Arthur Clarke - Cradle

There was a loud knock at the door. All three of them jumped. Several seconds later the knock repeated. Troy went to the door and partially opened it.

“There you are, you little shit,” Carol and Nick heard a gruff, angry voice say. Captain Homer Ashford pushed through the door. He didn’t see Nick and Carol at first. “We had a deal and you’ve welshed on it. You have been back two hours already…”

Out of the corner of his eye, Captain Homer saw that there were other people in the room. He turned around to talk to Greta, who had not yet entered the house. “Guess what?” he said. “Nick Williams and Miss Dawson are also here. No wonder we couldn’t find her at the hotel.”

Greta followed Homer into the living room. Her clear, expressionless eyes spent no more than one second staring at each of the trio. Carol thought she saw just a trace of disdain in Greta’s look, but she wasn’t certain. Homer turned to Carol, the tone in his voice markedly more civil. “We saw you two return from your excursion around two o’clock,” he said with a fake smile. “But somehow we missed Troy.” He winked at Carol and turned to Nick. “Find any more exciting trinkets today, Williams?”

Nick had never made any attempt to hide the fact that he did not like Captain Homer. “Why of course, Captain,” he answered, sneering the epithet, “would you believe we found a veritable mountain of gold and silver bars? Looked like that Santa Rosa stack we had on the boat one afternoon, must be about eight years ago. Remember? That was before Jake and I let you and Greta unload it.”

Homer’s voice had a nasty edge to it. “I should have sued you for slander, Williams. That would have shut your loud mouth once and for all. You had your day in court. Now knock off the crap, or one day you’ll have more trouble than you can handle.”

While Nick and Homer were trading insults and threats, Greta was strutting around the living room as if she were in her own house. She seemed to be oblivious to the conversation and even to the presence of the other people in the room. She was wearing a tight white muscle shirt and a pair of navy blue shorts. When Greta walked, she carried her arms high, her back straight, and her breasts erect. Carol was intrigued by her behavior. She watched Greta stop and sort through Troy’s compact discs. Greta pulled out the disc with the cover picture of Angie Leatherwood and licked her lips. This pair belongs in a kinky novel, Carol thought, as she overheard Troy tell Captain Homer that he was busy this afternoon but would get back to him later. What’s their story? wondered Carol. And where does fat Ellen fit in? Carol remembered that she was scheduled to interview the three of them later in the evening. But I’m not sure that I really want to find out.

“We were calling to tell you to bring your swimming suit tonight,” Captain Homer was addressing Carol. She had missed the first part of his statement while she was watching Greta parade around the room.

“Pardon me,” she said politely. “Could you repeat what you just said? I’m afraid I had drifted away for a few seconds.”

“I said that you should come early, about eight o’clock.” Homer replied. “And bring your suit. We have a most interesting and unusual pool.”

During this exchange, Greta walked up behind Nick and quickly reached both arms around him. With everyone else in the room watching, she lightly twisted his nipples through his polo shirt and laughed when he jumped. “You always did like that, ya, Nikki,” she said, releasing him after an instant. Carol saw anger flash in Homer’s eyes. Nick started to say something but Greta had already walked out the front door before he could register a protest.

“Be sure to call me when you’re through here, Homer said to Troy after an embarrassing silence. “We need to straighten out a few things.” The older man turned around, awkwardly, and without additional comment followed Greta toward his Mercedes parked in front of Troy’s house.

“Now where were we?” said Troy abstractedly, as he closed the door behind Homer and Greta.

“You,” said Nick with emphasis, “were telling us an amazing story and had almost reached the punch line, where you were going to tell us what we could do to help some aliens who landed here on Earth to repair their space vehicle. But first I, for one, would like some explanations. I don’t know if I believe any of this wild fairy tale you’re telling us, but I will admit that it is extremely creative. What concerns me at this minute, however, is not the issue of creatures from another world. It’s those two real-life sleazebag human beings who just left. What did they want? And are they somehow involved in our current adventure?”

“Just a minute, Nick,” Carol intervened. “Before we become sidetracked, I would like to know what kind of help these ETs of Troy’s want from us. A telephone? A new spaceship? Let’s find this out now and talk about Homer and your girlfriend Greta later.” Her reference to Greta was light and playful. Nick accepted it with good humor and feigned a wound. Then he nodded his assent to Carol’s suggestion. Troy pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket and took a deep breath.

“Now you guys must understand that I’m not yet absolutely certain that I am properly receiving all their messages. But this particular transmission, where they list the things they need from us, is repeated every half hour. My interpretation of it hasn’t changed for the last ninety minutes, so I’m fairly certain that I have it right. It’s a long list and of course I don’t pretend to comprehend why they want all this stuff. But I am certain you will both find it very interesting.”

Troy started reading from his handwritten list. “They want an English dictionary and grammar, plus the same thing for four other major languages; an encyclopedia of plant and animal life; a compact world history; a statistical tract defining the current political and economic status of the world; a comparative study of the world’s major existing religions; complete issues covering the last two years of at least three significant daily newspapers; summary journals of science and technology, including surveys of weapon systems both deployed and under development; an encyclopedia of the arts, preferably including video and sound where appropriate; forty-seven pounds of lead; and fifty-eight pounds of gold.”

Nick whistled when Troy was finished. At Carol’s request, Troy handed the sheet to her and Nick read it another time over her shoulder, absorbing every item. Neither of them said anything. “Believe it or not,” Troy added as an afterthought about a minute later, “the first eight items are not too difficult to obtain. I stopped by the Key West Public Library on the way home from the marina and, for a fee, they are preparing for me a set of compact discs that contain virtually all of the requested information. The difficult items are at the end of the list. That’s where your help is needed.”

Troy stopped for a second to see if Nick and Carol were following him. “Just to make certain I understand.” Nick was now walking slowly around the room with the list in his hand, “what you want, or they want if you will, is for us to return to their laboratory or vehicle or whatever it is with all this information plus the lead and gold?” Troy nodded. “But fifty-eight pounds of gold? That’s about a million dollars’ worth. Where would we get it? And what would they do with it anyway?”

Troy acknowledged that he didn’t know the answers to those questions. “But I have the feeling,” he added, “again based upon what I think they are telling me, that partially satisfying their needs will make their task that much easier. So I guess we do what we can and hope that it’s enough.”