15 A short story — Patricia’s Flying Saucer.
AN ORDINARY LIFE OF A SEVENTY-PERCENTER
Interlude: A short story — Patricia’s Flying Saucer.
Sometime in the year 2000 I finally gave up the business of web page creation and hosting and closed down the Activeweb.co.za domain which Tim and I had started together. With more time for writing short stories, and looking for magazines to which to submit them, I came across a webzine called “Would That It Were …..” which was looking for science fiction in the style of H.G. Wells and other writers of his era. (If you enjoy science fiction, you will find the site on the web.) I wrote a story especially for it; the story was accepted and published — and I was paid $100 for it! Inspired, I wrote more sci-fi stories but with no further success. This one just happened to catch the publisher’s fancy. Here it is:
Patricia’s Flying Saucer
by H J Sutton.
She said she would land on my roof at seven-thirty. At seven-fifteen I took the ladder from the shed and set it up at the back of the house, climbed onto the flat section of the roof, and waited. The other guests weren’t due to arrive before 8 o’clock, and, anyway, my butler would let them in and serve them with a drink. It was quite dark at twenty five past seven, and the sky was filled with stars as I stared up into the air, waiting for Partricia to arrive, not knowing quite what to expect. She had said she would land on the roof, and I expected that she meant just that, because she was not one to make jokes like that.
I saw the light coming down towards me at about one minute before the scheduled time, and I watched it steadily as it descended and landed in front of me. A hatch door lifted up on the side, and Patricia appeared in the opening, elegantly dressed in her evening attire. I didn’t show any surprise as I took her hand and helped her down the steps that lowered onto the roof. We stood there for a while, me still holding her hand, as we both looked at the craft.
I can only describe it as an object like a saucer with its cup turned upside down on it. There were windows all round the saucer as well as round the dome, to give views all round, and upwards and downwards. Even as it sat there, it made a low-pitched whirring sound, like a water mill turning in the distance. The whole thing gave off a glow which illuminated the area of the roof where we were. I looked at Patricia enquiringly, and she gave a little smile.
“It’s called a flying saucer,” she said. “You can see why.”
I gave a slight nod, trying hard not to show the amazement that I felt.
“Is this something the Wright brothers have developed?” I asked. “I have heard that they are working on other flying machines now that they have successfully shown the possibilities at Kitty Hawk, with those machines with wings. But this one is different. They really have something good here.”
“No,” she said, with a little laugh, “It’s not the Wright brothers’ machine. This one landed in my back garden last week. I was in the house when I heard a strange humming sound, and the room was lighted up with a bluish glow. I looked out the back window and saw it there on the grass. The people were already getting out when I opened the kitchen door.”
“Not the Wright brothers, you say? Who else is working on flying machines?”
“Oh, many people,” she said, “but these were not really people like we know any. They were different, but yet not that different. Just different. You know.”
I half nodded to give her the impression that I understood perfectly, which was a lie, of course, because I was completely dumfounded by the whole episode.
“What did these men look like? I mean, what sort of colouring were they, and how tall?”
“Actually, they weren’t men,” Patricia replied. “They were women. They were generally shorter that I am, and they all had blue hair, and deep purple eyes.”
I stared at her with my mouth half open, and when she saw that I couldn’t get any words out, she looked back at the saucer and said: “They said I could use it for a while.”
This was getting really silly, so I ushered her towards the ladder and helped her down. In any case, the sound of hoof beats on the driveway announced that other guests were starting to arrive for the party. When we joined the others, Patricia straightaway mingled with them, greeting one here and another there, always with that most friendly, welcoming smile playing around her lips. She was a real gem, always so willing to play hostess alongside my rather clumsy host at any of my parties — which was almost regularly once a month. She was always elegant, but this night she was exceptionally alluring, as befits one who arrives at events in a flying saucer.
It was not until I managed to capture her for a dance well into the evening, that I was able to ask her more about her strange new means of transport. None of the others guessed that there was something immensely interesting parked on the roof, and I kept my composure so very well so as not to give any grounds for wonderment. Patricia, of course, just chatted, and smiled, and danced away as if it was the most normal thing in the world to come to a party flying in a cup and saucer.
“What do you mean they said you could use it for a while?”
“Just that,” she said. “After I had invited them inside and entertained them with a cup of tea and a sandwich, they showed me over the saucer, explained all the workings to me, and said: ‘Have a go. Fly it.’ I was a bit nervous, but they seemed so confident that I could do it, so I did. It is really very easy to fly — it responds to the movements of your body, but only when you intend it to. Lean to the left, and it goes to the left; raise your right arm upwards, and it moves upwards to the right; push back in your seat, and it slows down. It’s really very easy.”
