F.O.B. Venus by Nelson S. Bond

 

 

---

F-O-B-VENUS

By NELSON S. BOND

Lancelot Biggs was perhaps the worst second
mate Captain Hanson had ever shipped, and
he was convinced of it when he ruined their
cargo. But how dumb a man is, may
sometimes be a matter of opinion.

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Fantastic Adventures November 1939.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

---

Something had gone a little haywire with my bug, and I had just repaired it and was CQ-ing on the 20 band when the door opened and Captain Hanson walked in.

Naturally, I was surprised. We were only four hours out of the Venus H-layer, and I hadn't expected any visitors; least of all the skipper. But he plunked himself down in the best chair and said, "Sparks, look at me! What do you see?"

That gave me a jolt. Even the best of them make the old dipsy-doo once in a while, but I never thought I'd live to see the day when Captain Hanson went space nutty. He'd been with the Corporation, man and boy, for more than thirty years now, and had never spent a day in dry-dock. I reached behind me cautiously and said in as soothing a voice as I could muster, "Why, I see a very nice man, Captain. Now, just you sit quiet for a minute. I've got to—"

"Stop bein' a damned fool, Sparks!" said the skipper wearily, "An' put down that monkey-wrench! I'm not slippin' my gravs—yet. I'm just askin' you a simple question. What do you see?"

I said, "Is it facts you're after, Cap, or am I allowed poetic license? If it's facts, I see a swell, slightly gray-haired guy in his middle fifties who's been through the mill, knows space like a book, and—"

"Wrong!" said Hanson. "Sparks, all radiomen are dumb. I guess that's why they're radiomen. What you see before you is a broken man. A man sadly buffeted by Fate and the dread clutch of circumstances. Not to mention meddlesome vice-presidents."

This time I got it.

"Biggs?" I said.

"Yes, Sparks. Biggs. Now tell me, man to man, what did I ever do to deserve Biggs?"

He had me there. Being the skipper of the Saturn is not what I'd call an easy job under the best of conditions. The Saturn is the oldest space-lugger still doing active duty on Corporation runs. She was built 'way back there before the turn of the century. For the past ten or twelve years, she had been on freight service, having been judged unfit for passenger duty by the SSCB—Space Safety Control Board.

To make matters worse, while we were taking on cargo at Sun City spaceport, the skipper had been called into the company offices. When he came out again, he had this Biggs in tow.

Biggs was tall. Biggs was lanky and gangly and all the other adjectives you can think of that mean a guy's Adam's-apple sticks out. He was overflowing at the mouth with a great big grin, and he was as dumb as they make 'em. He had his Third Mate's papers, and was entitled to be known as "Mister" Biggs—the "Mister" being a nice camouflage for his real name, Lancelot.

But—Biggs was the nephew of crusty old Prendergast Biggs, first vice-president of the Corporation. So there was nothing the skipper could do but gulp and say, "Very good!" when they assigned Biggs to the Saturn.

There was nothing to prevent him from hoping Biggs would stumble over his suitcases and bust his scrawny neck—but Biggs didn't do it. He was awkward enough to stumble, but lucky enough to fall on a cushion if he did!

I said gently, "What's he up to now, Captain?"

"What isn't he up to?" groaned the skipper. "First, he said he could handle the gravs when we broke out of Venus' clutch. So—"

"Oh!" I said, "He did that, did he?"

"Stop rubbin' your head an' feelin' sorry for yourself," said Hanson. "You got off lucky. Chief Garrity is nursin' two black eyes. One of the wipers has a busted arm. Everybody on the ship went floatin' off to the ceiling, same as you did."

"Anything else?" I asked.

"Everything else!" snorted Hanson. "While we were all scramblin' around in midair, Biggs made a grab for the hand-controls. He got the manual deflector by mistake. Todd has just finished shapin' the course revision. We're point-oh-seven degrees off course now; almost three hundred thousand miles! We've got to up revs and waste fuel to get back, or we'll report in to Earth a day late. And you know what that means!"

Sure, I knew what that meant. Cap on the carpet before the Board; the rest of us sitting around chewing our fingernails, wondering whether they'd yank the Saturn off the Venus run.

"Well, what are you going to do about him?" I asked.

"What can I do?"

"There's always the airlock," I suggested. "Nobody would ever blame you."

"This ain't no time to be funny, Sparks!" complained the skipper. "This is a serious problem. We've got a valuable cargo of mekel-root and clab-beans to take into New York. But if that guy messes up our flight any more—"

He shook his head dolefully. I scratched mine. Then I got a brilliant idea.

"Cargo!" I said. "There's your answer, Captain!"

"I'm listenin'," said Hanson.

"Put Biggs in charge of the cargo. That way he'll be down in the hold throughout the trip. He won't be up in the control turret to bother you. And there's nothing he can do down there that'll hurt anybody."

"But that's the supercargo's job," frowned the skipper. "Biggs knows that."

"Sure. But Harkness will play along with you. Tell him to let on he's sick. Give him a vacation for this trip. He deserves it, anyway. Then it's logical enough to put Biggs on special duty below."

The skipper grinned.

"Sparks, I take it back what I said about radiomen. I think you got somethin' there!"

"Then you'll do it?"

"Immediately," said Hanson, rising, "if not sooner!"

---

So that was that. That night my relief came on duty, and I went down to the mess hall to eat whatever I could stomach of Slops' slumgullion. First person I met up with was Mr. Lancelot Biggs himself.

"Hello, Sparks," he said.

"Hello, yourself," I answered. "What are you doing at this mess? Thought you ate at the skipper's hour?"

"I did until now," he grinned. "Harkness was taken ill this afternoon, and the Skipper put me on emergency duty in his place."

"Is that so?" I said, looking as surprised as possible. "Well, that's quite a job. Lot of responsibility, you know. That cargo's valuable."

I had to grin at the way his lean face sobered.

"I realize that, Sparks. I'm devoting a lot of thought to the job, too. You know, I'm a bit of an experimenter, and it seems to me—"

One of the mess boys brought on my chow then, and I didn't listen to the rest of his chatter. Which was a sad mistake. If I had listened, I would have been able to warn Captain Hanson that trouble was on the way.

