Anno Stellae 2393: RetroStar Chronicles

By R.D. Ginther

      Chronicle 24, the final chronicle in the series of Volume one, began with the final adventure between Dr. Pikkard and Pieter. But not before romance began to heat up for Pieter and Anne. Unable to cope with Anne's carefree spirit, Pieter was at cross roads with their relationship. On one hand, he enjoyed spending time with her but on the other hand she broke all his rules of living simply. To complicate their relationship even more, Pieter can't seem to forget his initial encounter with Dr. Pikkard who warned him off his niece. Will their romance cost him his job?

 

     But Dr. Pikkard had more in mind for Pieter; a chance to advance himself on an educational level, after all Pieter was proving to be a stellar assistant and a budding scientist of sorts. But thing took a turn for the worse and plans made could not be kept. Tragedy hits and suddenly there are new villains in town.

New characters came on the scene, a Pastor de Waals, but only for a brief moment. There was a chain of events where each new character seemed to be passing the baton, which was Dr. Pikkard's latest discovery. Finally Dr. Pikkards work landed back into the hands of his niece Anne, but once again the villains struck and she was left in the merciful hands of a couple called the Egges. Soon Ann was able to finish what her uncle had started.

 

     In the meanwhile, the Alien Entity's presence was observed and felt on a level far beyond man's five senses. A few people were spiritually awakened to see the catastrophic destruction of the Alien.

 

    In the final chapter of this Chronicle, Pieter had a very interesting experience that changed his life forever. His constant reluctance to broaden his limited point of view has finally led him down a very dark path. 

 

   Finally some answers to what mankind had been facing for hundreds of years. This slightly bigger than normal of all the books in Volume 1 is about 360 pages long packed with action, adventures, some parts that will cause you to giggle and other parts will cause a tear or two, a perfect blend of emotions. You will not be disappointed after you flipped the last page. For your additional pleasure and insight, R.D. Ginther has included  five Tables and an appendix with additional information concerning the main characters and the alien entity. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: K.A.Edwards
• Release date: May 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201473488

Book preview

CHRONICLE 24

ANNO STELLAE 2393

PART I

1   Convergence in Wioteheka Wi

On a cold but not very snowy Monday in the first week of January, the month the Lakota Sioux called Wioteheka Wi, Moon of the Terrible,  an old but still elegant German workhorse of an airship let down long steel hawsers, each weighing hundreds of pounds. 

Despite its weight and enormous size,  the Atlantis floated like a mere feather toward a towering mooring mast. 

Pieter and Dr. Pikkard watched the ground rise gently  and soundlessly up to meet them.  Giving off hisses and groans reminiscent of dinosaurs, its colossal girth gleamed with fresh silver paint as it slowly descended.

Many passengers lined the windows and took pictures with hand-cranked movie cameras and sturdy little Brownies, while others waved to people on the ground.

Over two hundred husky-limbed farmers needing paying work were called in.  They formed gangs, grunting and sweating hard as they helped secure lines of the incoming dirigible to the mooring mast at the modern aerodrome just outside the old Twin Cities Geo-Dome. 

Nearby hangars, built two centuries previously for prelaunch servicing of  quark-powered spacecraft in the 22nd Century, could easily accommodate her great bulk—a thirteen story building set on its side.

The hangars of the ancients were shut tight, however.  Computers that ran their cyclopean doors fell to the English disease, and the doors themselves began to shed disintegrating metal and became too dangerous to move. 

For a time wind gusted to thirty knots, threatening to tear the airship loose from its iron and concrete moorings and send it smashing against the edge of the dome a mile away.  Any farmers still clinging to the hawsers would have to drop them or be whipped into the sky and then sent falling to their deaths, as happened a time or two before.

Freight was quickly unloaded down a gangplank from a hatch in the nose.  Sometimes a shifting of the hull  or perhaps carelessness of the stevedores sent bags of Clarke-Tootle's mill products—mainly surplus blue corn meal greatly reduced in price to undercut  local mills and farmers—spilling to the ground.  Then a horde of rats and mice swarming in the old hangars,  attended by flocks of crows and starlings wintering in the ruins, had a great time cleaning it up. 

The wind flicked bitter cold flakes of dirty ice and blue corn in the faces of Pieter and the professor as they disembarked down a stepped gangplank.

Taking the opportunity, the captain and most of the officers and crew went with the passengers into town, riding in on local buses, taxis, and, cheapest of all, horse carriages and donkey wagons. 

Later, the airship floated with no one aboard but a mechanic servicing her six 12-cylinder 400 h.p. engines with oil and gas.

