Virtuellt samma fråga publicerades i BookSleuth Forum på AbeBooks.com, förutom att den något vilseledande "månen" ersattes av "på a moon":
I remember it took place on a moon. There was something siren like luring people out of the station and onto the surface. I remember the ending - the narrator was back on earth but at night would still feel the pull of the "siren" call he barely escaped.
Shane V2
Andy Phillips identifierade den på AbeBooks.com som "The Little Drummer Boy of Phobos" genom Glenn Chandler , och frågaren accepterade denna identifiering, även om berättelsen inte matchar beskrivningen perfekt . Lunarbasen är en enmans radiostation på Marsmånen Phobos:
Harry Bludgeon was the regular radio beacon operator on Phobos. He was a likeable fellow with a slack jaw and a droll sense of humour, and a temperament fitting him to the loneliest job on Mars. For a month at a stretch he'd be alone up there, manning a desolate little outpost on the Martian satellite.
Allt jag kommer ihåg är att det finns en "siren" som en effekt som lockar människor från en månbas till ytan
Berättaren, en psykiater på Mars, har en session med Harry Bludgeon:
'It always starts with the roll of a drum,' he began. 'The first time I heard it, I thought it was coming over the radio. Like a tattoo being beaten out, rhythmic, like sticks on a skin. Then I realized it wasn't coming from the radio, but from outside the station altogether. From the surface of Phobos.'
'Hang on,' I interrupted. 'There's no atmosphere on Phobos. Sound can't travel.'
'I know that. But I swear, the drum roll came from outside the hut. I looked out of the window, beyond the dome, and I saw this—this boy—walking across the bare rock. He was dressed rather like a soldier about the time of the battle of Waterloo. I know that because I had to study historical costumes for the space opera I'm writing. Anyway, he had this tunic on, and a sash crossing his chest, and a hat shaped like a pork pie, and—and a drum.'
[. . .]
'He wanted to summon me.'
'And did you go to him?'
'Not the first time. Not the second either, nor the third. But the fourth time he appeared he stayed so long I thought he was never going to go away. He just stood there for hours, beating that infernal drum. Rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat-tat. That's how it went. Never changing. I decided I couldn't stand any more of it and put on my outside gear. I had it in my head he would go away if I tried to touch him.'
där de dör. Det är en man som tittar på det här på basen, han lyckas knappt att dra sig ur samtalet och förlorar en vän / kollega till det.
Tja, nej. Ingen dör utom [SPOILER] den "lilla trummiskillen" som faktiskt är SPOILER, en utlänning, kanske en miljon år gammal flykting från den femte planeten, vars uppbrytning resulterade i asteroiderna. Efter att ha behandlat två patienter med samma "hallucination" (och hörseltal av andra observationer), går vår psykiater ut till Phobos för att se sig själv, finner "trummisen" och oavsiktligt dödar den, även om han inte känner till det ännu :
'Come back,' I yelled.
There was a cleft in the rock some distance away. He disappeared through it and I was about to follow him when I noticed that my oxygen supply was short. With the drumsticks in my hand, I returned to the radio hut. The great russet crescent of Mars was rising in the sky, pinched at the cusps by winter ice caps and pitted with channels.
'What happened?' asked Harry, once I was safely inside.
'Don't ask. I couldn't tell you.' I clambered out of the suit. 'Here are the drumsticks. What do you make of them, Harry?"
He took them from me. Together we gazed at them, tangible evidence that what we had seen was real. And shortly afterwards, after a search of the Phobian rock which revealed nothing—no drummer boy at all—I returned to Mars.
I slutet är han tillbaka på jorden och pratar om hur han fortfarande känner det oundvikliga draget i detta sirensamtal trots att han nu är tillbaka på jorden.
Han går tillbaka till jorden, skrattade ur sitt jobb på Mars när han berättar sin historia och de främmande "trummorna" förloras. År senare:
Twelve years elapsed before I discovered the uncomfortable and rather tragic truth. It hit all the terrestrial papers like a storm. During mining operations on Phobos, a cavern was discovered, believed to have been hollowed out of the rock over a million years earlier. At the end of this artifact lay the body of a boy, aged about sixteen, judging by his external appearance. He wasn't a terrestrial. Far from it. Despite his human shape he had a respiratory system the likes of which had astrobiologists in a frenzy.
Vad vår berättare känner på jorden är inte ett "sirensamtal" så mycket som skuld:
I'm not altogether sure what I can do now. Penitence doesn't seem nearly enough. Every night I go to bed, I try to say sorry to that thing up on Phobos, but every night, about three o'clock, I wake up with a persistent, almost vengeful, drumming in my ears.
Rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat-tat.
The poor alien only wanted to make friends.
Jag är ganska säker på att den här historien var i en antologi
Såvitt ISFDB vet, har denna historia dykt upp endast i 1980-antologin Utrymme 6 redigerad av Richard Davis