I think it was about the third day out that I began to smell those smells. Yes, I know it was the third day, because I'd just contacted Joe Marlowe on Lunar Three, giving him declination and cruising speed of the Saturn. I thought it was funny, but guessed it would go away. It didn't. It got worse. Finally, on the fifth day, I decided to do something.

There's nothing like meeting trouble halfway. I was just on my way from the radio room to the control turret when I bumped smack into Captain Hanson. It was a head on collision, but the Skipper's "Oof!" took longer than mine, so I got to talk first.

"Listen here!" I yelled, "I've had about as much of this rickety old tub as I'm going to stand. If you can't put a stop to those stinks Slops makes in the galley—"

Hanson gave me a look that would wilt lettuce.

"I don't want no trouble with you, Sparks!" was his comeback. "I been smellin' those smells, too. That's what I was aimin' to ask you about. Have you been foolin' around with some of them chemical experiments of your'n?"

"I have not," I informed him loftily. "And besides, while chemicals may stink sometimes, they don't ever give out a smell like the butt of an overripe cabbage. Except perhaps some of the sulphur compounds." Then I stared at him. "I'm not kidding. I think those smells are coming up out of the galley."

The skipper groaned softly.

"Trouble. Nothin' but trouble. It ain't enough I'm supposed to shuttle this barge between Earth an' Mars. Now I got smells to worry about, too. Well, come on! Let's look!"

We went down to the galley. Slops was stirring something in a bowl. I took one look and shuddered. Tapioca—again. And don't tell me you're not supposed to stir tapioca. I know it. Tell Slops.

Then the skipper loosed his blast.

"Okay, Slops," he snarled. "We give up. Where'd you hide it?"

Slops looked puzzled.

"Hide what? I didn't hide nothin'. What is this, a game?"

"Sure," I chinned in. "It's called Sniff-the-Atmosphere. You play it by pressing your thumb and forefinger to your nostrils. Then you try to guess what died."

"Quiet, Sparks!" roared the skipper. Then, to the cook, "Well, Slops?"

Slops shrugged.

"I ain't done nothin'," he protested. "I ain't hid nothin', and I ain't smelled nothin'. Now I got a meal on the fire. Go 'way and leave me alone."

The skipper looked at me, and I stared back at him. Both of us realized the same thing at the same time. Slops wasn't lying. The smell wasn't as bad here as it had been updeck.

Hanson scratched his head. He said, suspiciously, "Sparks, are you sure you ain't been mixin' chemicals?"

"I'll swear it," I told him, "on a pile of logbooks. That smell came from—Hey! What else beside the galley lies beneath my room and the control turret?"

"I'm a cook," said Slops, still stirring the tapioca, "not a blueprint. Don't ask me."

"Shut up!" snapped Captain Hanson. "He ain't askin' you. Let's see, Sparks. There's the storage closet ... the reservoir ... the refrigeration tanks, and the—" His eyes widened suddenly; fearfully. "Sparks!" he husked.

"Yes?"

"The vegetable hold!"

---

Man, that was it! The minute he said it, I knew. The vegetable hold—and Biggs in charge!

We hightailed it for the nearest ramp. The minute we turned down the corridor the smell got worse. Hanson blasted down the aisle like a rogue asteroid, with me trailing along behind. We hit the door; rammed it open—

Biggs was in there. The darned fool was standing in there dressed in a bulger, calmly spraying the bins of mekel-root and clab with a hose!

He turned as we entered and his eyes lighted behind the quartzite. His audiophone clacked pleasantly.

"Hello!" he said. "Is there anything wrong?"

"Anything wrong!" bellowed Captain Hanson. "He asks if there's anything wrong! That—that suit! And that hose—" The skipper's face was turning purple. "And this heat!"

"I turned off the refrigerating unit," clacked Biggs pleasantly. "You see, I had a theory that since the climate of Venus is warm and moist, it would be better for the cargo if I attempted to simulate its normal conditions of growth. So I—"

"And the suit?" roared Hanson. "Why the bulger?"

Biggs moved his hands deprecatingly.

"Why, possible infection, you know. I didn't want to expose the vegetables to any organisms—"

"Infect ... moisture ... heat...." Captain Hanson gave up. He buried his face in his hands. "Tell him, Sparks! Tell him what he's doing!"

I said, "Listen, Biggs—your theory is no good. Clab and mekel have to be kept in a cool, dry atmosphere or they rot. As a matter of fact, they are rotten! That's why the captain and I came down here—to investigate the smell. If you weren't wearing a bulger you'd notice it yourself."

"Smell?" said Biggs. "Why, now, come to think of it, I have noticed a curious odor about the ship from time to time. But I thought it was rats!"

Rats! On a space ship! Imagine!

That was the last straw for Hanson. He'd been trying, and trying hard. But now he exploded.

"Biggs!" he roared, "You've ruined this cargo! Now you're relieved from your command! But before you report to your quarters, I want every bit of this mess cleaned up. And I mean every last bit, understand? Junk it! Clear it out!"

Biggs faltered, "B-but, Captain, I only tried to—"

"You heard me!"

The skipper wheeled, fiery with wrath, and strode to the doorway. I hurried after him. I whispered in his ear, "Take it easy, Captain. He's the vice-president's nephew. Maybe you ought to go slow!"

"Slow?" groaned the skipper. "A fifty thousand dollar cargo ruined—and you tell me to go slow? I'll see that idiotic son-of-a-space-wrangler fryin' in chaos. I'll blast him out of space if I'm blacklisted for it!"

I said nothing more. What was there to say? Fifty thousand bucks worth of cargo rotting in the hold. The Board would love that!

---

That was all until the next morning. The next morning I was on the bridge when Captain Hanson had a visitor. Garrity, the Chief Engineer. Garrity never came to the bridge. So I knew, the minute I saw him, that something was vitally wrong.

It was. Garrity's first words made that clear. He glared at the skipper accusingly from eyes that were still faintly purpled.

"Captain Hanson," he exploded. "Would you be so kind as to tell me where I can find my Forenzi jars?"

Hanson said, "Forenzi jars? What are you talking about, Chief?"

"You'll be knowing what a Forenzi jar is, no doubt?" said Garrity caustically. "'Tis a lead container for battery solution. Yesterday there were thirty of them in the storeroom. Today there are only a half dozen left!"