It was as chilly as it normally was in  early January, though there was little snow as yet this year.  The well-wrapped mechanic, thus, had nothing but cold-nipped fingers to swear about as he climbed exterior ladders to the engine gondolas—but swear he did because Cuss was his middle name apparently.

Dr. Pikkard came back out to the aerodrome on Tuesday,  drawn by an ad in the paper about a small plane for sale.

After checking it out with the owner, he indicated his interest in seeing it again and  went back into town.

Wherever he found himself, he never varied his scientific routine if he could help it.  In the field he took notes.  Later, he would annotate them and make a final copy for eventual publishing in order to keep the public record up to date, even if the public never was allowed to peruse them and his articles were burnt in a burn barrel at the universities. 

So the rest of Tuesday,  taking out notes he had made on various research junkets with Pieter, he read and annotated them heavily with his old but still excellent Parker fountain pen, working far into the night before putting the results  into a briefcase he always carried for his latest research papers. 

His own findings and the first instances of English disease  had to be confirmed as much as possible with other lines of research, but he would need his own library back at the hotel to do that, since most universities locked him out of their libraries.  Only then, after checking the work of others relating to the subjects, would he send the papers to his printer, a fellow who did a good job, moon-lighting in his garage on equipment that the authorities did not know about on Dr. Pikkard’s writings, which they would do everything to suppress if they could find out who was printing his research papers.

The discovery of the New Amsterdam Cray had provided a very big boost—if only temporary.  Would his calculations prove correct? he wondered.  Would  he be able to explore the landing site of one of the 'shooting stars'?  If he could personally examine the star,  it would provide undeniable confirmation of his general thesis of economic and social break-down. 

Surely, he had to think, surely the academic community would not reject the plain truth forever, despite how much they fought him at present.  Could they be so unreasonable and intransigent as to reject him categorically until they each dropped into the grave?

Left alone after dinner with Dr. Pikkard,  Pieter was free to find his own amusement in the strange town that was the successor of two large twin cities on the  Niew Rhine.  The Twin Cities were Minnpaul, as many now called them,  actually was a town, much smaller than the capital,  New Amsterdam.

With very few factories running, it was dependent on shipping by river barge and rail on the Niew Rhine for its existence,  mainly flour to more populated and moneyed New Antwerp the port on the Great Lake and thence to the capital New Amsterdam, and finally over to Britain which could afford to buy whatever food stocks Holland America could still produce.  Britain’s agriculture was nearly defunct, what with the wintry conditions prevailed most of the year, and the bogginess and permafrost setting in, make it impractical for agriculture and supported only husbandry, the running of sheep, goats, and such on the scanty forage in the pastures and on the hillsides and mountains.

I'll be going out, Meinheer, to take the air, if you don't need me.

The professor looked up from his papers with a keen look.  Conditions are not any better here than in New Am,  I'm afraid.  Actually, they seem worse.  I say this, Pieter my boy, because beware of certain ill-bred elements of the local citizenry, good people as they may seem to you.  I tell you the truth from previous contacts.  They do not like us East Coasters and Dutchmen in these parts any more than they like stray wolves and Indians sneaking about.  Locals will just as readily slit your throat for a dime as try to sell you something expensive from them you don't need.

I can take care of myself, Meinheer, and I find them very nice folks!

That rebuff from a subordinate tore it with Dr. Pikkard.  Pieter heard a scrape of a chair as he was heading for the door.

In his haste to get to Pieter before he rushed out and got himself ambushed in a back alley, the professor tripped, and the next thing Pieter heard and saw was his employer falling and hitting his head on the corner of the desk. 

Blood started to flow from the abrasion as the professor sat and got his senses back.  He pulled out a handkerchief and started to dab at it, to keep it from his eyes, then held it to the wound.  Seeing Pieter staring with eyes bugged out,  he held out the handkerchief with the big blood spot on it.

Pieter, I would give you all my blood if I could make you see, could clear up your blindness, but it would do no good, no good at all.  You would not change your views in the least.  Why?  Because you think yourself good, and everyone else, despite all evidence to the contrary, also good at heart.  Nothing could be more false.  Humanity, at heart, is depraved!  Only one thing can change that.  So go, I will be all right.  Only one blood would ever help you, but it was shed once for all, and mine would not help you now if all were shed for you, since I am a sinner, something you cannot admit about yourself.  So go! 

Pieter was soon in the snowy street. 

Normally, city streets, wherever there were gaps in the Dome, were lined with shoulder-high drifts of snow and it was hard going for pedestrians and the few motor cars still running in the city.  But the year had continued unusually mild so far.  It was the blizzards in spring that people feared most.

