The thing in the auction gallery may have been a musical instrument, a child's toy, or a piece of surrealist sculpture, but whatever it was those two collectors were determined to have it. But there was another collector around town who knew how to outbid them without spending a cent.
by AUGUST DERLETH
TEX HARRIGAN looked into the clubroom. Seeing me, he came in.
"I thought I'd find you here," he said. "Got something to show you." He dropped a Parke-Bernet priced book catalog before me and opened it. "Take a look at that."
No. 77, I read. Curiosa. Unidentified musical instrument. Believed to be an ancient lute. Fine condition. From the collection of Gregory Saunders.
NB: One telephone bid to Saunders home at $10,000. Bidding starts at $12,000.
I knew Parke-Bernet as one of the greatest auction houses, specializing in rare books, works of art, and related pieces. It did not seem to be Harrigan's usual field. I looked up.
"Are you on an assignment?"
"I'm always looking for something to go into my file of queer people. You must recall Saunders—a gray little old fellow who always insisted he was in communication with Mars. Died last month. Parke-Bernet got hold of some of his things and have them on sale. I talked to Mason—he's my editor on the World—and he gave me the green light to go out and get what I could. I found this."
"What is it?"
"I meant to find out. I asked myself what kind of 'unidentified musical instrument' is worth a bid of ten thousand out of hand. I went down, but I got there a little too late. It had been sold. Parke-Bernet wouldn't reveal the sale price, of course, but I gathered it was more than twice that bid. Ever hear of Samuel Millerand? Or Herman Schliemann?"
The names sounded familiar. Harrigan said, "The fact is, they're brothers-in-law who've been associated in business for years. They rank with the top bibliophiles in the world. They live together over on Central Park West."
"But the item's listed as a musical instrument. What would a couple of book collectors want with a musical instrument?"
"That's what I'm curious to learn. There may be a story in it. In any case, a pair of rich eccentrics will make copy of some sort. Are you game?"
SAMUEL MILLERAND was a thin wisp of a man, neither tall nor short, with closely clipped graying hair, and bird-bright eyes behind his golden pince-nez. His brother-in-law was corpulent and generously bearded.
Millerand fingered the card his butler had brought in. "Gentlemen from, the World," he murmured. "What can we do for you?"
Harrigan came straight to the point. "We understand you've bought something from the Saunders sale at Parke-Bernet. Specifically, an unidentified musical instrument said to be a lute. We're interested in knowing whether two widely, reputed bibliophiles have branched out into another field."
A wintry smile crossed Millerand's face; it did not linger. "No, sir," he replied shortly. "Would you care to see it?"
"I would, sir."
Millerand got up and went into an adjoining room. Returning, he beckoned us over to a little table which stood under a green-shaded lamp.
"This is the Saunders piece, Mr. Harrigan."
It did resemble an ancient lute, except for two things; it was angular and it was flat. The whole thing was flat, in what seemed to be three layers or parts. It showed some evidence of use, but far from being the replica of an ancient instrument, it looked like something which would not be out of place in an exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art.
It looked complex. Its base was of some kind of material I could not identify. Attached to this base from the top was a sheet of some kind of material which was neither plastic nor celluloid, but looked somewhat like both; actually, it suggested a sheet of silicon. To this was affixed a series of fine, scintillant wires—not connected, but in little sequences—some scarcely an inch long, some merely straight, some very intricate in design. Each of these groups of wires was set beside what looked like musical keys, capable of being slightly depressed, as in any wind instrument.
Over all this lay a protective sheet of some transparent material, perforated with sizable triangular openings over the wires. There was neither note nor letter printed on the body of the instrument, but across the top in a straight line lay five meticulous round designs, which I recognized at once as representations of the five major planets; Saturn's rings were unmistakable, as were Earth's continents. This row of planets was surmounted by a small orb.
"I'm afraid my knowledge of music has been neglected," said Harrigan. "What kind of instrument is this?"
Schliemann growled. "It doesn't happen to be a musical instrument in the accepted sense of such an artifact."
"I take it you've never seen anything like it?" asked Millerand, with a faint smile.
"Never," said Harrigan.
Millerand glanced at me. I shook my head. "Schliemann—the comparative piece," murmured Millerand.