Hanson said pettishly, "Now, Chief, be kind enough to conduct your own search for the jars. I don't know anything about them. If you can't watch your own equipment, don't complain to me about it!"

"I'm complaining to you, sir," said the Chief, "for the verra simple reason that 'twas one of your men who removed them from the locker. Your third mate, Mister Biggs!"

"Biggs!" said Hanson. "Biggs!" His face reddened. He walked to the intercommunication unit, jabbed the button that connected with Biggs' quarters. "Mr. Biggs?" he yelped, "Chief Garrity is up here in the turret asking about twenty-four lead containers that disappeared strangely from his equipment locker. Do you know anything about—"

The diaphragm clacked an answer. Hanson started. His eyes bulged. He yelled, "What?"

Again some metallic buzzing. This time Hanson didn't try to answer. He tottered away from the 'phone.

"G-Garrity," he faltered, "will you be needin' the Forenzis before we make port?"

"Well, 'tis not exactly vital—" admitted Garrity.

"But—why?"

Hanson made a weak gesture.

"Because they're—out there!"

"What?" I said. "Outside the ship? How come? Why?"

Hanson's eyes were haunted.

"Biggs," he said in a hollow voice, "thought they were garbage cans! He used them to dispose of the rotten cargo!"

---

Well, there wasn't any danger of the Forenzis getting lost, anyway. But do you know I even had to point that out to Mr. Biggs? Yes. That night I got a personal message for him, and I took it down to his cabin. Being confined to quarters, he was lonely. He looked so abject that I felt sorry for him, and lingered to talk for a while.

"I guess you think I'm a frightful dummy, Sparks," he said ruefully. "And I know Captain Hanson thinks so. But—this is my first flight, you know. And nobody ever told me what to use for garbage pails—"

"Look, Biggs," I told him, "there's no need for garbage pails in space. You can't just dump things out the airlock and expect to get rid of them."

"But Captain Hanson said to junk the spoiled vegetables."

"Junk. Not dump! They should have been thrown into the incinerator. You see, anything tossed out of the Saturn in free space just follows along with the ship." I grinned. "I'd hate to be one of the spaceport attendants on Earth when the Saturn comes in surrounded by twenty-four lead satellites full of garbage."

He picked me up on that one quick as a flash.

"But—but they won't be with us when we land, Sparks. As soon as we hit Earth's atmosphere, the friction will destroy the Forenzis and their contents."

I whistled softly.

"By golly, you're right. I clean forgot about that, and Hanson was so sore, he forgot it, too. That means we have to get those containers back into the ship before we hit the tropo, or we're going to lose a couple hundred bucks worth of equipment."

Biggs said meekly, "I—I'll be glad to go out and reclaim them, Sparks. Can you fix it up with the skipper?"

"I'll try," I told him.

So the next day I told Hanson about it. The Captain yanked his lower lip thoughtfully and agreed.

"Let him do it. That's better than giving him a free ride to Earth. And maybe he'll slip into the rocket blasts?"

I passed the order on to Biggs; then went back to the radio room. Joe Marlowe was calling me from Lunar Three. And what he had to say drove all other thoughts from my mind. His message came right from Corporation headquarters.

"Please report," it said, "exact amount and probable value of cargo. Must have immediate reply."

I shot through an O.K. and passed the message up to the skipper. Then, my curiosity aroused, I contacted Joe on our private conversation band and asked him how come and why. He answered cautiously.

"Stock market taking nosedive in New York, Bert," he told me. "Corp. bonds fading. Need this cargo badly."

Boy, there was bad news! It was a private message, but I figured the Old Man ought to know it. So when he came in I passed it along. He stared at me.

"Hell's bells, Sparks! Then in that case, I can't send this!"

"This" was the message he had intended to relay: It said, succinctly, "Cargo ruined. Value zero."

"If you do," I told him, "we'll all be studying the want ads as soon as we hit port. Stock markets are screwy. This can't be a bad panic, or a fifty thousand buck cargo wouldn't be that important. But if the Corporation's under suspicion, and they learn the Saturn's cargo is worthless—"

"What will we do then?"

"Stall," I suggested. "Maybe by the time we get in, the situation will be cleared up."

So we framed a message that wouldn't upset the apple cart too soon. It said, "Value of cargo estimated at Sun City spaceport as $50,000." And that was true enough....

---

Biggs, with his unerring faculty for selecting the wrong moment, chose this time to come bouncing into my radio room. He had taken off his quartzite headpiece, but he was still wearing his bulger, and its deflated folds hung around him like the poorly draped carcass of a Venusian mammoth.

He said, "Hey, Sparks, have you got a book on energy and radiation?"

"Help yourself," I said, pointing to my bookcase. "Why, what's the sudden excitement?"

"I've been thinking," he began, "that maybe—"

Captain Hanson let out a blat like an angry lion.

"Mister Biggs! I thought you were reclaiming those Forenzi jars?"

"Yes, sir. I was. I mean—I am. But—"

"Never mind the 'buts'! Get back to work!"

"Y-yes, sir!" Biggs saluted meekly; tossed me a grateful glance. "Thanks, Sparks. I've got an idea, and if I'm right—"

"Get out, Biggs!" roared the skipper.

"Yes, sir." Biggs backed out hastily. He was thumbing the pages as he disappeared. Hanson yanked his lower lip angrily.

"The Corporation goes busted. The Saturn goes under the hammer. We're all out of jobs. And that—that insane young whippersnapper wants to play school!"

"He seemed mighty excited about something," I said.

"He'll be worse than that," promised the skipper, "if he doesn't get those jars back on board."

All this, to get Biblical about it, took place on the seventh day. The Saturn is a ten-day freighter. So we had three more days of headaches before us till we slipped into New York spaceport.

They were three days of headaches, too. The skipper and I spent most of our time hanging over the radio, watching the progress of the stock market slump in New York. We hoped the situation would ease up so that our coming in with a zero cargo wouldn't make any difference—but no such luck. Somehow the rumor had gotten around that the Saturn's cargo would not be of sufficient value to keep the Corporation in the blue. And the Wall Street wolves were closing in, getting ready to snap if the rumor were true.

In the meantime, our stupid friend, Biggs, was taking a hell of a long time to reclaim those Forenzis. It's really not a hard job, you know. All he had to do was slip out through the airlock, throw a grapple around each jar, and bring it in.

