Chapter 7

“I never mentioned it, I admit, yes. Sorry, Frances.”

“You can ask him later. What was that you said about someone ‘not telling you about it’?

“Oh, that was the rocky lump in the outer field. Something nasty happened to one of their instruments, and they put it down to something the rock did, or may have done; no proof. Sounds a daft conclusion, but the result is that they are calling off their investigations there, on the basis of zero results.”

“Daft conclusion,” snorted Frances in derision. “No results is still a result in itself. A nil return can be just as useful as a positive return, for example whether something is poisonous. Not very scientific, are they?”

“I think it is a case of not knowing what they are finding, and so wanting to be shot of it altogether. It saves face for them, to say that continuing might be dangerous to them and their equipment. They have nothing to gain from persisting, so they are taking the easy way out. Can’t say I blame them due to what they have to work with: mysteries.”

“Okay, but don’t phone him back right away. Give him a couple of hours respite from you, and then you can phone him. In the meantime, come and view our most recent room decoration. I think you’ll like it. The girls are putting the finishing touches to the window frames.”

The rest of the day was devoted to decoration, as the girls used Reg as an extra pair of hands, to steady someone on a ladder, hold a paint pot for the brush wielder, or merely casting his eye over a newly painted section of wall to point out a spot where the paint layer was too thin. He found it surprising how often each had to come close and brush her breasts against him, or ‘accidentally’ run her hand over his crotch.

It got to the point where he had to invite one or other wife to come to his room and bed for a short naked escapade. One invitee, Erika, turned him down. “No Reg, I have to get to the food preparation for our stew. Now, you like dough balls, don’t you?”

“Hmm ... yes, I like them, Erika my love. Do you want me to come and mix the dough?”

“Gosh, no. I can do that myself; us girls can do practically anything we put our hands to. It is men who are clueless until they are trained. Frances says you keep forgetting to ask things in your phone calls.”

“Well, you three trained me well, back on Earth. You made me the sociable person I am today. Unfortunately you did not train me in remembering what to cover in phone calls!”

“And we made you the father you are today: Nine wives and eight babies, plus two teenage daughters. Not bad going for a loner, eh?”

“Yes. Quite a change, I agree. You still enjoying being a mum?”

“Yep. It grows on you after a while. When you have a baby boy to love, everything else seems so much less important around you. I must get you to change him at times. When he needs to piss with his nappy off, he shoots a fountain upwards as he lies on his back, so you have to be quick with another diaper to catch it all, or it ends up on the floor.”

“I see,” said Reg. “Fair enough; give me a shout when you want me to do that task. Gerald is my son, so I have to be able to deal with his pissing shower!”

“Now that we have that settled, it is the kitchen for me. Sandra knows I’ll be busy, so she will get one of the others to feed Gerald if he gets hungry. There are plenty of milk-filled breasts available.”

“Okay, I’ll go back and see if I can give some more help with the decoration.”

Reg’s phone rang a little later. He stopped what he was doing to step outside the bedroom and answer it.

As soon as he said his name, the voice said, “We have contacted the Governor about a signal we received from the location of the object. The signal was non-directional, did not give us any information, and the Governor says his research team have removed themselves from the object.”

“Yes, the Governor told me that they had decided to discontinue the research on the grounds of danger to them and or their equipment.”

“Interesting data, that. You were told nothing specific?”

“Nothing. By the sound of it, neither has the Governor. It was just deemed too dangerous to continue. Do you think I will be in danger if I approach it with your gear?”

“Our calculations are not clear enough to be specific, but we calculate that you will be safe if you follow our instructions. We want you to attach the sensor leads at two points, WITHOUT switching on the equipment, and retire to the distance allowed by the sensor cables. We prepared for extra tolerance, so the cables will allow you to be four metres from the object at the time you finally switch on the equipment. Once you have done that, we will operate the equipment, for we will be linked directly to it, so you can move back another fifty metres. You should be safe there until we say what we have found and what you should do then.”

Reg tentatively ventured, “That sounds like you were prepared for adverse results before you even asked me to take the equipment to the site.”

“To us, it was simpler to have a human carry the measuring equipment to the site and attach the leads. It would be imprudent to have a Landership arrive and deploy a mechanical device to do the same thing. Such a landing might frighten people in the general vicinity. Your farm is not very far from the city.”

