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"I know, Morgan," said Betty penitently. "But I couldn't. I was -- "

 

 

"Then you're not going to last long on this unprintable world," said Morgan.

 

 

I considered slapping his head for that, but decided against it. Morgan
had never sworn before. It was apparently part and parcel of his new
self-assertion that he had to do everything that would shock or hurt or
irritate the people around him. I had to be careful what evidences of
it I noticed, or I'd be nagging at him the whole time.

 

 

Sammy was quite prepared to comment, though. "That's funny," he said in
a tone of mild surprise. "I thought you came from a good home, Morgan."

 

 

Morgan pretended not to hear him.

 

 

 

 

That was a fair sample of the Martian weather. What really caused its extreme
volatility was the steady rotation of the planet and the absence of large,
open tracts of water, which would heat and cool fairly slowly. The
red desert and the air over it were heated to at least 90° Fahrenheit,
then spun into darkness at something below zero. The days on Mars would
always be hot, the nights freezing. There would always be winds sweeping
and swirling from the twilight zone. That was permanent.

 

 

However, in about twenty years, we were told, much of the temporary
climatic upheaval would be over and Mars would begin to settle down to
a less violent, more comfortable existence.

 

 

That would be fine for our children.

 

 

Crops came up rapidly in the few areas of good soil. There was enough
water and plenty of heat. If these had been the only things that were
needed Mars would have been choked by the grain yield, despite the wind.

 

 

But crops also needed soil, something better than the sterile dust and
sand which covered most of the surface of Mars. Where good earth existed
the crops blazed up like ignited kerosene -- not quite the grain we
had known, for it had to adapt and be adapted to the new conditions,
but still usable. There wasn't enough of this good soil, however. Half
the people on Mars were kept busy on the land.

 

 

The other half were busy building. That was our job, for the most part.

 

 

Except for Morgan we had no personnel problems in 94. As I expected,
Leslie's worry and dissatisfaction disappeared with her responsibility.
"Now you can do the worrying, Bill," she said cheerfully, "and I'll make
the sympathetic, understanding remarks. But you don't worry, do you?"

 

 

"Not more than I can help," I said. "Leads to ulcers. And who wants ulcers?"

 

 

Yes, Leslie was a simple, straight-thinking, sunny character. She wasn't
capricious or moody. I suppose I'd try to cover up Leslie's faults
if she had any, but really there isn't any covering up to do. Back on
Earth she hadn't always shown up too well, but that was when I didn't
know her and she didn't know me. As we grew into each other's ways,
it became almost impossible for us to have any serious disagreement,
so long as I remembered -- and I did -- to tell Leslie every so often
how much I loved her.

 

 

As for Sammy, he worked hard, made only the routine complaints, and
didn't seem nearly so certain now that it would have been a good idea
never to have been born.

 

 

"What's come over you, Sammy?" Leslie asked him once. "I haven't heard
you prophesying disaster for weeks now. Did it take all the wind out of
your sails when Bill got the lifeship down safely?"

 

 

Sammy grunted. "Mark my words," he said darkly, "there'll be dirty work
or catastrophe or tragedy yet. I don't know what's going to happen,
but something will."

 

 

Though he spoke with his own pessimistic brand of humor, it was clear
that he half meant what he said.

 

 

"The leopard," Leslie sighed, "doesn't change his spots, I see. But I think
I know what's the trouble with you, Sammy. It's celibacy."

 

 

"Perhaps," Sammy agreed. "If you've got a dictionary handy, I'll tell you."

 

 

"Get yourself a girl, Sammy," Leslie advised.

 

 

Sammy's brow clouded for a moment, and I knew he was thinking of a girl
who must be dead now -- but a girl he'd lost long before that. However,
he rallied at once.

 

 

"You leaving Bill?" he asked. "I was wondering when you'd realize what
a mistake you'd made. I'll think it over, Leslie. If I decide to accept
your offer, I'll let you know."

 

 

Leslie merely grinned.

