First Man Read online

things." Harold gave his inane giggle.

  Orville felt cheated. "You call this neighborly? Remember when I droveclear out into the country with a gallon of gas that time when you gotstuck?"

  "I'm trying. You gotta think of it up to that point, then you gottathink the _other_ way. But you can't explain it. You just do it."

  * * * * *

  Harold picked up two of the rings from Rosie's fruit jars and moved themback and forth across one another. He tried with three rings, droppedthem.

  "It's no use."

  "Try harder."

  Harold shook his head. "I suppose if I wanted to bad enough.... But nowthat we been to the Moon, there's nothing else I want to do."

  Orville reached for the rings and tried.

  Suddenly, Harold sprang up. "Oh, my socks!"

  He turned on the scope and swung it wildly back and forth. "You made mecommit a boo-boo. I think we've shot right past the Earth!"

  The scope was getting weak. They could not find the Earth until Haroldhad reversed course. Then Orville saw it, the edge filling part of thescope. Harold's eyes were watering. He wiped the good lens of hisglasses and leaned close.

  "Can you make out any land?" he asked Orville.

  "This looks like Indian Lake. I've fished there lots of times."

  "It would be something bigger. Say, Greenland or South America."

  This was the first time Orville realized they might not land squarely inHarold's back yard. He began looking intently at the scope.

  "What's this kidney-bean shape?"

  Harold squinted. "Think that's Australia. Now we're getting somewhere."

  "But it belongs down here."

  "We're coming up on it the other way."

  "Can't we get closer to home than that?"

  "I'll not be too particular where it is, just so it's land. The Earth ismostly covered with water."

  Harold began turning the knobs and muttering. "Let me see now ... gottamiss Mount Everest...." At last, he turned off the scope. "It's cleargone. I'm taking her down slow. Will you look outside, Orville?"

  Orville gulped. But Harold said it was the only way, so he squeezed intothe other compartment. There were now about six of the little circlesgoing back and across inside of him. He stood a little to one side andstruck the lever of the outer door sharply with the palm of his hand.The door gave a faint "swoosh" and was open about an inch. His earscrackled and there was a dull whispering in his head like the sound in asea-shell.

  He put his face to the door, but saw nothing except the blue sky.

  "You sure we came to the right place?" he asked worriedly.

  "Positive ... almost," Harold called back. "Are we over land or water?"

  Orville looked up. There was a brown, black and white landscape. Treeshung down like icicles around a frozen lake.

  "There's land, but it's upside down."

  "Just a minute." Harold did something and the trees and land swirledaround until they were underneath.

  * * * * *

  Not far away, as they came down gently, Orville saw a building withpeople outside. Or he thought they were people. Harold set the ship downon its side in the snow and Orville stepped out. Then Harold was outbeside him, slapping him on the shoulder.

  "Well, old buddy-buddy! How about that?"

  "Yeah." Orville spoke with less enthusiasm. "How about that?"

  He proposed that they get in and ride back to civilization, but Haroldsaid there wasn't enough power left and it couldn't be done. Theystarted walking toward the house Orville had seen.

  Halfway there, they met four men wearing gray overcoats and furry hats.One carried a rifle, and as Harold ran shouting up to him, the manlifted the rifle and struck Harold across the head, knocking him intothe snow and breaking the other lens of his glasses. For a while,Orville wondered if it was the right planet after all. But, he decided,the men were Russian soldiers somewhere in Siberia.

  Since the men were more interested in looting the ship than guarding theprisoners, it was not hard to slip away and get to a railroad that raneast and west. Even Harold knew which direction to take. Their journeyout of Siberia, through Korea and Japan to San Francisco, though moredifficult than their trip to the Moon, was not very interesting. Once,on a freighter in mid-Pacific, Harold tried to convince a fellowdeckhand that they were on their way back from the Moon. He agreed notto talk of it again.

  "Looks like Rosie's still gone," Harold said as they slunk up the alleybehind Harold's shed. All the leaves had fallen and the place lookedforlorn without the spaceship poking up through the roof.

  "Wonder what they thought," Orville said, "when the ship disappeared,and us with it?"

  "Nothing, I expect."

  "If we'd disappeared with a couple of blondes now, the whole world wouldknow about it."

  * * * * *

  They parted. The back door was locked. As Orville went around the house,he heard the TV going. Polly sat in the turquoise armchair, sewing on adress. She put down the sewing and folded her arms.

  The oration lasted five minutes. He could still hear her upstairsthrough the noise of the shower.

  Then, after a visit to the barber's, he went to face old Haverstrom.This lecture was not quite as long, and through it the boss had a traceof a leer, and a certain respect, though he let Orville know thesedisappearances should not become a habit.

  Harold did not do so well. His old job was gone and he was a whole weekgetting another. Rosie did not come back for still another week.

  It was hard for Orville to believe that a moonstruck fellow like Haroldcould change his ways, but that was what happened. It was as though thatone wild trip had satisfied something inside Harold, for he never fooledwith things like that again. He even joined church.

  As for Orville: some evenings, when he reads of artificial satellites orof trips to the Moon, he feels a sharp rise in blood pressure and hebreathes fast. But a glance across the room at Polly in her turquoisechair sewing is enough to make him swallow and squirm back and keep hismouth shut.