“Excuses, excuses! I see your argument, even if I think it is over-protective of yourselves. You do not believe the object is explosive?”

“Not in your terms, that of a chemical explosive. There might be a powerful electronic signal; what you would call an electromagnetic pulse, if the object has access to some electrical power source greater than what has appeared so far.”

“Like a nuclear bomb’s EMP when it explodes?”

“Yes. Something of that nature, although there is no nuclear weapon involved. We would have sensed it if there was a nuclear source present.”

“So what kind of electronic pulse do you expect?”

“That we do not know. It is what the equipment is designed to determine.”

“Talking about designing, do you know what a hay baler is like? They normally produce short extremely thick cylinders of hay.”

“Balers? Towed behind a tractor?”

“That’s it. Would you be able to redesign such machines to produce bales that were flat and not very thick, say fifteen or twenty millimetres, such that the hay bale could be used for house insulation inside the exterior walls?”

“Possibly. How thick should the bale be at a minimum?”

“I was thinking about fifteen centimetres for a bale of about a metre square. The exact dimensions chosen can be slightly variable, but will need to be consistent in output so that an entire wall can be covered with hay insulation without gaps between the bales in any direction.”

“Give us time to check available specifications for the tractors and balers, then we will start looking at possible designs to produce the type of bale you require. Are you going to use these bales yourself?”

“Probably not, if our new house manages to cope with winter on Rehome. At this latitude, we shouldn’t get very cold in the winter. The new bales will be for houses built with local stone, rather than the complete house kit you supplied us with. The farther north the house, the more insulation it will need for the winter period. A double thickness might be needed for extra insulation in some cases.

New houses in this latitude can still use kits, but exterior walls and wall insulation will not be part of that proposed supply if winter conditions are as expected.”

The Personalia voice said, “Then I presume we do not have to alter our house kit list until after the hay insulation is available? The present insulation is expanded polystyrene, so it would make sense to convert to the new hay bales to do the same task.”

“Quite so. This is all at an early stage, but there is nothing to stop you redesigning a baler to produce bales for insulation panels. We also wondered whether you Personalia would wish to finance and build a factory for wire wheels as I described before? If so, then perhaps you might also finance and build a factory for making the new baler machines with wire wheels; or even just the wire wheels? Again, the idea is to build the factory on Rehome and sell the product to Earth as well as Rehome markets.”

The Personalia suggested, “On the other hand, we could sell the right to build the wheels and balers to a company on Earth; and they could build their own and sell them or their own variants. We anticipate a good market for the wire wheels for everything from farm tractors to quad motorbikes. Long-haul road vehicles may be another market for the wheels, as some of these vehicles deliver up unpaved roads in rural areas.”

Reginald replied, “If you can see good markets, then I am happy to have you go for it. Please discuss the Rehome factory option with Governor Kempe, as he has the final say on development on Rehome.”

“Very well. In return we ask you to proceed to the object and connect our instrument to it as we have instructed.”

“Understood. I will get to that task tomorrow,” said Reginald.

Morning was not a good time for Reginald, though it was usually a happy time as one or more of his wives demanded his sexual attention. He also had one or two of his children in his arms for a loving cuddle when he was not otherwise occupied, but at last he got time to speak to the Governor about the bank account.

Governor Kempe, once free to speak with Reginald, was conciliatory. “Oh, yes, that account. It appears that John was bending the rules a little. He has an account for his fencing business, and all his income goes into that account, until his income approaches the limit we have set. At that point, all new income goes into the second account, and that account is apparently set up as a notional next year’s business account.

In theory, he was anticipating next year’s business plan, but inevitably he would quickly be filling up that year’s allocation income limit, so it is similar to the old-style pyramid selling scheme: after a while, the whole scheme collapses, if it is continued. I have instructed him to sell off part of his business to another owner for the second person to compete with him for business; on a similar basis to the breakup of Standard Oil in the USA in 1911: preventing a monopoly. Does that satisfy you, Mr Robertson?”

“Yes, Governor. My payments for the fencing are not being siphoned off to a criminal element; that is what my original concern was. No doubt it will take time for this part of his business to be hived off to a new owner.”

“That is the position as it stands, Reginald. The work will continue as before, but ownership of your part of the business will move to a new operator in due course. We will be observing closely as this happens. It will also guide our decisions regarding other business startups.”

