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Read Ebook: World Without Glamor by Marlowe Stephen Terry W E Illustrator
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Ebook has 180 lines and 7528 words, and 4 pages
Marsden went for her with murder in his eyes, but at that moment there came a roaring overhead like a dozen summer storms rolled into one, booming and crashing in the sky over their cabin. Talbor's sullen orange sun had almost set, but bright light flashed in through the window, blinding them.
"I ought to beat you," said Marsden. But he opened the door and went outside into the strong, hot wind which had stirred over their rocky farmland and flapped the torn ends of his shirt against his chest.
The spaceship from Earth had arrived on Talbor.
Talbor City's one street, dry and dusty from the long day and hot sun, was ablaze with light. Marsden had never seen so many electric lights lit at once, not even on Saturday nights. Even as he entered the city from the north, taking off his torn shirt and discarding it because no shirt seemed better than a damaged one, he heard the singing.
Charlie Adcock's deep, off-key voice rose stridently above the others, singing a song which was popular among the men of Talbor, but which the women hated.
I want my arms around A slim, small girl of Earth. If she don't come to me I think I'll have to die For the slim, small girl of Earth.
"Well, Harry! Thought you'd never get here."
"I had some things to do," Marsden lied.
"They already landed. They're here on Talbor. Here. They went to the hotel right away, of course. First time the hotel's been used since the last freighter crew decided to stay overnight. The mayor's declared a holiday. Nobody's working tomorrow."
"Me and Marie got to work," said Marsden, realizing he might be able to make peace with his wife after a day in the field.
"You ain't serious."
Marsden said, "How many of them came?"
"I think I'll spend the night in town," said Marsden, forgetting all about Marie.
"Oh, didn't Marie come to town with you?"
Marsden shook his head without talking.
"Janie didn't come neither. Say now, that's all right, Harry. That sure is all right. Leave the wife at home on a night like this. You know what? I think I'll take a room right there in the hotel and maybe even get to eat breakfast with the women of Earth. What do you say, Harry?"
"Suits me." Marsden's mind formed a brief image of Marie trying awkwardly to fit into the dress--to please me, he suddenly realized--and then the image faded. With Charlie Adcock he pushed through the crowd on the hotel steps.
Marsden felt breakfast, heavy mouthful by mouthful, forming an uncomfortable lump inside his chest. It was a long table big enough for thirty people, with the men and women of Earth chatting comfortably on all sides of it, their gay clothing making the dining room appear intolerably drab. Marsden had been on the verge of forgetting breakfast entirely, for when he reached the dining room he found all the seats at the table were taken except one between two delicate, wasp-waisted women of Earth. But Charlie Adcock, who was already seated, had waved him on toward the table with a broad grin, and it was either sit down or forever be a coward in Charlie's eyes.
"Hello," one of the women said while Marsden fidgeted and scooped forkfuls of bacon and eggs into his dry mouth.
Marsden blinked. She was talking to him.
"Good morning, Miss."
"So you're a native of Talbor. Tell me, how do you stand it?"
"Born here, I guess." Marsden found it difficult to talk and eat at the same time. His face grew uncomfortably warm, his tongue seemed to swell until he wanted to spit it out.
"I'm Alice Cooper, Mr.--"
Mister. No one had ever called him Mister. "Better call me Harry, Miss. Just Harry."
"I want you to tell me all about your primitive planet, Harry. Everything. I've got a camera and I'm going to take pictures and write notes about them so when I get back to Earth I can tell everyone about this quaint planet."
Marsden wished he had a shirt, for it wasn't right for Alice Cooper to have to see his sun-scorched, hair-matted chest while she ate. But Marsden felt somewhat better when he let his eyes rove to the men of Earth. They sat tall and straight in clothing fancier than it was right for a man to wear, but they were thin, pale and--well, a little washed-out looking.
"Why don't you show me around?" Alice Cooper suddenly asked him. "You can't see a place unless a native shows it to you, and we have to leave tonight."
"Tonight?"
"Of course, Harry. We have lots of planets to visit and we can't spend more than a day on an out-of-the-way mote like Talbor."
"Well, now, there are plenty of interesting things on Talbor."
"Oh, I know. I know. Rustic cabins, rocky fields, stolid farmers who work the soil all day and fall into bed exhausted at night. It's all very thrilling."
"We have some mighty nice scenery," Marsden told her. "Madison falls are two-hundred feet high, and we've got some mountains that--"
"Certainly, Harry. But I can see that sort of thing just anyplace. I want you to show me your farm, your fields. How you people of Talbor can get by on this rocky, God-forsaken place I'll never know. Why your parents came here I could never figure out."
He stood up awkwardly. "I guess--well...."
Alice Cooper rose to her feet in a liquid motion beautiful to behold. The top of her head came up to his shoulders and she reached out with one small, dainty hand and touched his upper arm.
"My, but you have big muscles."
Marsden smiled.
"You need them in this grim, dreary place, of course. You probably wish you didn't. You probably would rather be thin and wear glasses maybe and spend most of your time in an air-cooled office and do things like that."
"I don't know. A man would grow bored working in an office."
"See?" Alice Cooper cried. "See? I just knew I'd love Talbor. You're so primitive. Why, you're practically--Cro-Magnon. Come on outside, Harry. I want to take your picture."
She took his big hand and led him to the door. Marsden looked back uncomfortably and saw Charlie Adcock off in a corner with two of the women of Earth, talking avidly. Strangely, he thought Charlie was scowling about something.
Talbor's strong orange sunlight made him squint while Alice Cooper said: "Tremendous place for a camera enthusiast. I hear it never rains around here. Surprising this place isn't a desert, don't you think?"
"It rains when it has to."
"Here. Stand over here. Yes, facing the sun. Can you do something to show you're almost--almost ancestral?"
"I don't understand, Miss."
"Goodness, I mean your muscles. Flex them. Use them to do something like lifting a heavy object. Break something if you want to. I'm sure those muscles are good for something besides weeding your fields or pulling a plow."
Marsden began to feel foolish but obliged her with a handstand. He lost his balance, though, before she could take the picture and tumbled flat on his back in the dusty street, landing so hard he saw stars.
A couple of men who had been watching from the hotel steps snickered. "I didn't know Marsden was an acrobat."
"His old lady claims she's going to sell him to the interstellar circus when it comes around."
"What do you say we give him a hand?"
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