But, somehow, the face of Lieutenant Archer was changing as McGarry talked. It grew even more solemn, even more compassionate.
«Old timer,» Archer said gently, «what year was it when you came here?»
McGarry saw it coming. How can you keep track of time on a planet whose sun and seasons are unchanging? A planet of eternal day, eternal summer —
He said flatly, «I came here in forty-two. How much have I misjudged, Lieutenant? How old am I — instead of thirty, as I’ve thought?»
«It’s twenty-two seventy-two, McGarry. You came here thirty years ago. You’re fifty-five. But don’t let that worry you too much. Medical science has advanced. You’ve still got a long time to live.»
McGarry said it softly. «Fifty-five. Thirty years.»
Lieutenant Archer looked at him pityingly. He said, «Old timer, do you want it all in a lump, all the rest of the bad news? There are several items of it. I’m no psychologist, but I think maybe it’s best for you to take it now, all at once, while you can throw in the scale against it the fact that you’re going back. Can you take it, McGarry?»
There couldn’t be anything worse than he’d learned already — the fact that thirty years of his life had been wasted here. Sure, he could take the rest of it — as long as he was getting back to Earth, green Earth.
He stared up at the violet sky, the red sun, the brown plain. He said quietly, «I can take it, Lieutenant. Dish it out.»
«You’ve done wonderfully for thirty years, McGarry. You can thank God for the fact that you believed Marley’s spacer crashed on Kruger III. It wasn’t Kruger III; it was Kruger IV. You’d never have found it here, but the search, as you say, kept you — reasonably sane.» He paused a moment. His voice was gentle when he spoke again. «There isn’t anything on your shoulder, McGarry. This Dorothy has been a figment of your imagination. But don’t worry about it; that particular delusion has probably kept you from cracking up completely.»
Slowly McGarry put his hand to his left shoulder. It touched — his shoulder. Nothing else.
Archer said, «My God, man, it’s marvelous that you’re otherwise okay. Thirty years alone; it’s almost a miracle. And if your one delusion persists, now that I’ve told you it is a delusion, a psychiatrist back at Carthage or on Mars can fix you up in a jiffy.»
McGarry said dully, «It doesn’t persist. It isn’t there now. I — I’m not even sure, Lieutenant, that I ever did believe in Dorothy. I think I made her up on purpose, to talk to, so I’d remain sane except for that. She was — she was like a woman’s hand, Lieutenant. Or did I tell you that?»
«You told me. Want the rest of it now, McGarry?»
McGarry stared at him. «The rest of it? What rest can there be? I’m fifty-five instead of thirty. I’ve spent thirty years — since I was twenty-five — hunting for a spacer I’d never have found because it was on another planet. I’ve been crazy — in one way, but only one — most of that time. But none of that matters, now that I can go back to Earth.»
Lieutenant Archer was shaking his head slowly. «Not back to Earth, old timer. To Mars, if you wish, the beautiful brown and yellow hills of Mars. Or, if you don’t mind heat, to purple Venus. But not to Earth, old timer. Nobody lives there now.»
«Earth — is — gone? I don’t —»
«Not gone, McGarry. It’s there. But it’s black and barren, a charred ball. The war with the Arcturians, twenty years ago. They struck first, and got Earth. We got them, we won, we exterminated them, but Earth was gone before we started. I’m sorry, old timer, but you’ll have to settle for somewhere else.»
McGarry said, «No Earth.» There was no expression in his voice. No expression at all.
Archer said, «That’s it, old timer. But Mars isn’t so bad. You’ll get used to it. It’s the center of the solar system now, and there are four billion Earthmen on it. You’ll miss the green of Earth, sure, but it’s not so bad.»
McGarry said, «No Earth.» There was no expression in his voice. No expression at all.
Archer nodded. «Glad you can take it that way, old timer. It must be rather a jolt. Well, I guess we can get going. The tubes ought to have cooled by now. I’ll check and make sure.»
He stood up and started toward the little spacer.
McGarry’s sol-gun came out of its holster. McGarry shot him, and Lieutenant Archer wasn’t there any more. McGarry stood up and walked over to the little spacer. He aimed the sol-gun at it and pulled the trigger. Part of the spacer was gone. Half a dozen shots and it was completely gone. Little atoms that had been the spacer and little atoms that had been Lieutenant Archer of the Space Patrol may have danced in the air, but they were invisible.
McGarry put the gun back into its holster and started walking toward the red splotch of jungle on the far horizon.
He put his hand up to his shoulder and touched Dorothy and she was there, as she’d been there for four of the five years he’d been on Kruger III. She felt, to his fingers and to his shoulder, like a woman’s hand.
He said, «Don’t worry, Dorothy. We’ll find it. Maybe this is the jungle it landed in. And when we find it —»
He was near the edge of the jungle now, the red jungle, and a tiger came running out to meet him and eat him. A mauve tiger with six legs and a head like a barrel. McGarry aimed his sol-gun and pulled the trigger, and there was a bright green flash, brief but beautiful — oh, so beautiful — and then the tiger wasn’t there any more.
McGarry chuckled softly. «Did you see that, Dorothy? That was green, the color there isn’t any of on any planet but the one we’re going to. The most beautiful color in the universe, Dorothy. Green! And I know where there’s a world that’s mostly green, the only one that is, and we’re going there. It’s the most beautiful place in the universe, Dorothy, and it’s the world I came from. You’ll love it.»
She said, «I know I will, Mac.» Her low, throaty voice was familiar to him. It was not odd that she had answered him; she had always answered him. Her voice was as familiar as his own. He reached up and touched her, resting on his naked shoulder. She felt like a woman’s hand.
He turned and looked back over the brown plain studded with brown bushes, the violet sky above, the crimson sun. He laughed at it. Not a mad laugh, a gentle one. It didn’t matter because soon he’d find the spacer he was looking for and in it the parts that would repair his own spacer so he could get back to Earth.
To the green hills, the green valleys, the green fields. Once more he patted the hand upon his shoulder and then turned back. Gun at ready, he entered the red jungle.
CRISIS, 1999
THE little man with the sparse gray hair and the inconspicuous bright red suit stopped on the corner of State and Randolph to buy a micronews, a Chicago Sun-Tribune of March 21st, 1999. Nobody noticed him as he walked into the corner superdrug and took a vacant booth. He dropped a quarter into the coffee-slot and while the conveyor brought him his coffee, he glanced at the headlines on the tiny three-by-four-inch page. His eyes were unusually keen; he could read those headlines easily without artificial aid. But nothing on the first page or the second interested him; they concerned international matters, the third Venus rocket, and the latest depressing report of the ninth moon expedition. But on page three there were two stories concerning crime, and he took a tiny micrographer from his pocket and adjusted it to read the stories while he drank his coffee.