Happiness: A Planet (5 page)

For all that, though, their ambition was simply a part of them. Nor was Petre using Munred solely as a ticket to the city. In their many years together a genuine affection for one another, as unacknowledged as their mutual ambition, had grown. Their ambition is only mentioned now because it was their ambition, not their sociable humanity, that had brought them both to XE2. And it was ambition, not narcissism, that had Petre daily grimacing on the floor of their apartment.

Petre had almost finished her two hour workout when she heard the apartment door close behind Munred, heard him — as usual — lay his case on the hall table, pick up the newspaper. From out of a mess of limbs Petre called a strained hello, heard him opening the newspaper in the next room.

“Don’t make yourself too comfortable,” she untangled herself. “We’re due at Linnie’s in an hour.”

“We eating there?”

“I hope so.” She straightened all her limbs, finished off her routine with some tumbles.

Munred, aware of her bumping about, desultorily scanned the newspaper.

Enervated by her exercises Petre bounced through to him. One glance at his stern face, at his introverted sprawling in the chair, told her that he was not in the best of moods and to approach him with caution. She took a deep breath — to quiet herself, to match his frame of mind.

“If you don’t feel like it,” she said, “I’ll call them.”

“Won’t they have trouble finding another pair?”

“For all the good you are they might welcome the opportunity.”

Every station that Munred and Petre had been on had had its fad. Many of those fads had coincided with their stay there, with the change of Service personnel, communities travelling within communities. On some stations old board games had been the rage, on others more arduous sports; some stations were, of course, only soberly interested in their work, while others had been awash with booze and bonhomie. One had had an earnest literary society, another the tomfoolery of amateur dramatics, while yet another had boasted choirs and madrigals. On XE2, at the moment, the fad was for card and dice games. But, even when the stakes were high, Munred could find no passion for it, didn’t care whether he won or lost, much to the frustration of his fellow players.

“I’ve been thinking,” Petre rolled her head around her shoulders, “you deal best with people, why not do social psychology on your year?”

Like many conversations between couples of long-standing Munred’s and Petre’s took place in pieces over weeks rather than hours, unresolved considerations being taken up without preamble from where they had left them off days, maybe months, ago. So for the past month or more Munred and Petre had been occasionally wondering what Department he should specialise in eighteen months hence, when they reached the city. Munred favoured Communication, but knew the competition to be fierce. Petre wanted him to opt for Welfare and Leisure; Munred, though, thought it less important than she.

“Psychology’s an easy option,” he looked up from his paper. “Anyone who makes it to the city has to be good at dealing with people.”

“What are the hard options?”

“Hygiene, Nobody wants that.”

“I can understand why.”

“Actually it’s quite involved...”

“But Hygiene...” she made a distasteful face.

“This might all be academic anyway.”

“Why?”

But Munred didn’t answer, sank morosely once more behind his paper. Petre shook her limbs loose, again offered to cancel their evening commitment.

“No. I’ll go.” Munred wearily laid aside the newspaper, self-pityingly sighed, “Give me something else to think about.”

“Trouble at work?” she began stripping for a shower.

“Could say that.”

“Well snap out of it,” she flung her leotard at him. Petre had no patience with self-pity. Munred picked the sweaty warm leotard off his shoulder, obediently grimaced a smile.

“That’s better.” She playfully kicked the sole of his slipper, “Look alive.”

He grunted sourly; and they returned to talking of the evening ahead at Linnie’s. Who would be there with who. And while they talked Petre, naked, continued to wind down from her exercises, touching her toes, stretching out her arms. Though appreciative of the beauty of her lithe body, the sight of it, at that moment, did not excite Munred. Nor was it Petre’s intention to arouse him: in such a mood sex often left Munred even more introverted. Their sex, like that of many monogamous couples, had its own self-congratulatory time and place. Her nakedness was simply the unselfconscious familiarity born of their years together.

Some loose association of ideas, or possibly an unconscious attempt to cheer him, to distract him, prompted Petre to ask,

“Did you know there’s a planet near here called Happiness?” Munred regarded her suspiciously,

“What do you know about that?”

Although Munred kept Petre up to date with office gossip, he told her nothing of his work. (A cynic, again, might say because he had nothing to tell her.)

“Tulla said something about it today.”

“What about it?”

“I don’t know. She only got as far as telling me it was called Happiness. Then we got to thinking about living there and feeling you had to be happy. Bang your head and laugh, ‘Ho Ho that hurt,’ sort of thing. Having to say you’re fed up with a smile. Yes,” she remembered, acted it, “somebody calling Happiness. ‘Hello, are you on Happi...’ ‘Funny you should say that, I haven’t been feeling too bright.’”

Munred did not smile.

“I know she wants to see you about it.”

Relinquishing all further efforts to amuse him Petre left for her shower.

Munred did not understand Petre’s friendship with Tulla Yorke. They were, apart from their both being women, in every other respect unequal and unalike. Physically Petre was short, Tulla tall. Tulla had casually cropped yellow hair, Petre dark lustrous braids. And, where Petre was pert and pretty and perfectly proportioned, Tulla was all big feet, big hands, elbows and knees. Tulla couldn’t hold a glass without spilling it; Petre slid untouched through any crowd. Where Petre was vivacious and apparently scatterbrained, Tulla was slow and nodding pensive. Tulla disliked card games and cheap excitements; Petre enjoyed any game of chance, relished every morsel of sleazy scandal. Petre was a once-upon-a-time gymnast, hadn’t qualifications enough to be a technician; Tulla was an astrophysicist, had degrees from four universities. And she and Petre were friends.

