When a new building had hardened a door would be cut to the outside and a pressure lock installed; the colonials maintained about two-thirds Earth-normal pressure indoors for comfort and the pressure on Mars is never as much as half of that. A visitor from Earth, not conditioned to the planet, will die without a respirator. Among the colonists only Tibetans and Bolivian Indians will venture outdoors without respirators and even they will wear the snug elastic Mars suits to avoid skin hemorrhages.
Buildings had not even view windows, any more than a modem building in New York has. The surrounding desert, while beautiful, is monotonous. South Colony was in an area granted by the Martians, just north of the ancient city of Charax-there is no need to give the Martian name since an Earthman can't pronounce it-and between the legs of the double canal Strymon. Again we follow colonial custom in using the name assigned by the immortal Dr. Percival Lowell.
Francis accompanied Jim and Doctor MacRae as far as the junction of the tunnels under city hall, then turned down his own tunnel. A few minutes later the doctor and Jim-and Willis-ascended into the Marlowe home. Jim's mother met them; Doctor MacRae bowed, a bow made no less courtly by bare feet, and a grizzled, hairy chest: "Madame, I am again imposing on your good nature."
"Fiddlesticks, Doctor. You are always welcome at our table."
"I would that I had the character to wish that you were not so superlative a cook, that you might know the certain truth: it is yourself, my dear, that brings me here."
Jim's mother blushed. She was wearing a costume that a terrestrial lady might choose for sunbathing or gardening and was a very pretty sight, although Jim was certainly not aware of it. She changed the subject, "Jim, hang up your pistol. Don't leave it on the sofa where Oliver can get it."
Jim's baby brother, hearing his name, immediately made a dash for the pistol. Jim and his sister Phyllis both saw this, both yelled, "Oilie!"-and were immediately mimicked by Willis, who performed the difficult trick, possible only to an atonal diaphragm, of duplicating both voices simultaneously.
Phyllis was nearer; she grabbed the gun and slapped the child's hands. Oliver began to cry, reinforced by Willis.
"Children!" said Mrs. Marlowe, just as Mr. Marlowe appeared in the door.
"What's all the ruckus?" he inquired mildly.
Doctor MacRae picked up Oliver, turned him upside down, and sat him on his shoulders. Oliver forgot that he was crying. Mrs. Marlowe added, "Nothing darling. I'm glad you're home. Children, go wash for dinner, all of you."
The second generation trooped out. Phyllis said, "Take the charges out of your gun. Jimmy, and let me practice with it."
"You're too young for a gun."
"Pooh! I can't outshoot you." This was very nearly true and not to be borne; Phyllis was two years younger than Jim and female besides.
"Girls are just target shooters. If you saw a water-seeker, you'd scream."
"I would, huh? We'll go hunting together and I'll bet you two credits that I score first."
"You haven't got two credits."
"I have, too."
"Then how was it you couldn't lend me a half credit yesterday?"
Phyllis changed the subject. Jim hung up his weapon in his cupboard and locked it. Presently they were back in the living room, to find that their father was home and dinner ready.
Phyllis waited for a lull in grown-up talk to say, "Daddy?"
"Yes, Puddin'? What is it?"
"Isn't it about time I had a pistol of my own?"
"Eh? Plenty of time for that later. You keep up your target
practice."
"But, look, Daddy-Jim's going away and that means that Oilie can't ever go outside unless you or mother have time to take him. If I had a gun, I could help out."
Mr. Marlowe wrinkled his brow. "You've got a point. You've passed all your tests, haven't you?"
"You know I have!"
"What do you think, my dear? Shall we take Phyllis down to city hall and see if they will license her?"
Before Mrs. Marlowe could answer Doctor MacRae muttered something into his plate. The remark was forceful and probably not polite.
"Eh? What did you say. Doctor?"
"I said," answered MacRae, "that I was going to move to another planet. At least that's what I meant."
"Why? What's wrong with this one? In another twenty years we'll have it fixed up good as new. You'll be able to walk outside without a mask."
"Sir, it is not the natural limitations of this globe that I object to; it is the pantywaist nincompoops who rule itThese ridiculous regulations offend me. That a free citizen should have to go before a committee, hat in hand, and pray for permission to bear arms-fantastic! Arm your daughter, sir, and pay no attention to petty bureaucrats."
Jim's father stirred his coffee. "I'm tempted to. I really don't know why the Company set up such rules in the first place."
"Pure copy-cattism. The swarming beehives back on Earth have similar childish rules; the fat clerks that decide these tilings cannot imagine any other conditions. This is a frontier community; it should be free of such."
"Mmmm... probably you're right, Doctor. Can't say that I disagree with you, but I'm so busy trying to get on with my job that I really don't have time to worry about politics. It's easier to comply than to fight a test case." Jim's father turned to his wife. "If it's all right with you, my dear, could you find time to arrange for a license for Phyllis?"
"Why, yes," she answered doubtfully, "if you really think she's old enough." The doctor muttered something that combined "Danegeld" and the "Boston Tea Party" in the same breath. Phyllis answered:
"Sure, I'm old enough. Mother. I'm a better shot than Jimmy."
Jim said, "You're crazy as a spin bug!"
"Mind your manners, Jim," his father cautioned. "We don't speak that way to ladies."
"Was she talking like a lady? I ask you. Dad."
"You are bound to assume that she is one. Drop the matter. What were you saying. Doctor?"
"Eh? Nothing that I should have been saying, I'm sure. You said something earlier about another twenty years and we could throw away our respirators; tell me: is there news about the Project?"
The colony had dozens of projects, all intended to make Mars more livable for human beings, but the Project always meant the atmosphere, or oxygen, project. The pioneers of the Harvard-Carnegie expedition reported Mars suitable for colonization except for the all-important fact that the air was so thin that a normal man would suffocate. However they reported also that many, many billions of tons of oxygen were locked in the Martian desert sands, the red iron oxides that give Mars its ruddy color. The Project proposed to free this oxygen for humans to breathe.
"Didn't you hear the Deimos newscast this afternoon?" Mr. Marlowe answered.
"Never listen to newscasts. Saves wear and tear on the nervous system."
"No doubt. But this was good news. The pilot plant in Libya is in operation, successful operation. The first day's run restored nearly four million tons mass of oxygen to the airand no breakdowns."
Mrs. Marlowe looked startled. "Four million tons? That seems a tremendous lot."
Her husband grinned. "Any idea how long it would take that one plant at that rate to do the job, that is, increase the oxygen pressure by five mass-pounds per square inch?"
"Of course I haven't. But not very long 1should think."
"Let me see-" His lips moved soundlessly. "Uh, around two hundred thousand years-Mars years, of course."