The Bluebird Planet - Robert F. Young, ebook, Temp
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the
bluebird
planet
by ROBERT F. YOUNG
She'd never seen so many birds. The woods were blue
with them. And then a bird perched on her shoulder!
Robert F, Young, author of WISH UPON A STAR, our lead novel in our December 1956 issue,
works in a machine shop in upstate New York and usually writes stories critical of tomorrow's
machine age. Here is a gentler story, however, an exception—the story of a lonely woman, and a
bird.
THE SHIP had landed in
a clearing in a forest. The grass was jet-burned just beneath it, but a little
ways away the grass was green, and dancing in a summer wind. And beyond the dancing grass the forest
trees curtsied like timid girls m new summer dresses.
Miss Mintz could hardly believe her eyes. They'd
said
that Deneb 6 was a lovely planet, and they'd
said
that once you landed there you'd never want to leave; and they'd
said,
just wait till you see the
moon! But Miss Mintz was invariably skeptical of the third person plural, particularly when it referred to
travel agency pitchmen, and she'd taken what
they
had said with several grains of salt.
But she needn't have, she saw now. She climbed the rest of the way down the disembarking stairs
and stepped into the dancing grass. The Senior Class came tumbling down behind her, laughing and
shouting like the kids they really were beneath the blase exteriors they had affected throughout the trip.
There was a winy tang to the sparkling air, and winsome little white clouds hung high in the bright blue
sky.
In the clearing the whole class began talking at once:
"Did you ever
see
such green grass?"
"Just
look
at that sky!"
"Say— There's a bluebird!"
"Where?"
"Over there! Why— There's another!"
"And
another!"
Miss Mintz saw them then. The forest was full of them. Her heart began to pound. It pounded even
harder when Chief Petty Officer Burke, whose responsibility it was to see that excursion parties got
started off on the right foot, appeared in the ship's lock at the top of the stairs and raised his hand for
silence.
"The bluebirds can wait," he said when the seniors had quieted. He pointed to where Deneb blazed
like a macrocosmic gasoline lantern in the middle of the afternoon sky. "When that sun sets it's going to
get dark awful quick, so what you kids had better do is start setting up camp right away—unless you
want to spend another night aboard ship."
 There was a chorus of "Oh no's!" and "I should say not's!" followed by enthusiastic activity. Miss
Mintz took command in her capacity as chaperon and oversaw the unloading of the collapsible
camp-village. After consulting with Mr. Burke she selected a site at the edge of the forest conveniently
close to an effervescent brook. The Jiffy Huts were set up in a jiffy, and by the time the first night
shadows had begun to creep in out of the forest there was a little plastic village nestling at the feet of the
trees within shouting distance of the ship. Shortly thereafter a portable generator began to hum, and
new-strung electric lights came to radiant life along Little Main Street and shone warmly from the square
screened windows of the huts.
The Mess Hut had been assembled with loving care and a little after sundown it was ceremoniously
christened the Deneb Six Cafe. After the christening the male division of the Senior Class carried the
treasured provisions from the ship's deep freeze across the clearing to the kitchen where the female
division took over the task of preparing the first cooked meal the class had had since leaving Earth.
Everyone got in each other's way, and Miss Mintz found herself involved in a chaos of kids whose
appetites had merely been stimulated by the condensed breakfast, lunch, and dinner tablets which
Excursion Lines, Inc., called food, but presently the chaos gave way to a semblance of order and after
awhile the aroma of pork chops and scalloped potatoes rode appetizingly on the night air of Deneb 6.
Miss Mintz was afraid, at first, that Mr. Burke had forgotten her invitation, and she was relieved
when she finally saw him come striding up Little Main Street, bedecked in his spaceman's blues. She met
him just outside the entrance. "Welcome to the Deneb Six Cafe," she said.
Mr. Burke sniffed the night air. "Smells almost like pork chops," he said. "But of course that's
impossible. You couldn't
really
be having pork chops."
"Oh yes we could," Miss Mintz said, "and we're having scalloped potatoes with them. Come on in,
Mr. Burke. We're just starting to serve."
There were three long collapsible tables and two small ones. Miss Mintz chose one of the small ones,
a little apart from the others, and one of the senior girls came over and took their order. Mr. Burke
winked at her just as though she were a regular waitress, just as though he and Miss Mintz had been out
doing the town and had stopped in for a bite to eat before grabbing a skycar home.