Pieter had little difficulty in reaching the Minnetonka Hotel, about six or seven blocks, down a string of  drugstore saloons,  extending from his own hotel.

Anne was not in the lobby, so he went up to her room.  Stubborn Dutch that she was, she had come anyway, despite his objections and her Oom’s reservations about a girl going unattended.  Had she danced in the street as she had threatened to do? he wondered, shaking his head.  They would think she was a Gypsy!  What a disgrace for Dutch girl to bring upon herself and her reputation!

He also had to wonder why he continued to befriend her.  He knew she would never fit into New Alkmaar society, as she barely fit into New Amsterdam’s. 

His views about her inappropriate behavior were always taken aback whenever they met, however,  Anne’s beauty was always a mild shock whenever they met again.  This time too he found her beautiful enough to distract him completely from a rebuke he had already practiced in his mind on way to the Minnetonka. 

Her appearance was not what he expected, for one thing.  Not at all!  The wild colors retired to the trunk, a simple gray silk gown just touched the floor and pearl-seeded lace trimmed her neckline. 

Looking  more grown-up and dignified than she had looked to him in New Am, she was sitting beside a roaring fire in the grate.  A full dinner had just been laid out,  with candles, flowers, and the establishment's finest napkins set in tall crystal water glasses.  She had demanded, if Pieter could have known, the best the Minnetonka could do, and it rose to the occasion and did it!  Anne, after all, had not changed from the young woman who usually managed to get her way.

Pieter got his breath back after the first shock wore off. 

It was all so like Anne to do the unexpected, but he never got used to her ways, since she never kept to one thing or pattern for very long so that he could pin her down. 

How like the penny-unwise Kilpaisons!  Obviously, she had gone all out to make it nice for them with every last bit of her savings and whatever she had been able to earn or lifted from her Oom’s overflowing pockets where he customarily carried money he had stuffed in and forgotten.  That habit had always caused problems for Pieter’s accounting in the bank book, but couldn’t be changed.

Pieter frowned.

What an terrible expense! he thought. Is that the 'Kilpaison female temperament' her grandmother mentioned?  Spending when you don't have it to spend?  I can’t afford a wife like her if she’s going to act like this all the time!

Why didn't you let me know you were going to do this?  I've already eaten, he told her quite truthfully, for he had wolfed down a huge meal at the hotel, then promptly forgotten what it had consisted of. 

Anne's face fell, but she quickly recovered.  I wanted it to be a nice surprise.  Knowing your appetite, you can still  eat a dessert, can't you?  We can at least have dessert and coffee together.  I just lost my appetite for mutton chops and potatoes anyway.  That is all they served here. 

Despite the Jack Dutch situation, things had relaxed after a while.  Anne proved more than equal to his reluctance, taking his arms and placing them around her.  They sat on the bed for some time, and after a time Pieter began kissing her.  This must have been the after-glow of the incident on the street back  by the canal in New Amsterdam, for it came relatively easy for him to do.

There soon came a point where it seemed they would carry on where they had left off. 

But not until we're—  he objected,  his desperate words stopped by her return kisses as she tugged his pants open.  But what about your uncle? he murmured.  What would he think if he found out we care for each other?

Anne sniffed at the notion.  Never mind Oom.  If we’ve made up our minds  and decide to marry, he may complain a bit, but he’ll come round to it.

Her clothes made it very clear she wanted that decision made soon.  After slipping out of her dress, she pulled off his shirt, and his breeches and drawers down... 

Suddenly, like an Arctic breeze on a sunny day coming in the window, Pieter turned cold as the ice outside on the window sills.  The fire was dying in the grate, and Pieter rose up, pulling his breeches and drawers back up,  and moved to the other end of the bed.

He thought he might love Anne despite her unwelcome advances, but he realized he would never take her hand in marriage.  Somehow, he just felt their relationship should end—but when?  how? 

What's the matter? she called as she rose and was going to stir up the fire.

Don’t bother with the fire,  he muttered.  You’ll just be charged more, and, besides, I am going soon.

He reached for his shirt and coat.

How come you’re getting dressed?  Where are you going?

He did not answer as he dressed.

Then he felt her warm arms around his shoulders.  He stiffened and pulled away. 

Yet he didn’t hurry off as she thought he might.  He just went and sat in her armchair, and she let him fall asleep there, and then brought a blanket to cover him.

The coal fire had died again and the room's growing chill was causing her to shake, despite the blanket she had pulled around her shoulders. 

Anne took a cold, hard look at her  reluctant swain—one rosebud with possibilities  that refused to be gathered. 

The candles on the table burned down.  The dinners were cold. 