But he seemed to be as awkward at this as at every other job he had ever attempted. On an off-period, I went down to watch him once. I found he'd thrown grapples around the jars, but had not brought a single one into the airlock yet.

---

Biggs was in a frightful mess, trying to throw grapples around the jars.

---

I told him, "You'd better get a wiggle on, Biggs. We hit the tropo tomorrow. If those things get into the atmosphere, you'll be able to pour them into the airlock."

"I know," he said abstractedly, "but I'm not quite ready to—Sparks, according to that book you lent me, cosmic rays go down to 1/100,000 Ângstrom units."

"That's right," I told him.

"That means they are more than ten times as intense as gamma rays."

"Right again. Why? What's the pay-off?"

"That's what I'm trying to find out," he said strangely. He finished tying a loop around one of the jars; pushed himself free and toward the airlock.

"You want me to help you drag 'em in now?" I asked.

"No thanks, Sparks. I think we'll leave them out till tomorrow," he said.

"But Captain Hanson—" I began.

"Tomorrow."

"After all, I'm just a radioman," I shrugged. "It's your funeral," I said.

---

He got them inside the next day. I saw them lying in the corridor beside the airlock, covered with a strip of tarpaulin. And he got them in just in time, too, for about an hour later we hit the Heaviside layer.

We set out our Ampie and eased through all right. From there on, it was just an easy coast to Earth. We threw out our lug-sails—the retractable metal fins which give "space luggers" their name—and put on the power brakes. In a couple of hours we were settling into our hangar off New York spaceport.

I closed out my key and locked the radio room. There was nothing more I could do now. So I went up to the control turret and found Captain Hanson gnawing the fingernail of his index finger down to the second joint.

"Well, Captain?" I said.

"Any late news, Sparks?" he demanded anxiously.

I shook my head.

"Only bad news. The Board's sending over their appraisers immediately."

He said wearily, "Well, we did our best. If it hadn't been for that crazy Biggs, we'd still have our cargo. But as it is—"

"I wonder if International Stratoplanes need any radio operators?" I said gloomily.

We were grounded now. As we walked down the corridor the motors went off, and I could hear the hiss of the airlock opening. We reached the port just as the committee entered. Doc Challenger was there, and Col. Brophy, and old Prendergast Biggs himself. I knew, then, that things were in a bad state, or all the big bugs would not have come out.

Challenger stepped forward, beaming.

"Happy landing, Captain!" he chortled. "I need not tell you how glad we are you came in safely. We've been experiencing bad times in New York, sir, bad times! But everything's all right now."

Hanson said, "Yes, sir. But I've got something to tell you, sir—"

"Later, Captain, later! First we must take up this cargo question. Approximately $50,000 worth of mekel and clab—is that right? We have our appraisers here. If your estimate is right, the Corporation will weather this—er—mild storm."

Hanson coughed nervously. He hedged.

"Well, now, you see—about that there cargo—"

You never saw three faces lose their smiles so suddenly. There was stony silence for a minute. Then Col. Brophy said in a deep voice, "Captain Hanson, there's nothing wrong in your estimate of the cargo's value, is there?"

"No, sir. I mean the estimate was right, but—"

---

IT was right here that young Lancelot Biggs interrupted.

"Excuse me, gentlemen," he said, "but I don't quite understand. Is it important that we land a cargo of clab and mekel?"

Captain Hanson whirled on him.

"Biggs!" he snapped sternly. Then he turned to old Prendergast Biggs. "Sir," he said, "I've delayed telling this as long as possible. But now I must tell you. This precious nephew of yours—"

The old man smiled fatuously.

"Yes, yes, Captain Hanson. A fine lad, isn't he? What was it you were starting to say, Lancelot?"

I grabbed Hanson's arm. I thought he was going to blow his tubes and hit somebody right then and there. But before he got a chance, Lancelot Biggs was talking again. To the Captain.

"Captain Hanson," he said seriously, "I wish you'd told me this before. I didn't realize that our cargo was so important—"

Then he turned to the committee.

"I hope you will not be surprised to learn, gentlemen, that our cargo is not vegetable. At the last minute, Captain Hanson decided to make a change—"

Hanson's face turned white. He squawked, "What! Are you trying to shift the blame to—"

Biggs' voice drowned out his protest.

"—and so, gentlemen, we have placed the cargo right here for your inspection. Look!" With a swift motion he tore the tarpaulin off the Forenzi jars. I looked—and gulped! They were the same jars, all right. Only different! They were no longer a dull, whitish metal. They were a glinting copper color! Biggs patted one of them affectionately.

"Ask your appraisers to estimate the value of these, gentlemen. I think they'll find their value to be approximately a quarter of a million dollars. These are—pure gold!"

It's a good thing I was holding on to Captain Hanson's arm. For just as the committee was exclaiming, "Excellent! Excellent trading, Captain Hanson!" the skipper's nerves gave out. He collapsed like a punctured bulger. I remember shouting, "Water! Water, somebody!" Then I passed out, too!

---

Afterward, the three of us were alone in the turret. And Hanson was asking, "But how, Biggs? I don't get it at all? How in blazes did it happen?"

Biggs blushed and looked uncomfortable.

"Why, it's pretty obvious when you come to analyze it, Captain. I can't understand how it is that no one ever discovered it before, in twenty years of space travel. But perhaps it's because ships and bulgers are made of permalloy instead of lead. Or it may be that some enzyme secreted by the rotten vegetables acted as a catalyst. Lab workers will have to study that."

"You're still not telling us what happened."

"Don't you know? It was transmutation, induced in the lead Forenzi jars by the action of cosmic rays."[1]

Captain Hanson said in an awed tone. "Exposure to cosmic rays done that?"

"Yes. Artificial transmutations were caused 'way back in the early 20th Century through bombardment with gamma rays. And cosmic rays are more than ten times as short as gammas.

"I began to suspect something strange was happening to the Forenzi jars when I first went out to gather them in. Their color had changed slightly, and their exterior was rather more granular. That's why I came in to borrow Spark's book on radiation. What I saw convinced me that the lead was being transmuted; was then in the mesolead stage; approximately an isotope of thallium.

"I decided to wait and see if the transmutation would continue—"

Hanson wiped his hand across his forehead.

