CHAPTER IV. IN THE MEANTIME . . . A Contribution by Various Hands

1. Michael Malone

WELL!—here goes! I said that we three “young people” would turn up in Chap Four, and here we are.

I reckon myself it’s high time we had something to cheer us up at this point. I mean, I’m all for Steve MacFarlane—don’t think for a moment I’m not. But these professional writing chaps do fuss on a bit when they get going; and by the time J.K.C. has edited Uncle Steve’s own stuff, well, it’s grand, I know, and I daresay there are chaps who will come along and read it all and say, “Whizzo, this is Literature this is—big words and commas and all that,” and I won’t say there hasn’t been any action either, for there was the Yellow Cloud, and Malu turning up that way, just at the right minute (trust old Malu), but all the same, we could do with a change, and besides, it’s all a bit sad-making about poor old Doctor Mac, so there will be no harm in a chapter stuck in here mainly by Paul and Jacky and me, just to let you know how we were getting on at the time when Steve’s messages were coming in from Mars, and old J.K.C. was sitting up there in Scotland as excited as an old hen (I wish I’d seen him—Paul said he was so fussed and pompous you’d think it was him and Marconi had invented wireless between them, with Marconi as the little fellow holding J.K.C.’s jacket while he got on and did the important work).[1]

So here we are—Paul and Jacky and me. And I’m starting off with a few comments to remind you all about us (except you’ll know already that we were the stowaways—quite by accident—when the Albatross first went to Mars).

Well then: I’m Uncle Steve’s nephew. (Of course! I can hear you say—but what I mean is that the others only called MacFarlane Uncle Steve, whereas he actually is my uncle: my mother is his sister Marian.)

Paul and Jacqueline are kind of distant cousins of mine. Their family name is Adam. Paul is the oldest of the three of us, and I’m the youngest. They live in Dorset and I live in London—some of the time at least: my father’s a Business Man, and he has to do a lot of traveling about, sometimes all over the world, and sometimes Mother and I go with him. Got it?

Right. So now I pass over to Jacky and Paul for a bit, ’cos they were in on the messages part with old J.K.C. up in Scotland. I wasn’t, worse luck—or rather worse luck only in one way—jolly good luck in another. You’ll see why in a minute, when I start in again myself later on in this Chapter. Cheerio for now.

2. Jacqueline Adam

In taking up my poor pen once more, on the invitation of our genial editor, to inscribe some thoughts and impressions connected with the period before our return to the Angry Planet, I do so indeed in all humility.

If I may quote the Immortal Bard of Avon, this brief essay will be “a poor thing—but mine own.” I trust it will be received in that spirit of kind condescension we know to have been exercised by our readers toward our previous efforts in the field of literary composition.

Almost a year had elapsed since our return across limitless space; and my brother P— and myself had once more accustomed ourselves to our normal mode of existence after the many excitements attending our adventure.

You may judge of our surprise, therefore, when the postman one morning delivered into our hands a bulky envelope bearing a Scottish postmark!

With ill-concealed curiosity we set to an examination of its contents; and you can judge of our further surprise when they were revealed as a letter from our friend Mr. John Keir Cross in which he apprised us of the remarkable train of circumstances which had led to the establishing of communication with our erstwhile companion, Mr. S— MacF—: viz, the circumstances already known to the reader concerning the wireless messages received via Mr. Mackellar’s airstrip. (What a piece of work is a man! How infinite in faculties, etc.—W. Shakespeare.)

We acquainted our parents at once with the turn events had taken; and passed on to them the request embodied in the author’s epistle, namely, that if they were agreeable, and since in any event the school holidays were imminent, my brother and myself should travel to Scotland to participate at first hand in the latest stage of the adventure. He argued that in view of our previous association with Mr. MacF— we might indeed be interested in hearing from him; and added that, as a purely practical consideration, we would, by being “on the spot,” so to say, be in a position to verify the authenticity of the messages received.

I need hardly say that with their usual understanding, our parents instantly expressed their agreement; our mother adding only the injunction that “we were to take care not to be carried away once more to Mars ourselves in the event.” (Little did she know the subsequent course the adventure would take! so that indeed we were, for a second time, involved in a voyage through space. But I anticipate.)

Thus it was, then, that one sunny day in the year 19—, my brother and I traveled to Scotland and there made the acquaintance of Mr. Mackellar, his assistant Mr. Archibald Borrowdale, and the distinguished performer of stage and screen, Miss Catherine Hogarth.

No words of mine can hope to convey the deep emotion which assailed us when first we heard the faint whispering messages in Morse. It was “The voice, the very voice!” (RLS)

It was with feelings equally profound that we read the narrative so carefully built by Miss Hogarth from the disjointed fragments of Mr. MacF—’s communications. The messages went on, of course, from the point that you yourselves have reached; and so gradually the narrative was built further—as you will see in due course. And they finally broke off, while we—even we—were listening to them one night, with the high dramatic announcement which took us once more across the starry wastes ourselves, on a mission of rescue.

What happened thereafter will be related in its proper place. For the moment, I feel I have performed the initial function outlined to me by our editor: viz, to reintroduce ourselves into the chronicle and so prepare the way for all that lies ahead. With this thought I momentarily suspend composition, and will ask my brother P—to add any brief comments of his own before the resumption of the Martian narrative as transcribed from the “Mackellar Messages.”

May I say then, for the moment, au revoir; and permit myself the concluding classical reflection: magna est veritas et praevalebit (truth will prevail).

