Uncle Plum's Lunar Excursion

by Paul E. Martens


Pelham Grenville, Plum to his friends, sat in the airport bar enjoying
a brandy and soda as two men approached him from different directions.

The tall, well-dressed young man wearing an anxious look, coming at him
from the sou'-southeast was his nephew, Bill Pratt.

Heaving to from a norwesterly direction, wearing the uniform of a moon
shuttle pilot with the dignity it deserved, was, in point of fact, a moon
shuttle pilot.

The pilot reached Plum first.  He saluted and said, just as Bill
arrived, "Mr. Tidbury?"

"Absolutely, Captain ... Bergstrom," Plum said, reading the pilot's
name tag.  He shook the other's hand warmly.  He indicated Bill and said,
"And this is my secretary, Jamieson."

Bill's anxious look became one of horror with the realization that his
uncle was about to embark on another of his 'japes.'

He opened his mouth to say, "Unc ..." which became "Owwww!" when Plum's
foot came down on his.

"What can I do for you, Captain?" asked Plum.

Sparing a suspicious glance at Bill, who had found a chair and was
massaging his foot, Bergstrom said, "The shuttle is ready for launch
whenever you are, sir.  Bay Seventeen."  He saluted again, turned crisply
and strode off.

Bill limped to his uncle's side.  A slight smile touched his lips.  "No
luck, Uncle Plum?  Too bad.  Well, where are your bags?  I'm in a no-parking
zone."

Plum smiled like a beneficent god about to bestow manna on a favored
populace.

"We're going to the moon, my boy."

"No!"  Inwardly, Bill cursed the sweepstakes had made his uncle a rich
man, and his own lack of character which forced him to rely on Plum's
largesse.  "Don't you know who Robert Tidbury is?"

"I hear a bell ringing faintly when you mention the name."

"Tidbury Interplanetary Corporation?"

"A capitalist, is he?"

"He is the very definition of a capitalist.  You can't throw a brick
without hitting something that belongs to him, and he'd probably sue you for
it.  He also owns a good-sized slice of the moon, and the men and women
enslaved to him there.  I've heard rumors of a revolt brewing.  He's
probably on his way to crush it."  He stopped and looked at his uncle.  "And
this is the man whose identity you want to assume?"

"Exactly."  Plum rubbed his hands together. "What else can you tell
me?"

  "Do you remember a girl I used to know named Rosalind?"

"Of course.  Lovely girl.  Tall.  Blonde hair, blue eyes, a patrician,
aquiline nose."

Bill grit his teeth.  "Rosalind is short.  Petite, really.  With soft
brown hair, and big brown eyes and a cute little pug nose.  We were
practically engaged!  How can you not remember her?"

"Ah, yes.  Rosalind.  Why do you mention her now?"

"She's Tidbury's daughter."

"Excellent!  You can assist me with the niceties of my performance.
Firstly, appearance.  I assume that, since I was mistaken for him, he must
be a handsome man."

Bill shuddered.  "He's got the complexion of a bowl of cream of wheat.
His eyes must have been hard boiled then shoved partway back into their
sockets.  He's shaped like a five foot tall, overweight penguin.  That's why
almost no one knows what he looks like.  As a boy he was tormented for his
looks and he's never gotten over it."

"Hmm.  And he's not a pleasant chap?"

Bill chewed his lower lip.  "Picture the ruthless leader of a barbarian
horde riding roughshod over a terrified citizenry.  Now picture the person
who would make that man run home to mother."

"Tidbury?"

"Tidbury."

Plum eyed Bill shrewdly.  "You speak as if from personal experience."

"We were in love, Uncle Plum."  Bills words floated on unshed tears.

"You and Tidbury?"

"Rosalind and I!"

"Ah.  Tidbury put the kibosh on the thing, did he?"

Bill nodded.  "He forbid her to see me.  She saw me anyway.  He sent
her away.  I followed her.  He reasoned with her.  He bullied her.  Finally,
he presented her with evidence of my infidelity."

Plum shook his head with avuncular disapproval.  "With that tall,
blonde girl."

"With no one!  It was all lies!  But it worked.  She wouldn't see me,
wouldn't take my calls.  My letters were returned unopened.  I could forget
it if he had only ruined my life, but he broke her heart.  That I will never
forgive.  I will make him pay for that.  Rosalind will be mine again!"

"Bravo!  What have you done so far?"

"Well, nothing," he admitted.  "But what can I do?  He's an amoral
mega-billionaire, with unlimited power.  And what am I?  Powerless.
Penniless.  A nobody."

Grasping his nephew's shoulder, Plum said, "You are a young man wronged
who has been presented with an opportunity to strike a blow against this
carbuncle.  And, more importantly, you have an uncle."

Moved by Plum's words, Bill clasped his hand.  "Let's go get him."  He
said it loudly, trying to drown out the hysterical screaming of the voice of
reason in his head.

*


Bill stepped into Tidbury's shuttle, then backed out hurriedly,
colliding with Plum.

"Avaunt, boy.  Why the cha-cha steps?"

"That woman," he whispered, pointing at the cabin's sole occupant, a
middle-aged female built along the lines of a commercial washing machine.

Plum pursed his lips.  "Ghastly, but no doubt benign."

"You think so?  That's Rosalind's Aunt Edith.  I've seen pictures.
She's sure to blow the whistle on your little caper.  We'd better leave
while we can."  His retreat was foiled by Plum's grip on his collar.

"Someone took pictures of her?  Remarkable."  He pushed Bill ahead of
him and said more loudly, "So the policeman said, 'I don't know who was in
the back, but his chauffeur was the Pope.'  Ha, ha!  Rich, what?  Ah, we
have a traveling companion.  How do you do, madam?  I am Cardinal Richelieu.
This is my secretary, Monsignor Barelli."

The woman squinted.  "Richelieu?  Wasn't that ..."

"An ancestor," smiled Plum.

She inspected him much as a rat might scrutinize a suspect bit of
Gorgonzola.

"You're confused by the absence of priestly attire."  Plum peered
around the cabin.  "We're traveling in mufti on special assignment for his
Holiness.  Rumors have reached us - vicious, unfounded rumors - that Tidbury
employees are maltreated."

A hollow moan escaped from Bill.

"Totally spurious, I'm sure, but," Plum shrugged, "we shepherds have
certain obligations to our flock.  You understand, I'm sure."  He smiled his
most engaging smile.

Edith made an unladylike grunt that may have denoted provisional
acceptance of Plum's story, then said, "Better sit down.  We'll be taking
off as soon as my brother gets here.  I can't imagine what's keeping him but
you can bet that whoever's responsible is going to pay for it."  A predatory
smile creased her face.

Bill moaned again.

Plum, after a brief pause, said, "Perhaps I'd better step into the
cockpit and bless the crew.  Best kind of insurance, eh?"

He headed forward, Bill scurrying in his wake.