However long she had to wait for him, it would never be long enough, she realized.  But she had known that before coming to Minneapolis.  Now he had proved it beyond question.  He had twice successfully rebuffed her open invitation.

She kept her voice low and called a maid from the room service,  endured the smirking stare at her in a blanket after the girl glanced over at  the dozing Pieter in the chair,  and took the scissors she had requested.

She cut off a bit of the sleeping Pieter’s hair and put it in a gold locket her grandmother had given her from her own neck. 

Pieter was still asleep when she  had her bags packed, which wasn’t a big job, or make any noise, as she had not actually unpacked, removing only a few things to start off the evening with Pieter.

He awoke just as she shut the door and found a note, telling him not to worry.  As for her bill, she would settle it with the manager or assistant on her way out. 

With color rising in his face, he also read that she understood how he felt, so she was going to a cheap ladies boarding house in town to stay for the time being.

Also, he was to give her love to her  Oom. 

A General Delivery address followed, in case her uncle wanted to get in touch, which she fully expected.

In a postscript she told Pieter to say she had a nasty cold developing and it was just as well, for the work that he had to do, that he didn't catch it from her.

Lost on Pieter, she had signed in a tender Kilpaisoni style a distant King of Ellis would have approved—

Pieter, love always, always!  I won’t forget even if you should, that you showed back home you down deep really cared for me!  Otherwise I would not have followed you here.  Your little fool,  Anne.

2  Fool's Day

Chilly weather that had swept in between Anne and Pieter in Minneapolis was still holding off from the town itself. 

Farmers' almanacs heralded an exceptional avalanche of northern snow across the Upper Great Plains, though it was not to be in that part of the country. 

Instead New Amsterdam and provinces to the south were being blasted by a killer storm in which eighty people froze to death,  including little country schools with children and teachers who couldn’t get out to home. 

While for the moment the Great Blizzard failed to materialize in Holland America's heartland, thankful people scurried to get errands done while they could still get about the streets.

Wednesday the 7th of January dawned—the 7th considered lucky in some cultures, very unlucky in others.

The professor went out to look at the plane again.

It seemed to have a problem with the oil.  The owner said his grease monkey was too busy to take care of it that day, so it might have to wait.

Okay, do it on Fool’s Day, joked Dr. Pikkard, referring to the convenient excuse of putting off to tomorrow—in this case a non-existent Wednesday II—any left-over business.  That, in turn, meant somebody would have to get up early to beat Thursday’s dawn and get the work done.  Farmers, of course, anxious to get late-maturing crops in before the first snowfall, put an even harder squeeze on Thursday than was necessary in town.

The following day, Thursday the 8th,  continued the previous day’s weather,  unusually bright and clear, with all the signs of being fortuitous.  It was the day farmers had made expressly for bringing in harvests, though why it was identified with fools was never quite made clear by anyone, as fools don’t normally like to admit what they are.

It worked so well in late summer and fall, the custom had been extended to the rest of the calendar year,  whether or not it was needed.

With no particular terminus,  it could be stretched as long as needed to get in the corn or wheat or whatever else was being harvested.

Though probably agrarian Swedish in origin, the New World Dutch had taken to it so completely that they claimed it was their own invention—which honor the British, for one, were very pleased to concede to them.

No one in the cities liked it, but the countryside—which had grown very powerful over against the declining urban population—had carried the day. 

Squinting into the brightness, Dr. Pikkard and his assistant arrived back at the Minneapolis-St. Paul aerodrome. 

Dr. Pikkard was urging on Pieter  to put on more speed, as he was anxious to make up for the lateness of the season and the delayed departure of the Atlantis from New Amsterdam.

The hired Hupmobile skidded on ice and nearly rammed a pyramid of rusting air control computers from the Crystal Age a junkman had piled up for sorting through first before loading.—the buildings where he got them being too dark for seeing what was of possible value and what was not.

The old man throwing computers on his truck shook his head.

Don’a mind me, gennilmen!  Dinke van Klooft at your service!  And how 'bout sellin' me that old jalopy?  Don't matter what condition it's in.  It'd make jelly gut sale on parts!  Ye be surprised what Ole Dinke gets fur old machineery from those  fancy-pants Englishmun in New Antwerp!  Ole  Dinke goes there once a month, he does!

The junk dealer laughed through a tattered, yellowish scarf wrapped around his neck and jaw.

But I don't need da business.  I got all that oder there to cart off!  I don’a tink I live long enuf to cart all dat away to New Antwerp, dough I got de license, I doo!

He paused and jerked a naked black thumb through his tattered glove toward immense Crystal Age spaceport buildings that towered along the horizon beyond the airfield.