"Suppose there'd been more time? An' suppose'n the transmutation had gone on a step farther? What then?"

"Well, now, there's an interesting question. The next element down the ladder is platinum.[2] It's quite possible that—"

"Wait a minute," interrupted the skipper. "Did you say platinum?"

"Yes. Why?"

"Nothin'. That is, nothin' much."

The skipper rose and strode to the intercommunicating phone.

"Ross?" he yelled. "Listen—I want you to get this crate ready to roll again. We're takin' off for Venus first thing in the mornin'. An', hey, Ross! Send to the warehouse for about five—no, make it six—dozen Forenzi jars. Yeah, Forenzi jars, I said.

"And Ross—get the biggest ones they got! The Corporation ain't found it out yet, but we're goin' into the transmutin' business. And Mister Biggs comes aboard as First Mate!"

---

[1]Lead has an atomic weight of 207 plus, and its atomic number is 82. This atomic number corresponds to its net positive nuclear charge. Gold on the other hand, has an atomic weight of 197, with an atomic number of 79.

The loss of two alpha particles and the loss of a single beta particle in a molecule of lead, causes that molecule to become an isotopal molecule of gold, with an atomic number 79, and the atomic weight of 199. For all practical commercial purposes, this is the same as true gold.—Author.

[2]Platinum has a weight of 195 plus, and a net Positive nuclear charge of 78.—Author.

 

About the Author

Nelson Slade Bond (November 23, 1908 – November 4, 2006) was an American writer. His works included books, magazine articles, and scripts used in radio, for television and on the stage.(Wikipedia)

👉Nelson S. Bond Books at Amazon

The Crawling Chaos H.P. Lovecraft and Winifred V. Jackson (1921)

 

A horror short story written first published April 1921 in the United Co-operative. H. P. Lovecraft wrote the entire text, but Jackson is also credited since the story was based on a dream she experienced.

The Crawling Chaos

By

H. P. Lovecraft 

Of the pleasures and pains of opium much has been written. The ecstasies and horrors of De Quincey and the paradis artificiels of Baudelaire are preserved and interpreted with an art which makes them immortal, and the world knows well the beauty, the terror and the mystery of those obscure realms into which the inspired dreamer is transported. But much as has been told, no man has yet dared intimate the nature of the phantasms thus unfolded to the mind, or hint at the direction of the unheard-of roads along whose ornate and exotic course the partaker of the drug is so irresistibly borne. De Quincey was drawn back into Asia, that teeming land of nebulous shadows whose hideous antiquity is so impressive that "the vast age of the race and name overpowers the sense of youth in the individual," but farther than that he dared not go. Those who have gone farther seldom returned, and even when they have, they have been either silent or quite mad. I took opium but once—in the year of the plague, when doctors sought to deaden the agonies they could not cure. There was an overdose—my physician was worn out with horror and exertion—and I travelled very far indeed. In the end I returned and lived, but my nights are filled with strange memories, nor have I ever permitted a doctor to give me opium again.

The pain and pounding in my head had been quite unendurable when the drug was administered. Of the future I had no heed; to escape, whether by cure, unconsciousness, or death, was all that concerned me. I was partly delirious, so that it is hard to place the exact moment of transition, but I think the effect must have begun shortly before the pounding ceased to be painful. As I have said, there was an overdose; so my reactions were probably far from normal. The sensation of falling, curiously dissociated from the idea of gravity or direction, was paramount; though there was subsidiary impression of unseen throngs in incalculable profusion, throngs of infinitely diverse nature, but all more or less related to me. Sometimes it seemed less as though I were falling, than as though the universe or the ages were falling past me. Suddenly my pain ceased, and I began to associate the pounding with an external rather than internal force. The falling had ceased also, giving place to a sensation of uneasy, temporary rest; and when I listened closely, I fancied the pounding was that of the vast, inscrutable sea as its sinister, colossal breakers lacerated some desolate shore after a storm of titanic magnitude. Then I opened my eyes. For a moment my surroundings seemed confused, like a projected image hopelessly out of focus, but gradually I realised my solitary presence in a strange and beautiful room lighted by many windows. Of the exact nature of the apartment I could form no idea, for my thoughts were still far from settled, but I noticed van-coloured rugs and draperies, elaborately fashioned tables, chairs, ottomans, and divans, and delicate vases and ornaments which conveyed a suggestion of the exotic without being actually alien. These things I noticed, yet they were not long uppermost in my mind. Slowly but inexorably crawling upon my consciousness and rising above every other impression, came a dizzying fear of the unknown; a fear all the greater because I could not analyse it, and seeming to concern a stealthily approaching menace; not death, but some nameless, unheard-of thing inexpressibly more ghastly and abhorrent. Presently I realised that the direct symbol and excitant of my fear was the hideous pounding whose incessant reverberations throbbed maddeningly against my exhausted brain. It seemed to come from a point outside and below the edifice in which I stood, and to associate itself with the most terrifying mental images. I felt that some horrible scene or object lurked beyond the silk-hung walls, and shrank from glancing through the arched, latticed windows that opened so bewilderingly on every hand. Perceiving shutters attached to these windows, I closed them all, averting my eyes from the exterior as I did so. Then, employing a flint and steel which I found on one of the small tables, I lit the many candles reposing about the walls in arabesque sconces. The added sense of security brought by closed shutters and artificial light calmed my nerves to some degree, but I could not shut out the monotonous pounding. Now that I was calmer, the sound became as fascinating as it was fearful, and I felt a contradictory desire to seek out its source despite my still powerful shrinking. Opening a portiere at the side of the room nearest the pounding, I beheld a small and richly draped corridor ending in a carven door and large oriel window. To this window I was irresistibly drawn, though my ill-defined apprehensions seemed almost equally bent on holding me back. As I approached it I could see a chaotic whirl of waters in the distance. Then, as I attained it and glanced out on all sides, the stupendous picture of my surroundings burst upon me with full and devastating force.