"What now, Uncle Plum?  Come on, we can still get out before Tidbury
gets here.  If he finds out you've been impersonating him, he'll ... he'll
..."

Plum stopped and looked at Bill.  "You know, sometimes I wonder if you
enjoy these little japes as much as I do."  He ducked into the cockpit.
"Well, all aboard, Captain.  You may blast off.  If 'twere done, 'twere well
'twere done quickly."

"Very well, sir.  I've already gotten permission from the tower.  If
you and your secretary will take your seats we'll be on our way."

"Good man."

Plum turned and, shepherding Bill before him, started back down the
aisle, only to be halted by a young woman emerging from the lavatory.

"Rosalind!"

"Bill!"

They came together in a thunderclap of passion until Rosalind broke the
clinch, took a step back and administered a resounding slap to Bill's cheek.

"Rosalind!" Bill said plaintively.

"Don't you 'Rosalind' me, Mr. William Jasper Pratt."

Plum's eyebrow rose.  "You've revealed your true name to her?  A
powerful tool with which to conjure, young Bill."

"Oh, hello, Uncle Plum."

"Well met, fair Diana.  I hope you entertain no notion of turning your
attack upon these white hairs?"

"Of course not.  You're a loveable old lamb.  How is it that you allow
yourself to be related to this treacherous snake?"  She glared at Bill.

Plum tsked-tsked sadly.  "It's difficult to credit that, in describing
me as a loveable old lamb, you could offer so accurate an assessment, yet be
so wide of the mark in describing Bill.  Far from being a treacherous snake,
he is the innocent victim of the treachery of another.  To wit, your
father."  Plum and Rosalind examined the red-faced Bill.  "Observe the
guileless eyes, the face unlined by the effort of scheming, the rosy
complexion of one who spends his days idling in the sun, not skulking
furtively on his way to midnight assignations.  Would a treacherous snake be
filled with such longing for you that he would risk being thrown overboard
into the vacuum of space by your father?"

"What?" said Bill.

"Really?" asked Rosalind.

"How else would you account for our presence here?  I am a mere
bystander, brought along by the sheer force of his personality."

"Oh, Uncle Plum!"  Rosalind kissed Plum.

"Hey!" Bill complained.

"Bill!  Darling!"  Rosalind sprang from Plum and onto Bill, her
momentum carrying the two of them across a pair of seats.

Plum smiled warmly on his way aft, only to be stopped by the basilisk
stare of Edith Tidbury.

"Touch of indigestion?" he asked politely, patting his pockets.  "I'm
afraid I haven't any antacids."

"What's that priest doing with my niece?"

"Heartwarming, isn't it?"  He shook his head admiringly.  "Inspiring."

Not long after the shuttle achieved orbit, Plum was awakened from a
peaceful nap by a steward.

"The captain would like a word with you, sir."

"Hmm?  Oh.  Certainly, Dennis, certainly."

Weightless, he floated back to the cockpit.

"What ho, Captain."

Bergstrom glowered at Plum.  "We've just been contacted by radio, sir."

Plum smiled.  "Good news, I hope."

"By Mr. Tidbury, sir."

"Oh?  And how is the old tycoon?"

"I believe you said you were Mr. Tidbury, sir."

"Me?  Tidbury?  Surely not.  You yourself said that you just spoke with
Tidbury.  How could I be Tidbury?"  He squinted at the pilot.  "You haven't
been drinking, have you?"

A crack appeared in the Captain's stern facade.

"When I approached you at the airport, did you not claim to be Mr.
Tidbury?"

"But, I'm not Tidbury.  From what I know about him, why would anyone
not Tidbury do anything but rejoice in the fact?"

The Captain's facade was beginning to resemble the House of Usher.
"But ...  When I came up to you at the bar, I said, 'Mr. Tidbury?' and you
said, 'Absolutely.'  Didn't you?"

"Ah, I see now.  You thought I said that I was Tidbury."

Bergstrom nodded.

"Funny the way these things happen.  I thought you were asking if I was
there to see Tidbury."

The Captain stared at him.  "But then, who are you?"

Proffering his hand, Plum said, "George Pullman.  Taft-Hartley
Publications.  'The Magazines With Their Foot on the Pulse of the Working
Man.'  I'm to interview Tidbury about this strike everyone's on about. You
know the sort of thing.  Tips on hiring scabs and strikebreakers, rounding
up the ringleaders and tossing them out an airlock.  We're hoping to use it
in our Christmas issue."

"The strike?"

Plum eyed Bergstrom.  "My journalist's ear detects the possibility that
you have information relevant to this strike.  Information which you could
be prevailed upon to share, perhaps?"

"No."

"No?"

"No!"

"No?"

"All right, damn you, yes!  It's my daughter, Helga."  He plucked a
photograph from its place on the control panel and gave it to Plum.  "She's
one of the ringleaders."

"Ah, I see.  You'd rather she wasn't chucked out of an airlock?"

The other man shuddered.

"You know," said Plum, "There's something familiar about this
patrician, aquiline nose."  He handed the photo back to Bergstrom who gazed
at it fondly before replacing it.

"Helga's a head-strong girl, and I'm afraid that it might get her into
trouble."

"All right, then, let's see.  We've got the who and the where.  Oh, and
the what, that's the strike.  Who, what, where ... Ah yes.  When?  And why?"

"Air."

"Air?"

"That's the why.  Air, and water and food.  Tidbury controls it all.
He charges outrageous prices that keep his employees in virtual slavery"

"A situation not without historical precedent."

"Helga's a selenologist.  She's really not the type to suffer slavery
gladly.  I'm afraid that, rather than submit to their demands, Tidbury will
cut off all life support, and, when everyone is dead, just bring in new
workers."

Plum nodded.  "Yes, that's just the sort of decisive action one would
expect from a man like Tidbury.  Simple, direct."

Bergstrom groaned.

Plum sighed.  "I can see that you might judge it harsh, Captain, but
that's how these plutocrats are.  They despise being thwarted."

Begstrom swallowed.

"But, I suppose it will be up to me to thwart him and make him like
it."

The pilot gazed at Plum much as Jane might have gazed at Tarzan after
he'd swooped down on a vine to snatch her from the jaws of Simba the lion.
"You would do that, Mr. Pullman?"

"Absolutely."

"But what about your assignment, your magazine?"

Plum waived off the objection.

"But how?"

"Tut, tut, Captain.  Rely on me.  I'll have things well in hand almost
as soon as we land on the moon."

The other's face fell.  "But, we're not going to the moon.  Mr. Tidbury
ordered me to return to Earth.  And he fired me."

"No, I'm afraid that won't do."  Plum spoke more in sorrow than in
anger.  "I wouldn't have imagined that you could just change your mind in
mid-flight on your way to the moon.  Aren't there some thrust, or
gravitational or some such considerations to be taken into account?"