Looking at him across the little table, Miss Mintz could hardly believe the last three days. The first
one had been the most incredible of all. That was when Mr. Burke had said good morning to her on the
passenger deck and had stopped to pass the time of day. He had never even noticed her before and
Miss Mintz was sure it was the dress she was wearing that had caught his eye. It was a new dress, one of
the two she'd bought especially for the trip—a novelty number with an upturned collar and a girlish swirl
skirt that was guaranteed to make you look younger and feel younger.
She had been sure at first that it was the dress, but the next day she wasn't quite so sure, because on
that day she wore her ordinary lounging slacks and her ship and planet blouse with the little space ships
stenciled on it, and Mr. Burke said good morning to her anyway, and stopped for an even longer time to
pass the time of day. He'd had a great deal to say that morning, particularly about the monotony of the
ration tablets. He'd reminisced a little about the "old days", only it was a sort of vicarious reminiscing, for
Mr. Burke was much too young to have had much to do with the "old days." He was around Miss
Mintz's age, and Miss Mintz was only twenty-nine.
"Can you imagine, Miss Mintz!" he had said. "They used to serve hot beans for breakfast on the first
star ships.
Hot
beans, mind you! And I've heard—though I don't believe it for one minute!—that the
crews used to gripe about the chow. Imagine anybody griping about real beans! They should have had
condensed ones, then they'd really have had something to gripe about!"
That night she hadn't been able to get him out of her mind and she'd had a silly dream about
him—one that made her blush the next morning when he stopped to talk to her on the passenger deck
just after the ship had come out of transphotic and Deneb 6 was a gauzy ball of blue yarn in the
viewplates. He'd gone into more detail about the monotony of the chow, and that was when the
inspiration had come to her, when she'd said, vibrant with sudden singing happiness, "Why Mr. Burke,
why don't you eat with
us
during stop-over? We've brought all our own food from home and we're going
to cook our own meals for a whole week. I'm sure you'll like some of the things we have."
 That was the way it had happened, but it was still hard to believe, even with Mr. Burke sitting across
the table from her, smiling his disarming smile, his carefree blue eyes lighting up when the "waitress"
brought over two plates heaped with scalloped potatoes and pork chops. The pork chops were a little
on the crisp side, but they tasted so good that Miss Mintz, who ordinarily ate like a bird, had two of
them. Mr. Burke had five.
After the meal she walked to the end of Little Main Street with him. "You know," she said, as they
paused beneath the last light bulb, "I think I'm going to love it here."
"It sure is a pretty place," Mr. Burke said.
"All those bluebirds! I think we should call it Maeterlinck's Planet, don't you?"
"Did
he
discover it? I thought it was a trader by the name of Schmidt who landed here first."
"I—I didn't mean it quite that way," Miss Mintz said. "But we could call it the Bluebird Planet. That
would be just as good."
"Sounds all right to me," Mr. Burke said. He raised his fingers to his lips, stifling a small burp. "Excuse
me, Miss Mintz," he said. "I guess I ate too much. But everything was so good I couldn't help it.... Well,
I've got to be getting shipside."
"Oh... Are you on duty, Mr. Burke?"
"We're short-handed, or I wouldn't be. Imagine a C.P.O. having to pull the first watch! But there's
nothing I can do except make the best of it. Good night, Miss Mintz." He started to turn away.
"You'll be with us for breakfast, won't you, Mr. Burke?" Miss Mintz said. "We're having bacon and
eggs."
"Eggs? Real
eggs, Miss Mintz? Not powdered, pulverized, condensed or synthetic?"
"Why of course real eggs!"
"Miss Mintz, you're a dream!" Mr. Burke said. "I could kiss you." For a moment Miss Mintz thought
he was going to, but he didn't. Instead he raised his blue kepi and executed an exaggerated bow. "I'll be
waiting at your doorstep. Good night, Miss Mintz."
"Good night, Mr. Burke." She watched him walk across the clearing toward the ship. The huge
Deneb 6 moon was rising behind her, infiltrating the forest with silver, turning the clearing into an argent
lake. The silvered ship was like a peaceful church steeple on a still summer's night on Earth, and Mr.
Burke was a lonely silver figure wading through silver-drenched grass. For a moment Miss Mintz could
hardly breathe. Abruptly she turned and ran like a high school girl up Little Main Street to her hut.
Betty Lou Faraday, one of her two hut mates, awakened her the following morning. "Miss Mintz!
Miss Mintz! Look! I've caught a bluebird!"