Now there exists a romantic misapprehension that all astrophysicists daringly proceed beyond the frontiers of civilisation charting and assessing the unknown. The contrary is the truth. Because, although a sense of adventure may have lured them into the profession, the great majority of astrophysicists dwell dully secure within city limits, their mundane task to reach a greater understanding of the known. Tulla Yorke belonged to the latter category.

And Munred, with all the usual competitive male vanity, was intimidated by Tulla’s unassailable intelligence. He knew that she happened to be on XE2 as part of her research into certain orbital conditions. He had looked no further. Yet Tulla had told Petre in detail about her research, about what she hoped to be able to demonstrate; and Petre had appeared to understand. Tulla enjoyed Petre’s company, Petre enjoyed hers, a friendship in which both regarded one another as equals and which Munred did not understand: it therefore worried him.

Where he to admit it Munred would have confessed that he was jealous of Tulla’s friendship with Petre, that he perceived it as a threat to himself. Hence his coolness to Tulla. He was not to know that the friendship for both women was an echo of older schoolgirl friendships. Both had known, before they had met, how to amuse the other. In roles previously mapped out for themselves, Petre regarded herself as Tulla’s protector, saving her from social blunders; while Tulla saw herself as Petre’s guardian, preventing her from being exploited by the likes of Munred Danporr. Munred would, therefore, seem to be intuitively right in viewing Tulla as endangering his partnership with Petre; except that Tulla knew that the habit of thought that had her regarding him as Petre’s exploiter was at odds with Petre’s present reality, and so she earnestly endeavoured to be pleasant towards him. Tulla was, however, incapable of dissembling. Consequently, at odds within herself, whenever she met Munred she blushed. Those blushes Munred took to be evidence of her duplicity towards him.

Now, worrying over Tulla’s sudden interest in Happiness, Munred had stripped, was awaiting his turn for the shower.

“Tulla didn’t say what it was about?”

“Only that she’s going to see you in the morning. Before she goes to Ben.”

“Why’s she going out there?”

“I didn’t ask. She didn’t say. Now,” she pushed him under the shower, “work is over.” With her wet hand she slapped his bare bum. He span around, face contorted.

“Do you mind!” he lisping shouted at her through the spray of water. And snatching the soap from the dish he then, cursing, dropped it.

Any display of temper is produced by a psychological quantum state dependant on the number and frequency of irritations and frustrations. A few infrequent irritations and we can brush them placidly aside; a host of constant irritations and we can learn to stoically endure them; but, somewhere between those two, one’s own failure to rid oneself of one’s irritations has to find an outlet in an undirected show of anger, usually against an innocent third party. That quantum temper state also depends on the temperament of the individual and their audience. Aimless solitary people who desire nothing very much rarely lose their tempers. Whereas those with an aim, those who want to get things done, anything done, they are very prone to losses of temper. So, for his intemperate language, Munred’s ambition can once more be held responsible.

As for Petre... she was used to these annual bouts of petulance. For, although Munred had undergone interviews all his working life, and although his promotion had often been a foregone conclusion, he had not once failed to be apprehensive of an approaching interview. That nervousness had always found an outlet in his irritability with Petre. This interview, though, was still weeks away. So Petre said,

“Take it easy sweetheart.” And when Petre said sweetheart it was like ice being grated.

Munred was sitting, his back to Tulla, facing his desk.

“Good morning Munred,” Tulla said.

Dealing with officialdom flustered Tulla: she invariably offended protocol. Her greeting was probably wrong, she thought, should have said Director or somesuch. Nor, when Munred turned to face her, did he appear his usual affable off-duty self.

“Morning Tulla. This official?”

“I suppose so.”

“Right,” he ostentatiously pressed a switch on his desk.

Tulla found his brisk manner off-putting, forgot her opening remark.

As people she preferred technicians, they at least were interested in their work for its own sake. Unfortunately few technicians are versed in the social arts, being more often than not interested in their work to the exclusion of all else. On her travels, therefore, Tulla frequently found herself, despite her reservations, seeking the company of the sociable Service personnel.

“So what do you want to see me about?” Munred faced her.

“Happiness,” she said, and blushed. “The inhabited planet of that yellow G.”

“What about it?”

“Its moon has disappeared.”

“Since when?”

“Thirty two days ago.”

Munred abruptly turned from her, tapped keys. He studied the screen,

“That could account for it.”

“Account for what?”

“That,” Munred pointed to the ‘Priority Happiness’ flashing on the screen. Up until now he had blocked Tulla’s view of it. “We lost radio contact with them thirty three days ago. Could the moon have crashed into the planet?”

Negligently tipping her case over on the floor Tulla sat down and furiously thought. Munred got up and began walking excitedly back and forth, at first stepping over her case, then setting it upright beside her chair.

“The moon crashing into the planet,” he said as he straightened, “would have wiped out all its transmissions. Yes?”

“It would certainly have caused considerable damage. But only on that hemisphere on which it crashed. And then depending on whether it hit the land or the sea. It’s not that big a moon. In one of the larger oceans it might have had no appreciable effect. Tidal waves possibly. On land it may have caused earthquakes. Globally. But even then I can’t see it stopping all transmissions. Besides, you said the transmissions ceased the day before the moon disappeared.”

“But over that distance, a small error in calculation...”

“No. I went to great pains to pinpoint the time exactly. My computations require its position to the second and to the metre.” She tapped buttons on her case, checked date and time with him. “Seven days thirteen hours six minutes twenty three seconds distance?” she said. He concurred. “That makes the moon’s disappearance,” another calculation, “exactly twenty one hours after you lost contact with Happiness. Cause and effect aren’t regressive. And that moon was in full view of our scanners when it disappeared. One second it was there, the next it wasn’t.”