SCHLIEMANN got to his feet with some effort and moved in a rolling gait into the adjoining room. He came out with "the comparative piece" and put it down beside the Saunders "lute."
"But this, surely, is not entirely unfamiliar to you," pressed Millerand.
I could see what he meant by "comparative." The new curiosity was paddle-shaped, similarly hooked, and made for the most part of well-worn wood. The secondary sheet corresponding to what looked like silicon in the Saunders piece was of vellum. On it were imprinted a large cross, in place of the planets on the "lute," and the alphabet in large and small letters. These were followed by the vowels in a single line, and the consonants in tabular form. Beneath this primary information were the Lord's Prayer, and, at the bottom of the paddle-shaped sheet of vellum, the Roman numerals. The vellum was protected by a stiff sheet of transparent horn. The whole thing looked very old and bore the signs of long use.
"I'm afraid I have to admit I'm not familiar with this, either," said Harrigan. "It's a little out of my line."
"What does it suggest to you, Mr. Harrigan?"
"If I had to guess—a primer of some kind."
"Very good, sir. This is a hornbook, one of the earliest forms of the primer. In some places, the hornbook was also called the christcross row, or crisscross row, because of the cross which you see here. It was attached to the child's girdle, hence the hook."
"Ah, then the Saunders piece is a musical primer!"
"Say, rather, a sound hornbook. When depressed, the little keys cause a small bow, or, in some cases, a claw-like appendage, to scrape the wires—or what would appear to be wires. We're not quite sure what their composition is." He took up the Saunders hornbook. "Let me show you."
He pressed one of the little keys. Immediately, an almost invisible tiny claw came up out of the key itself and plucked the wires, being evidently sheathed in the stem of the key. A faint, faraway sound flowered into the room. It was not so much a musical note, as the birdlike enunciation of a vowel. I could not distinguish which vowel it was, though, for it didn't seem to reproduce exactly any one of the familiar vowels, and it was not a sound I had ever heard before.
MILLERAND pressed another key. Again a faint sound, different from the first.
"Why are the sounds so faint?" Harrigan asked.
"Well, just suppose, Mr. Harrigan, that the book was designed for use in some place of more rarified atmosphere."
"Mountain country?"
"Even more rarified than that. I'm afraid you're woefully limited to the terrestrial."
Harrigan skipped that. "How would such a thing be used, Mr. Millerand?"
"We can only conjecture. Given a child whose circumstances are more conducive to learning by vocal study, and who may need help to sound his words—"
"Do you mean to say those sounds we heard were words?"
"Words, or parts of words; the equivalent of our vowels and consonants, perhaps. It's a fascinating speculation. We don't know very much about the place where this hornbook was commonly used. We don't even know the special quality —and we suspect there may be more than one—of the material out of which the sound hornbook is made."
"You can have it analyzed."
"We've tried, Mr. Harrigan. Part of it would appear to be silicon. But that is as far as we can go. The base material has so far not been identified by science."
Harrigan flashed him a dubious glance. "I'm afraid you're way out ahead of me, Mr. Millerand."
Millerand sighed. "I feared so. The caliber of newspapermen isn't what it used to be. I'm trying to suggest that this hornbook may not be used quite as our ancestors used theirs—that is, not in a collective school, but in solitude. Each hornbook may have qualities for sending and receiving messages. They may be capable of use in a school, and I use the term loosely, whose pupils are widely separated, one from another, perhaps by many miles, and who study very much as children of today do by television. I'm trying to make this as simple as possible for you, Mr. Harrigan."
"THE QUESTION is, where would such a place be?" Harrigan challenged him.
"Well, there are certain inferences to be made. Take a look at this row of planets depicted across the top of the hornbook. Does it suggest anything to you?"
"Not particularly."
"I submit there's something especially tantalizing about it. The row of planets is surmounted by a small, rayed orb, which must certainly stand, for the sun. The arrangement of the planets below it is most interesting. In any representation of planets made here, wouldn't you expect Earth to occupy the central position?"
"I suppose so."
"But here, you see, Earth is on the left of the central planet, and, like all the others, inferior in representational size to that central planet. It's easy to identify Saturn, and Jupiter's moons leave us in no doubt about it. Venus also seems quite clear. Mercury is absent. All the planets shown here are quite remarkably detailed insofar as land masses and water areas are concerned, when these occur. The two moons of the central planet identify it plainly, even if the surface map is unknown to us—as are all the other surfaces, save that of Earth. That planet is Mars. Can you think of any reason why Mars should occupy the central position on the hornbook other than that it is the center of the manufacturer's universe?"