Bergstrom nodded.  "Of course.  But Mr. Tidbury's overruled the physics
of the matter.  If I don't return at once, he'll report me as a hijacker."

"A hijacker, eh?  Yes, that would do nicely.  But it's not you who has
hijacked the shuttle, it's Tidbury's own daughter, Rosalind.  Can you get
Tidbury on the phone?"

"What will you say?"

"Just put your trust in Pel ... er, George Pullman.  Happy endings
guaranteed or double your money back."

"Hello!  Hello!"  Tidbury's bark threatened to blow out the speakers.
"Where the devil are you, Bergstrom?  Why isn't my shuttle here?  I have a
million things still to do after I have you thrown in prison"

Plum said, "Hello, Tidbury?  Is that you?  You'll have to speak up if
you expect to be heard."

"What do you mean?  Who is that?"

"This is Geoffrey Oliver Drake, the co-pilot.  Captain Bergstrom has
been incapacitated by the latest onslaught of the terrorist."

"Terrorist?  What terrorist?  What the devil are you talking about?
What in blazes is going on up there?"

"A young woman claiming to be your daughter has forced us to continue
our way to the moon.  Of course, she may not be your daughter.  There is a
school of thought that she is much too attractive to be related to you."

"What?"

"In any event, some weight has been given to the theory that she is
your daughter in that she has insisted that her orders be followed and damn
the consequences."

"She has, eh?  What the devil for?"

"For love, I suspect."

"Love?"

  "Yes, may have heard of such a thing."

"Of course I have.  I'm just surprised, that's all.  I didn't think she
was all that fond of young Prendergast."

"Prendergast?"  It was Plum's turn to be baffled.

"Yes, Prendergast.  Her fiancé."

Plum's eyes involuntarily turned toward the passenger cabin.

"Well, if she wants to go to the moon," Tidbury continued, "You'd
better take her.  We had to have a governess put down once when she tried to
get Rosalind take a bath when she didn't want to."

"Put down?"  There were obviously aspects of Rosalind's character of
which Plum had been unaware.

"Yes, put down in the kitchen as a cook's assistant where Rosalind
couldn't see her."

"Oh.  And Captain Bergstrom's job?"

"What about it?  Oh, all right.  I suppose he'd better keep it.  At
least until he gets back down here with my shuttle.  But what kind of pilot
lets himself be incapacitated by a girl not much bigger than your thumb?"
Tidbury ended his transmission.

"Well, Captain, that's that.  A job well done, I'd say."

Bergstrom didn't look convinced that everything was coming up roses.
"At least I still have my job, however temporarily, and we can continue on
with to the moon.  But what about the strike?  What about my daughter?"

"All in good time, Captain."  Plum paused a second.  "Now, if you'll
excuse me, this business of a certain party being engaged to second certain
party while dallying with a third party needs looking into."

Bill and Rosalind were apparently between rounds.

"Ahem," said Plum.

The pair turned to Plum.

"Hello, Uncle Plum," said Bill.  "Rosalind and I were just discussing
... uh ..."

"Never mind what you were discussing, nephew.  I wonder if you would do
me a favor and see if you can get me a cup of coffee from somewhere."

"But, Uncle Plum, we ..." He stopped.  To an outsider, Plum appeared
his usual, affable self.  To Bill and his conscience, however, Plum's mien
was that of a rich relative who does so much and asks so little and who
thinks that maybe it's time to stop doing so much if he can't even get
something as trivial as a cup of coffee.  "Right ho, one cup of coffee
coming up."  Bill departed.

Plum settled in next to Rosalind and addressed her with a stern look.

Rosalind blushed.  "I'm sorry, Uncle Plum.  I'm afraid we got carried
away."

"It is not, my dear Rosalind, what you were doing with my nephew's body
that concerns me, but, rather, his heart.  What's all this I hear about a
Prendergast?"

Rosalind's eyes opened wide.  "Oh!  I'd forgotten all about Ronald."

"So it's true?  You are engaged?"

She nodded.  "It was Daddy's idea.  He thinks if I marry Ronald, Ronald
won't try to take over his companies.  And I was so upset about Bill that I
just didn't care about anything, so I said I would.  But now that I realize
that Bill isn't the snake my father made me believe he was, I know I can't
marry Ronald.  But Daddy absolutely will not let me marry Bill, and I did
promise Ronald ...  I just don't know what to do!"

Plum patted her shoulder.  "You will do what so many have done before
you, my dear.  Put yourself in my hands and watch your troubles pop like so
many soap bubbles."

"But how?"

"Quite easily, I imagine, though the details are not yet clear to me."

Bill arrived with coffee.  "Here you are Uncle Plum."

"What's that you have there, my boy?  Coffee?  You know I never touch
the stuff.  Never mind.  Sit down."  Plum rose to let Bill take his place.
"Rosalind has something she wants to tell you."

"Bill, darling ..." Rosalind began.

Plum did not stay to listen, but drifted back to his seat.  He was
pleased at the way things were going.  He had wrangled a trip to the moon, a
place he'd always meant to visit.  He was in the process of restoring his
nephew's heart to its natural, unbroken condition.  He was going to make of
the moon a worker's paradise that not even Marx at his sunniest could have
envisioned.  Anything else?  Ah, yes, Captain Bergstrom's job needed saving.
Other problems might arise as things unfolded, but that they could be dealt
with, he was confident.  A lesser man might wrack his brain and plot
feverishly to accomplish so much.  Plum took a nap.

*


Plum was awoken by the steward and ushered back into the cockpit.

"Mr. Pullman, thank goodness you're here," Bergstrom's manner was not
the calm, steady manner one likes to see in the man guiding one through the
vacuum of space.  "I've been contacted by the security forces on the moon
about the hijacking.  What am I supposed to tell them?"

"Perhaps you'd like me to have a word with them, Captain?"

Bergstrom relinquished the microphone with a look of gratitude that
would do credit to a faithful hound looking at its master after receiving a
scrap of filet mignon from the table..

"Greetings, people of Luna.  We come in peace to extend the hand of
friendship," Plum intoned.

"What?  Hey, what's going on up there?"

"Going on?"

"Weren't you hijacked?"

"Hijacked?  Wasn't there some sort of flight plan filed?"

"Yes, we have it here."

"And does it not say we were coming to the moon?"

"Sure."

"And are we not now arriving at the moon?"

"Well, yes, but ..."

"So what is all this talk of hijacking?  Whoever heard of someone
hijacking a flight to make it go where it was supposed to go?"

"But Mr. Tidbury said ..."

"Ah, Tidbury.  I see how you came to be confused.  Poor Tidbury is
distraught at the idea of his only daughter fleeing his bosom and flying off
into the arms of her lover."

"Uh, I don't know how well you know Mr. Tidbury, pal, but I don't see
him as ever being distraught."

