The children with their yellow hair hollered at the deep dome of Martian sky. There

was no answer but the racing hiss of wind through the stiff grass. He picked up the

luggage in his cold hands. “Here we go,” he said—a man standing on the edge of a sea,

ready to wade in and be drowned. They walked into town.

“This is Mars. It was meant for Martians. For heaven’s sake, Cora, let’s buy tickets for

home!” But she only shook her head. “One day the atom bomb will fix Earth. Then we’ll

be safe here.”

There were little, very dim flecks of new gold captured in the blue of his eyes. “Now

“Cora, these blossoms!” She handled them. “Do you see? They’re different. They’ve

changed! They're not peach blossoms any more!” “Look all right to me,” she said.

“They’re not. They’re wrong! I can’t tell how. An extra petal, a leaf, something, the color,

the smell!”

”Laura stumbled through the settlement, crying. She dashed blindly on to the porch.

“Mother, Father—the war, Earth!” she sobbed. “A radio flash just came. Atom bombs hit

New York! All the space rockets blown up. No more rockets to Mars, ever!” “Oh, Harry!”

The mother held on to her husband and daughter.

They stared at him. “Sam,” he said to one of them. “Yes, Harry?” “Will you help me

build a rocket?” “Harry, I got a whole load of metal and some blueprints. You want to

work in my metal shop on a rocket, you’re welcome. I’ll sell you that metal for five

hundred dollars. You should be able to construct a right pretty rocket, if you work alone,

in about thirty years.” Everyone laughed.

His wife took him aside a few days later. “Harry, I’ve used up all the food in the

Deepfreeze. There’s nothing left. I’ll have to make sandwiches using food grown on

Mars.” He sat down heavily. “You must eat,” she said. “You’re weak.”

But as he worked that night, the thought of the cool blue marble villa entered his mind.

As the hours passed, the rocket seemed less important. In the flow of days and weeks, the

rocket receded and dwindled. The old fever was gone. It frightened him to think he had

let it slip this way. But somehow the heat, the air, the working conditions--

They stopped and ate meat sandwiches. He saw their skin baking brown. And he saw

the yellow eyes of his wife and his children, their eyes that were never yellow before. A

few tremblings shook him, but were carried off in waves of pleasant heat as he lay in the

sun. He was too tired to be afraid.

“We must get away,” said Bittering. “We’ll eat this stuff and then we’ll change—who

knows to what? I can’t let it happen. There’s only one thing to do. Burn this food!” “It’s

not poisoned.” “But it is. Subtly, very subtly. A little bit. A very little bit. We mustn't

touch it.”

A strange word emerged from Mr. Bittering’s lips. “Iorrt. Iorrt.” He repeated it. It was

a Martian word. He knew no Martian. In the middle of the night he arose and dialed a call

through to Simpson, the archaeologist. “Simpson, what does the word Iortt mean?” “Why

that’s the old Martian word for our planet Earth.”