The Planetoid of Amazement. Mel Gilden

old science-fiction movies, they also knew that telling aliens the location of your home planet was generally a bad idea. Rodney couldn’t change the fact that the aliens were here, but he didn’t have to help them. At least not till he knew their intentions. Feeling like some kind of spy, he handed the postcard and the paper and the magnifier back to Drum and said suspiciously, “You figured out the location of the Earth and its sun from this?”

      “Well, actually not us alone. The Starship Club helped us read the instructions.” Drum opened her arms wide and cried, “Grubber just wanted to drop in and say hello.”

      “Well,” said Grubber with self-importance, “we’re here on business too.”

      Rodney folded his arms and said, “What sort of business?”

      Grubber held up his hand, and from his utility belt he pulled something that might have been a timepiece. On it, Mobambi numbers changed rapidly. He used more clear jelly to remove Rodney’s blue sticker. “Can you still understand me?” he asked.

      Still suspicious, Rodney said, “I understand the words.”

      “Can’t ask for better than that.”

      Rodney disagreed, but he said, “That blue sticker didn’t take long to work. Is the yellow sticker that fast?”

      “Give or take a few minutes,” Drum said.

      So Rodney had suffered the humiliation of wearing that sticker to school for no reason. He’d evidently been able to read that first envelope almost immedi­ately, though he hadn’t actually discovered what the sticker had done to him till the mail came the following day. Of course, he hadn’t had any of that handy jelly, so maybe none of this mattered after all. He said “You still didn’t tell me what your business here is.”

      “Absolutely right, kid.” Like a carnival barker, Grubber pointed his finger in the air and declaimed, “The House of Amazement is a museum where people come to see artifacts from all across the gal­axy.” Grubber became more enthusiastic. “One can see flying objects, both identified and un. Probes, of course. We’ve got your satellites, your space suits and armor, your ray guns, your antimatter torpedoes, and your hyperdrives.”

      “Many of the things are so alien,” Drum admitted, “we don’t know what they are.”

      “And so?” said Rodney, waiting for the big revela­tion.

      “And so,” Grubber Young said as he shook the postcard of the Statue of Liberty in the air, “we came to pick up a few souvenirs.”