"You think distraught not the mot juste?  In any event, the heart of
the issue is that there is no hijacking, the lark's on the wing, the snail's
on the thorn, and all's right with the world.  Well, we mustn't keep you
from your anointed tasks any longer.  We will meet at Phillipi."

"Wha ..."

Plum snapped off the radio and turned to Bergstrom, who was gazing at
him reverently.  "You see, Captain?  Just a minor misunderstanding.  Tell
me, do I have time for a strengthening cocktail and a short nap before we
land?  Excellent" He floated down the aisle to his seat, to find his nephew
next to him, looking like a seaside vacationer after the fourth straight day
of rain.  "Shouldn't you be carrying on shamelessly with Rosalind?"

"She's engaged, Uncle Plum," said Bill.

"Of course."

Bill blinked.  "To another man."

"Naturally."

Bill stared at Plum.  Plum closed his eyes and went to sleep.

*



Being cooped up within the cramped confines of the shuttle had left
Plum feeling much as he imagined a wildcat kept in a sack might feel; ready
for some high-spirited fun with the person or persons waiting at the point
of egress.

The person at Plum's point of egress was a bespectacled young man, with
straight black hair and straight black eyebrows.

"Ah," Plum said to him, "here's the patient, himself, come to meet me.
I was given to understand that it would take several large men sitting on
your head to get you to climb down off the ceiling and be tied to the couch.
I'm gratified, my boy."

The other eyed him coldly.  "I don't have the slightest idea what you
are talking about.  I am Ronald Prendergast, the station manager.  And you
are ...?"

"Tsk, tsk," Plum shook his head.  "And I had such hopes.  Well, there's
nothing for it, I suppose, but to play your little game.  I am, as you very
well know, Dr. Hans Roderick, the eminent psychiatrist, brought to the moon
at great expense by your favorite employer and future relation, Robert
Tidbury, to, in his words, 'unscramble your egg.'"

Prendergast looked as though he wanted to disregard Plum's words.

Plum patted him on the shoulder. "There, there, my boy, great wits are
sure to madness near allied. It's a compliment, really."

"I assure you,  I am not now, nor do I have any plans to become,
insane."

"I am sorry to hear you say that, my boy.  We shrinkers of heads don't
generally like to use words like loopy, but what other word would describe a
young, good-looking, capable chap like yourself who gets himself engaged to
someone who, let's be blunt, would frighten Medusa's snakes?"

"My fiancé is quite attractive, if a bit diminutive."

"And you wonder why your tailor insists on sleeves that tie in the
back.  Edith Tidbury is no one's idea of attractive.  As for being
diminutive, I will admit she is short, but can you really call someone who
is as wide as she is high diminutive?"

"Edith Tidbury?  There must be some mistake.  I'm engaged to ..."

"A mistake?  I think not.  Would she have traveled all this way to see
you if it was a mistake?"

Prendergast's eyes lit upon his employer's sister making her way down
the gang plank.  "But Rosalind said ...  I thought she said ...  Edith
Tidbury?"

"I'll tell you what.  You seem like a nice enough fellow, if
certifiable.  You scamper off.  I will intercept your betrothed with some
plausible tale.  The doctor is in.  Don't be surprised if I help you weasel
out of this ill-conceived alliance, cure you of your barmyness and save your
job, all in one fell swoop."

"My job?"

"Certainly, your job.  You don't think Tidbury will stand for your
trifling with his sister's affections, do you?"

Prendergast blanched.

Plum, catching sight of Rosalind and Bill emerging from the shuttle,
took him by the shoulders and turned him around.  "Stand not upon the order
of your going, but go at once."  He gave him a shove, sending him several
yards in the low lunar gravity.

Prendergast was barely out of the way, when the air was filled with a
musical voice trilling, "Bill!"

A willowy blond girl with a patrician nose waved at Bill and made her
way to him, neatly excising Rosalind from his arm.  She embraced him warmly,
ignoring the lass simmering at his side.

"Bill, why didn't you tell me you were coming?"

"Um ...  That is ... Helga!  How are you?  Do you know Rosali ...?
Rosalind?"  He looked for the girl in vain.

'Is this that haughty gallant, gay Lothario?" Plum asked Bill as he
strolled up.  "Is any female safe from your animal appetites?"

Bill looked pained.  "I was just trying to explain to Helga how we came
to be here and, besides which,  I seem to have misplaced Rosalind."

"Oh, hello, Uncle Plum," said Helga.  "I think it's wonderful that you
and Bill have come to join our struggle to overthrow the yoke of oppression.
I had no idea that Bill was anything more than a drone living on the blood
and sweat of the working class."

"Yes, that was our Bill all right.  Blood and sweat for breakfast,
lunch and dinner.  But the once bloated leech, Pratt the Parasite, has
become the lean and hungry Bill the Bolshevik, the embodiment of the Red
Menace."

"Um, actually, Helga ...  It's a funny story, really.  Rosalind, you
know Rosalind, don't you?  Well, it seems that Uncle Plum was off on one of
his japes, and I happened to be caught in the undertow, and  ..."

Helga tugged at his sleeve.  "I'm sure I'll love to hear all about it,
but later, after we've brought about the triumph of the proletariat and the
plutocrats are hanging from the lampposts."

Plum gently removed her hand from Bill's jacket.  "I think, Comrade,
that for now, it would be best for Bill and me to work in our own way.
There are wheels within wheels, you know.  You may take it from me, however,
it will not be long before we all stand arm in arm, singing the
Internationale over the rotting corpses of the aristocrats and their Wall
Street lackeys."  Thus saying, he led Bill away.

After a few yards, Bill halted.  "This has gone far enough, Uncle Plum.
I admit that, thanks to you, I found Rosalind again, but, also thanks to
you, now I've lost her again.  I'm on the moon under false pretenses, in
danger of getting chucked out an air lock.  And now you've gotten me
involved with a bloodthirsty girl who is apparently crazy.  Enough!  From
now on, I will take charge of my own life."  Bill stood before Plum, panting
like a bull who has just told a matador he is fed up with being stuck with
swords.

Plum smiled broadly.  "Well said.  For bright manhood, there is no such
word as fail." He clapped Bill on the shoulder and started to leave.

"Wait!"  The word seemed ripped from Bill.  "Um, that is ..."

Plum raised an eyebrow.

"I mean ..."  Tiger-like, Bill stiffened his sinews and summoned up the
blood.  "Very well.  If you should need me, I will be making up with
Rosalind.  I expect you will be able to reach me through her."  He strode
off, stopping to look around a few times, then stride off in a different
direction.  He stopped and looked around once more.

Plum smiled, sniffed the air, and went in search of a libation.

*


Plum sat at a white plastic table in what had once been white room.
The table, and, indeed the room, had taken on a sheen of deshabille
befitting a tavern catering to miners.  He was sipping something brewed from
kitchen scraps and enjoying the company of a smallish chap in wrinkled
overalls. The chap was having difficulty keeping his head at eye level and
his goatee was soaking in mug of ethanol purchased for him by Plum.