I beheld such a sight as I had never beheld before, and which no living person can have seen save in the delirium of fever or the inferno of opium. The building stood on a narrow point of land—or what was now a narrow point of land—fully three hundred feet above what must lately have been a seething vortex of mad waters. On either side of the house there fell a newly washed-out precipice of red earth, whilst ahead of me the hideous waves were still rolling in frightfully, eating away the land with ghastly monotony and deliberation. Out a mile or more there rose and fell menacing breakers at least fifty feet in height, and on the far horizon ghoulish black clouds of grotesque contour were resting and brooding like unwholesome vultures. The waves were dark and purplish, almost black, and clutched at the yielding red mud of the bank as if with uncouth, greedy hands. I could not but feel that some noxious marine mind had declared a war of extermination upon all the solid ground, perhaps abetted by the angry sky.

Recovering at length from the stupor into which this unnatural spectacle had thrown me, I realized that my actual physical danger was acute. Even whilst I gazed, the bank had lost many feet, and it could not be long before the house would fall undermined into the awful pit of lashing waves. Accordingly I hastened to the opposite side of the edifice, and finding a door, emerged at once, locking it after me with a curious key which had hung inside. I now beheld more of the strange region about me, and marked a singular division which seemed to exist in the hostile ocean and firmament. On each side of the jutting promontory different conditions held sway. At my left as I faced inland was a gently heaving sea with great green waves rolling peacefully in under a brightly shining sun. Something about that sun’s nature and position made me shudder, but I could not then tell, and cannot tell now, what it was. At my right also was the sea, but it was blue, calm, and only gently undulating, while the sky above it was darker and the washed-out bank more nearly white than reddish. I now turned my attention to the land, and found occasion for fresh surprise; for the vegetation resembled nothing I had ever seen or read about. It was apparently tropical or at least sub-tropical—a conclusion borne out by the intense heat of the air. Sometimes I thought I could trace strange analogies with the flora of my native land, fancying that the well-known plants and shrubs might assume such forms under a radical change of climate; but the gigantic and omnipresent palm trees were plainly foreign. The house I had just left was very small—hardly more than a cottage—but its material was evidently marble, and its architecture was weird and composite, involving a quaint fusion of Western and Eastern forms. At the corners were Corinthian columns, but the red tile roof was like that of a Chinese pagoda. From the door inland there stretched a path of singularly white sand, about four feet wide, and lined on either side with stately palms and unidentifiable flowering shrubs and plants. It lay toward the side of the promontory where the sea was blue and the bank rather whitish. Down this path I felt impelled to flee, as if pursued by some malignant spirit from the pounding ocean. At first it was slightly uphill, then I reached a gentle crest. Behind me I saw the scene I had left; the entire point with the cottage and the black water, with the green sea on one side and the blue sea on the other, and a curse unnamed and unnamable lowering over all. I never saw it again, and often wonder. . . . After this last look I strode ahead and surveyed the inland panorama before me.

The path, as I have intimated, ran along the right-hand shore as one went inland. Ahead and to the left I now viewed a magnificent valley comprising thousands of acres, and covered with a swaying growth of tropical grass higher than my head. Almost at the limit of vision was a colossal palm tree which seemed to fascinate and beckon me. By this time wonder and’ escape from the imperilled peninsula had largely dissipated my fear, but as I paused and sank fatigued to the path, idly digging with my hands into the warm, whitish-golden sand, a new and acute sense of danger seized me. Some terror in the swishing tall grass seemed added to that of the diabolically pounding sea, and I started up crying aloud and disjointedly, "Tiger? Tiger? Is it Tiger? Beast? Beast? Is it a Beast that I am afraid of?" My mind wandered back to an ancient and classical story of tigers which I had read; I strove to recall the author, but had difficulty. Then in the midst of my fear I remembered that the tale was by Rudyard Kipling; nor did the grotesqueness of deeming him an ancient author occur to me; I wished for the volume containing this story, and had almost started back toward the doomed cottage to procure it when my better sense and the lure of the palm prevented me.

Whether or not I could have resisted the backward beckoning without the counter-fascination of the vast palm tree, I do not know. This attraction was now dominant, and I left the path and crawled on hands and knees down the valley’s slope despite my fear of the grass and of the serpents it might contain. I resolved to fight for life and reason as long as possible against all menaces of sea or land, though I sometimes feared defeat as the maddening swish of the uncanny grasses joined the still audible and irritating pounding of the distant breakers. I would frequently pause and put my hands to my ears for relief, but could never quite shut out the detestable sound. It was, as it seemed to me, only after ages that I finally dragged myself to the beckoning palm tree and lay quiet beneath its protecting shade.

There now ensued a series of incidents which transported me to the opposite extremes of ecstasy and horror; incidents which I tremble to recall and dare not seek to interpret. No sooner had I crawled beneath the overhanging foliage of the palm, than there dropped from its branches a young child of such beauty as I never beheld before. Though ragged and dusty, this being bore the features of a faun or demigod, and seemed almost to diffuse a radiance in the dense shadow of the tree. It smiled and extended its hand, but before I could arise and speak I heard in the upper air the exquisite melody of singing; notes high and low blent with a sublime and ethereal harmoniousness. The sun had by this time sunk below the horizon, and in the twilight I saw an aureole of lambent light encircled the child’s head. Then in a tone of silver it addressed me: "It is the end. They have come down through the gloaming from the stars. Now all is over, and beyond the Arinurian streams we shall dwell blissfully in Teloe. " As the child spoke, I beheld a soft radiance through the leaves of the palm tree, and rising, greeted a pair whom I knew to be the chief singers among those I had heard. A god and goddess they must have been, for such beauty is not mortal; and they took my hands, saying, "Come, child, you have heard the voices, and all is well. In Teloe beyond the Milky Way and the Arinurian streams are cities all of amber and chalcedony. And upon their domes of many facets glisten the images of strange and beautiful stars. Under the ivory bridges of Teloe flow rivers of liquid gold bearing pleasure-barges bound for blossomy Cytharion of the Seven Suns. And in Teloe and Cytharion abide only youth, beauty, and pleasure, nor are any sounds heard, save of laughter, song, and the lute. Only the gods dwell in Teloe of the golden rivers, but among them shalt thou dwell."