A license, you say?  My friend, whom did you say is buying from you? inquired the professor. 

Clarke, some fat cat Londoner!  He sends men oder to New Amst.  A real blood-sucker, I hears,  but pays with gold from de king's  own royal mint—ye seen it—de coin comes with the oliphant on one side and that moon-eyed, egg-headed fellow on the udder, ye can't miss it.  Hear'd of  Clarke,  Meinheer?

Where haven't I heard that name? laughed Dr. Pikkard, turning back to the business at hand.  He must own half of New Amsterdam and has his finger in most every blackbird pie!  But exactly what, if I may ask, do you do with these old cars if you can get them and they still run?

It was the junkman's turn to guffaw.  I don’a keer if dey don’a run!  Ev'ry dang thing you can think 'tis made of them from joolery to silverware.  Dere mo' valooble in pieces den in runnin' order!  If da metal holds good, a piece no big as half my hand alone brings me a dollar, cuz of blacksmiths make chopper knives from it.  Turn dis heap a yers oder to me, I’ll tear out da leap spring,  and in 'bout a week some butcher will be choppin' horse steaks and burger with it in some high class New Ant eat'ry!  It’s a gold mine in deese old cars, Meinheer!

Meanwhile, Pieter was doing a little looking around himself.  He didn’t have to look far, however, for the one he saw talking to Dr. Pikkard was the only item of interest to him at the moment.

A little skid on ice could not spoil a fine day, but a chance encounter with someone who looked disturbingly like Old Goatley?  It  brought Pieter up short for a moment.

Until that moment the last thing from his mind,  the amazed Peter was wondering if Old Goatley had a twin in the Twin Cities.

He opened his mouth to call out, but the name died back in his throat.

Recalling the explosion in the balloon shed, he held his peace for the moment, though he continued to examine the junk dealer.  He wondered if his eyes were tricking him, since he had gotten little if any sleep after the incident with Anne.  But they had no time to determine whether it was truly Old Goatley or a lookalike cousin. 

Dr. Pikkard was all Dutch business and evidently saw nothing peculiar about the junkman.

Quickly, the pair of aeronauts pulled on specially padded flight jackets, the professor keeping his unseasonable straw boater while Pieter changed Dutch homespun for a  flight cap that came with a chin strap.

Icarus the sparrow was carefully put in Pieter's coat pocket with the zipper pulled for safe-keeping.

More and more, the professor was entrusting Pieter with his most treasured companion other than Anne.

It was odd of the bird, Pieter felt.  It was fluttering so much he took his eye off the old man to see what was wrong.  When he looked again, Old Goatley, or his equally mysterious twin, was gone.

But for a light dusting of new snow, both could see by the nearly limp wind sock.  Taking newly purchased rifles and one fold-up shovel, they hurried across the gravel. 

Snug in winter clothing, they passed under part of the immense shadow of the Atlantis, which was glowing at the ends of long cables like a captive, sheer-sided mountain.

Dr. Pikkard paused to examine one of the lines let down by the dirigible on landing and used to tow it to the mooring mast.

Instead of being drawn up into the ship, it had been attached to the tower's base.

He began to draw himself up as nimbly as a boy, bracing his feet against the mooring mast.  A slight shift in the Zeppelin soon drew the hawser tightly vertical, snapping Dr. Pikkard five or six feet back to the ground.

Watch out, Meinheer! said Pieter, amazed at Dr. Pikkard’s demonstration of his youthful dexterity.

Dr. Pikkard slid down and turned around to his assistant. 

His cut from the desk patched with tape, hardly mattered now, as the incident was minor, and all the talk about blood forgotten by Pieter. 

Pinching his mustache,  the professor spoke more slowly than usual. 

I just can't help it, my boy.  I know it isn't very dignified for a man of my age, but whenever I see cables like that in the air, I almost think I could climb to Heaven and see for myself!  You see, I get tired sometimes of hanging around in my old balloons, so close to heaven but never actually going there! 

He clapped Pieter on the same shoulder that old Horst had almost crushed a century previously, or so it now seemed, it being so far away and New Alkmaar faded like an old photograph. 

My boy,  there must be plenty of things up there for a scientist to study!  And I am just itching to be allowed to get at them!"

Just beyond the Atlantis and a big pile of gas hoses thrown down by the mechanic, huddled what looked like sheep sheds.  Pieter and his employer then moved toward Hangar 7, toward a dim light glowing like the single eye of a Cyclops busy counting sheep in a seaside cliff cave.