It was the second time in twenty-four hours that Miss Mintz could hardly believe her eyes. She
rubbed them to make sure that she was really e and not having another silly dream, but when she got
through rubbing them Betty Lou was still standing by her bed and the bluebird was still perched
charmingly on Betty Lou's forefinger. Its plumage was even bluer than Betty Lou's eyes.
"See, Miss Mintz? I'm going to build a cage for it with my Do-It-Yourself Kit!"
"Why, it's beautiful, Betty Lou. How did you catch it?"
"Oh, they're easy to catch, Miss Mintz. All you do is walk into the woods and they fly right up to
you. All the kids are out looking for them. Why don't
you
catch one, Miss Mintz? I'll build a cage for you
to keep it in."
Why not indeed! A bluebird would just match the way she felt. She heard her happiness singing
inside of her. "I think I will, Betty Lou," she said, getting up. "I —I've always wanted a bluebird..."
Miss Mintz had never seen so many birds. The woods were blue with them. And she had hardly
gone two steps before one of them—the bluest one of all, it seemed— flew right down from a leafy limb
and perched upon her shoulder. Miss Mintz trembled with excitement. She raised her forefinger to her
shoulder and the bluebird hopped daintily upon it, its tiny golden eyes twinkling in the sunlight.
And as though that were not enough, when she returned to her hut there was Mr. Burke waiting on
her doorstep just as he had promised."
 “Good morning, Miss Mintz," he said. "I see you've been joining the youngsters in bluebird hunting."
"Oh, I have, Mr. Eurke! Why, I never saw so many bluebirds!"
Betty Lou came out of the hut then with two plastic cages. One of them already had a blue occupant
and she exhibited it proudly. She gave the other cage to Miss Mintz. "Thank you, Betty Lou," Miss Mintz
said. She put her bluebird into the cage, secured the little door, and carried the cage into the hut and
placed it on top of her collapsible wardrobe. Then she returned to the street and walked with Mr. Burke
to the Deneb Six Cafe.
In every hut they passed, enthusiastic seniors, breakfast forgotten, were hard at work with their
Do-It-Yourself Kits fashioning plastic cages. Bluebirds were everywhere— perched on youthful
shoulders, on roof peaks, on door R sills; weaving ephemeral blue patterns in the sparkling summer air.
Miss Mintz shook her head in wonderment. "Are all the birds on Deneb 6 blue, Mr. Burke?" she
asked.
"I've heard they are," Mr. Burke said. "I've heard other things about them too. For instance, they're
hypersensitive: When you catch one and keep it, it reflects the way you feel—something like a dog, only
more so."
"Why I didn't know that, Mr. Burke. It's funny the guidebook doesn't say anything about it. The
guidebook doesn't even mention bluebirds."
"Guidebooks!" Mr. Burke said. "What the people who write guidebooks don't knew would fill a
thousand times as many books as they write! I'll bet your guidebook doesn't mention the Deneb 6
Exodus either."
"Why no, it doesn't," Miss Mintz said.
"About a thousand years ago—long before
we
had space travel—the original natives took off and
never came back. I don't mean all at once, of course, but over a period of three or four centuries.
They're scattered all over the galaxy now, I've read
.
They—"
"But why? Why did they leave, Mr. Burke?"
"Why?"
He stared at her. "Now that's a silly question if I ever heard one, Miss Mintz. Why wouldn't
they leave once they'd developed a technology that enabled them to? There's nothing here but trees, and
trees aren't good for anything any more. Everything's made of metal now, and there isn't a decent ore
deposit left on
the whole planet. And there's hardly an ounce of uranium either!"
"Oh..." Miss Mintz said.
They were at the entrance to the Deneb Six Cafe by then, and Mr. Burke sniffed the morning air.
"Bacon and eggs," he breathed. "Real, honest to God bacon and eggs! Miss Mintz, I love you!"
It was a purely hyperbolic remark of course, but it left Miss Mintz breathless just she same. She
could hardly speak all through breakfast, but then, speech wouldn't have been appropriate anyway, for
Mr. Burke was too preoccupied with his bacon and eggs. Miss Mintz was a little bit awed by his
appetite, but then of course you had to figure that the poor man had been eating ration tablets for at least
a third of his life, and anyway, six eggs wasn't such an awful lot for a robust man to put away. Lots of
people ate six eggs for breakfast. She'd have liked to see him eat twelve, for that matter: it made her
happy to be able to give something away. She'd never had much of anything to give before...
The meal over, she went out to the kitchen and got a handful of bread crumbs for her bluebird, then
she walked with Mr. Burke to the end of Little Main Street. "You'll have lunch with us, won't you, Mr.
