13. SANDY GRIMSDYKE

THE CASE OF MERCURY RISING, 13

“This most certainly must be checked out,” I said, “The last thing I expected to meet on the moon was a man from Yorkshire! Mercury Rising, do you detect any danger?”

“Not a morsel,” came the reply, “at least, he doesn’t appear to be armed and a swift analysis of him doesn’t indicate anything harmful, like the Black Death or flu.”

“Then Mercury Rising, open the inner door,” I said quietly, “and let’s find out what’s going on.”

The computer complied with a swift willingness that I thought showed an unusual degree of enthusiasm on its part, and I couldn’t help concluding that part of its programming might have included human-like curiosity. Almost immediately, the door from the airlock slid open and the stranger took a step into our cabin.

I looked at him. From what I could see, which was really only his head behind a visor, he was possibly middle-aged, though that covers a broad spectrum of human life from nearly young to almost old. His suit looked worn as if it was old enough to tell a tale or two and there was a fresh, keen expression on his face, which was bearded and as weathered as his outfit. But all in all he looked fit and well.

He stood there for a moment, smiling.

“It may be snowing, I suppose, in Barnsley” I said to him, “it’s that time of year, though the weather’s been a bit unusual of late. I’m called Royston, Royston Williams. This is Angelina Parr. Who are you?”

“Ah, so good to hear a stranger’s voice. I’m Sandy, and that’s the only name I use here, though back in Barnsley I was Sandy Grimsdyke for my sins.” This reply was both thoughtful and friendly, and if I’m allowed to form an opinion straight away it is that I rather liked him.

“You can see how we got here,” said Angelina, “but would it be impertinent to ask how you did?”

“Nothing as swish as this here ship,” he grinned, “and it was some years back. There was a group of us in Yorkshire, good men and women with a bit of cash behind us, who got together when it was clear as mud that Earth was due to become uninhabitable sooner or later, and we decided to secretly make our get away. We were going to Mars, if you must know, but when we got here our motor, gave out … we couldn’t re-ignite the solid fuel ... and here we decided to stay. At least, our damned rocket decided for us.”

“But where’s that rocket of yours now?” I asked, “I’ve not seen hide nor hair of anything non-lunar other than you waving your arm.”

“All used up, Royston. All broken to pieces and used to create our shelter, which is in this here crater. It’s cosy enough, and of the five of us who set out that foggy day in September years ago, there are still four of us alive and well and happily living our lives on this here satellite.”

“Four of you?” queried Angelina.

“Aye, lass, four of us. Old Archie Pinkerton copped it when he snagged his suit on a sharp piece of steel from the cowling early on when we were making our home. Lost his oxygen, he did, and that just had to be that. Buried him, we did, though I was all for eating him. We don’t get fresh meat up here and a nice juicy steak would have gone down well.”

“But you manage for food without meat?” asked Angelina, shuddering.

“We grow stuff. We brought enough seeds and the like planning to make a settlement on Mars, which we never reached, but they grow well enough here, and, surprise surprise, there’s ice down our pit. We dug a pit, you know, looking for anything that might make our life here last a bit longer than old Archie’s did, like metal ores and the like, which we thought we might manage to smelt, given time. And we found ice, like a seam in the rocks, and hard as iron till you thaw it. Enough to see us out, I reckon, and we vowed that next time folks from home were due to pay their moon a visit we’d hitch a ride back with them.”

“How come nobody knew you’d made the trip in the first place,” I asked, noting his comment about hitching a lift home, “after all, I thought the skies were monitored by the yanks and anything unusual checked out and blasted to Kingdom Come if it wasn’t recognised.”

“That was our big fear,” he acknowledged, “but there was a lot in the news about this silly bugger who was trying to break records by taking a balloon into space and jumping off it when he was nearly high enough to call himself an astronaut. Everyone was looking out for him when it seemed he got lost, and when all eyes were glued to where he should have been we sneaked off in the early hours when we hoped nobody would notice us because it’s a balloon they were looking for, and we weren’t one of those.”

“We passed him on our way here,” said Angelina, “poor fellow,” she added.

“You did? So he didn’t make the record books. Ah, well,” murmured our guest.

“He’ll fall back when his orbit decays enough, and then he might make those record books, as a corpse.” I said darkly.

“Anyway, I was sent to look out when we detected you approaching us, and if you came, say, to within a mile or two of our homestead to beg a lift home of you.”

“We’re not going home. Not yet,” said Angelina, “we’re on a mission that will take us a long way away before we get to go back home.”

“That’s a shame, then,” said Sandy Grimsdyke almost regretfully, “because there’s four of us and we’re keen to give up the life of hermits on the moon and mix again with out fellow man. And it’s more important for our Bessie because, well, she’s been a bit careless and got herself in the family way. She don’t think it’s the best upbringing for a bairn, to have the moon as its playground because, and here’s the rub, the moon makes a fair dangerous playground. We’d do just about anything to get back home, if you see what I mean.”

It was then that I noticed a glint in his eyes, one that hadn’t been there at the start. I began to suspect he had something quite threatening on his agenda.

“Well, I’ll get a message to our friends back home and get someone to come and pick you up if you like,” I said, hoping the glint didn’t mean what I thought it did.

He shook her head. “Snow, you say, down Barnsley way?” he asked, “piles of bootiful white snow? All piled up and freezing the bollocks off a man? Well, I guess we’ll take that. I’m afraid you and your bird here will have to make room for four and a bit extra passengers. Either that or tell us how to drive this crate and hide away in our shelter which we’ve made like home over this past several years, until those friends of yours as you mentioned come to pick you up. But we’re planning on leaving and you might as well accept that for starters.”

Mercury Rising must have been monitoring the conversation because a voice that could only have been his. though it sounded most unlike one that it’d used before, filled the air.

“Masser mine,” it said, and the accent was most definitely supposed to be African, though not like any African tongue I had ever heard, “Masser boss man, we set to explode in ten, an’ it sure will be a bloody big bang, so help up!”

© Peter Rogerson 25.02.20