shifting cloud bands, the intense green of the fens, the Cotswolds and rustling Sherwood beyond. Grendel turned slowly against a crystal blackness set with stars, so many and so icily beautiful that she wanted to cry.

  When she actually felt tears and saw the vision blur, she bit her lip. Crying wouldn’t be British. It wouldn’t even be Duncanite. Then she realized that the tears were due to a whiff from Herr Syrup’s pipe.

  The engineer slipped through the door and closed it behind him. ‘Hist!’ he warned hoarsely.

  ‘Oh, go hist yourself!’ snapped the girl. And then, in contrition: ‘No, I’m sorry. A bad mood. I just don’t know what to think.’

  ‘Ja. I feel I am up in an alley myself.’

  ‘Maybe it’s the water aboard ship. It’s tanked, isn’t it? I mean, it doesn’t come bubbling up from some mossy spring, does it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I thought not. I guess that’s it. I mean, why I feel so mixed up inside, all sad and yet not really sad. Do you know what I mean? I’m afraid I don’t myself.’

  ‘Miss Croft,’ said Herr Syrup, ‘ve is in trouble.’

  ‘Oh. You mean about Ro – about Major McConnell?’

  ‘Ja. He has taken inventory of everyt’ing aboard. He has stowed all de electric stuffs in a cabinet vich he has locked, and he has de key, himself. How are ve going to make a broadcaster now?’

  ‘Oh, damn Major McConnell!’ cried Emily. ‘I mean, damn him, actually!’

  ‘Dere is a hope I can see,’ said Herr Syrup. ‘It vill depend on you.’

  ‘Oh!’ Emily brightened. ‘Why, how wonderful! I mean, I was afraid it would be so dull, just waiting for you to—And I’m sorry to say it, but the ship is not very esthetic, I mean there’s just white paint and all those clocks and dials and thingummies and really, I haven’t found any books except things like The Jovian Intersatellite Pilot with Ephemerides or something else called Pictures For Men, where the women aren’t in classical poses at all, I mean it’s—’ She broke off, confused. ‘Where was I? Oh, yes, you wanted me to – But that’s terrif! I mean, wheel’ She jumped up and down, twirled till her tunic stood out horizontally and her wreath titled askew, and grabbed Herr Syrup’s hands. ‘What can I do? Do you want any secret messages translated into Greek?’

  ‘No,’ said the engineer. ‘Not yust now. Uh … er—’ He stared down, blushing, and dug at the carpet with one square-toed boot. ‘Vell, you see, Miss Croft, if McConnell got distracted from vorking on de compensator … if he vas not in de machine shop vit’ me very often, and den had his mind on somet’ing else … I could pick de lock on de electrics box and sneak out de parts I need and carry on vit’ our plan. But, vell, first he must be given some odder interest dat vill hold all his attention for several days.’

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said Emily. She laid a finger to her cheek. ‘Let me think. What is he interested in? Well, he talks a lot about spaceships, he wanted to be an interplanetary explorer when this trouble is over, and, you know, he really is enthusiastic about that, why, he’s so much like a little boy I want to rumple his hair—’ She stopped, gulping. ‘No. That won’t do. I mean, the only person here who can talk to him about spaceships is yourself.’

  ‘I am afraid I am not yust exactly his type,’ said Herr Syrup in an elaborate tone.

  ‘I mean, you can’t keep him distracted, because you’re the one we want to have working behind his back,’ said Emily. ‘Let me see, what else? Yes, I believe Major McConnell mentioned being fond of poker. It’s a card game, you know. And Mr Sarmishkidu is very interested in, uh, permutations. So maybe they could—’

  ‘I am afraid Sarmishkidu is not yust exactly his type eider.’ Herr Syrup frowned. ‘For a young lady vat is so mad ‘vit dat crazy Erser, you ban spending a lot of time vit’ him to know his tastes so vell.’

  Emily’s face heated up. ‘Don’t you call me a collaborationist!’ she shouted. ‘Why, when the invaders first landed I put on a Phrygian liberty cap and went around with a flag calling on all our men to follow me and drive them off. And nobody did. They said they had nothing more powerful than a few shotguns. As if that made any difference!’