3    A Good Deal

Crouched in the shop manager's shack nearest the window, Vincente de Rabiscu sat in his low-set swivel chair, a man with  sharp eyes well able to pick out the suckers with the money in any crowd.  His most noteworthy feature, they were coal-black, inscrutable eyes with no sheen, the sort that held no secret anyone would want to know.

He had been waiting about half an hour, or one whole cigar.

Killing time, he had taken his pen and drawn an Edwardian handlebar mustache above film star Betti Bangles’  red, pouting lips on a magazine cover, smoked a cheap English stogie that was ground up leather, sawdust, and some tobacco, and listened to a big band.

Hit singer Rose Marie van Kloon on the radio show, Hit Parade, gave him a sour stomach with her sugared lyrics about love.

You've been so untrue, but, darlin', I'll  just  keep on lovin'  youuuuuu...babeeeeeee....

That was too much for a man like Rabiscu.  He liked women well enough, but not exactly for faithfulness and fidelity.

Those eyes of him were most handy.  The only cool aspect in a florid, shapeless face, they studied the documents he had drawn up.  Everything was in order.  He looked and saw someone coming.  Throwing the magazines under the desk, he stubbed his cigar out.  Straightening up, Rabiscu extended his hand to Dr. Pikkard, ignoring the other,  younger cripple that came with him evidently as the gentleman’s sidekick.

Pikkard, however, proudly pulled forward his assistant and companion.  I'd like you to meet my valued colleague, Dr. Pikkard began.  His eyes shone in the gloom as he put his arm around  Pieter's  sturdy shoulder.

Do you wonder why I call him my colleague?  said the professor.  Well, let me enlighten you a bit.  We have just completed some rather risky experiments and researches out North East, and he's been of great service to me as my hired assistant.  I am renewing his contract with increased wages, from forty cents an hour to one dollar if he wishes to continue with me.  Otherwise, I'll pay his way through college.  He's expressed a desire to go to school and improve himself.  I must respect that, for I believe he has the makings of a true man of science.  And though I am a bachelor by temperament, he has become like a son to me—no longer a mere assistant.  I am telling you this, so you can choose maybe to hire him on here in case you need a mechanic sometime.  I am sure he will fit right in, as he knows math, even calculus, and is able-bodied in a lot of ways that will surprise you.

The professor did not seem to notice Pieter's red face, who was wondering why the professor was telling this stranger all this personal stuff,  and went on.

Lord willing, I will buy your plane for starting glacier research, Mr. Rabiscu.  My assistant will take his first lesson in flying from me, just as he learned the bathysphere and ballooning!  Since my young friend will be temporarily parting company with me after today, I am treating him to a hunt via the biplane.  We've brought along rifles.  We might even bag a coyote  or fox or two for the bounty money, so he can earn a little spending money!  You know young folks always are strapped for spending money!

Rabiscu  glanced uncomfortably  at Pieter, whose clear, blue, damn Dutch eyes, for some reason, seemed to be piercing him to the bone.  He decided it was best to ignore it and get to the business at hand. 

The unusually jolly and expansive Dr. Pikkard was smiling enough to make up for his young friend,  and in response Rabiscu could not help but relax one degree, baring badly foxed eyeteeth. 

You go right ahead, Meinheer.  This is a free country despite goin' so Dutchie, ain't it?  Now don't get me wrong.  I ain't got nothin' 'gainst  your people.  My people were somethin' else cuz'n they shipped here from some country over the water called Ally Po—would you know where that is by any chance?  I looked on a map once but I couldn't 'dentify it.  As it was, this country was hard enough to find,  what with the pieces being scattered all over the dang world.  Well, some of my best friends are Dutchies.  Do as you want.  Sign now or later.  I'd ride along with you again today, but I'm a poor shot and couldn't hit a barn if it were aimed at me!  As for the aeroplane, you'll not find one better, and I've got lots of prospective buyers anxious to take 'er up.  So if you wanna sign now, that's fine with me.  Nail her down now and she’s good as yours.  I don’t mind taken a cheque now, and cashin’ it later, as a man like you is good to his word, and that’s the kinda man I be too! 

Rabiscu's flood of  tactless remarks seemed to break the ice. 

Dr. Pikkard and Pieter glanced at each other and the professor shrugged and smiled.  For a brief moment the murky air of the shop lightened and cleared.  It was a beautiful day after all.  News had yet to reach the area from New Amsterdam about fires destroying the Royal Wilhelmina and Professor Pikkard's bathysphere.  As for his gyroplane, which unlike the dummie in the warehouse, had survived in a cave in the Katskills, that was all he would have left as his legacy, besides the papers he had along to work on,  which were the fruits of his most important researches of late.

