McIlvaine sat down tohis machine, turnedthe complex knobs,and a message flamedacross the void.
Old Thaddeus McIlvaine discovered adark star and took it for his own. Thushe inherited a dark destiny—or did he?
"Call them what you like,"said Tex Harrigan. "Lostpeople or strayed, crackpots orwarped geniuses—I know enoughof them to fill an entire departmentof queer people. I've been a reporterlong enough to have run intoquite a few of them."
"For example?" I said, recognizingHarrigan's mellowness.
"Take Thaddeus McIlvaine,"said Harrigan.
"I never heard of him."
"I suppose not," said Harrigan."But I knew him. He was an eccentricold fellow who had a modestincome—enough to keep up hishobbies, which were three: heplayed cards and chess at a taverncalled Bixby's on North ClarkStreet; he was an amateur astronomer;and he had the fixed ideathat there was life somewhere outsidethis planet and that it waspossible to communicate with otherbeings—but unlike most others, hetried it constantly with the queermachinery he had rigged up.
"Well, now, this old fellow hada trio of cronies with whom heplayed on occasion down at Bixby's.He had no one else to confide in.He kept them up with his progressamong the stars and his communicationwith other life in the cosmosbeyond our own, and they made agreat joke out of it, from all Icould gather. I suppose, because hehad no one else to talk to, McIlvainetook it without complaint.Well, as I said, I never heard ofhim until one morning the cityeditor—it was old Bill Hendersonthen—called me in and said, 'Harrigan,we just got a lead on a fellownamed Thaddeus McIlvainewho claims to have discovered anew star. Amateur astronomer upNorth Clark. Find him and get astory.' So I set out to track himdown...."
It was a great moment for ThaddeusMcIlvaine. He sat downamong his friends almost portentously,adjusted his spectacles, andpeered over them in his usual manner,half way between a querulousoldster and a reproachful schoolmaster.
"I've done it," he said quietly.
"Aye, and what?" asked Alexandertestily.
"I discovered a new star."
"Oh," said Leopold flatly. "Acinder in your eye."
"It lies just off Arcturus," McIlvainewent on, "and it wouldappear to be coming closer."
"Give it my love," said Richardsonwith a wry smile. "Have younamed it yet? Or don't the discoverersof new stars name them anymore? McIlvaine's Star—that's agood name for it. Hard a port ofArcturus, with special displays onwindy nights."
McIlvaine only smiled. "It's adark star," he said presently. "Itdoesn't have light." He spoke almostapologetically, as if somehowhe had disappointed his friends."I'm going to try and communicatewith it."
"That's the ticket," said Alexander.
"Cut for deal," said Leopold.
That was how the news aboutMcIlvaine's Star was received byhis cronies. Afterward, after McIlvainehad dutifully played severalgames of euchre, Richardson conceivedthe idea of telephoning theGlobe to announce McIlvaine's discovery.
"The old fellow took himselfseriously," Harrigan wenton. "And yet he was so damnedmousy about it. I mean, you got theimpression that he had been tryingfor so long that now he hardly believedin his star himself any longer.But there it was. He had a long, detailedstory of its discovery, whichwas an accident, as those thingsusually are. They happen all thetime, and his story sounded convincingenough. Just the same