As I listened, enchanted, I suddenly became aware of a change in my surroundings. The palm tree, so lately overshadowing my exhausted form, was now some distance to my left and considerably below me. I was obviously floating in the atmosphere; companioned not only by the strange child and the radiant pair, but by a constantly increasing throng of half-luminous, vine-crowned youths and maidens with wind-blown hair and joyful countenance. We slowly ascended together, as if borne on a fragrant breeze which blew not from the earth but from the golden nebulae, and the child whispered in my ear that I must look always upward to the pathways of light, and never backward to the sphere I had just left. The youths and maidens now chanted mellifluous choriambics to the accompaniment of lutes, and I felt enveloped in a peace and happiness more profound than any I had in life imagined, when the intrusion of a single sound altered my destiny and shattered my soul. Through the ravishing strains of the singers and the lutanists, as if in mocking, daemoniac concord, throbbed from gulfs below the damnable, the detestable pounding of that hideous ocean. As those black breakers beat their message into my ears I forgot the words of the child and looked back, down upon the doomed scene from which I thought I had escaped.

Down through the aether I saw the accursed earth slowly turning, ever turning, with angry and tempestuous seas gnawing at wild desolate shores and dashing foam against the tottering towers of deserted cities. And under a ghastly moon there gleamed sights I can never describe, sights I can never forget; deserts of corpselike clay and jungles of ruin and decadence where once stretched the populous plains and villages of my native land, and maelstroms of frothing ocean where once rose the mighty temples of my forefathers. Around the northern pole steamed a morass of noisome growths and miasmal vapours, hissing before the onslaught of the ever-mounting waves that curled and fretted from the shuddering deep. Then a rending report clave the night, and athwart the desert of deserts appeared a smoking rift. Still the black ocean foamed and gnawed, eating away the desert on either side as the rift in the center widened and widened. There was now no land left but the desert, and still the fuming ocean ate and ate. All at once I thought even the pounding sea seemed afraid of something, afraid of dark gods of the inner earth that are greater than the evil god of waters, but even if it was it could not turn back; and the desert had suffered too much from those nightmare waves to help them now. So the ocean ate the last of the land and poured into the smoking gulf, thereby giving up all it had ever conquered. From the new-flooded lands it flowed again, uncovering death and decay; and from its ancient and immemorial bed it trickled loathsomely, uncovering nighted secrets of the years when Time was young and the gods unborn. Above the waves rose weedy remembered spires. The moon laid pale lilies of light on dead London, and Paris stood up from its damp grave to be sanctified with star-dust. Then rose spires and monoliths that were weedy but not remembered; terrible spires and monoliths of lands that men never knew were lands. There was not any pounding now, but only the unearthly roaring and hissing of waters tumbling into the rift. The smoke of that rift had changed to steam, and almost hid the world as it grew denser and denser. It seared my face and hands, and when I looked to see how it affected my companions I found they had all disappeared. Then very suddenly it ended, and I knew no more till I awaked upon a bed of convalescence. As the cloud of steam from the Plutonic gulf finally concealed the entire surface from my sight, all the firmament shrieked at a sudden agony of mad reverberations which shook the trembling aether. In one delirious flash and burst it happened; one blinding, deafening holocaust of fire, smoke, and thunder that dissolved the wan moon as it sped outward to the void.

And when the smoke cleared away, and I sought to look upon the earth, I beheld against the background of cold, humorous stars only the dying sun and the pale mournful planets searching for their sister.

Authenticated Vampire Story by Franz Hartman

 

Authenticated Vampire Story

by

Franz Hartman

 

On June 10, 1909, there appeared in a prominent Vienna paper (the Neues Wiener Journal) a notice (which I herewith enclose) saying that the castle of B---had been burned by the populace, because there was a great mortality among the peasant children, and it was generally believed that this was due to the invasion of a vampire, supposed to be the last Count B--, who died and acquired that reputation. The castle was situated in a wild and desolate part of the Carpathian Mountains and was formerly a fortification against the Turks. It was not inhabited owing to its being believed to be in the possession of ghosts, only a wing of it was used as a dwelling for the caretaker and his wife.

Now it so happened that when I read the above notice, I was sitting in a coffee-house at Vienna in company with an old friend of mine who is an experienced occultist and editor of a well known journal and who had spent several months in the neighborhood of the castle. From him I obtained the following account and it appears that the vampire in question was probably not the old Count, but his beautiful daughter, the Countess Elga, whose photograph, taken from the original painting, I obtained. My friend said:--

"Two years ago I was living at Hermannstadt, and being engaged in engineering a road through the hills, I often came within the vicinity of the old castle, where I made the acquaintance of the old castellan, or caretaker, and his wife, who occupied a part of the wing of the house, almost separate from the main body of the building. They were a quiet old couple and rather reticent in giving information or expressing an opinion in regard to the strange noises which were often heard at night in the deserted halls, or of the apparitions which the Wallachian peasants claimed to have seen when they loitered in the surroundings after dark. All I could gather was that the old Count was a widower and had a beautiful daughter, who was one day killed by a fall from her horse, and that soon after the old man died in some mysterious manner, and the bodies were buried in a solitary graveyard belonging to a neighboring village. Not long after their death an unusual mortality was noticed among the inhabitants of the village: several children and even some grown people died without any apparent illness; they merely wasted away; and thus a rumor was started that the old Count had become a vampire after his death. There is no doubt that he was not a saint, as he was addicted to drinking, and some shocking tales were in circulation about his conduct and that of his daughter; but whether or not there was any truth in them. I am not in a position to say.

"Afterwards the property came into possession of---, a distant relative of the family, who is a young man and officer in a cavalry regiment at Vienna. It appears that the heir enjoyed his life at the capital and did not trouble himself much about the old castle in the wilderness; he did not even come to look at it, but gave his direction by letter to the old janitor, telling him merely to keep things in order and to attend to repairs, if any were necessary. Thus the castellan was actually master of the house and offered its hospitality to me and my friends.

"One evening myself and my two assistants, Dr. E--, a young lawyer, and Mr. W--, a literary man, went to inspect the premises. First we went to the stables. There were no horses, as they had been sold; but what attracted our special attention was an old queer-fashioned coach with gilded ornaments and bearing the emblems of the family. We then inspected the rooms, passing through some halls and gloomy corridors, such as may be found in any old castle. There was nothing remarkable about the furniture; but in one of the halls there hung in a frame an oil-painting, a portrait, representing a lady with a large hat and wearing a fur coat. We all were involuntarily startled on beholding this picture; not so much on account of the beauty of the lady, but on account of the uncanny expression of her eyes, and Dr. E--, after looking at the picture for a short time, suddenly exclaimed--

"'How strange! The picture closes its eyes and opens them again, and now begins to smile!'.

