The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke (36 page)

‘Trade secret,’ said the proud producer. ‘Still, I’ll let you in on it. A lot of that stuff is genuine.’

‘What!’

‘Oh, don’t get me wrong! We haven’t been on location to Sirius B. But they’ve developed a microcamera over at Cal Tech, and we used that to film spiders in action. We cut in the best shots, and I think you’d have a job telling which was micro and which was the full-sized studio stuff. Now you understand why I wanted the Aliens to be insects, and not octopuses, like the script said first.’

‘There’s a good publicity angle here,’ said Tony. ‘One thing worries me, though. That scene where the monsters kidnap Gloria. Do you suppose the censor… I mean the way we’ve done it, it almost looks…’

‘Aw, quit worrying!
That’s
what people are supposed to think! Anyway, we make it clear in the next reel that they really want her for dissection, so that’s all right.’

‘It’ll be a riot!’ gloated R.B., a faraway gleam in his eye as if he was already hearing the avalanche of dollars pouring into the box office. ‘Look—we’ll put another million into publicity! I can just see the posters—get all this down, Tony.
WATCH THE SKY! THE SIRIANS ARE COMING!
And we’ll make thousands of clockwork models—can’t you imagine them scuttling around on their hairy legs! People love to be scared, and we’ll scare them. By the time we’ve finished, no one will be able to look at the sky without getting the creeps! I leave it to you, boys—this picture is going to make
history
!’

He was right. ‘Monsters from Space’ hit the public two months later. Within a week of the simultaneous London and New York
premières
, there could have been no one in the western world who had not seen the posters screaming
EARTH BEWARE!
or had not shuddered at the photograph of the hairy horrors stalking along deserted Fifth Avenue on their thin, many-jointed legs. Blimps cleverly disguised as spaceships cruised across the skies, to the vast confusion of pilots who encountered them, and clockwork models of the Alien invaders were everywhere, scaring old ladies out of their wits.

The publicity campaign was brilliant, and the picture would undoubtedly have run for months had it not been for a coincidence as disastrous as it was unforeseeable. While the number of people fainting at each performance was still news, the skies of Earth filled suddenly with long, lean shadows sliding swiftly through the clouds….

Prince Zervashni was good-natured but inclined to be impetuous—a well-known failing of his race. There was no reason to suppose that his present mission, that of making a peaceful contact with the planet Earth, would present any particular problems. The correct technique of approach had been thoroughly worked out over many thousands of years, as the Third Galactic Empire slowly expanded its frontiers, absorbing planet after planet, sun upon sun. There was seldom any trouble: really intelligent races can always co-operate, once they have got over the initial shock of learning that they are not alone in the universe.

It was true that humanity had emerged from its primitive, warlike stage only within the last generation. This however, did not worry Prince Zervashni’s chief adviser, Sigisnin II, Professor of Astropolitics.

‘It’s a perfectly typical Class E culture,’ said the professor. ‘Technically advanced, morally rather backward. However, they are already used to the conception of space flight, and will soon take us for granted. The normal precautions will be sufficient until we have won their confidence.’

‘Very well,’ said the prince. ‘Tell the envoys to leave at once.’

It was unfortunate that the ‘normal precautions’ did not allow for Tony Auerbach’s publicity campaign, which had now reached new heights of interplanetary xenophobia. The ambassadors landed in New York’s Central Park on the very day that a prominent astronomer, unusually hard up and therefore amenable to influence, announced in a widely reported interview that any visitors from space probably would be unfriendly.

The luckless ambassadors, heading for the United Nations Building, had got as far south as 60th Street when they met the mob. The encounter was very one-sided, and the scientists at the Museum of Natural History were most annoyed that there was so little left for them to examine.

Prince Zervashni tried once more, on the other side of the planet, but the news had got there first. This time the ambassadors were armed, and gave a good account of themselves before they were overwhelmed by sheer numbers. Even so, it was not until the rocket bombs started climbing up toward his fleet that the prince finally lost his temper and decided to take drastic action.

It was all over in twenty minutes, and was really quite painless. Then the prince turned to his adviser and said, with considerable understatement: ‘That appears to be that. And now—can you tell me exactly what went wrong?’

Sigisnin II knitted his dozen flexible fingers together in acute anguish. It was not only the spectacle of the neatly disinfected Earth that distressed him, though to a scientist the destruction of such a beautiful specimen is always a major tragedy. At least equally upsetting was the demolition of his theories and, with them, his reputation.

‘I just don’t understand it!’ he lamented. ‘Of course, races at this level of culture are often suspicious and nervous when contact is first made. But they’d never had visitors before, so there was no reason for them to be hostile.’

‘Hostile! They were demons! I think they were all insane.’ The prince turned to his captain, a tripedal creature who looked rather like a ball of wool balanced on three knitting needles.

‘Is the fleet reassembled?’

‘Yes, Sire.’

‘Then we will return to Base at optimum speed. This planet depresses me.’

On the dead and silent Earth, the posters still screamed their warnings from a thousand hoardings. The malevolent insectile shapes shown pouring from the skies bore no resemblance at all to Prince Zervashni, who apart from his four eyes might have been mistaken for a panda with purple fur—and who, moreover, had come from Rigel, not Sirius.

But, of course, it was now much too late to point this out.

Armaments Race

First published in
Adventure
, April 1954

Collected in
Tales from the White Hart

This story was inspired by a visit to George Pal in Hollywood, while he was working on the special effects for
The War of the Worlds
. Bill Temple was in fact William F. Temple, the well-known writer of science fiction.

