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“It is evident that the Midianites are engaged in a war of attrition. They mean to conquer us. They mean to have Bronson Beta for themselves—or at least to insure that all human beings upon the planet will be governed by them and will live by their precepts. And Lady Cynthia has left no doubt in our minds about their desire for our women. They need what they call ‘breeding females.’ I think that ‘need’ in itself would be sufficient to cause every man and woman here to fight to the death.
“Yes, we could and should be happy here now. But—
“More than three hundred Englishmen and Englishwomen are living in subjugation, and we are unable to set them free. They are our own blood and kin. They are living under conditions at best odious, at worst horrible to them. We cannot be happy while they are virtually slaves.
“And also—Bronson Beta moves ever into cold. Bitter cold! Sixty days ago the surface of the planet was chilly. Then, for a while, it warmed again, so that we enjoyed a long fall or Indian summer. But now the chill is returning. Our seasons are due not to an inclination of our axis, as on earth, but to our eccentric orbit. The earth in winter was actually nearer to the sun than in the summer, but in winter the earth’s axis caused the sun’s rays to fall obliquely. Here on Bronson Beta we move from a point close to the orbit of Venus to a point near that of Mars—and the change in distance from the sun will bring extremes of temperature.
“That is not all. That is not the only problem—anxious problem—which faces us in these autumn days. Shall we turn back toward the sun? Our scientists say so; but shall we? This planet has not done it yet. Its specialty seems to be a drift out into space.
“Our astrophysicists and mathematicians burn their lights far into the night of this new planet in order to anticipate the possibilities in our state. They are not romantic men.
“Meanwhile as we move out into space toward Mars, that red world increases in size and brilliance. Already it is a more vivid body than was Venus from the earth, and its color is malevolent and ominous.
“So the days and nights pass.
“Yes, our colony is returning to the happy human pursuits of love and knowledge and social relationships. But we are surrounded by mysteries, terrors, spies within our city, enemies who would conquer us; and always the red planet draws nearer—as not long ago the two bodies from cosmos drew toward the condemned and terrified earth.”
As Eliot James finished that entry in his diary, he was interrupted by a knock on his door.
“Come in!” he called.
Shirley Cotton entered. She said something that sounded like “Hopayiato!”
“Hopayiato yourself,” Eliot James answered.
“That’s a Bronson Beta word,” she said. “It means, ‘How the devil are you?’—or something like that.”
“Sit,” said the writer. “I’m fine. What’s news?”
Shirley grinned. “Want a nice mauve-and-yellow shirt? Want a pair of red-and-silver shorts?”
“Any rags? Any old iron? What’s the trouble? Your clothing-department running out of orders?”
“Nope. And when we do, we’ll revive fashions—so you’ll have to patronize Shirley Cotton’s mills, whether you want to or not.”
“My God,” said James with mock anger, “you’d think that after managing to abolish styles for a couple of years, people would be glad enough to give them up forever!”
She shook her head. “This year we’re going in for light clothing with animal designs. Next year I plan flowers. Higgins is going to present some patterns—”
“He never will, I trust.”
“I’ll bribe him with a waistcoat in Bronson Beta orchids and mushrooms. By the way—how long have you been sitting in this cramped hole?”
“All morning. Why?”
“Then you haven’t heard about the green rain.”
James looked at her with surprise. “Green rain?”
“Sure. Outdoors. Didn’t amount to anything—but for about ten minutes it rained green.”
“I’ll be damned! What was it?”
Shirley shrugged. “Search me. A green sky is bad enough. But a green rain—well, anything can happen. Higgins has bottles full of whatever it was—more like snow than rain—only not frozen. It misted the dome a little. And then—you probably haven’t heard the rumor about Von Beitz that was going around.”
“News?”
“Not news. A rumor. Scandal, I’d call it. People have been saying this morning that the spies hiding here are undoubtedly from the Midianite gang. Some of them are Germans. Von Beitz was a German. So they say that he wasn’t kidnaped, but that he had always belonged to them, and merely joined them at the first opportunity.”
