Mars is our nearest neighbour in the solar system, with the exception of our own satellite Luna. It will be considerably easier to hit the moon of course, but what will we find when we get there? Plenty to interest the scientist, the mining engineer, and the cosmologist. But the Biologist will find only fossilised traces of Lunar life, if he finds anything at all. On Mars the story will be vastly different. We know that there is vegetation there. We still argue about those enigmatic canals. Are they optical illusion or...? What if...? What if an intelligent civilisation cut those great water courses? What if that civilisation still exists? Is man the only intelligence in God's great Universe? How will earth's envoys react when they first encounter non-human intellect for the first time? Will the aliens be friendly, or...?
Release date:
December 30, 2013
Publisher:
Orion Publishing Group
Print pages:
320
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THERE were six of them listening to the lecture—correction! There were five of them listening to the lecture, because Ordo was drunk! The other five were vaguely aware of his intoxication, were partially conscious of his inebriation and didn’t know whether to be embarrassed by it or to ignore it.
There was Carlak, the captain, a square, rather chunky man with earnest eyes that peered behind square, rimless glasses. His hair was cropped close to his head, and there was about him an air of bustling efficiency. He could be summed up in the one word: ‘capable’.
Fergus was a tall, gangling individual. Fergus was a doctor, a biologist and a botanist of some repute. Fergus was one of those men who went through life like a tall drooping reed. Yet, for all his apparent droop and his awkward gangling height, he was a man with a tremendously scholarly turn of mind. Fergus was a man to be reckoned with, as a lecturer at any rate.
Indall was small, almost microscopic, his temperament was quixotic and his mind mercurial. He was a physicist and a chemist.
Then there was Lomax, big, broad, easy-going Lomax—bluff, hale and hearty. He was a sociologist and a psychologist.
When Ordo wasn’t busy getting drunk he was just an average human being. Medium height, medium build, medium weight. Medium intelligence, medium everything. If there had been any world titles for ‘Mr. Average’ Ordo would have got them. He was so normal as to be abnormal. He was just a lay figure. He was an historian and a photographer, but mainly as far as this expedition was concerned he was the photographer. His other duty would be that of recording expert. But right now Ordo was neither recorder, historian nor photographer because Ordo was drunk. Staggeringly drunk. Hazily drunk.
The sixth man was Rudge. Rudge was as tough as nails, as tough as leather, wire or whipcord. He was as tough as the great pounding engines that he guarded. He was as bitter, and as angry and as explosive as the fuel that surged through his rockets. A strange man.
Lomax didn’t know what to make of Rudge, but he was too good an engineer to have been turned down. Still—that bitter, angry cynicism of his raised a problem. ‘What do you do with a man like Rudge?’ thought Lomax over and over again. ‘How do you deal with a mind like that? Maybe you don’t … Maybe you just let him go his own sweet way, and hope that he won’t cause any more trouble than you think he’s going to.’
It hadn’t been an easy decision to make and the brunt of the responsibility had rested on Lomax. Anyhow, it was done now. Lomax had another worry—Ordo! Ordo was far from being irreplaceable, but he had strung along with them this far and it seemed a pity to turn the boy back. ‘Boy’ thought Lomax—that means you’re getting old. When you start talking of a man in his thirties as a ‘boy,’ you aren’t the chicken you used to be! Lomax looked down into his own mind and smiled complacently.
The voice of the lecturer suddenly cut across his train of thought. The lecturer seemed to be looking straight at Ordo. Lomax didn’t like that, because if the lecturer spotted that Ordo was drunk there would be questions about the psychological selection board, and if there were questions about the psychological selection board there would be questions about Lomax’s abilities to select members of the crew—and Lomax didn’t want questions about that.
“… Mars as you know, astronomically speaking,” said the lecturer, “is, in order of distance, the fourth planet out from the solar furnace. It is our next most immediate neighbour. Now let us conduct this lecture—your final briefing, gentlemen—in the form of a catechism. Or Question and Answer. A dissertation rather than as a straight-forward peroration or a lecture from me. After all, I feel it would be of considerably great advantage to you to run through any questions that may exist in your minds, at this late stage. This is your introduction to Mars, as it were. I am going to tell you everything that it is possible to tell you while you are still on the earthly side of the thing. From then on, it will be up to you!”
