But he was already striding away, big and powerful, towering over most of the Earthlings who were scurrying past. She saw him give something to the Martian porter, watched him swing the trunk up on his shoulder. It writhed in her, it devastated her, her father's contemptuous dismissal--"porters and janitors, that's all they're fit for." "Greg, put it down," she said frantically. "I won't have you carrying it!" He smiled at her indulgently. "It is not heavy." "I don't want you to," she pleaded. "Why do you not want me to?" he asked puzzledly. "Somebody must." But how could she say it? How could she discuss it at all? She walked beside him, dumbly. They went down the ramp to where the aircabs were loading. An Earthling company had put in all the air transport here; the Martians themselves had never bothered to develop anything more advanced than the _eshbrug_, a lumbering, three-wheeled, sun-powered vehicle. "We shall take the airbus," Gregrill said. "Oh, do we have to?" she asked. "How else can we go?" "Can't we get an _eshbrug_?" He looked at her wonderingly. "To travel three times as long? I am aware that you are tired--" "I'm tired of a lot of things," she blurted. "I'm tired of all the smooth, cynical, streamlined--Right now, I'd rather walk the whole way than step into an Earthling airbus." He gave an uncertain laugh. "I am not sure that I understand your meaning." "I'll explain it some time." But how could she ever? He thought Earthlings were all such noble, shining, gifted creatures. How could she tell him of the rot at the heart of so many of them? "Come on," she insisted desperately. "Let's find an _eshbrug_." * * * * * The driver let them out at Gregrill's road. Gregrill shouldered the trunk, and they walked down past the irregular row of red, sunbaked, dome-shaped houses, each with its big tank in the rear for catching Mars' meager rainfall. Joyce felt a quickening, a surge of warmth, when she saw them and the quiet, open-faced people in their doorways, smiling their shy welcomes. She was coming home. She was coming home.... Gregrill's mother and father were waiting just inside their door. They opened their arms; they hardly said a word. Joyce ran to them, folded them against her. She didn't mind the tears. She let them lead her into the main room, let them seat her, put pillows around her. She sat there bathing in their tenderness, their simple good-heartedness. Couldn't everybody see it? Why couldn't her father know it? These were the best people in the Universe! Dinner was an Earthling meal. Joyce had been looking forward to a dish of _mrila_, the Martian rice, and _krulevak_, the white fruit that tasted like luscious chicken meat. But Gregrill's parents had obviously felt that their humble foods were too mean for her exalted taste and they had gone to the expense of bringing in vegetables and meats from the Earthling import shop in Memnonia.