  ‘It does make some difference,’ said Herr Syrup placatingly.

  ‘But as for seeing Major McConnell since, why, how could I help it? I mean, O’Toole made him the liaison officer for us Grendelians, because even O’Toole must admit that Rory has more charm. And naturally he had to discuss many things with my father, who’s one of Grendel’s leading citizens, the vicar, you know. And while he was in our house, well, he’s a guest even if he is an enemy, and no Croft has been impolite to a guest since Sir Hardman Croft showed a Puritan constable the door in 1657. I mean, it just isn’t done. Of course I had to be nice to him. And he does have a lovely soft voice, and any Duncanite appreciates musical qualities, and that doesn’t make me a collaborator, because I’d lead an attack on their spaceship this very day if somebody would only help me. And if I don’t want any of them to get hurt, why, I’m only thinking about their innocent parents and, and sweethearts, and so there!’

  ‘Oh,’ said Herr Syrup.

  His pipe had gone out. He became very busy rekindling it. ‘Vell, Miss,’ he said, ‘in dat case you vill help us out and try to distract de mayor’s mind off his vork, vill you not? It ban your patriotic duty. Yust-encourashe-him-in-a-nice-vay-because-he-is-really-in-love-vit’-you-okay? Good night.’ And hiding his beet-colored face in a cloud of smoke, Herr Syrup bolted.

  Emily stared after him. ‘Why, good heavens,’ she whispered. ‘I mean, actually!’

  Her eyes traveled back to Grendel and the stars. ‘But that isn’t so,’ she protested. ‘It’s just what they call blarney. Makros Logos to be exact.’

  No one answered her for a moment, then feet resounded in the companionway and a hearty voice boomed: ‘Emily, are ye up there?’

  ‘Oh, dear!’ exclaimed the girl. She looked around for a mirror, made do with a polished chrome surface, and adjusted her wreath and the yellow hair below it. She must not let a foreigner see an Anglian lady disarrayed, and really, she regretted not having any lipstick and felt sure that abstention from such materials didn’t represent the true Duncanism.

  Rory McConnell clumped in, his shoulders brushing the door jambs and his head stooped under the lintel. ‘Ah, macushla, I found ye,’ he said. ‘Will ye not speek for a bit to a weary man, so he can slee
p content? For even the hour or two of testin’ I’ve been able to do today on that devil’s machine has revealed nothin’ to me but me own bafflement, an’ ’tis consolation I need.’

  Emily found herself breathing as hard as if she had run a long distance. Oh, stop it! she scolded. Hyperventilating! No wonder you feel so weak and dizzy.

  The Erseman leaned close. For once he did not grin, he smiled, and it was not fair that a barbarian could have so tender a smile. ‘Sure an’ I never knew a pulse in any throat could be that adorable,’ he murmured.

  ‘Nice weather we’re having, isn’t it?’ said Emily, since nothing else came to mind.

  ‘The wither in space is always noice, though perhaps just a trifle monotonous,’ quirked McConnell. He came around the pilot chair and stood beside her. The red hairs on the back of one hand brushed her bare thigh; she gulped and clung to the chair for support.

  After all, her duty was to distract him. She was certain that even Isadora Duncan, the pure and serene, would have approved.

  McConnell reached out a long arm and switched off the bridge lights, so that they stood in the soft, drenching radiance of Grendel, among a million stars. ‘’Tis enough to make a man believe in destiny,’ he said.

  ‘It is?’ asked Emily. Her voice wobbled, and she berated herself. ‘I mean, what is?’

  ‘Crossin’ space on this mission an’ findin’ ye waitin’ at the yonder end. For I’ll admit to yez what I’ve dared say to no one else, ’tis not important to me who owns that silly piece of ore Laoighise. I went with O’Toole because a McConnell has never hung back from any brave venture, arragh, how ye wring truth from me which I had not ayven admitted to meself! Oh, to be sure, I’m proud to do me country a service, but I cannot think ’tis so great an’ holy a deed as O’Toole prates of. So I came more on impulse than plan, me darlin’, an’ yet I found me destiny. The which is your own sweet self.’