Burke?"
"I'm afraid I'm taking advantage of you, Miss Mintz. I don't want to eat up
all
your food on you."
"Oh, don't worry about that. We've got p1enty more than we'll ever be able to get away with by
ourselves. And we're awfully glad to have you with us."
"Well, in that case, it would be sort of foolish for me to stay away, wouldn't it?" Mr. Burke smiled his
disarming smile, exposing his white, even teeth to the morning sunlight. He doffed his kepi in the charming
way he had, and executed his exaggerated little bow. "I'll be waiting at your doorstep," he said.
And he was. And he was waiting there again for dinner. Miss Mintz accompanied him part way back
to the ship that night. The full moon was rising—on Deneb 6 there was always a full moon; the guidebook
 had got that much right—and once again the ship seemed like a church steeple, all soft and silvered, the
forest like a tossed silver sea around it, the grass so drenched with silver that it splashed on your shoes
when you walked through it and splotched your legs with evanescent patterns ...
"Well, I've got to get ship-side, Miss Mintz. That watch again."
"You'll be with us for breakfast, won't you? We're having wheatcakes and sausage."
"Real, honest to God sausage?"
"Why of course real sausage. Don't you like sausage, Mr. Burke?"
"Do I like it? Miss Mintz, I love it! And I love you too!" He doffed his kepi and executed his bow.
"I'll be waiting at the usual corner of your doorstep. Good night, Miss Mintz."
"Good night, Mr. Burke."
THE next morning Miss Mintz couldn't get over how blue her bluebird was. It put Betty Lou's to
shame, and beside it Teresa Best's—her other hut mate—seemed positively lacklustre—as thin and
pinched and colorless as Teresa herself.
"Gosh, you found the bluest bird on the whole planet, Miss Mintz," Betty Lou said.
"I'll say," Teresa said. "What do you feed it, Miss Mintz?"
"A few bread crumbs from the kitchen is all," Miss Mintz said. "Birds don't require much food.''
"I feed mine bread crumbs too, but it doesn't seem to fill out. It looks like it's half starved."
"So does mine," Betty Lou said. . . "Are you coming to the Farewell Dance, Miss Mintz? We're
holding it in the Deneb Six Cafe."
"Why of course. I
have
to
be there."
"Oh, I didn't mean in your
official
capacity, Miss Mintz." Betty Lou lowered her blue eyes. "I
thought maybe you'd ask that handsome officer who eats with us."
Miss Mintz turned pink. "I—I never thought about that."
"I bet he'd like to come. Why don't you ask him?"
"Maybe I will," Miss Mintz said. She finished dressing and made her cot, her heart singing. It had
been years since she'd danced. Lonely years. Her breath caught in her throat. I wonder if he
would
come, she thought. I could wear
my
new white dress with the star and galaxy sequins. It's just decollete
enough for such an occasion, and it's really not
too
young for me.
The invitation trembled on her lips during breakfast and during lunch and during dinner; but it wasn't
until she was walking part way back to the ship with Mr. Burke that she found the courage to deliver it.
For a moment Mr. Burke was silent. "Of course I'd
like
to come, Miss Mintz," he said finally. "But
you see it's that first watch—"
"Oh..." Miss Mintz wilted in the moonlight. "I—I forgot all about that, Mr. Burke."
"We're so short handed it's pretty hard to get relief. ... I
could
ask someone to take my place for
awhile, though—long enough to drop in for a couple of dances. How would that be?"
"Oh, that'll be fine, Mr. Burke. I— We'll be ever so glad to have you."
"We'll leave it that way then... See you in the morning, Miss Mintz. The usual corner of your
doorstep."
"Good night, Mr. Burke."
The days flew by. The seniors fished, hunted, played tennis, baseball, badminton and scuffle; laughed
and sang; had ephemeral romances and brief broken hearts—
And one by one, their bluebirds sickened and died...
Miss Mintz couldn't understand it. If what Mr. Burke bad said was true, their bluebirds should have
been blue and beautiful with so much happiness to reflect, for she had never seen a happier bunch of kids
in all her life.
Morning was at seven in her own world, and all of her hillsides ware dew-pearled. Day after day,
before her shining eyes, Mr. Burke ate his way through roast beef, southern fried chicken, Virginia ham,
Venerian swamp duck, and Martian
pfall;
smiling his disarming smile and exposing his even white teeth,
doffing his kepi and showing his wavy brown hair, uttering his outlandish hyperboles and making his
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