As I’ve remarked on previous occasions, no one has ever succeeded in pinning down Harry Purvis, prize raconteur of the ‘White Hart,’ for any length of time. Of his scientific knowledge there can be no doubt—but where did he pick it up? And what justification is there for the terms of familiarity with which he speaks of so many Fellows of the Royal Society? There are, it must be admitted, many who do not believe a single word he says. That, I feel, is going a little too far as I recently remarked somewhat forcibly to Bill Temple.

‘You’re always gunning for Harry,’ I said, ‘but you must admit that he provides entertainment. And that’s more than most of us can say.’

‘If you’re being personal,’ retorted Bill, still rankling over the fact that some perfectly serious stories had just been returned by an American editor on the grounds that they hadn’t made him laugh, ‘step outside and say that again.’ He glanced through the window, noticed that it was still snowing hard, and hastily added, ‘Not today, then, but maybe sometime in the summer, if we’re both here on the Wednesday that catches it. Have another of your favourite shots of straight pineapple juice?’

‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘One day I’ll ask for a gin with it, just to shake you. I think I must be the only guy in the “White Hart” who can take it or leave it—
and
leaves it.’

This was as far as the conversation got, because the subject of the discussion then arrived. Normally, this would merely have added fuel to the controversy, but as Harry had a stranger with him we decided to be polite little boys.

‘Hello, folks,’ said Harry. ‘Meet my friend Solly Blumberg. Best special-effects man in Hollywood.’

‘Let’s be accurate, Harry,’ said Mr Blumberg sadly, in a voice that should have belonged to a whipped spaniel. ‘Not
in
Hollywood.
Out
of Hollywood.’

‘Harry waved the correction aside.

‘All the better for you. Sol’s come over here to apply his talents to the British film industry.’

‘There
is
a British film industry?’ said Solly anxiously. ‘No one seemed very sure round the studio.’

‘Sure there is. It’s in a very flourishing condition, too. The Government piles on an entertainments tax that drives it to bankruptcy, then keeps it alive with whacking big grants. That’s the way we do things in this country. Hey, Drew, where’s the visitors’ book? And a double for both of us. Solly’s had a terrible time—he needs a bit of building up.’

I cannot say that, apart from his hangdog look, Mr Blumberg had the appearance of a man who had suffered extreme hardship. He was neatly dressed in a Hart Schnaffner & Marx suit, and the points of his shirt collar buttoned down somewhere around the middle of his chest. That was thoughtful of them as they thus concealed something, but not enough, of his tie. I wondered what the trouble was. Not un-American activities
again
, I prayed: that would trigger off our pet Communist, who at the moment was peaceably studying a chessboard in the corner.

We all made sympathetic noises and John said rather pointedly: ‘Maybe it’ll help to get it off your chest. It will be such a change to hear someone else talking around here.’

‘Don’t be so modest, John,’ cut in Harry promptly. ‘
I’m
not tired of hearing you yet. But I doubt if Solly feels much like going through it again. Do you, old man?’

‘No,’ said Mr Blumberg. ‘
You
tell them.’

(‘I knew it would come to that,’ sighed John in my ear.)

‘Where shall I begin,’ asked Harry. ‘The time Lillian Ross came to interview you?’

‘Anywhere but
there
,’ shuddered Solly. ‘It really started when we were making the first “Captain Zoom” serial.’

‘“Captain Zoom”?’ said someone ominously. ‘Those are two very rude words in this place. Don’t say you were responsible for
that
unspeakable rubbish!’

‘Now boys!’ put in Harry in his best oil-on-troubled-waters voice. ‘Don’t be too harsh. We can’t apply our own high standards of criticism to everything. And people have got to earn a living. Besides, millions of kids
like
Captain Zoom. Surely you wouldn’t want to break their little hearts—and so near Xmas, too!’

‘If they
really
liked Captain Zoom, I’d rather break their little necks.’

‘Such unseasonable sentiments! I really must apologise for some of my compatriots, Solly. Let’s see, what was the name of the first serial?’

‘“Captain Zoom and the Menace from Mars”’

‘Ah yes, that’s right. Incidentally, I wonder why we always are menaced by Mars? I suppose that man Welles started it. One day we may have a big interplanetary libel action on our hands—unless we can prove that the Martians have been equally rude about
us
.

‘I’m very glad to say that I never saw “Menace from Mars”.’ (‘I did,’ moaned somebody in the background. ‘I’m still trying to forget it.’) ‘But we are not concerned with the story, such as it was. That was written by three men in a bar on Wilshire Boulevard. No one is sure whether the Menace came out the way it did because the script-writers were drunk, or whether they had to keep drunk in order to face the Menace. If that’s confusing, don’t bother. All that Solly was concerned with were the special effects that the director demanded.

‘First of all, he had to build Mars. To do this he spent half an hour with
The Conquest of Space
, and then emerged with a sketch which the carpenters turned into an overripe orange floating in nothingness, with an improbable number of stars around it.
That
was easy. The Martian cities weren’t so simple. You try and think of
completely alien
architecture that still makes sense. I doubt if it’s possible—if it will work at all, someone’s already used it here on Earth. What the studio finally built was vaguely Byzantine with touches of Frank Lloyd Wright. The fact that none of the doors led anywhere didn’t really matter, as long as there was enough room on the sets for the swordplay and general acrobatics that the script demanded.