Thundering back they came across cold space--eyes
aching for remembered vistas, nostrils flaring
for sweet fresh air, feet itching to tread on
precious soil. They stepped down--into a wasted
lifeless horror! Eying each other in despair, they
wondered. Must they--_could_ they--colonize
an alien world they once called HOME?
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories Fall 1947.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
"Earth!" said Matthew Magoffin happily. "Good old Terra. Sounds
wonderful, doesn't it?" Elbows on table, he sat listening to the
specially-beamed broadcast from Earth. Half a dozen other members of
the first expedition to Mars were also in the messroom of the _Argus_.
"What's first on your program when we land, Lynn?"
They had been out two and a half years, and it was a subject of which
they never wearied.
Lynn said, "A bath--a real one. Not out of a tea cup." She was the
expedition's photographer and reporter, a small blonde with a soft
triangular face.
The music stopped in the middle of a bar. An announcer's voice broke in.
"_We interrupt this program to bring you a news flash from the Union of
South America._"
Everyone stopped talking in the messroom of the spaceship.
"_The plague area in the Andean region is spreading out of control.
Disease characterized by minute black spots that appear all over the
body from head to foot. The spots are accompanied by a high fever and
followed in two to three hours by death._"
"Whew!" said Matt to the company at large. "What a disagreeable way to
die! Wonder what causes it?"
As if in answer to his question, the announcer on Earth said, "_To
date, the germ has not been isolated. And all attempts to curb the
spread of the disease have proved futile._
"_The Pan-American League is meeting now in Lima to consider
segregating the entire Andean area where the plague is raging_...."
There was an interruption. Everyone in the messroom was tense,
conscious of blurred background noises in the far away studio toward
which they were flashing.
"_Here's a special bulletin!_" The announcer's voice sounded frightened
and excited. "_Marseilles, Liverpool, Hong Kong and San Francisco
report_...."
The speaker went dead.
Matt Magoffin found himself holding his breath, waiting for the news to
come back on. But it never did.
After a minute's silence, he leaped to his feet. "Damn that operator!
I'm going to see what's wrong."
He started for the starboard passage, a babble of voices breaking out
behind him. Matt was a stocky, powerfully built man in his thirties,
the expedition's palaeobotanist. He reached the starboard ladder, ran
up to the control deck and shouldered into the radio shack without
knocking.
"What's up?" he demanded of the operator, a thin freckled youth who was
staring at the banks of equipment in perplexity.
Sparks knit his brows.
"Nothing--that I can find."
"What!"
"There isn't a damn thing wrong at this end. The broadcast was
interrupted. Power failure, maybe."
Matt Magoffin ran his hand through his short crisp black hair, alarm in
his blue eyes.
"Have you tried to contact Earth?"
"No. Not yet."
The operator sat down at his instruments, threw in a switch and spoke
into a microphone.
"_Argus_ calling Earth. _Argus_ calling Earth. _Argus_ calling Earth.
Come in Earth."
Silence!
* * * * *
Matt's jaw shut with a click. The operator tried again and again,
but without success. He was still trying when the director of the
expedition burst into the radio shack, followed closely by the captain.
"What interrupted the broadcast, Sparks?" the director burst out.
The operator shrugged. "There's nothing wrong with our instruments. But
I can't raise a peep from Earth."