The Best of Argosy #2 - Minions on the Moon Read online

  Introduction to the Best of Argosy

  by Robert Weinberg

  Minions of the Moon — Argosy April 22, 1939

  by William Grey Beyer

  Greatest since Jules Verne! The incredible story of Mark Nevins who woke up in the year X2 — to become the protege of the Man on the Moon.

  Let ‘Em Eat Space — Argosy November 4, 1939

  by William Grey Beyer

  A deficiency in cosmic rays is causing a slowing in the human metabolism... and it’s up to Ham Eggles and Slim Winters to travel into deep space to get to the bottom of the mystery before mankind is eradicated.

  Radio Archives • 2014

  Copyright Page

  Copyright © 1939 by Popular Publications, Inc. Copyright renewed © 1967 and assigned to Argosy Communications, Inc. “Argosy” and its distinctive logo and symbolism and all related elements are trademarks and are the property of Argosy Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved. © 2014 RadioArchives.com. Reprinted and produced under license from Argosy Communications, Inc. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form.

  These pulp stories are a product of their time. The text is reprinted intact, unabridged, and may include ethnic and cultural stereotyping that was typical of the era.

  View all of our hundreds of exciting pulp eBooks at

  http://www.RadioArchives.com/SearchResults.asp?Cat=128

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  Introduction to The Best of Argosy

  By Robert Weinberg

  Perhaps the most profitable decision ever made in American magazine publishing was made by Frank A. Munsey in 1896. Munsey had started a magazine titled The Golden Argosy in 1882, aimed at the boy’s adventure audience. In 1888, he dropped the word Golden as he tried to move to an older audience. In 1894, Munsey began publishing The Argosy as a monthly magazine. Two years later, he made his big decision. Reasoning that his readership bought his magazine for the stories it contained and not the paper the magazine was printed upon, Munsey started publishing The Argosy on much cheaper pulp-wood paper instead of the slick white paper used by nearly all magazines. This bold move enabled him to drop the price of his all-fiction magazine from a quarter to a dime. Munsey’s reasoning proved correct and The Argosy magazine became one of the best selling publications in America.

  The earliest pulps grew out of the tradition of dime novels and boys' magazines, so were from the start tainted with a juvenile image. The first pulp was The Argosy published in New York by Frank A. Munsey. It had started as The Golden Argosy, a weekly boys' adventure magazine in dime novel format, in Dec. 1882. The title became The Argosy in Dec. 1888, trying to move away from the younger readership, and from Apr. 1894 it shifted to a monthly schedule, aimed at the same readership as Munsey's Magazine which Munsey had started in Feb. 1889. For two years The Argosy was similar to Munsey's, but in Oct. 1896 Munsey dropped the articles, making it the first all-fiction issue and, from Dec. 1896, the paper was all pulp.

  The goal of Argosy, (the The being dropped over the years) was to publish the best adventure and action fiction for men and boys. Not that women were neglected as there was plenty of romance mixed in with the danger. But, Argosy remained true to its purpose for well over a thousand issues, printing the top-of-the-line stories by the world’s greatest masters of exciting fiction.

  The purpose of this series, The Best of Argosy, is to make available to modern adventure fans some of the finest stories ever published in the 1920s and 1930s issues of Argosy. This period is considered, by most pulp magazine historians, the magazine’s greatest. While many of the tremendous tales from these eras have been reprinted in book and paperback format, many many others have been forgotten and never before been reprinted. The Best of Argosy will make available incredible stories by such writers as George F. Worts, William Grey Beyer, Arthur Leo Zagat, Ray Cummings, Borden Chase, and dozens of others. Fire up your ray gun, cinch your saddle, put your car into gear – it’s time to revisit the golden age of pulp adventure with The Best of Argosy!

  Robert Weinberg

  Minions of the Moon

  from the pages of Argosy April 22, 1939

  by William Grey Beyer

  Mark Nevin was a healthy young man whose appendix, of all prosaic things, led him into unbelievable adventure. For, Mark’s doctor had perfected a tremendously powerful anaesthetic, and after sleeping peacefully for twenty-two days, Mark slipped quietly into a state of suspended animation. He didn’t wake up until the Year A.D. X2, and the first thing he did was to make friends with the Man on the Moon and Miss America of the Day After Tomorrow.

  Chapter 1: The Unknown Years

  THERE seemed to be no rhyme or reason to anything, Mark reflected sleepily. In the first place, no such healthy specimen as he had any business with an inflamed vermiform appendix. And certainly there was no sense in old “Chisel-chin,” the physician, making him sign a bunch of papers giving authority to administer his new anaesthetic. He could have used it without asking permission, and nobody would have been the wiser. He hadn’t asked the consent of the guinea pig he had tried it on in the lab.

  Mark chuckled, half awake. It seemed to have worked, he decided, for here he was coming out of it, sans pain — which meant sans appendix.

  Something was wrong however, he mused, almost rousing himself to the task of lifting his eyelids. One thing that bothered him was a strong musty odor, one of the few not usually found in a hospital. Another annoyance was the hardness of his bed. He was almost convinced that he had been placed in some dungeon under the hospital, after the operation. Fine way to treat a paying guest!