"Wounn't you like to know."  The man said, squinting at Plum.

Plum, who had not the slightest idea of what he was talking about,
replied, "I'm simply dying to know."

"Huh," said the other, and seemed to fall asleep.
    Eventually the chap roused himself to peer suspiciously at Plum.  "Well,
you finally got it out of me, didn't you?  Now you know."

Plum nodded sagely.  "Yes, now I know."

His companion managed to sit upright for a moment.  "You won't tell
her, will you?"

"My dear chap, need you ask?"

"Well, that's aw right, then."  He regarded Plum.  "You're a good egg.
You know how to keep your mouth shut.  Not like Edith."  He shook his head.
"Dames!"

Although his sharp ears perked up at the name Edith, Plum nodded in
sympathy.  "The faith and trust of dames, the poet agrees, are characters to
be written in dust.  But what has this one done specifically?"

He snorted.  "She had a brother.  A pain inna neck, this brother is.
And she wants to let him in on it.  Of all the fat-headed ideas."

"The mind boggles," said Plum.  "But you're too wise for him, aren't
you?"

"You bet.  I dinn't even tell Edith the whole story yet.  She's a dame,
see."  He studied Plum.  "You're not gonna spill it, are you?"

"I had thought it already established that the word mum is prominently
displayed on the Grenville escutcheon, but, if after all we have been
through together, I have failed to gain your trust ..."

"No, no, no.  'Course I trust you.  'Course I do.  Why," the man
reached hurriedly into a pocket of his overalls and brought out a piece of
paper which he thrust at Plum.  "If I dinn't trust you, would I give you
this?"

Plum stole a glance at the document.  "Your perspicacity as a judge of
character is a byword, and to have your trust is an honor of which I am
fully cognizant."  Slipping the paper into the pocket of his jacket, Plum
got to his feet.  "But now I must bid you adieu."  Stopping only to buy
another dose of alcohol for his new friend, Plum left the bar, to come face
to face with the stern, bespectacled countenance of Ronald Prendergast.

"Hey, you," the young station manager said.

"And back at you, my bemused chum.  Have you sought me out to begin
your treatments?"

"Enough of that.  You're no more a psychiatrist than I am."

  "Ah, you've found me out, eh?  Good for you. No harm done.  Just a
small jape.  But I suppose you're right, it's time to put away childish
things and get down to business.  No wonder Tidbury puts so much faith in
you."  Plum started to amble off.  "We will no doubt meet again when we are
neither of us quite so busy."

"Stop!"

Plum turned around and attended Prendergast politely.

"We've established who and what you are not, but you haven't told me
who you are, and what you are doing here."

"You mean you don't know?  My dear chap.  I had assumed ...   My fault
entirely."  He clicked his heals Teutonically.  "Otto von Hassenfuss.  Or,
if one wishes to be punctilious, Herr Professor Dr. Dr. von Hassenfuss.
Lucky Otto to my pals."

Prendergast regarded him impassively.

"The sonar expert?" Plum offered.

"Sonar?" asked Prendergast.

"Radar?" suggested Plum.

"Radar?"

"In layman's terms, I send out signals to gambol about the lunar
surface, then I pour over the signals returning to me like lambs to fold,
and, hey! Presto!, I find ..."  He stopped and smiled at Prendergast.
"Something very interesting."

"And what would that be?"

"What, indeed?  There's the rub.  All in good time.  But, for the
nonce, I will bid you farewell.  I sense there are persons in need who yearn
for the comforting presence of Pel..., Lucky Otto von Hassenfuss."  Waving,
Plum left, saying, "The parting genius is with sighing sent."

Plum directed his steps toward what passed for a hotel on the moon.  In
the bar of that hotel that Plum found his nephew getting on the outside of
what was certainly not his first cocktail.

"Hail fellow, well met," said Plum, with a buffet to Bill's back that
sent the latter sprawling across the table at which he was sitting.  "I bear
glad tidings."

Bill sat up and straightened his clothes.  "We're leaving?"  There was
a note of forlorn hope in his voice that might have caused a lesser man to
hesitate to inflict any further strain on him.

"If by 'we' you mean you, and if by 'leaving' you mean going out onto
the surface of the moon, then, yes, absolutely."

Bill, when again able to speak, said, "We have a wildly different ideas
about what constitutes glad tidings, Uncle Plum.  Although Rosalind might
agree with you.  At least she also suggested that I go and kill myself."

"Tut, tut, my boy.  Have faith in your Uncle Plum.  As for Rosalind,
you will recall that in our hours of ease women are notoriously uncertain,
coy and hard to please, but, when a bit of pain and anguish wring the brow,
they become what we might term ministering angels."

"But I don't want anguish to wring my brow."

"That's all right.  She only has to think that your brow is being
wrung.  And, if you're clambering about on the lunar landscape, she will, no
doubt, make that assumption."

Bill chewed a thumbnail meditatively.  "Do you really think it would
work?"

"If you are not satisfied, your money will be cheerfully refunded."  He
drew Bill to his feet and put an arm around the young man's shoulder.  "I've
drawn up an itinerary for you.  I'll explain it to you on our way to bung
you out an air lock."

Bill shivered, but went quietly.

*


Plum's knocking finally brought results.  The door was thrown open and
Rosalind appeared like an avenging Fury.

"If you refuse to drop dead out of common decency, I'll ...  Oh."

"Oh, indeed."

"I'm sorry, Uncle Plum, I thought you were your duplicitous,
skirt-chasing satyr of a nephew."

"His pleas, charming though they might be, making you do your famous
impression of a deaf adder, no doubt."

"Charming, huh!"  Rosalind snorted.  "I'm surprised he has any charm
left, using it so liberally on bleached-blonde, female Goliaths."

Plum sighed.  "Is this what your life together would have been?"

"Would have been?  What do you mean?"

Plum hung his head.  "He's gone."

"Gone?"  Rosalind gasped.  "You mean ..."

Plum nodded.

"He's ... dead?"

Plum consulted his watch.  "Perhaps not quite yet."

"What do you mean?  Where is he?"

Plum threw an arm out in a broad gesture.  "Out there.  Somewhere.
Seeking peace and the endless extinction of unhappy hates."

Rosalind's hands flew to her face.  "Oh, Uncle Plum.  What shall we
do?"

"Do?  Is this not what you wanted?"

"Of course not!  I love him."  She flung herself against Plum and
sobbed.

"There, there," he said, patting her gently.  "Uncle Plum will make it
better."  He took her shoulders.  "The first thing we must do is mount a
search.  If only we had the use of some flying vehicle.  It's a shame that
the shuttle in which we arrived isn't at our disposal."

"What?  Why not?"

"It belongs to your father, does it not?  Surely he would never consent
to using it to rescue someone whom he considers unworthy of you."