Harrigan could certainly see as well as I in what direction Millerand was leading us, but he preferred to pretend he did not understand. He shook his head.
"Ah, well," said Millerand, shrugging his shoulders, "I suppose it's too much to ask of the press. Mr. Harrigan, we believe this artifact comes from Mars, purely on the basis of the prima facie evidence: the unknown materials out of which it is made, the quality of the sounds it emits, suggesting that the hornbook was intended for an atmosphere as rarified as that of Mars, and the position of Mars as central planet on the face of the hornbook. The first book from another planet to appear on Earth, Mr. Harrigan —and how fitting that it should be a child's book!"
Harrigan did not blink an eye. "Supposing we accept that premise," he said, "would this be an ancient hornbook or a modern one?"
Schliemann chuckled. "An iconoclast, Sam."
"Presumably one now in use, if its condition is any indication," answered Millerand seriously. "But we don't know anything about the durability of the materials, though they seem indestructible, nor can we tell, of course, how long Saunders had it."
"I hope it isn't impertinent to ask how much you paid for it?"
Millerand flashed a glance at Schliemann, who shrugged.
"Twenty - four thousand," said Millerand.
"A bargain," put in Schliemann. "We were quite certain what it was. We would never have got it if Dr. Rosenbach had been alive."
"What would he have bid for it, I wonder," mused Millerand. "Fifty thousand? A hundred thousand?"
"I take it you gentlemen aren't averse to being quoted," ventured Harrigan.
"Not at all," Millerand replied.
"Hold on!" cried Schliemann. "Quoted in what way?"
"As claiming to be in possession of a sound hornbook from Mars."
"We can't offer anything but presumptive proof," said Schliemann. "If you'll make that clear, please. And we'd prefer that the price we paid remain unknown to the press. We don't particularly care for publicity—but it has had its value in bringing to our attention various items here and there on the globe."
"Could I send a man around to take a photograph of it—say, beside the genuine hornbook?"
Millerand and Schliemann agreed, although reluctantly.
DOWN ON the street again, Harrigan smiled wryly. "That's what comes of reading too much science-fiction." He stopped to light a cigarette. "I've known a good many characters like that, though most of them weren't as rich. But the possession of money isn't any guarantee of practicality or common sense."
"It doesn't seem likely that, two men as canny as Millerand and Schliemann could readily be persuaded to subscribe to anything, too wildly incredible," I protested.
"Oh, it's as easy to hoodwink an intelligent man as a moron," retorted Harrigan. "All things are relative, and in a case like this the willingness to suspend the critical faculty in favor of the will to believe is all that's necessary.
"The circumstances were right. In the background was Saunders, who had the reputation as a crank on the subject of Mars. The artifact was found among his effects. How easy it is to link the two! Would you have me believe that the unidentified bidder soon after Saunders' death was a Martian anxious to retrieve the hornbook?
"Go on from there to the prima facie evidence they mentioned. It needn't be somebody from Mars to put Mars in central and enlarged position among the planets, and we have artisans in the out-of-the-way places of this planet who can and do perform wonders of skill with their hands, equivalent to those strings or wires, or whatever they are."
"But that metallic material out of which it was made!" I cried.
"I admit I can't name it. Grant them that point for the time being, and forget that it's presumptively possible to turn out in a laboratory something not readily identifiable. Besides, we have only their word that it can't be named. All the remaining points yield to other explanation as well."
"How'll you do the story?"
"Straight—with tongue in cheek."
Harrigan's story broke two days later, together with a reasonably clear photograph of the two hornbooks side by side. He had painted a not unkind picture of the two eccentric bibliophiles and blown up the idea of the sound hornbook from Mars, adding a colorful biographical sketch of its late owner, Gregory Saunders. He had drawn liberally on his imagination to suggest that Saunders might actually have been in communication with Mars, as he had always claimed, and that the sound hornbook might have been acquired by him from Martian visitors. He had even dropped some pointed hints about the possible extraterrestriality of the mysterious bidder prior to the Parke-Bernet sale.
