Another little piece that echoes a writer influential on me. Or at least, kind of. I think I had the sixties film "The Time Machine" in my head for this, rather than Wells' actual writing. The feeble dance joke - well, it was funny at the period this is set, ok? A weak ending as ever, and it's looking already incredibly dated, written as this was in 2008. In retrospect, the ending also makes even less sense than it's supposed to, but hey, there's the lesson for me, so it achieved something.
The Memsbury Lecture Hall was the venue for the Wednesday night “Exploration and Beyond…” series of talks. Each week an amateur scientist from the locality was invited to talk on what was exciting him at that moment, whether it was coleoptra or dendrochronology. To be honest, both Ginger and I found this entirely dull, but it was a good way of meeting up with him, and he and I would pretend to take an intellectual interest for the sake of appearances; the main event, of course, was the evening at the Waggon and Horses afterwards.
Ginger sighed next to me. “This”, he said, “looks to be most enervating evening yet”.
I looked down at the card that had been handed to me on the way in.
“Tonight’s presenter will be “Palliass Macarthy”, I read, and groaned.
“Not old Pally Ass again. Last time he went on for hours about that new star he’d found. Turned out to be the new electric light up at the Hall”.
“I know!”, said Ginger. “The man’s a complete buffoon. But I suppose there aren’t that many interested parties who want to speak, so we’re stuck with him. Anyway, we’ve got gammon and eggs to look forward to”.
It has to be said that Ginger was looking forward to that meal more than I, but for reasons of delicacy I won’t elucidate.
After a little more of this mournful banter, the lights dimmed and old Pally Ass himself appeared on the stage, looking like a stage magician. He was still wearing his topper, and the cloak in which he traversed the streets was still fastened about his neck. Indeed, he looked as if he had only just arrived, and was breathing hard.
With no preamble, Pally Ass began.
“Gentlemen. GENTLEMEN”, he said. “I bring news to you tonight of the most incredible variety. Seldom can tidings of such import have been communicated, and certainly not with such swiftness, to the common man.”
“Get along old horse”, whispered Ginger good naturedly.
Pally Ass continued. “As many of you will be aware, I often choose to while away the evening hours in search of the mysteries of Outer Space. I do this not through some wish to become famous, but simply to make discoveries that will advance the knowledge of all humankind.”
“He do go on”, said Ginger a little less quietly.
“In my time I have observed the luminescent trails of comets, observed the extension of the Martian civilisation and of course discovered new stars”.
Ginger laughed, but I shushed him hurriedly. Any diversion at this stage would be likely to extend uncomfortably the time that still lay between me and my dinner.
Pally Ass appeared not to notice. “Well gentlemen,” he continued, “I am here to tell you that I have been recently investigating other means of Universal exploration – to wit a move away from the optical range and into the suboptical.”
Here Pally Ass paused to see the effect his words were having, a grin on his face. It faded as he quickly realised nobody had grasped what he was talking about.
“I refer of course”, he went on, “to wireless transmissions. Ah! I see glimmers of understanding upon your countenances! Yes, gentlemen, wireless! Ever since Guglielmo Marconi published his results last year I have been fascinated by the topic. At no little expense I have over recent months procured the necessary equipment to undertake experiments of my own. If, as I thought, Marconi had set his sights on communications across the
There was immediate uproar in the room. From the far corner came a voice decrying such a thing as unnatural. Another declaimed that there was some danger involved, not from the equipment but from the possible hostile intent of Martians upon receiving our communication and realising we were so advanced. Ginger was red in the face and pounding the bench, although this was more through hilarity at the utter ridiculousness of the idea than of any innate objection.
Pally Ass stood his ground, and I will give him that he maintained his composure admirably. He had the air of a man who is above petty squabbling, who has already answered all possible questions, and indeed, who has more to impart.
Gradually, as Pally Ass declined to respond, the hubbub in the room dwindled, until at last the Lecturer could be heard once more.
“I anticipated your reaction would be along these lines, gentlemen”, he said. “It is for that precise reason that I did not in fact make this information public when I first attempted the experiment. In fact, I intend not to make public the precise method of transmission and reception at this stage – allow me to say that I have simply combined the work of Marconi with that of Samuel Morse, and as such have constructed an apparatus that allows me to compose a message letter by letter. I can however tell you now that message I sent out to Space left me in fact a good three weeks ago. Yes gentlemen, I see you are eager to know what I said. In fact, that is of little import. I am here tonight, gentlemen, to tell you. To tell you – I have received an answer!”
If the previous noise had been unbearable then this time around it was indescribable. Shouts and cries, a number of intense arguments and even, I am ashamed to say, a sporadic outburst of fisticuffs ensued amongst the audience, who were nonetheless spellbound by this revelation.
“Hang the Waggon and Horses”, said Ginger. “This really IS something!”
After a short while cries of “hush” and “let the man speak” began to permeate through, and once again, the hall fell silent, waiting for Pally Ass to expand upon his extraordinary revelation.
“I have here”, he began again at last, “The message I have only just this evening received from Space”. He paused, looking for a moment slightly discomfited.
Ginger could bear it no more. “What does it say, man? For heaven’s sake!”
Pally Ass drew himself up to his full five foot three and looked Ginger straight in the eye.
“I’m afraid”, he said, “I have absolutely no idea”.
Three hours later, Ginger and I were in the Waggon and Horses. Ginger had his gammon, although he was only toying with it, and even I, who can usually be relied upon to do justice to a fish pie, had ample left on my plate. We had other things to think about.
“I own it’s a rum thing”, said Ginger at length. “To receive a message from space and not be able to decipher it”.
“Well don’t forget that Pally Ass must have taken it down verbatim. Perhaps he couldn’t hear properly”, I said. “Maybe what he wrote down sounded like the words he was given, but they weren’t actually the words themselves. Like, oh I don’t know, hearing someone ask you to send reinforcements, we’re going to advance, and it coming out as send three and fourpence, we’re going to a dance.”
Ginger looked at me witheringly. “Are you saying we’re in the middle of the biggest Chinese Whispers game of all time?” he asked. “Anyway, you heard the old goat. He got the answer back on his apparatus letter by letter, in the same way as he sent it out”.
“Oh. Yes indeed“, I concurred. “Well let’s look at what he wrote down again anyway”.
Ginger sighed, but he once again pulled out the paper on which he had transcribed what Pally Ass had told us. We looked it over gloomily, with no success. It simply made no sense at all. Pally Ass was simply going to have to try again to communicate, but it we could see it was going to be a long haul, using the best translators in the land, and would take years.
The agony of it of course, was that the message undoubtedly contained secrets that Mankind could benefit from, ways of enhancing our civilisation, perhaps a new social order that would relieve poverty, would alleviate hunger and misery, that would perhaps spark a little divinity in mankind.
We stared at it in silence.
“Wtf”, it said. “woot. ASL? Lmao omg this fone is so gay lol.”
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