"Now Dr. E---is a very sensitive person and has more than once had some experience in spiritism, and we made up our minds to form a circle for the purpose of investigating this phenomenon. Accordingly, on the same evening we sat around a table in an adjoining room, forming a magnetic chain with our hands. Soon the table began to move and the name 'Elga' was spelled. We asked who this Elga was, and the answer was rapped out 'The lady, whose picture you have seen."

"'Is the lady living?' asked Mr. W--. This question was not answered; but instead it was rapped out: 'If W---desires it, I will appear to him bodily tonight at two o'clock.' W---consented, and now the table seemed to be endowed with life and manifested a great affection for W--; it rose on two legs and pressed against his breast, as if it intended to embrace him.

"We inquired of the castellan whom the picture represented; but to our surprise he did not know. He said that it was the copy of a picture painted by the celebrated painter Hans Markart of Vienna, and had been bought by the old Count because its demoniacal look pleased him so much.

"We left the castle, and W---retired to his room at an inn, a half-hour's journey distant from that place. He was of a somewhat skeptical turn of mind, being neither a firm believer in ghosts and apparitions nor ready to deny their possibility. He was not afraid, but anxious to see what would come out of his agreement, and for the purpose of keeping himself awake he sat down and began to write an article for a journal.

"Towards two o'clock he heard steps on the stairs and the door of the hall opened, there was a rustling of a silk dress and the sound of the feet of a lady walking to and fro in the corridor.

"It may be imagined that he was somewhat startled; but taking courage, he said to himself: 'if this is Elga, let her come in.' Then the door of his room opened and Elga entered. She was most elegantly dressed and appeared still more youthful and seductive than the picture. There was a lounge on the other side of the table where W---was writing, and there she silently posed herself. She did not speak, but her looks and gestures left no doubt in regard to her desires and intentions.

"Mr. W---resisted the temptation and remained firm. It is not known, whether he did so out of principle or timidity or fear. Be this as it may, he kept on writing, looking from time to time at his visitor and silently wishing that she would leave.

At last, after half an hour, which seemed to him much longer, the lady departed in the same manner in which she came.

"This adventure left W---no peace, and we consequently arranged several sittings at the old castle, where a variety of uncanny phenomena took place. Thus, for instance, once the servant-girl was about to light a fire in the stove, when the door of the apartment opened and Elga stood there. The girl, frightened out of her wits, rushed out of the room, tumbling down the stairs in terror with the petroleum lamp in her hand, which broke and came very near to setting her clothes on fire. Lighted lamps and candles went out when brought near the picture, and many other 'manifestations' took place, which it would be tedious to describe; but the following incident ought not to be omitted.

"Mr. W---was at that time desirous of obtaining the position as co-editor of a certain journal, and a few days after the above-narrated adventure he received a letter in which a noble lady of high position offered him her patronage for that purpose. The writer requested him to come to a certain place the same evening, where he would meet a gentleman who would give him further particulars. He went and was met by an unknown stranger, who told him that he was requested by the Countess Elga to invite Mr. W---to a carriage drive and that she would await him at midnight at a certain crossing of two roads, not far from the village. The stranger then suddenly disappeared.

"Now it seems that Mr. W---had some misgivings about the meeting and drive and he hired a policeman as detective to go at midnight to the appointed place, to see what would happen. The policeman went and reported next morning that he had seen nothing but the well-known, old fashioned carriage from the castle with two black horses attached to it standing there as if waiting for somebody, and that he had no occasion to interfere and merely waited until the carriage moved on. When the castellan of the castle was asked, he swore that the carriage had not been out that night, and in fact it could not have been out, as there were no horses to draw it.

"But this is not all, for on the following day I met a friend who is a great skeptic and disbeliever in ghosts and always used to laugh at such things. Now, however, he seemed to be very serious and said: 'Last night something very strange happened to me. At about one o'clock this morning I returned from a late visit and as I happened to pass the graveyard of the village, I saw a carriage with gilded ornaments standing at the entrance. I wondered about this taking place at such an unusual hour, and being curious to see what would happen, I waited. Two elegantly dressed ladies issued from the carriage. One of these was young and pretty, but threw at me a devilish and scornful look as they both passed by and entered the cemetery. There they were met by a well-dressed man, who saluted the ladies and spoke to the younger one, saying: 'Why, Miss Elga! Are you returned so soon?' Such a queer feeling came over me that I abruptly left and hurried home.

"This matter has not been explained; but certain experiments which we subsequently made with the picture of Elga brought out some curious facts.

"To look at the picture for a certain time caused me to feel a very disagreeable sensation in the region of the solar plexus. I began to dislike the portrait and proposed to destroy it. We held a sitting in the adjoining room; the table manifested a great aversion against my presence. It was rapped out that I should leave the circle, and that the picture must not be destroyed. I ordered a Bible to be brought in and read the beginning of the first chapter of St. John, whereupon the above-mentioned Mr. E---(the medium) and another man present claimed that they saw the picture distorting its face. I turned the frame and pricked the back of the picture with my penknife in different places, and Mr. E--, as well as the other man, felt all the pricks, although they had retired to the corridor.

"I made the sign of the pentagram over the picture, and again the two gentlemen claimed that the picture was horribly distorting its face.

"Soon afterwards we were called away and left that country. Of Elga I heard nothing more."

Thus far goes the account of my friend the editor. There are several points in it which call for an explanation. Perhaps the sages of the S.P.R. will find it by investigating the laws of nature ruling the astral plane, unless they prefer to take the easier route, by proclaiming it all to be humbug and fraud.

 

 About the Author 

Franz Hartmann (22 November 1838, Donauwörth – 7 August 1912, Kempten im Allgäu) was a German medical doctor, theosophist, occultist, geomancer, astrologer, and author. (Wikipedia)

👉Franz Hartman Books at Amazon

LibriVox Recording of Short Ghost and Horror Collection 073 by Various.

 

 

 LibriVox recording of Short Ghost and Horror Collection 073 by Various.
Read in English by LibriVox Volunteers

A collection of twenty stories featuring ghoulies, ghosties, four-legged beasts and things that go bump in the night. Expect shivers up your spine, the sound of a monstrous howl, and the occasional touch of wonder.