Fredric Brown - Martians, Go Home

As soon as this was learned, people knew that they could never again be sure of privacy as long as the Marbans stayed. Even if there wasn’t a Martian in the room with them, there might be one in the next room or outside the building watching them through the wall.

But that is getting ahead of ourselves, because few people learned or guessed it the first night. (Luke Deevereaux, for one, should have guessed it, because his Martian had read Rosalind’s letters in a closed suitcase—but there at that moment Luke didn’t yet know that the Martian couldn’t have simply opened the suitcase and handled the letter. And after Luke did have those two facts to couple together he was in no shape to do any effective coupling.) And that first night, before most people knew, the Martians must have seen plenty. Especially the thousands of them that happened to kwim into already darkened rooms and found themselves interested enough in what was going on there to keep their mouths shut for a while.

America’s second most popular indoor sport took an even worse beating that night, and became impossible then and thereafter.

Take what happened to the gang that played poker every Thursday night at George Keller’s place on the beach a few miles north of Laguna, California. George was a bachelor and retired; he lived there the year round. The others all lived in Laguna, held jobs or owned shops.

That particular Thursday evening there were six of them, counting George. Just the right number for a good game, and they played a good game, all of them, with the stakes just high enough to make it exciting but not high enough to hurt the losers seriously. Dealer’s choice, but dealers chose only between draw poker and five-card stead, never a wild game. With all of them poker was more nearly a religion than it was a vice. Thursday nights from around eight until around one—or sometimes even two—in the morning were the highlights in their lives, the shining hours to which they looked forward throughout the duller days and evenings of the week. You couldn’t call them fanatics, perhaps, but you could call them dedicated.

By a few minutes after eight they were comfortable in shirt sleeves and with neckties loosened or taken off, sitting around the big table in the living room ready to start play as soon as George had finished shuffling the new deck he had just broken out. They’d all bought chips and they all had tinkling glasses or opened beer cans in front of them. (They always drank, but always moderately, never enough to spoil their judgment or the game.)

George finished his shuffle and dealt the cards around face up to see who’d catch a jack for the first deal; it went to Gerry Dix, head teller at the Laguna bank.

Dix dealt and won the first hand himself on three tens. It was a small pot, though; only George had been able to stay and draw cards with him. And George hadn’t even been able to call; he’d drawn to a pair of nines and hadn’t improved them.

Next man around, Bob Trimble, proprietor of the local stationery store, gathered in the cards for next deal. “Ante up, boys,” be said. “This one’ll be better. Everybody gets good cards.”

Across the room the radio played soft music. George Keller liked background music and knew which stations to get it on at any given hour of a Thursday evening.

Trimble dealt. George picked up his hand and saw two small pairs, sevens and treys. Openers, but a bit weak to open on right under the gun; someone would probably raise him. If someone else opened he could stay and draw a card. “By me,” he said.

Two more passed and then Wainright—Harry Wainright, manager of a small department store in South Laguna—opened the pot for a red chip. Dix and Trimble both stayed, without raising, and George did the same. The men who’d passed between George and Wainright passed again. That left four of them in the game and gave George an inexpensive draw to his two small pairs; if he made a full house out of them he’d probably have the winning hand.

Trimble picked up the deck again. “Cards, George?”

“Just a second,” George said suddenly. He’d turned his head and was listening to the radio. It wasn’t playing music now and, in retrospect, he realized that it hadn’t been for the past minute or two. Somebody was yammering, and much too excitedly for it to be a commercial; the voice sounded actually hysterical. Besides, it was around a quarter after eight and if he had the program he thought he had, it was the Starlight Hour , which was interrupted only once, at the half hour, by a commercial break.

Could this possibly by an emergency announcement—a declaration of war, warning of an impending air attack, or something of the sort?

“Just a second, Bob,” he said to Trimble, putting down his hand and getting up out of his chair. He went over to the radio and turned up the volume.

“…little green men, dozens of them, all ever the studio and the station. They say they’re Martians. They’re being reported from all over. But don’t get excited—they can’t hurt you. Perfectly harmless because they’re impal—im—you can’t touch them; your hand or anything you throw at them goes right through like they weren’t there, and they can’t touch you for the same reason. So don’t—”

There was more.

All six of them were listening now. Then Gerry Dix said, “What the hell, George? You holding up the game just to listen to a science-fiction program?”

George said, “But is it? I had the Goddam Starlight Hour tuned in there. Music.”

“That’s right,” Walt Grainger said. “A minute or two ago they were playing a Strauss waltz. Vienna Woods , I think.”

“Try a different station, George,” Trimble suggested. Just then, before George could reach out for the dial, the radio went suddenly dead.

“Damn,” George said, fiddling with the dials. “A tube must have just conked out. Can’t even get a hum out of it now.”

Wainright said, “Maybe the Martians did it. Come on back to the game, George, before my cards get cold. They’re hot enough right now to take this little hand.”

George hesitated, then looked toward Walt Grainger. All five of the men had come out from Laguna in one car, Grainger’s.

“Walt,” George said, “you got a radio in your car?”

“No.”

George said, “Damn it. And no telephone because the lousy phone company won’t run poles this far out from—Oh, hell, let’s forget it.”

“If you’re really worried, George,” Walt said, “we can take a quick run into town. Either you and me and let the others keep playing, or all six of us can go, and be back here in less than an hour. It won’t lose us too much time; we can play a little later to make up for it.”

“Unless we run into a spaceshipload of Martians on the way,” Gerry Dix said.

“Nuts,” Wainright said, “George, what happened is your radio jumped stations somehow. It was going on the blink anyway or it wouldn’t be dead now.”

“I’ll go along with that,” Dix said. “And what the hell, if there are Martians around let ’em come out here if they want to see us. This is our poker night, Gentlemen. Let’s play cards, and let the chips fall where they may.”

George Keller sighed. “Okay,” he said.

He walked back to the table and sat down, picked up his hand and looked at it to remind himself what it had been. Oh, yes, sevens and treys. And it was his turn to draw.

“Cards?” Trimble asked, picking up the deck again. “One for me,” George said, discarding his fifth card. But Trimble never dealt it.

Suddenly, across the table, Walt Grainger said, “Jesus Christ!” in such a tone of voice that they all froze for a second; then they stared at him and quickly turned to see what he was staring at.