Part 7 (1/2)

'Fiddle de, fiddle dum. We must formulate a plan of campaign.'

'I would not reject breakfast out of hand,' said George.

'A plan of campaign,' said Professor Coffin. 'If we are to discover this wonder, it would be well for us to have some inkling of where to search. Do you not agree?'

'j.a.pan,' said George. Without hesitation.

'It would seem the logical place to start.' Professor Coffin took to pacing up and down, measuring his strides with his cane.

'We shall cross the Channel,' said George, 'work our way through Europe, then traverse Russia, then China, then down the Korean Peninsula to j.a.pan.'

'Your knowledge of geography is profound,' said the professor.

'It was one of my favourite subjects at school.'

'And arithmetic?' Professor Coffin asked.

'I have some skills in that discipline, yes.'

'Then perhaps you would care to calculate how many days it would take a traction engine with a top speed of five miles per hour to span the continent of Europe, cross Russia, China and Korea and fetch up in Tokyo?'

George attempted certain mental calculations. He folded his brow with the effort.

'Let me spare you a banjoing of the brain, George,' said the professor. 'A very, very, very long time would be the answer to that. And whether the engine would even hold up past Calais, I would not care to wager upon.'

'Then we are lost,' said George. 'It cannot be done.'

'There are other modes of transport,' the professor said. 'We live in the Modern Age, remember. There are steam trains now that can travel at sixty miles an hour. And other vessels faster still than that.'

'Ah,' said George. 'You speak of course of s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps. They may take the wealthy upon the Grand Tour, but there are no s.p.a.ceports in j.a.pan.'

'True,' said Professor Coffin. 'There are no s.p.a.ceports anywhere upon this Earth but London. But there are other craft that fly in the sky and one that is bound for j.a.pan.'

George lifted his bowler hat and gave a scratch to his head.

'You marvelled at it only two days back, young George.' Professor Coffin fished into his waistcoat pocket and pulled out a printed flysheet. 'I saw this a-blowing along the road. I do not know why I picked it up, but I did. This, young George, is how we will reach j.a.pan.'

George took the crumpled paper, unfolded same and put his gaze upon it.AROUND THE WORLD IN SEVENTY-NINE DAYS.

he read.

GREAT FLIGHT OF WONDER.

SEVENTEEN CAPITAL CITIES TO BE VISITED.

UPON THIS STUPENDOUS.

AERIAL PERAMBULATION OF THE PLANET.

PARIS ROME MOSCOW TOKYO ETC.THE EMPRESS OF MARS.

THE WORLD'S MOST MODERN AIRs.h.i.+P TAKES FLIGHTS FROM.

THE ROYAL LONDON s.p.a.cEPORT AT SYDENHAM.

27TH JULY 1895.Tickets from 200 gnsGeorge looked up at Professor Coffin. 'The Empress of Mars Empress of Mars?' he said.

'And she takes flight three days from now.'

'But two hundred guineas a ticket,' George said. 'How could we come by such wealth?'

'Ah,' said the professor. 'It might be done. In such a n.o.ble and adventurous cause, we might sell the wagon and its contents.'

'The Martian?' said George, with relish in his voice.

'And the traction engine. Mandible Haxan would willingly purchase it back.'

'But four hundred guineas?'

'It will require enterprise on both our parts. This is a huge commitment for me, young George. I will be parting with everything. We will have to live entirely on our wits alone. Does that thrill you, or fill you full of fear?'

'A little of both, as it happens,' said George.

'So, shall we do it, my boy?'

'The Empress of Mars Empress of Mars,' said George, wistfully. 'To fly on the Empress of Mars Empress of Mars.'

'To seek the j.a.panese Devil Fish Girl,' said Professor Coffin.

11.

From its very genesis, Earth's first s.p.a.ceport gave cause for concern and controversy. The British Empire's back-engineering of crashed Martian s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps and subsequent annihilation of the Martian race brought forth worldwide rejoicings. And the arrival of emissaries from Venus and Jupiter, to welcome Earth into the fellows.h.i.+p of planets (a fellows.h.i.+p from which Mars had been notably excluded due to its people's warlike nature and expansionist policies), with the emissaries presenting themselves before the court of Queen Victoria, gave rise to further exultations of joy.

But there the fun and jollification and the elation at opening trade and communing between planets ceased. For anyone other than the wealthy of the British Empire. The British Empire owned the Martian s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps. The British Empire had exclusive use of these s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps to commune between the planets. The British Empire signed treaties and trade agreements with the Venusians and Jovians.

The British Empire would build the Earth's first and and only only s.p.a.ceport. In London. s.p.a.ceport. In London.

The Americans were not best pleased. They wanted a s.p.a.ceport built in Was.h.i.+ngton. P. T. Barnum, considered by most, if not all, to be the world's greatest showman, had even promised to finance the building of the Was.h.i.+ngton s.p.a.ceport (as long as he might be allowed to run the food concessions there and establish a permanent circus in the arrivals building).

Requests had been put in from France, the Prussian Empire and Czarist Russia. The British Empire held firm. The one and only s.p.a.ceport would be in London.

Then came the matter of design, for the buildings, hangars, landing platforms and so forth. Naturally, only British architects and engineers would be given consideration. And and here once more conspiracy theories came into their own it was said that only high-ranking Freemasons need apply. A fist fight broke out in the House of Commons between Isambard Kingdom Brunel, designer of the Great Western Railway and just about anything else that could be constructed from iron and steel, and Alfred Waterhouse, architect of the Natural History Museum and pretty much anything else that might be raised from terracotta brick.

Brunel won the fight, but Waterhouse took the contract with a design based upon Charles Barry's neo-Gothic masterpiece, the Houses of Parliament. The architectural designs were pa.s.sed personally by Her Majesty Queen Victoria, who considered them eminently suitable. For, to quote her words: 'As the Houses of Parliament pa.s.s bills to convey fairness, justice, truth and virtue throughout this world, so such a design will convey these concepts to travellers from other worlds.'