It took very little effort then to get the entire story. It seemed that
Frank Landor and Kaarji had trekked four days into the Martian Cap.
Only Kaarji had ever gone that far before. Late on the fourth day, as
they camped, Kaarji was awakened by a shout from Frank. He had leaped
up and glimpsed Frank Landor running toward a vehicle that rested at
the bottom of an icy decline....
Here Kaarji faltered slightly in his story. He had not seen the vehicle
plainly enough nor long enough to describe it as other than a car,
seemingly unlike any he had ever seen before. It was simply round and
grayish and metallic, and completely enclosed. It had a bluish beam of
light in the front of it. Frank Landor had seemed to enter the car--and
then it sped away with him.
"Kaarji, try to remember," Jim said to the Martian now. "Frank entered
the car of his own volition? You saw no one else, no other person?"
"No one else." Kaarji seemed sure of it.
Jim shook his head in puzzlement. This was the same story Kaarji had
told Conley, there were no discrepancies.
They walked on to the mine in silence. Jim examined several tunnels
leading back into the hills and saw that Frank's claim had indeed
petered out. In his iron-walled cabin, everything was left as though
Frank had merely gone and intended to return in a few days.
"Let's go back," Jim said finally. "Nothing we can do here."
On the walk back to Riida, Jim thought that Kaarji looked at him
several times as though he were going to speak. But when Jim questioned
him, the Martian shook his head negatively. He offered Kaarji another
cigarette but this time it was declined.
It was not until then that Jim realized he was still chewing on the
Martian _tsith_ stems, and that Kaarji was grinning at him.
It was not until he reached the edge of town that he became violently
ill.
II
The sun rose on a crystal clear morning and glanced beckoningly from
the white expanse that capped the cliffs a few miles distant. Five men
were making the trip: Jim and Kaarji, Conley, Wessel and Lewis, the
latter, one of the workmen who had had some Polar experience.
The motor-sled parts were light but bulky, and it took a dozen men to
transport them across to the cliffs and up into the Cap, where they
would be assembled.
"I want to tell you something about Kaarji," Conley said, walking
beside Jim as the trek began. "He's not like other Martians, not
philosophic and indolent. On the contrary he seems--well, _restless_."
"I know the type," Jim nodded. "I've seen a few of them myself, even
in the Capitol City; amazingly energetic for Martians, restless and
perpetually wandering as though seeking for--for something vague and
unknown even to them."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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