"Oh no?"  There was a flinty gleam in Rosalind's eyes.  "He'd better if
he knows what's good for him."

"Well, if you think so.  Why don't you contact Captain Bergstrom and
instruct him to get the ship ready.  I have some other preparations to make
and I will meet you at the shuttle shortly."

"All right.  But hurry, Uncle Plum." Rosalind retreated into her room
and Plum set off.

He spied a squat, black-swathed figure waddling toward him, and smiled,
somewhat complacently, at fate's complicity in his plans.  He stepped in
front of Rosalind's her, wondering if she would roll over him, paying no
more attention to him than would a steamroller a gnat, but she came to a
halt and glared at him.

"You're no priest," she growled.

"And yet, fair lady, I offer you salvation."

The woman scrunched up her features as she tried to decipher Plum's
words.  "What are you talking about?"

"Salvation, not from the fiery pits of Satan's dominion, but from your
brother."

Edith eyed Plum and stroked the two long hairs which sprouted from one
of her chins.  "How?"

Plum beamed at her.  "Simply join the throng aboard Captain Bergstrom's
shuttle. Time will explain it all."

"He is a talker and needs no questioning before he speaks."

When he was a lad of some eight summers, Plum had been caught with a
good portion of his father's liquor cabinet gurgling in his interior.  The
elder Grenville demanded to know what his son and heir thought he was about.
Snozzled to the eyeballs, and as yet unused to that condition, Plum had been
at a loss for words.  That situation had never been repeated until now.  He
had simply not been prepared for Edith Tidbury to quote Euripides at him.
Eventually he asked, "Just one other thing.  Do you happen to know a
smallish chap sporting dirty overalls and an alcohol-sodden goatee?"

Edith Tidbury simpered.

The effect was so startling that Plum involuntarily took a step back.
It struck him that there was more to this female Tidbury than met the eye,
ample though the visible parts might be.

"Do you mean Algernon Motherspaugh?" she asked shyly.

"Do I?  In any event, might I prevail upon you to direct me to Mr.
Motherspaugh?  We've become pals and I thought that he could be persuaded to
join us."  He gave Edith a knowing look.  "And it seems to me that you might
not object to his company, either."

Edith fluttered her eyelashes bashfully.  Plum wasn't sure how much
more of this ingenue side of her he could take.  "Down this street two
blocks, turn left, then left again.  It's the third cave on the right.  But
he's ... not feeling well."

"I imagine not.  I knew a man once with a similar illness."

Following Edith's directions, Plum came to Motherspaugh's apartment.
He hammered at the door exuberantly until the occupant opened it, leaning on
it as if it were a crutch.  Motherspaugh peered blearily at Plum, his face a
greenish-white.  "Why ..." he whispered

"Algy!" Plum boomed, pushing his way inside.  "I've come to make you a
rich man."

"What?  Who ..." he squinted at Plum.  "I remember you.  I think."

"Perhaps this will aid you in your recollection."  Plum held up the
paper he had somehow forgotten to return to Motherspaugh.

"Hey!  That's mine!"  Algy started to reach for the paper but changed
his mind and used his hands to hold his head instead.  "Ow."

"My dear fellow, of course it's yours.  I was merely its temporary
custodian.  I couldn't help but be intrigued, however, by the device
described therein."

"Yeah, it's a beauty, ain't it?"  Algy regarded it with pride.  "It
don't work, though."

"It don't, er, doesn't?"  Plum contemplated the paper.  "It certainly
looks as though it ought to.  What about the map?"

"Oh, those are just some spots I thought it would be good to try the
thing out on."

"Nothing doing there, either, then?"

Algy shrugged.  "Beats me.  Like I told you, the thing don't work."

"Hmm."  Plum meditated a moment.  "Oh, well, that shouldn't matter
overly much.  You did your best, and that's what's important.  I wouldn't be
at all surprised if you still make enough money from it to keep Edith
Tidbury in blue hair dye til death do you part."

"Edith?  How did you ..."

"The wise and wonderful Plum sees all, knows all.  But come along, we
don't have all day, you know.  And bring your machine.  We've got a shuttle
to catch."  Plum dragged his new chum out, despite the other's protests that
he would much rather crawl into a hole and die.

When they reached the Station Manager's office, Plum sent Algy on to
the ship by himself.
"There is yet much to be done, and so little time in which to do it."  Plum
sighed.  "I doubt a lesser man could manage it."

He tapped on the office door.  He rapped, knocked and finally smote the
door a mighty blow.  The door was ripped open and there appeared in the
doorway an apparition so notably revolting that Plum was forced to say, "Ah,
Tidbury, we meet at last."

"Who the devil are you?  What do you mean by barging in here?  Get out,
blast you!"

"Very kind of you, but I'm afraid we haven't time for a sociable drink
and a cigar right now.  Perhaps later, after our little excursion."

"What?  What do you mean?  Prendergast!"  Tidbury bellowed the name of
his employee like some Scotsman from Dee calling to his cattle from about
eighty-seven miles away.  "Prendergast!  Come here, blast your eyes!  Why am
I dealing with this lunatic?  What do I pay you for?"

Prendergast joined the two of them at the door, looked at Plum and
sniffed haughtily.  "This is the man about whom I was telling you, sir.  He
claims to be some sort of scientist with information allegedly of great
interest to us."

Plum smiled.  "What would you say if I told you there was a machine to
locate water on the moon?  What would such a machine be worth to you?"

Tidbury's native shrewdness took hold and he suddenly became reserved.
"Hmm.  I suppose that such a machine, if it existed, could have its uses.  I
might possibly offer a couple hundred ..." he caught sight of Plum, "er, a
couple thousand, for the thing.  As a novelty, mind you.  A sort of toy.
I'd have to see it work, of course."

"Naturally," ceded Plum.  "But, when you say thousands, you mean
millions, I think, don't you?"

"Millions?  Millions?  Listen you ... you ... you ..." Tidbury
spluttered.

Plum held up a restraining hand.  "We needn't quibble over the price
this instant.  Why don't we see the thing in action and then negotiate?  Who
knows, perhaps you won't even want to bother with it..  After all, of what
use is water on the moon?"  Plum took the billionaire's hand and shook it.
"But, tempus fugits.  Meet me on the shuttle.  I'll join you anon."

There were two colossi bestriding the doorway at his next stop.  They
glowered at Plum like vicious mastiffs outside a seraglio at the approach of
Errol Flynn.  "Comrades!" he cried.  "Up the revolution!  Is the lady of the
house at home?"

Helga came to the door.  "What's the ...  Oh, hullo, Uncle Plum.
Where's Bill?  Are you ready to overthrow the yoke of oppression and cause
the streets to run red with the blood of the capitalists?"