Harrigan's story was compelling, dramatic, and completely incredible. He had not failed to stress, at the last, the basic absence of any real proof to support vivid conjecture, and he had slyly added his own prosaic explanations.
I SAW HIM ten days later, early one morning, at a bar we both frequented. He hailed me.
"Any reaction on that story about the Martian hornbook?" I asked.
"Plenty. The news services picked it up, and other papers copied it pretty liberally. I'll wager the story's had as many readers as any major news break in the last two weeks."
"What about Millerand and Schliemann?"
"Nothing from them. By this time, they'll have heard from half a hundred crackpots, a dozen different reporters, and two or three people who might have something genuine to offer them. And those two or three will make the whole thing worthwhile for them. I know collectors. I've got enough of them in my file."
We were still talking about Harrigan's file of queer people when Harrigan was called to the telephone.
"Talk about coincidences," he said, coming back. "That Was Millerand. The office told him he might find me here. Says he has something for me. Got time to come along?"
MILLERAND looked pale and troubled. He was capable of nothing more than a quiet greeting.
Schliemann, like Millerand still in his pajamas and dressing gown, did the talking.
"You were so good at suggesting possible explanations other than the one so manifest to us, Mr. Harrigan," he said sardonically, "we naturally thought of you when this happened. It seems like proof to us. But to you—who knows? We priced the hornbook at a million. Thanks to your story, which was so widely circulated, the attention of certain outsiders must have been drawn to it...."
He and Millerand had been crossing toward the inner room from which they had taken their hornbooks on our previous visit. The door of that room stood open, and from the threshold we saw what was doubtless an inestimably valuable collection of books in glassed-in and locked cases—vellum-bound folios, books bound in gleaming calf, books showing the marks of perhaps centuries of use, ancient manuscripts....
And we saw something else. Opposite the door was a window which had once been secured by steel shutters. It was now wide open. Window and shutters—apart from just enough of the remains to show that they had once been there—were, gone.
Harrigan would have crossed the bare floor directly to it, but Schliemann barred his way.
"Come around here, Mr. Harrigan," said Alillerand, leading the way along one wall in a circuitous route to the window.
"Melted away!" exclaimed Harrigan, examining the frame.
"What we found particularly interesting, Mr. Harrigan," said Schliemann in a rasping voice, "is that not only do the glass and steel seem to have been melted, but the brick and wood of part of the frame. Not burned—melted!"
"The Martian hornbook, of course, is gone," said Miller-and, and sighed.
"And now perhaps Mr. Harrigan would like to look at the prints on the floor. They lead from the window to this table here where we kept the hornbook," continued Schliemann. "The floor is highly waxed, so they are really quite clear. Careful, don't walk on them."
I bent over Harrigan's shoulder to look.
The prints on the floor seemed to have been made by a clawed foot with scaley paws —neither quite bird nor beast, and of considerable weight, for the prints, which led straight from the window to the table and back, were cut deep into the floor.
"Perhaps Mr. Harrigan has an explanation for that," suggested Schliemann.
"An imaginative and ingenious burglar," said Harrigan. "One who was able to scale the outside wall for a height of seven stories and leave no mark. Armed with a weapon unknown to any scientist of my acquaintance, which will melt wood, steel, glass and brick simultaneously and with equal ease," added Schliemann with a bitter laugh.
"I suppose," said Millerand, "Mr. Saunders' Martian friends disliked the thought of their hornbook in possibly unfriendly or unappreciative hands."
"And, being subscribers to the World, came back for it," added Harrigan with a broad smile. "Call the police, gentlemen. This isn't my department."
"I don't know how they did it," Harrigan said in the elevator going down, "but it's as clever a way out of the position my story put them in as anything I could imagine."
WHAT TROUBLED me most about the matter of the Martian hornbook was the testimony of seven people who had quite possibly never heard of it. A policeman, two chorus girls, a playboy, a cab driver, and a scrub woman on her way home late that night. Their stories appeared in the papers on the same day. One and all swore solemnly to seeing an unidentified flying object in the vicinity of Central Park West the night before. The policeman insisted that he had, in fact, seen it lying up against a building in the early hours of the morning, hovering in the air about seven stories from the street.
Harrigan couldn't explain that, either.
THE END