Reginald told him, “Talking of startups, Governor, I have suggested to The Personalia that they might desire to set up a company to design and produce, firstly, new wire wheels for coping with rough ground on Rehome, and secondly a new design of a hay baler that will produce bales of a size and shape measured to becoming house insulation in future. Our idea is to encourage more locally-built houses using local stone walls, end eventually slate roofing, with compressed hay insulation for the walls between the stone exterior and a wooden interior wall. The interior house construction might remain much as before with house kits coming from Earth. We would suggest, if not already in hand, that you encourage the production of gypsum and cement products; especially cement, as concrete is a much used material everywhere. Gypsum is the centre filling of wallboards, which are in common use in housing.”

Governor Kempe replied, “The subject of gypsum for wallboards has come up previously, but our geologists have still to source a satisfactory local supply. I must ask The Personalia if they are able to identify a possible gypsum quarry site from orbit, but that may not be possible. Cement is seen as a more technical and so more long-term resource to exploit.”

Reginald was not so sure. “The trouble with that approach, sir, is that cement is used for every house we build, to put in the foundations for the building. The same applies to almost every building erected on the planet, so delays simply mean more costs in buying it from Earth. The sooner we can be making cement the better, if your aim of self-sufficiency is to be achieved.”

“A point well made, Reginald. I will refer it to my economics team. Have you done your own checks of that object in your field?”

“No sir, I have been too busy; but I hope to get started on that tomorrow.”

“Let me know what you find. It may have repercussions for all of us on Rehome.”

With all the pressure building up, Reginald set off early next morning for the distant field, but his wives insisted that one of them come along to observe from a distance and make sure Reginald remained safe. He knew when to defer to his wives, and this was one of these times. Frances took on the task as the one most likely to make Reg listen to sense.

Once Reg had got out the equipment sent to him, they travelled by tractor to the field, where Reg made a preliminary reconnaissance from a higher point, where he could see into the hole. It looked much as he had left it, but slightly more exposed. It appeared larger than before, but there was no apparent surface difference; nothing more exposed. The excavated clay soil looked almost off-white in colour.

Reg returned to the tractor and drove it down to beside the hole. He unloaded the Personalia-supplied gear and laid it on the trampled ground, evidence of several days of men trying their best to reveal its secrets, but unsuccessfully.

Reg pulled out the cables of the attachments, to establish the length of the leads relative to the tractor. He reckoned that the equipment had to be closer, so carried the metal unit to within the estimated maximum length of cable, then carried the cables loosely over towards the hole. Once there he dropped them and made a visual measurement of the distance to make the attachments. The distance seemed to be about right for the linkage, so he checked that the power switch on the unit was in the ‘off’ position before he stepped into the hole. Frances watched anxiously from the tractor, ready to drive it off the moment her husband was able to retire from the object.

Reg stepped down and walked a few paces to the bulky object to check where he could attach the connectors. There appeared to be an open spot where a metal skin had been peeled back, as described by the Personalia, so that was where the clips were to be fixed. He peered closer and selected both ends of what appeared to be a line of what was vaguely like a long motherboard. Having done that, he simultaneously attached both clips and stood back, afraid there might be an adverse reaction, but nothing happened. The object remained as before; a static lump.

Relieved, he clambered out and back to the metal box on the ground. Getting there, he got out his phone and pressed the icon for The Personalia. The voice answered, “Yes, Reginald Robertson?”

“I am calling to tell you I have made the connections to the object in the field. I connected the clips to both ends of what seemed to me like a motherboard. Is that what you wanted? I have not switched on your equipment yet.”

The voice responded, “That may be satisfactory, Reginald Robertson. We will know better once you switch on, for the unit will connect to us in orbit. We always have one of in line of sight of that target. You may proceed to switch on the unit, then remove yourself to the prescribed distance. Keep your phone connection open, for we may have to advise you further on any adjustment that might be required.”

Obeying these instructions, Reg looked up towards Frances and said, “Prepare to drive away the moment I am aboard, love.”

Having said that, he got to his feet, ready to move away, then leaned down to switch on the power of the unit. Immediately he ran to the tractor and climbed in. Frances was at the wheel, ready to move off, and the moment Reg was on board, she had it moving away with alacrity. Reg hung on to the framework, still not inside the cab, but glad to be moving away. He need not have been worried, because the power button had a timed delay before activation. The tractor was at least as far as dictated before the power came on and the cables became live, ready to feed back anything they could detect from the object.