3. Paul Adam

I just want to say that you’re not to think dear old Jacky is half so stuffy as she sounds when she sits down to write. I know she’s my sister, but all the same she is really a bit of all right, as I think she showed right through everything that happened to us. It’s just that when she gets a pen in her hand she suddenly seems to go all long-winded, somehow, as if she were writing school essays all the time, and puts in those bits of Latin just to impress people.

The main thing is that we did go to Scotland. It was where the last adventure started, so it was only right that it should be where this one started. The whole setup was marvelous, of course—I mean, the airstrip and Uncle Steve’s messages. I don’t mind confessing that I took a great liking to Mr. Mackellar and Archie—to say nothing of Katey (Jacky wants me to call her Miss Hogarth, but I’m for none of that—we always called her Katey to her face, by her own request, and so that’s how I’ll refer to her here).

So there it was—the setup, as I say; and in spite of all that Mother said before she let us go to Scotland at all, we did in the end go off to Mars again. You’ll see how it all happened as you go on: this is just to let you know that we were all poised and waiting. That is, Jacky and I were, at least, for, as she has said, we were actually there, in the wireless shed beside the airstrip, when the fatal final message came through from Uncle Steve. As for Mike, for once he didn’t have his nose in things! Except—

4. Michael Malone

—except that Mike did, so there! He had his nose far more deeply in things than anyone else after all, only in a different way, as you’ll see.

The reason I wasn’t at Larkwell at the time when the others were listening to the messages was that I wasn’t available. It was all very well for old J.K.C. to send for Paul and Jacky—but he couldn’t very well send for me.

I was in America!

I told you, didn’t I, that my Dad often took Mother and me on business trips with him? Well—that’s just what had happened this time. There I was—in America!—which is more than had ever happened to Paul and Jacky, for all that they’d been to Mars.

Oh yes—that’s where I was. And I’ll tell you something else: Do you know which part of America?

Chicago.

And where does that tie up, I hear you ask?

I’ll tell you.

Somebody lived in Chicago who’d had quite a bit to do with us when we came back from Mars last time.

Does the name Kalkenbrenner mean anything to you? It probably will if you read our last book—and it probably will, too, if you’re what old J.K.C. would call “a student of the press.”

It was Dr. Kalkenbrenner of Chicago who was Dr. McGillivray’s friendly rival in the days when he was first building the Albatross. In fact, Dr. Kalkenbrenner had almost succeeded in building a rocket of his own—it was that that gave Doctor Mac the final spurt to invent his own patent fuel, so that he would be first to leave Earth (you know what rival scientists are).

When we came back from Mars that first time, Dr. K. was a bit snooty—he was one of the ones who first started to say we’d all been making it up and that it hadn’t really happened. But that was only professional jealousy, as they say—he knew perfectly well that we had been to Mars. And when he went back to his own country after visiting Doctor Mac in England, before Steve and Doctor Mac set off for their second trip, what do you think he did?

What would you have done? He got a spurt on himself—went on more furiously than ever with his own experiments. And—take my word for it—he’d been pretty successful too, oh yes! He was almost ready! His rocket was all ripe for a flight!

How do I know all this? For the very simple reason, dear friends, that when I was in Chicago I went and called on Dr. K. It was only natural after all, wasn’t it?—after all that had happened.

And he wasn’t in the least like the ogre we’d all thought him when he was doubting our word after the first trip. Now that he was in sight of triumph himself, he was a perfectly decent chap, and I had a simply swell time with him in his lab, telling him all the little ways the Albatross was different from his own rocket. Oh yes—I saw it! I was shown all over it; and if I couldn’t go into all the technical details, at least I could tell him the little things, like how we’d stored our food in the old toothpaste tubes, and so on. His rocket was much bigger than the old Albatross—a great huge lovely shiny job—just the thing.

Oh, we got on like a house on fire, old Kalkers and me (I was even allowed to call him that, so that shows you). I reckon one of the reasons was that I grew to be real friendly with his niece Maggie—Maggie Sherwood, and an orphan—Kalkers had brought her up from the time her father and mother had died (Maggie’s mother was Kalkers’ sister, you see). And he was very fond of her.

And so was I, I don’t mind admitting right now. She was an American, of course, but she was all right—she sure was. Just my own age, you see—and more of a tomboy even than Jacky. I hardly noticed she was a girl at all.

It was Maggie and Kalkers who showed me all over the Comet, which is what he called his rocket. And when I got the first long air-mail letter from old J.K.C. in Scotland, with enclosures from Paul and Jacky, telling me the whole story of the airstrip messages, why, what would you have done but show the whole thing to Kalkers and Maggie too?—which is just what I did do.

And this time there wasn’t any doubt at all from Dr. K.—no sir! And it’s just as well, as you’ll see.

So I did have my nose in after all. Well and truly in. If I hadn’t, things mightn’t have been so easy to arrange when, about a couple of weeks after the first air-mail letter, I got a second “communication” (as Jacky would call it) from the folk in Scotland.

This one was a cablegram—a very long cablegram. And when I read it I showed that to old Kalkers too. And when he read it he said, “Phew!” (If that’s how you spell the kind of excited whistle he gave). “Phew!” he said. “You know what this means, Michael, don’t you?” (I hated being called Michael—always have—much prefer Mike; but it was what Dr. K. always called me.)

“Phew!” says he, “you know what this means, Michael?”

And I nodded. I sure did. And I winked at Maggie—and then nudged her and nodded over to the great shiny Comet, all stuck up on its launching field, ready for a take-off. And Maggie Sherwood winked back . . . !

5. The Editor

All in due course. For the moment, and until it is made clear why “Maggie Sherwood winked back,” we must return to MacFarlane himself and the continuation of the narrative built by Miss Hogarth from those lonely messages from across the skies.

To Chapter Five, then—entitled: The Canals.