The Rocket of 1955

C. M. Kornbluth

The Rocket of 1955

THE SCHEME was all Fein’s, but the trimmings that made it more than a pipe dream and its actual operation depended on me. How long the plan had been in incubation I do not know, but Fein, one spring day, broke it to me in crude form. I pointed out some errors, corrected and amplified on the thing in general, and told him that I’d have no part of it-and changed my mind when he threatened to reveal certain indiscretions committed by me some years ago.

It was necessary that I spend some months inEurope, conducting research work incidental to the scheme. I returned with recorded statements, old newspapers, and photostatic copies of certain documents. There was a brief, quiet interview with that old, bushy-haired Viennese worshipped incontinently by the mob; he was convinced by the evidence I had compiled that it would be wise to assist us.

You all know what happened next-it was the professor’s historic radio broadcast. Fein had drafted the thing, I had rewritten it, and told the astronomer to assume a German accent while reading. Some of the Page 1

phrases were beautiful: “American dominion over the very planets! … veil at last ripped aside … man defies gravity … travel through limitless space … plant the red-white-and-blue banner in the soil of Mars!”

The requested contributions poured in. Newspapers and magazines ostentatiously donated yard-long checks of a few thousand dollars; the government gave a welcome half-million; heavy sugar came from the “Rocket Contribution Week” held in the nation’s public schools; but independent contributions were the largest. We cleared seven rail-lion dollars, and then started to build the spaceship.

The virginium that took up most of the money was tin plate; the monoatomic fluorine that gave us our terrific speed was hydrogen. The take-off was a party for the newsreels: the big, gleaming bullet extravagant with vanes and projections; speeches by the professor; Parley, who was to fly it to Mars, grinning into the cameras. He climbed an outside ladder to the nose of the thing,then dropped into the steering compartment. I screwed down the sound-proof door, smiling as he hammered to be let out. To his surprise, there was no duplicate of the elaborate dummy controls he had been practicing on for the past few weeks.

I cautioned the pressmen to stand back under the shelter, and gave the professor the knife switch that would send the rocket on its way. He hesitated too long-Fein hissed into his ear: “Anna ParelofE of Cracow, Herr Professor…”

The triple blade clicked into the sockets. The vaned projectile roared a hundred yards into the air with a wobbling curve-then exploded.

A photographer, eager for an angle shot, was killed; so were some kids. The steel roof protected the rest of us. Fein and I shook hands, while the pressmen screamed into the telephones which we had provided.

But the professor gotdrunk, and, disgusted with the part he had played in the affair, told all and poisoned himself. Fein and I left the cash behind and hoppeda freight . We were picked off it by a vigilance committee (headed by a man who had lost fifty cents in our rocket). Fein was too frightened to talk or write so they hanged him first, and gave me a paper and pencil to tell the story as best I could.

Here they come, with an insulting thick rope.

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