Asimov's SF, March 2007 by Issue 03 # March

Author:Issue 03 # March
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2011-07-10T14:00:55+00:00

DOCTOR MUFFET’S ISLAND by Brian Stableford

Brian Stableford’s recent works include the novel The New Faust at the Tragicomique and the anthology News from the Moon and Other French Scientific Romances, both from Black Coat Press. Routledge published his mammoth reference book Science Fact and Science Fiction: An Encyclopedia in 2006. One does not have to be familiar with the remarkable events that occurred in Brian’s tale about “The Plurality of Worlds” (August 2006), to follow the further exploits of Francis Drake and his adventures on…

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The island’s only hill was so shallow that it would have posed no challenge at all had it been a Devon moor, nor was its vegetation unduly thorny, but the thin-boled trees were parasitized by so many sticky vines that it was difficult for Francis Drake and Martin Lyle to climb it, even with the aid of a machete.

The island seemed to have little in the way of animal life except for birds, of which there were many brightly colored kinds, which seemed quite unintimidated by their visitors. Whenever Drake was not fully occupied in clearing a path he attempted to watch the birds more attentively, but the only result of his cursory study was a conviction that a few of the larger parrots were studying him with equal intensity. It was easy to imagine that the endless avian chattering was conversation.

When Drake and his young cousin finally got to the top of the rise it was necessary for the boy to climb a coconut palm with the captain’s best telescope clutched beneath his arm. Drake watched him anxiously, afraid for the instrument. It was one of John Dee’s finest, designed with the aid of the theory of optics Dee and Tom Digges had worked out in happier days and constructed by a lens-grinder from Strasbourg, who had fled to Protestant England to escape the gathering storm of the continental wars of religion. In theory, it was a capital offense for anyone outside the Queen’s Navy to possess a telescope, but Drake had long been an exception to that rule. The ethership fiasco had reduced his reputation as Queen Jane’s favorite privateer, but he ought to be able to recover his prestige if his present expedition went well.

As soon as Martin had attained an adequate height, Drake demanded to know whether the large island of which he desperately wanted news was visible. Its real existence was a point he desperately needed to prove, for the benefit of his belief in his own sanity.

Martin uncapped the telescope’s objective lens, and put it to his eye. “I can see two isles to the west, captain,” he reported. “The nearer is tiny, no bigger than this one, but the other—God’s blood!”

There had been a time when Drake’s automatic reaction would have been to warn the boy against taking the Lord’s name in vain, but they were in the middle of the mis-named Pacific Ocean now. Although Drake had prayed as fervently as he ever had in his life during

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