Dr. Pikkard laughed.  I'm sorry I can't offer anything bigger than a barn for you to shoot,  Mr. Rabiscu,  unless you want to take on a grain elevator or one of those antediluvian hangars over there! 

He added with a wink, Are you sure you won't reconsider and  go along?  I had told Pieter  you and I would go up first, then sign if everything went all right, then go hunting.  Afterwards, I'll be dropping him off at the university and tendering my  farewell to him and, hopefully, my niece, who is staying with friends in town.  She'd be here today with us, in fact, if she hadn't caught a nasty cold.

Wrinkling bushy salt-and-pepper brows, Rabiscu and his  leaden eyes seemed to take on expression for the first time, though it would be hard to say what it was in human terms.  He reached up under his hat and scratched his red-splotched bald spot.

Thanks, no, I  rather hold down the fort here, if you don’t mind.  This here weather won't last much longer, so you best be off, gentlemen.  You might as well sign for her now, Meinheer, and you have a couple hours in the contract to change your mind—that’s in that bottom fine print.  Sure, it was taking too much oil yesterday when you took her up, but I've had that little matter taken care of.  I put my best mechanic on it.  He done her up fine and dandy, spit and polish all the way.  Just look at her, she's immaculate!  Well, how about it, Meinheer? 

The dealer held up a pen to Dr. Pikkard to take.

Just then the three-prop Kosmocraft, a New Antwerp flight museum product, appeared.  Her dust cover removed, resplendent in a new paint job of shining colors, she rolled out into the hangar's entrance, and the light hit her just right, with no shadow on the entire plane. 

The dazzling gold highlights on its boots and the blue on its wings, body, cab and tail would have been too gaudy and improper, too much like a butterfly's for any scientist except the daring Dr. Pikkard. 

Surprisingly, he seemed a bit shocked by the sight of the plane.  It was as if he had seen a ghost, and Rabiscu caught the professor’s expression. 

Hurriedly, Rabiscu, still holding the pen,  gestured toward the shop manager's desk, indicating papers dated Wednesday II, January  8,  2393—the 8 smudged a bit as if it had been changed from a 6 or  even 7.

Dr. Pikkard, however,  had turned from looking at the plane to looking at Rabiscu's face, not the rather dirty hand of the seller with the pen.

For Rabiscu, Dr. Pikkard's expression was one this experienced but not so successful salesmen most dreaded.  Evidently, the Dutch sucker had something on his mind, and maybe second thoughts.  Had Sloakum ruined his chances by painting it so fancy as he did?  Dutchies, he knew, had a reputation for not liking much color on anything they wore or rode in.

A sinking feeling in his belly, Rabiscu fully expected his plane to be turned down, or for Dr. Pikkard to do something to complicate things. He also feared Dr. Pikkard’s young assistant, who, by the staunch, starched, bug-up-his behind Dutch looks of him, seemed to have smelled something fishy.

Instead, Dr. Pikkard asked if Rabiscu would mind if they prayed about the deal. 

Pray?  The dealer was flabbergasted.  He never heard anyone ever do that, in his entire time spent wheeling and dealing with used aircraft.

He started to say something, but croaked.  Grabbing his cold coffee in a cup he had set a week previously and let get scum on top, he forced it down, and got his voice back.

Oh, oh,  sure, Meinheer,  be my guest,  Rabiscu blurted out in a higher pitch than usual as if he had gulped helium from a balloon.

Pieter was as surprised as the aircraft dealer,  this being the professor's first public prayer before a journey. 

The professor began his prayer.  Rabiscu inclined his head a little and looked floorward.  He did his best to look respectful, he thought,  while the praying was done.  It was then he first noticed the Lloyds of London-insured legs of Betti Bangles sticking out from under the desk.  Wincing, Rabiscu glanced instantly at Dr. Pikkard and his helper, but they were standing eyes closed, with bent heads. 

Seeing his chance, he took his foot and scooted the Hollywood queen further under the desk. 

Lord God, our lives are in your hands.  I  feel buying this plane now as Mr. Rabiscu offered is your will, as he has been so kind to let us change our minds if we wish after this last test flight.  May all we do be to your glory.  Amen.

Much relieved the prayer was so short, Rabiscu took the liberty of patting the scientist's shoulder as soon as the uncomfortable praying rigmarole was over.

Yeah, like I said, Doctor, you can tear up your cheque on your return,  and I will tear up the papers you sign,  and everything will be as before, in case you change your mind.  Now, there's the nice little papers all done up ready for you, my friend.  I'm sure you'll find everything clean as a whistle! 

He handed the professor the fountain pen with his name and business on it and said to keep it.  He also took extra pains in handing not another pen but a business card to Pieter his fingers had smudged.