“Where are they now? I mean the women who lent it to you?”
We were still moving slowly round the crowded dance floor, keeping good time to the strains of a Straus waltz which had come back into vogue since his recent death. I say ‘keeping good time’, because I was hardly concentrating at all on the dance, so preoccupied was I with this thing on my roof, but Patricia was calm as always, and easily kept control over our dancing, while still leaving the impression that I was leading as I should have been.
“They went away. A second saucer followed us down at the end of my trial flight, and the women climbed aboard, waved goodbye, and the machine took off in the direction of Venus. Since then, I’ve taken rides in the saucer, but only at night so that no one would see me. I don’t quite know what I would say if anyone asked me about it. But you’re okay,” she said, giving my arm a little squeeze. “But I don’t think you should mention it to anyone. I don’t think they would understand.”
Silently I agreed. Not even to my butler who normally is quite imperturbable.
At the close of the evening, both Patricia and I stood on the front steps to say goodnight to the departing guests as their carriages came up to the front for them to get in, and we waved to them as the horses clip-clopped with them out the front gate. Then Patricia and I had a last quiet drink together before I ushered her out the backdoor. The butler, who was busily straightening up and putting dirty glasses and plates neatly on the sink ready for the kitchen staff to wash up in the morning, gave us a glance as we passed through, but allowed nothing to register on his face. I didn’t quite work out what I would say to him when he saw me return alone — not that he would ask or say anything at all.
I climbed the ladder ahead of Patricia, and then turned to help her over the parapet onto the roof. She stopped beside me as I stood there for a long while just looking at this strange machine, taking in the detail of its smooth, pale grey hull and the white dome. Then, after a brief goodnight hug and kiss, she walked up to the saucer, the hatch lifted up, and the steps lowered to the roof — she had not said a word or done anything that I could see, the machine just acted of its own accord. Patricia waved from inside, the steps lifted, the hatch closed, and in a moment the saucer lifted from the roof and I watched it rise into the air in the direction from which it had come. I stood there for a long while puzzling over this thing, and then turned to the ladder. That was when I saw my butler gazing silently up at me. He reached out to steady the ladder as I descended, then picked up the ladder without a word and took it to the shed. When he brought me my pot of hot chocolate before retiring, he gave no indication that he had seen anything, even though I knew full well that he had watched the saucer lift from the roof. That is the man he is — I can trust him fully.
After that very interesting event, Patricia disappeared for seven days. She had not left word with her closest friends, and everyone was very concerned for her well-being. You will understand that I was extremely worried because I was probably the last person to see her, but I could say nothing as the whole episode would sound so very improbable. Yet there was no evidence of any foul play, she had simply dropped form view. My butler did look at me often with a slight enquiring look, but he said nothing — he wouldn’t if I didn’t raise it, and I didn’t. What could,I say even to him?
Then Patricia appeared again, as suddenly as she had disappeared. I heard the news, but didn’t have any opportunity to speak with her until several weeks later when we had another reception at my mansion. This time, she arrived as normal in her horseless carriage, she being, as you may have suspected, one of the very first people in our circle to acquire one, which she also drove herself. The other guests required her full attention, so I didn’t have much chance of conversation with her until we were dancing together once more.
“Where is the saucer?” I asked her as we twirled round the floor to the strains of The Blue Danube.
“The saucer?” she asked, drawing back from my arms to look me in the eyes. “What saucer?”
Just for a moment I thought she might be joking, but then I reminded myself that that was not very likely, because as I said before, Patricia wasn’t one to make jokes like that. But I was taken completely by surprise at her behaviour in response to my question.
“Last time,” I said, “You arrived for the party in a flying saucer. You remember? You landed on the roof.”
“On the roof?” She looked so genuinely surprised that I had to believe her, so I changed the subject.
We had a pleasant evening together, she and I, and we sat and chatted for a long time after the other guests had left. Then she gave me a hug and a goodnight kiss on the front step before she climbed into her automobile and drove off down the driveway.
When my butler brought me my pot of hot chocolate before retiring, I started to ask him, “Maxwell, last time Miss Coming was here, did you see her leave in the sau… ?” But I never finished the sentence because of the look on his face which told me that he wouldn’t want anyone to think he had seen a flying saucer, any more than I would.
The End.
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Copyright: H J Sutton, Cape Town, October 2000.
Words = 1948
