Old Mars

The boat was an Expeditionary Force fast-patrol craft, one heat ray turret fore, one mounted in a blister next to the captain’s position. It was barely big enough for the piano, let alone us and the sullen four-man crew. They smoked constantly and tried to outrage Count Jack with their vile space trooper’s language. He could out-swear any of them. But he kept silence and dignity and our little boat threaded through the incomprehensible maze of Nyx’s canals; soft green waters of Mars overhung by the purple fronds of crosier trees, dropping the golden coins of their seed cases into the water, where they sprouted corkscrew propellers and swam away. This was the land of the Oont, and their tall, heronlike figures, perched in the rear of their living punts, were our constant companions. On occasion, down the wider channels and basins, we glimpsed their legendary organic paddle wheelers, or their pale blue ceramic stilt towns. The crew treated the Oont with undisguised contempt and idly trained the boat’s weapons on them. The Oont had accepted the mandate of the Commanderie without a fight, and their cities and ships and secretive, solitary way of life went unchanged. Our captain thought them a species of innate cowards and traitors. Only a species tamed by the touch of the heat ray could be trusted.

For five hundred miles, up the Grand Canal and through the maze of Nyx, Twav stevedores had lifted and laid my piano with precision and delicacy. It took the Terrene army to drop it. From the foot of the gangplank, I heard the jangling crash, and turned to see the cargo net on the jetty and troopers grinning. At once, I wanted to strip away the packing and see if anything remained. It was not my piano—I would never have risked my Bosendorfer on the vagaries of space travel—but it was a passable upright from a company that specialized in interplanetary hire. I had grown fond of it. One does with pianos. They are like dogs. I walked on. That much I had learned from Count Jack. Dignity, always dignity.

Oudeman was a repair base for Third Skyfleet. We walked in the shadow of hovering skymasters. Engineers in repair rigs swarmed over hulls, lowered engines on hoists, opened hull sections, deflated gas cells. It was clear to me that the fleet had suffered grievously in recent and grim battle. Skins were gashed open to the very bones; holes stabbed through the rounded hulls from side to side. Engine pylons terminated in melted drips. Entire crew gondolas and gun turrets had been torn away. Some had been so terribly mauled they were air-going skeletons, a few lift cells wrapped around naked ship spine.

Of the crews who had fought through such ruin, there was no sign.

The base commander, Yuzbashi Osman, greeted us personally. He was a great fan, a great fan. A dedicated lifelong fan. He had seen the Maestro in his every Istanbul concert. He always sat in the same seat. He had all the Maestro’s recordings. He played them daily and had tried to educate his junior officers over mess dinners, but the rising generation were ignorant, low men—technically competent but little better than the Devshirmey conscripts. A clap of his hands summoned batmen to carry our luggage. I did not speak his language, but from the reactions of the engineers who had dropped my piano, I understood that further disrespect would not be tolerated. He cleared the camp steam bath for our exclusive use. Sweated, steamed, and scraped clean, a glowing Count Jack bowled into the mess tent as if he were striding onto the stage of La Scala. He was funny, he was witty, he was charming, he was glorious. Most of the junior Onbashis and Mulazims at the dinner in his honor could not speak English, but his charisma transcended all language. They smiled and laughed readily.

“Would you look at that?” Count Jack said in the backstage tent that was our dressing room. He held up a bottle of champagne, dripping from the ice bucket. “Krug. They got me my Krug. Oh the dear, lovely boys.”

At the dinner, I had noted the paucity of some of the offerings and marveled at the effort it must have taken, what personal dedication by the Yuzbashi, to fulfill a rider that was only there to check the contract had been read. Count Jack slid the bottle back into the melting ice. “I shall return to you later, beautiful thing, with my heart full of song and my feet light on the applause of my audience. I am a star, Faisal. I am a true star. Leave me, dear boy.”