Plum nodded, "I am, indeed, here to strike a blow for freedom, but
surely we can avoid all that messy gore.  It's so hard to get out of one's
shirts.  We can accomplish much the same thing with what I like to think of
as a little mental ju jitsu.  And, more to the point, we will have great fun
doing it.  I often think that that is a failing in so many of your
well-known revolutionaries.  No sense of humor.  I doubt that Trotsky had a
good laugh from one May Day to the next."

Helga did not look convinced.  In fact, she looked disappointed, as if
she had just oiled up her trusty guillotine, only to have Robespierre tell
her, never mind, we've decided that those aristocrats aren't such bad chaps
after all.  But she went with him.

*


Plum surveyed the cast assembled before him.  "All present?  Fine.
Let's away."  So saying, he lead his merry band onto the shuttle.

He accompanied Captain Bergstrom to the cockpit and handed him Algy's
map, with a route highlighted.  "I think, Captain, that if you follow this
path, much good will come of it."  He turned to the rest of the throng.
"Ah, friend Motherspaugh, have you the device with you?"

Algy passed his machine to Plum, who placed in on what, in an
automobile, would be a dashboard.  "Thank you, Algy.  Now, Tidbury, you'll
no doubt want to claim the co-pilot's seat, seeing as how you own the plane,
and since you will be able to see the apparatus in action from there.  I
will remain as your guide and mentor and I'll ask the rest of you to make
yourselves comfortable in seats to the rear."

There was some grousing and grumbling but they went.

The shuttle took off, flying as low as practical.

No more than a minute had passed before Tidbury demanded, "Well?"

"Patience, thou young and rose-lipp'd cherubin."  Plum flipped a switch
and was gratified to note that the device blipped and pinged in a very
authoritative manner.  "Ah, observe the rich stream of data into which we
can dip to slake our thirst for knowledge."

Tidbury leaned forward and squinted at the machine.  "What the devil
are you talking about?  I don't see anything."  And, in fact there was
nothing to see.  Algy had not lied when he reported that the thing did not
work.

Plum did a double take.  "What?  You don't?  It all works along the
same lines as radar."

"Radar?"

"Sonar?  In any event, as I explained to Prendergast, we send out waves
of sound, or light or something and those waves fling themselves upon the
objects below, and when they bounce back they are subtly altered by the
contact in such a way that the trained eye is able to perceive what it was
they struck."

Tidbury looked harder.  "I still don't see anything," he said
petulantly.

"Well, that's all right.  There's nothing very interesting to see just
yet anyway.  Water is what we seek.  I'll let you know when we find it."

Below them, Plum could see the tracks left by Bill as he drove from
crater to crater.

Rosalind came into the cockpit.  "Where is he, Uncle Plum?  Oh, if
anything has happened to him I'll never forgive myself."

"What the blazes are you keening about, girl?" her father inquired
solicitously.

"Bill, of course.  That's why we're here, isn't it?"
    "Who the devil is Bill?"  Suddenly his eyes popped out, even further
than normal.  "Do mean that Pratt pest?  I thought you were over him.
Aren't you marrying Prendergast?"

"No!  I'm marrying Bill, and if you try any more funny business, you'll
be sorry."  She glared at him.

"Listen, you little snippet, I'll decide who you're going to marry, and
I say you're marrying Prendergast."  He returned her glare.  "Prendergast!"
he bellowed.  When the station manager failed to appear in the cabin
instantaneously, he stormed out toward the rear of the shuttle, Rosalind in
his wake, Plum toddling along behind them.

"Prendergast!" Tidbury came to a sudden stop, causing Rosalind to run
into him.

"Ronald!" said Rosalind, with a barely suppressed giggle.

Plum arrived on the scene to see a blushing Prendergast, not quite
entirely separated from Helga Bergstrom in the seat next to him.  Helga's
lipstick was smeared and her hair was mussed.

Prendergast disentangled himself and leapt to his feet.  "Mr. Tidbury!
I was just ...  That is ..."

"Never mind that, I know what you were doing, blast you.  I want to
know why you were doing it with that Bolshevik instead of my daughter."

"She's not a ..."

  "I don't need you to defend me," Helga broke in.  "And if it's being a
Bolshevik to stand up for the rights of workers being oppressed by greedy
capitalists who care only for lining their own pockets without regard for
the basic needs of ..."

"Hey!" grunted Edith Tidbury.  "What's that guy doing down there?"

The rest rushed to windows to peer at the surface of the Moon where a
lonely figure was waving at them frantically.

"Bill!" cried Rosalind.

"Ah," said Plum.  "And not before time, either."  He made his way back
to Bergstrom.  "Well, there he is, Captain.  Let's go get him."

"I'm sorry, sir, but I can't land the shuttle down there."

"No?  Well, I suppose that makes sense.  Can you contact him by radio?"

Bergstrom nodded.  "Yes, if we can find the right frequency."  He
started listening while fiddling with dials.  After a moment, he flipped a
switch.

"...LP!!!"  Bill's voice in mid-cry echoed from loud speakers.  "Uncle
Plum!  Help!"

"Bill," his relative responded.  "Enjoying the scenery?"

"Enjoying the ...?  Do you know what I've been through?  I've been
following that stupid map of yours.  It's been a complete waste of time.
There was nothing in any of those craters.  And then, way back in the
shadows in this last one, I slipped on some ice and almost broke my ankle.
And my lunar jeep got stuck and now I'm stranded out here."

"That's fine, lad, just fine.  Stiff upper lip and all that.  We'll
talk again soon."  He flicked off the radio and said to Bergstrom.  "Perhaps
you could request some sort of tow truck or what have you be sent to pick
him up?  Now, I think we can return to home base and proceed with the next
step of our program.  If you'll just make one little call back to Earth for
me, first."  He wrote out a message for Bergstrom to deliver and sauntered
back to bring the sunshine of his presence to the other passengers.

"What the devil is going on?" Tidbury demanded.

"Nothing so very momentous, I suppose.  Unless you consider things like
the discovery of  fire, or the invention of the first highball momentous.
You've just missed seeing the discovery of water on the moon."

"What?" said Algy.  "You mean my machine works after all?"

Plum simply smiled a smile about which the late Mr. da Vinci would have
said, "Hey, that's what I was trying to do with the painting of that
Giaconda woman."

Ignoring the hugger-mugger his words brought about, Plum sat down,
closed his eyes and took a nap.

*


Once back at the Moon port, Plum promised all would be made clear if
they would gather at the hotel bar later that evening, after Bill had
returned.

"I am not going to allow some blasted nobody to dictate my movements to
me," Tidbury declared.  "This is my moon and it's my air you're breathing
and if I say you tell me what's going on right now, by gum that's what
you'll do."

Plum said to Edith.  "I suppose he'll hold his breath until he turns
blue next.  Was he just the same as a child?"  He turned back to Tidbury.
"To every thing there is a season, and a time for every purpose under the
heaven."  Then he winked and strolled off, Algy's contraption under his arm.