  A sudden and confirming drop of water splashed on his forehead, snapping him completely awake. Somebody would hear about this, he vowed, opening his eyes. An impenetrable blackness was the reward of this effort.

  Attempting to rise, he received a jarring thump on the head and fell back. With a surge of panic he realized he was in a coffin! A questing hand had encountered nothing but hard, cold stone on all sides. His own breath, condensing on the lid of the coffin, had caused the drop of water!

  Buried alive! He fought to calm himself. The whole thing was probably a dream anyway — a result of the anaesthetic. People had such dreams when under the influence of ether. And besides, they didn’t use stone coffins any more...

  It had to be a dream. Yet why was he so lucid, and why did he feel that trickle of water advancing, inch by inch, down the side of his face? Sensations were never so clear in dreams.

  And how long had he lain there, assuming this were not all a figment of the imagination?

  Abruptly he stirred, pressing his elbows against the sides of the coffin. A swirling cloud of dust choked him. The cloth of his shroud had disintegrated, giving rise to the musty odor and the dust which he had disturbed. Centuries must have passed since the operation!

  With a burst of frenzy he pressed upward against the lid of his coffin. Quite unexpectedly it raised. A full foot of it extended past the hinges, effectively counterbalancing its great weight. He sat up.

  A LARGE, domed, stone vault met his surprised gaze. Two small windows admitted cheerful beams of sunlight. He shielded his eyes, stung by the sudden transition from complete darkness.

  Cautiously he climbed from the coffin, half fearful that his legs would crack or collapse under a weight they had not borne for many years. He was surprised and r
elieved to find that after stretching he seemed as well and strong as before the appendix trouble. A hasty examination disclosed that the incision had healed nicely and left but the thinnest of scars.

  And here was a strange situation, Mark decided. Instead of being alive and well, he should be quite defunct. It was only logical to expect his body to be in the same deplorable state as the grave clothes which fell in dust as he moved. His eyes chanced upon the hinged top of the coffin. Whoever had designed that counterbalanced lid had evidently expected it to be lifted from the inside. Most irregular indeed.

  A more thorough inspection of his surroundings revealed several additional irregularities. The vault, he noticed, looked more like a locker room than a tomb. Its walls were lined with shiny, stainless-steel cabinets, the doors of which were sealed with wax. There were so many of these that the only bare spaces were those occupied by the two small, paneless windows and a door.

  On impulse he strode toward the latter with the idea of seeing what the world looked like outside. He caught himself up short, however, when he saw his reflection in one of the shiny surfaces flanking the door.

  “That will never do,” he said aloud. “There just might be someone around who objects to nudism. Maybe I had better explore those lockers. Should be some clothes inside if my guess is right.”

  The sound reverberated hollowly inside the vault, causing him to shiver in spite of the warm breeze which was entering one of the windows. His eyes cast about for some implement with which to dig the hardened wax from the cabinet doors. He found what he sought — an ice pick of stainless steel, which would serve the purpose, nicely-hanging from a hook above one of the cabinets. With this discovery he found another thing he hadn’t seen before. The compartment beneath the ice pick was inscribed with the legend:

  OPEN THIS ONE FIRST.

  Mark obeyed the instructions without delay. Removing the wax turned out to be simple. Long strips of it rifted out of the cracks as he slid the pick around the edges of the door. When the last chunk had been pried loose, he stepped aside as he tugged on the door handle. The precaution was the result of a last-minute thought that he might be greeted by a cloud of the same kind of musty dust that he had stirred up in the coffin. Obviously time had passed — lots of it — since he had been placed in this tomb, and any ordinary fabrics in the cabinet might well be in the same condition as his grave raiment.

  HIS apprehensions proved to be groundless, however, for the cabinet contained a phonograph and a large rack full of records. Mark noticed that a record was already on the playing disk so he wound the machine and started it spinning. The welcome voice of old “Chisel-chin” with its nasal twang, blared forth from the horn:

  “At the present time, which is twenty-two years after the administration of the drug which placed you in a state of suspended animation, there is no discernible change in your body. The flesh is soft, the blood fluid; and X-ray photographs show all internal organs to be in perfect condition. Following the operation you remained unconscious for more than two weeks — quite sufficient time for the incision to heal — before gradually falling into the state of suspended animation in which your body now lies.

  “It is my belief that you may awaken some day, although every attempt of mine to bring you to life has failed. When this may occur there is no way of guessing. A hundred years may pass, or even a thousand. It is with this thought in mind that I have spent the last few years in preparing a resting place for your body which will survive the ravages of time, and stocking it with supplies which will enable you to live under any adverse conditions which may prevail.

  “I say this because in recent years the world has gone from one devastating conflict to another, and with no end in sight. There is every possibility that you will awaken to find a world of barbarism, in which mankind has fallen to a low state. This is only a guess, but I have provided you with weapons of the latest design with which to defend yourself.

  “There are also hunting rifles using cartridges of small caliber, but far higher in velocity than any in existence in your time. Your marksmanship will render these small bullets as effective as larger ones in the hands of a less experienced person.