Dr. Pikkard gave a hike to his groin and sat down at the desk, pen in hand. 

Are you sure you're doing right by yourself, Mr. Rabiscu?  the professor asked after a glance at the written figure.  You're maybe shorting yourself, I think, but I appreciate a man of business who isn’t after every schuyler,  and, when he sails,  goes straight through the sea.

Swert  the shop manager chose that moment to ram open the sliding glass window on the shop side adjoining Rabiscu’s office.  The shack filled with the reek and tang of high octane.

Sloakum’s over in Number 4 at the moment scrapping the Clipper for parts, but I'll crank Old Gertie up for you, Slick.  I just hope she'll not disappoint these fine gents you got here today!  That piston—you checked it lately?  And I think someone at the museum was dinking around with the instrument panel too.  Musta taken it apart and didn't get all the screws back in jist so.  But Sloakum fixed those things good like new.

Rabiscu face flushed beet-red.  He didn’t like being called his old nickname in front of his prospective customers.  A salesman and the shop manager were not always of one mind about that and quite a few other things too.

To Rabiscu,  Swert the Swede was always pulling things like that,  just when he had a super deal clinched.  The plane dealer  nodded with a grimace, as if a slab of concrete had hit square on his corns, and slammed the window.

Meinheer Professor, I just want to treat you Dutchies  fair and square, that's all, Rabiscu said quickly to dispel the construction Joe’s use of Slick may have cast on things. 

Far as that plane goes, it’s grist for your windmill, as you people say.  You can’t lose on her!  And if you change your mind, no deal is final till that cheque clears at the bank anyway, so never you mind, I am waiting here while you take her up for a nice little spin around, and you come back when you like and tells me if it’s a done deal or now.  I’ll be waiting!

The signing was done.  Dr. Pikkard and Rabiscu shook hands on the deal and then parted. 

There followed an awkward moment for Rabiscu only.  He  felt most uncomfortable under Pieter's scrutinizing gaze until the moment the youth, still looking  him square in the eye, handed over a cheque drawn on the Royal Bank of New Amsterdam. 

The dealer was surprised, seeing the responsibility that the professor doctor had entrusted to an underling and a cripple at that. 

Soon Rabiscu was alone with the professor's fancy, gilt-engraved cheque.  He finally tore his eyes off it and began watching Dr. Pikkard.

He also saw the professor's sidekick scuttle up a ladder and into the plane with amazing speed for someone with wooden legs and  braces. 

Still on the ground,  the professor was looking the plane over as he carefully inspected wings, struts, and flaps.  Rabiscu could have left with the cheque right then, but he didn't want to make a wrong impression that he was so anxious to get that money in his pocket as he was.

The Dutch boy's mean look had so spooked him, he decided he had better stick around a bit more until the fliers were in the air.

So he forced himself to settle down and watched the proceedings,  relieved more words could say that it was all over.  After all, he had owned it too long,  and it was understandable a man like this  had grown anxious to get rid of it so he could deposit something to cover his expenditures. 

But he had gotten rid of it, he crowed to himself.  Thanks to  the New Amsterdam university professor and museum curator, a most gentlemanly, distinguished Dr. Hugh van de Goatt, he had been alerted to Dr. Pikkard and his need for an aircraft to conduct research on glaciers.

Goatt had even shipped the plane out to him at no expense to Rabiscu.

Now his bank account’s over-draughts were paid off including the penalties,  and he hadn't had to overhaul the old junker for sale.  He had made out like a bandit too on the deal.  Dr. Goatt's museum had let him have it for $75, since so many airports based on prop aircraft were on the list for closure or had already closed down.  And he was selling it for $800 to this East Coast Dutchie! 

Swert had Sloakum slap on some paint, adding any special touches he could think of, and it had sold for nearly a cool grand!  If the Dutchie read the fine print, he might see there were residual fees after the sale, that legally applied, that he would ask be paid too, bringing it to 1 grand.  But nobody ever read that fine print, he was counting on that.  900% or so profit! 

Not bad! he thought. A couple more sales like this, and I can make a few wise investments in the new line of steam cars and maybe retire down south a rich man, maybe even buy into some West Indies banana plantation with plenty of servants to cool his drinks, draw his bath, and haul bananas to the boats.  The southern girlies, even if a bit dark, were said to be good lookers too!

Swert started the three engines while Rabiscu dreamed of the West Indies, Rabiscu-style.  Just then black smoke poured out of the exhaust of Engine #3 on the left wing and the prop even faltered.

With scowl screwing up both face and forehead, the salesman cursed his luck.  To calm himself, he grabbed a fat, black, five-center from