"Hey!  Come back, blast you!"  When Plum failed to respond, he yelled,
"Prendergast!  What the devil do you mean letting that man go off like that?
You're fired!  Fired!"  He stalked off, too.

Rosalind ran after Plum.  "Uncle Plum!  Wait!"  He stopped for her.
"Will Bill be all right?"

Plum gave her a saintly smile.  "My dear, Bill will be all right, you
will be all right, your aunt will be all right.  Algy, Helga, Prendergast,
Bergstrom, even your father will be all right.  Pelham Grenville has said
so.  Happiness is my being's end and aim."  He patted her on the head and
said, "But, for now, my intermediate aim is a drink.  Perhaps two."  He
resumed his stroll.

Eventually, his tonsils suitably bathed, he adjourned to the hotel,
where he found the others already assembled.

He beamed at them.  "What a delight to see your smiling countenances.
And your smiles are not out of place.  As I will now make clear."  He
addressed his nephew.  "Bill, my boon companion on many a jape, it isn't
that I begrudge you even the thinnest dime of the thousands I have shared
with you, but it is time you struck out on your own.  So I've registered the
crater in which you located the ice today with the authorities as yours.
But of what use, you ask, is a crater to you?  None.  However, such a thing
could be something someone such as Tidbury here might covet."  A lean and
hungry look came over Tidbury.  "But, then again," Plum continued.  "Tidbury
has so much already, it seems a shame to hand him any more."

"Hey!" barked Tidbury.

"But," Plum went on, "It seemed to me that Edith Tidbury might be
chafing under her brother's great, fat thumb and might relish the
opportunity to establish her independence.  Therefore, and I will presume to
speak for Bill in this matter, Bill will sell his ice-filled crater to Edith
Tidbury for this eminently reasonable amount."  He slid a sheet of paper to
Edith.  "Am I right in assuming that you have access to some part of the
Tidbury billions?"  Edith read the note and nodded, her own version of the
Tidbury predatory smile on her lips.  She then passed the paper on to Bill
who read it and whose eyes subsequently glazed over.

"Fine, then," concluded Plum.  "Bill has enough money to marry Rosalind
and Edith is freed from fraternal bondage."

He paused to inventory the others at the table.  "Ah, but what of
Prendergast, you ask. Something of an ass, to be sure, but still my heart is
big enough to encompass even Prendergast."  He faced Edith again.  "Miss
Tidbury, you'll want someone to oversee the operations of your new facility.
May I recommend this bespectacled chap?  He is not without experience in
these matters."

Edith studied Ronald until he writhed in discomfort.  Finally she said,
"Fine."

"A perfect woman, nobly planned," said Plum.

"To warn, to comfort and command," Edith continued.

Plum shook his head in admiration, then continued.  "So, then,
Tidbury," he said to the mogul.

Tidbury returned his look and waited.

"When you fired Prendergast did you consider that you lacked a
replacement for him?  Or did you think that you had the expertise to run
things here yourself?"

Tidbury wisely said nothing, though one could see that it cost him.

"Fortunately for you, you have at your disposal someone who does have
that expertise."  He nodded across the table.  "Helga Bergstrom."

"What!" exploded from two mouths.  Tidbury and Helga started trying to
out-shout each other.  If one listened carefully, one could hear words such
as, "Murderer!"  "Red!"
"Pig!"  "Bolshevik!"  "Never!"  "Never!"

Plum waited for the uproar to subside.  Then he said, "Tidbury, you
haven't much choice.  She is qualified.  Who else is there?  You don't have
to like it, but you do have to swallow your medicine like the big boy you
are."  Tidbury mumbled his reluctant acceptance of the arrangement.  "And
Helga, if you are concerned about the rights of the workers, how better to
protect them than to be the one in charge?  And, as an additional benefit,
you will be able to continue to work closely with Ronald Prendergast."  She
nodded her consent as well.

"Fine.  The problem of Algy next begs our attention.  He hungers for
Edith, who reciprocates his desire, but, being penniless, he hesitates to do
anything about it.  Fortunately, he has invented a device which, if it
works, could make a certain excessively rich individual even more
excessive."  He looked from Algy to Tidbury to Algy again.  "Do you, Algy,
take this man for his filthy lucre?  And do you, Tidbury, take this man for
his life's work and the child of his sweat and imagination?"

"But, I told you," said Algy, "It don't ..."

"Yes, yes, I know, mere money doesn't make up for losing your creation,
but keep in mind you will also have Edith."  He eyed Algy archly.  "And, in
addition to purchasing the device, I'm sure Tidbury will give some thought
to hiring you to operate it, making such improvements and refinements as you
think necessary."  Algy seemed to see this as the sop to his ethics it was
and shut up.

Plum slid another slip of paper across the table, this time to Tidbury.
The tycoon examined it, threatened to become apoplectic but changed his mind
upon being at the receiving end of glares from his daughter and sister.
And, as it really would have been a fair offer if the gadget actually
performed as advertised, he nodded his acquiescence.

Plum had come armed with contracts which he passed around to have
signed and duly witnessed.

When all was in order, he stood.  "Excellent!  The motion is carried
and the meeting is adjourned."  Rosalind and Helga converged on him and
showered him with kisses before turning their attentions to Bill and Ronald
respectively.  Ere long everyone had left the room, leaving only Plum and
Captain Bergstrom behind.

The pilot smiled, a bit wanly, at Plum.  "Well, sir, you certainly seem
to have taken care of everyone."

Plum regarded him warmly.  "Was there ever any doubt?  But could it be
you think that I've forgotten something?"

Bergstrom cleared his throat.  "Um, well.  It's just that it's likely
that Mr. Tidbury did say earlier that my head was on the chopping block ..."

"And you thought that it had somehow slipped my mind that I promised to
save your job, is that it?  Oh, ye of little faith."  Plum shook his head.
"It's true that I did nothing to secure your position with the tyrant,
Tidbury, but what Pelham Grenville promises, Pelham Grenville delivers.
Since the first Sir Pelham earned his spurs during the Crusades by providing
the Lionheart with female companionship during the siege of Jerusalem, no
one of the line has ever gone back on his word, if one interprets the word
liberally enough.  In any event, I have something better than securing your
employment with the fickle Tidbury.  I have been chatting up a  few of my
pals from home, and we agree that what the moon most needs is a casino.
Naturally, we'll need someone to ferry the suckers back and forth twixt
Earth and moon.  How would you like the job?  At a substantial increase,
naturally."

If Moon shuttle pilots could cry tears of gratitude and joy, Captain
Bergstrom would have needed an extra hanky.  As it was, he was too moved to
speak and merely indicated his acceptance with a nod and grateful smile.

"Splendid!" said Plum.  "And, with that, my work here is done.  What
say we borrow Tidbury's shuttle one more time before he gets wind of it and
head for good old Terra Firma, eh?"  He took Bergstrom's arm in a comradely
way. "Exit, pursued by a bear."
The End