 

 

The Stowes, Caroline and John, were very self-sufficient. They did all
that had to be done without complaining. They were always ready to help
anyone who needed help, but they never asked for help themselves.
Caroline, like Leslie and Betty, was pregnant, but unlike them, she
didn't like anyone to mention it. Though she wasn't ashamed of the fact,
it wasn't the sort of thing one talked about.

 

 

"She's still Miss Wallace, really," Leslie commented, without malice.
"One of those women who can be a respectable matron and an old maid at
the same time."

 

 

I grinned, because the remark was so just. Nevertheless I couldn't help
saying: "Don't be rude about Caroline, Leslie. Did I ever tell you she
came to me in Simsville and begged me to take you to Mars?"

 

 

"Did she?" asked Leslie, astonished. "I always thought she disapproved
of me. Incidentally, did that influence you?"

 

 

"No," I said. "You and she were already on my list at the time."

 

 

Leslie started to say something, then stopped. That was something we still
didn't talk about.

 

 

Jim Stowe was fourteen now, and with his first birthday on Mars he felt
he was a man. He continued to be my personal assistant. His quick
intelligence was soon known at all the stores and depots. I saw no
reason to revise my idea that one day Jim would be a big man in the
Martian settlement.

 

 

Harry Phillips was the same as ever, kindly and slow and phlegmatic.
He couldn't smoke a pipe or drink a reflective half pint of beer any more,
but that difficulty, which one might have thought would have taken half
the savor out of life for him, didn't seem to bother him at all.

 

 

"Guess if I had a smoke now I'd wonder what I ever saw in tobacco,"
he said philosophically. "And I don't think I'd like the taste of beer
any more. Been telling myself that, anyway. I've got more than halfway
to believing it, too."

 

 

I tried several times to get Harry transferred to an agricultural unit,
where he would be much more useful. However, the work party system was
working so well that nobody wanted to break up any of the units if it
could be helped. And Harry said that in the circumstances he'd just as
soon stay with us.

 

 

I didn't see much of little Bessie these days. Young children were given
jobs at the research station, making things, sorting things, running errands.
It would be a long time yet before there was school again for the children.
When there was, Leslie and Caroline would be back at their old jobs,
teaching.

 

 

Anyway, I knew Bessie would be happy. She always was.

 

 

That left only Betty and Morgan.

 

 

Betty put up a brave show. She always pretended she was perfectly happy
and that Morgan and she got on very much as Leslie and I did, or the Stowes.
We pretended to believe it.

 

 

Morgan continued to do only what he had to, sketchily, resentfully,
without pride or interest in it. He couldn't be trusted to do anything
on his own.

 

 

"Listen, Morgan," I said to him on one occasion. "Nobody's trying to make
you do more than your fair share. I know you don't want to do this --
think any of us do? Why we're doing it is so that we can all be comfortable
again. We -- "

 

 

"Shut up," said Morgan harshly. "I may have to work, but I don't have to
listen to you."

 

 

"What's gone sour in you, Morgan?" I asked curiously. "Tell me -- was I right
to pick you for my lifeship crew, or did I make a mistake? Were you a cheap
chiseler back on Earth too?"

 

 

That got under his skin. He flushed a dull red down to his shoulders.
I was glad to see that, not because I wanted to get under his skin but
because a man isn't hopeless so long as you can.

 

 

He didn't answer.

 

 

"What's eating you, Morgan?" I persisted.

 

 

"I'll tell you," he said suddenly, passionately. "I've heard you talk
about human rights, but you still act the little dictator. You always
have. We had to lick your boots back in Simsville -- you had all the
power, with nobody to check on you. On the lifeship you kept on being the
big boss. Well, now I'm good and sick of you. I'm sick of being pushed
around and worked like a slave and never being left alone. I didn't come
here to be a slave. Who are you to talk about rights?"

 

 

I didn't remember talking about human rights, but I might have, and this
was obviously one of Morgan's sore spots. I could tell that from the way
he suddenly dragged the question of human rights from nowhere and got angry
about it.