  “Knowing this, I chose weapons of light caliber because of the smaller space needed to store a large quantity of ammunition. In the cabinets on the far wall, is enough to last a lifetime. It is interchangeable in side-arms and rifles except in the case of the tiny hand-machine-gun you will find. This weapon is to be used at close quarters — less than a hundred feet — and fires slugs smaller in size than the needle in this phonograph. They barely penetrate the skin at full range, but a person hit by one drops instantly. The tips of the needles are coated with a poison which causes instant coma, lasting several hours. Be careful how you handle them.

  “There are several cabinets filled with clothing of all kinds, made of the spun-glass fabric which has become popular in recent years. This cloth is durable and not apt to disintegrate with time, being of inorganic origin. Other compartments will reveal a supply of preserved foods in glass jars, quantities of distilled water — just in case you aren’t able to find natural water in the vicinity — and tools and implements of varied uses. The records in the rack may furnish you amusement, if you find yourself bored.

  “In stocking this vault, I have included everything a man might need to survive in a hostile environment. It is my sincere hope that the nations of the world will settle their difficulties and you will awake in a world of peace and progress, but from present indications it would seem that such is not to be. These cabinets you see about you are an old man’s best efforts to atone for a great wrong.

  “Goodbye and good luck, my boy.”

  FOR a long minute, Mark allowed the record to spin, after the voice had ceased, then bestirred himself to turn off the machine.

  “You did a good job, doc,” he said, addressing the phonograph. “But you forgot to mention just where the heck this tomb is situated. But I guess it doesn’t matter. I’ll see for myself.”

  Picking up the ice pick he started to chip away the wax which sealed the next cabinet. He was beginning to get thirsty and hoped to uncover some of the distilled water mentioned by the doctor. The task was barely started when a voice suddenly shouted in his ear: “North America!”

  Mark instinctively ducked and whirled to face the speaker. No one was there! He leaned weakly against the cabinet, bathed in cold perspiration, and wondered if his long sleep had affected his brain. Then, when there was no repetition of the astral voice, he resumed his chipping, muttering aloud. Abruptly he was interrupted again.

  “Stop mumbling, my fine-feathered corpse!” the voice scolded. “ ‘Tis not seeming. And besides, it’s a nasty way to treat a guest. If I were you I wouldn’t let my eyes pop out like that. Somebody might step on them.”

  Mark, by this time firmly convinced of his own insanity, decided to humor himself.

  “No self-respecting corpse would entertain an unattached voice in the privacy of his own tomb,” he stated, returning to his task. “You must bring your body when calling. It is one of the first rules of etiquette.”

  “The nerve of the cub!” the voice complained, talking to itself. “And me an old man when his ancestors were hanging by their tails. All right, you perambulating cadaver, here’s a body for you.”

  Chapter 2: If a Body Meet a Body

  MARK resignedly turned around to see what new trick his senses were going to play on him. There, balanced on one foot atop the coffin lid arms outstretched, in a pose that might have done credit to an aesthetic dancer — a slightly cracked one — was a well-muscled masculine figure, gazing with a silly expression at the ceiling. Mark walked around the apparition and examined it critically. No, really; this was going too far.

  “Look here. That won’t do,” he said firmly. “You’ll have to get another. That’s mine you’re wearing now.”

  The figure floated gently down, seated itself on the edge of the coffin, and assumed the attitude
of Rodin’s Thinker.

  “You humans are the most specialized sort of beings I’ve ever encountered,” he marveled. “I’ve been studying your race since early Grecian times, and I’ve never seen two exactly alike. For instance, I remember a man who used to write poetry in a Scotch dialect, and he bemoaned the fact that a person never could see himself as others saw him. And here I give you the opportunity to do that very thing, and you complain.”

  “Nobody ever saw me in a pose like the one you were just in. You’re what I would call a phony facsimile. You look like me, but you don’t act like me. Say, don’t you have a body of your own?”

  “Alas, no,” the phantom admitted sadly. “I once had a beautiful body, too. Eight legs, three pairs of the most gracefully undulating tentacles you ever saw, and a chitinous armor which was my special pride and joy.”

  Mark clucked his tongue in sympathy. “Must have broken your heart to part with it, old man. But it seems to me it must have looked like a spider, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

  Mark’s facsimile jumped to his feet, and struck a calculatedly bellicose pose. It muttered angrily and glared. “I don’t like the way you said that. Take it back?” he challenged. Then suddenly changing his mind, sat down and fell back into the Thinker attitude. “As a matter of fact, my race did resemble the arachnids, though we had none of their objectionable habits. Then too, we had six tentacles, far more efficient members than anything owned by a spider — or a man either, for that matter. We could do things a man wouldn’t even attempt with his silly hands and their stiff-jointed fingers.”

  Now it was Mark’s turn to be angry. “Don’t be absurd. If you ever saw anybody play a piano, you wouldn’t talk about stiff fingers. Why, I’ve seen — oh, I don’t know why I’m arguing with you. You’re only a figment of my imagination. I’m going to find something to drink.”