“How does Mars usually appear to the naked eye?” Carlak asked. He wasn’t asking because he wanted to know, he was asking because the lecturer expected someone to ask a question, and he felt it was his job as Captain to prime the lecturer, to keep him going. To prevent one of those awkward gaps, one of those ‘nasty ’orrible silences’ which students dread in the course of a lecture in case they get asked a question …!
“To the naked eye,” replied the lecturer, “Mars appears as a bright star of a slightly reddish or lurid tint, contrasting very greatly with the whiteness of Venus. Does that satisfy your question, Captain Carlak?”
“Oh adequately, adequately. Thank you,” said Carlak.
“Good. Then we will proceed a little further,” went on the lecturer. “Although I said Mars ‘appears as a star’ I use the word ‘star’ in the broadest term. Mars, as we all know, is a planet! We are not interested in reaching the stars just yet, are we?” It was a rhetorical question and he chuckled rather thickly at his own joke … “By virtue of its position, the planet Mars is very, very favourably situated as far as earthly astronomy goes. In other words, we are able to view it with the greatest possible ease and clarity. However, with the exception”—he paused, lost in thought for a moment—“with the exception of Mercury only, there is an eccentricity in the orbit of Mars which is larger than the eccentricity in the orbit of any other major planet. Eccentricity to the degree of .0933. …”
“What is the obvious result of that, sir?” asked Lomax.
“The obvious result of that eccentricity—a good question, a very good question—the result is that in apposition near Perihelion, Mars is decidedly nearer to the earth than it is when an apposition occurs near Aphelion. In the former case, the Red Planet is within thirty-five million miles of our own home world. And in the latter case when apposition occurs near Aphelion, then the Red World is at a distance of sixty-three million miles from our own planet. And now—let us get on to some technicalities …”
“What is the length of the Martian revolution?” asked Carlak brightly, blinking behind his square-lensed glasses.
“The length of the Martian revolution is six hundred and eighty six point ninety eight terrestrial days, 686.98 terrestrial days …” the lecturer repeated himself slowly and carefully, but before he could say any more he was interrupted again.
“Could you tell me,” asked Indall, “in exact terms, the length of the interval—the mean interval, you understand—between appositions?”
“Well, that would be in the nature of two years forty-nine and a half days, terrestrial chronology,” replied the lecturer, “but we must again take into account the eccentricity of the orbit; that makes a substantial difference.”
“I understand that,” said Fergus, the tall, gangling doctor, “What in your opinion, would be the actual excess over two years?”
“The variations come between thirty-six days to more than two and a half months,” explained the lecturer.
“Ah yes,” said Fergus. “Thank you very much.”
“I—I have a—question,” said Ordo thickly. All eyes were turned in his direction. Carlak with a mixture of embarrassment and annoyance; Fergus with almost clinical interest; Indall’s fiery, quixotic, rather angry eyes gave him an angry look. Lomax was caught in mid-stream between his own easy-going nature and his apprehension lest Ordo’s drunkenness should reflect on his election. …
“I have a question,” hiccoughed Ordo for the second time.
“Yes, Mr. Ordo,” answered the lecturer, slightly taken aback.
God, I hope this is something sensible, thought Lomax as he offered up a silent prayer to whatever gods or benevolent spirits protect rash psychologists.
“What is the inclination of the axis of rotation of the planet?” asked Ordo spitting the words out as though each one had a strong flavour which he found disagreeable.
“Would you mind repeating the question?” asked the lecturer.
“Not at all—hic! Not at all my dear fellow! The question was ‘What is the exact inclination of planetary rotation?’” He leant back expansively with the air of a man who has just said a very good thing.
“Between 23 and 24 degrees to the Pole of the orbit,” answered the lecturer rather tartly, “and, of course, the equator of the planet has the same inclination towards the orbital plane.”
“Thank you—thank you!” rejoined Ordo. He stood up and gave a rather cavalier bow, “Thank you hic—very much indeed, Mr. Lecturer. I feel much better for knowing that!”
“There is a point I would like to clear up regarding intensity of solar radiation,” began Carlak.
“I think I can be most explicit on that point,” replied the lecturer. “The intensity of solar radiation on the planetary surface is the inverse square of the ratio 6:5, the ratio of 6:5 is taken from the distances of the planet from the sun, at Aphelion, and at Peri. . .
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