 

 

"Sometimes human rights have to be suspended for a bit," I said coolly.
"Particularly such human rights as sitting on your backside and letting
other people do the work."

 

 

Betty came along then. I tried to continue the discussion, but Morgan so
obviously resented my bawling him out in front of Betty, as he considered
it, that I shrugged and left them.

 

 

There was something in what he said about my being a dictator. I had to be.
When things are grim, people have to be put in charge, people who say "Jump"
and make sure everyone jumps without reporting in triplicate on their methods
to some central bureau of justice.

 

 

The truth, I suspected, was not that Morgan was worried over the principle
of the thing, as Sammy, say, might have been. Morgan didn't really mind
someone giving the orders and cracking the whip to make sure they were
immediately obeyed.

 

 

Morgan wanted to crack the whip himself.

 

 

I referred to the only law there was higher than the lieutenants --
the council Sammy had told me about when I was still in the hospital.
His description hadn't been unfair. Winant was governed by the original
colony committee, plus the leaders who had emerged from the complements
of the big spaceships, plus a few of the lieutenants themselves -- never
very many, not because we didn't all have the right to sit in on council
meetings, but because there were seldom very many of us free to do so.

 

 

The council's advice on Morgan was merely: "Beat him. Starve him."
It wasn't inhuman advice, it was inevitable. We were still fighting for
our lives on Mars. Anyone among us who didn't pull his weight had to be
kicked in the teeth until he did.

 

 

I tried docking Morgan's rations, without effect. Betty, I knew, was
sharing hers with him, and I could hardly punish her too. I tried to
make her see that Morgan must be brought into line, but as Leslie said:
"That argument wouldn't have any effect on me, Bill, so why should it
sway Betty?"

 

 

Sammy was surprised I didn't try the other suggestion. "I always thought
you were a hard nut, Bill," he said. "But now when Morgan needs a swift
kick in the pants, you won't give it to him."

 

 

I shrugged. "I'd beat anyone else, including you," I told him, "but I don't
think it'll do Morgan the slightest good. He'll only resent it, hate me,
hate everybody, and try to get even."

 

 

"He's doing that anyway," said Sammy, "so I don't see what harm it can do."

 

 

Morgan had taken up with an old acquaintance of mine, Alec Ritchie,
who had just been discharged from the hospital with his leg in a cast.
I remembered Ritchie showing interest in anyone who made a nuisance
of himself.

 

 

"I never liked Ritchie," Sammy told Leslie and me. "Now that he and
Morgan are hanging around together I know I was right."

 

 

I grinned. "Talk about bias," I said.

 

 

"No, I'm talking about Ritchie. Another thing. I don't like tbe way
Morgan's been looking at Aileen Ritchie."

 

 

"Why, are you casting covetous eyes on Aileen?" demanded Leslie, interested.

 

 

"Just the words I was looking for," said Sammy. "Not that I am. Morgan is."

 

 

"Is what?"

 

 

"Casting covetous eyes on Aileen Ritchie."

 

 

"But he can't . . ." Suddenly Leslie realized that he could. Marriage didn't
really count any more. Strictly, Betty and Morgan weren't married anyway.
Neither were Leslie and I.

 

 

"Oh, Lord," I said, seeing more trouble.

 

 

"That would be the end of Betty," said Leslie vehemently. "She'd kill
herself. I know it sounds crazy, but it's true. The poor kid still
worships the ground Morgan treads on."

 

 

"I know," said Sammy. "That's why I don't like it."

 

 

"But Aileen wouldn't be such a fool . . ."

 

 

"Let's hope not," I said. "But frankly I don't see any happiness for Betty
until Morgan does leave her. She certainly isn't happy with him."

 

 

We were uncomfortably silent after that. There was nothing anyone could do
about Betty. Hers was one of those purely private tragedies which no one
else can share or understand, and which most people prefer not to see.