A moment later there was that dreadful man knocking again.
She whipped the door open.
“What now?” she wondered.
The man was still there, trying to smile, looking bewildered.
He put out his hands.
“I don’t think you understand — ”
“What?” she snapped.
The man gazed at her in surprise.
“We’re from Earth!”
“I haven’t time,” she said.
“I’ve a lot of cooking today and there’s cleaning and sewing and all. You evidently wish to see Mr. Ttt; he’s upstairs in his study.”
“Yes,” said the Earth Man confusedly, blinking.
“By all means, let us see Mr. Ttt.”
“He’s busy.”
She slammed the door again.
This time the knock on the door was most impertinently loud.
“See here!” cried the man when the door was thrust open again.
He jumped in as if to surprise her.
“This is no way to treat visitors!”
“All over my clean floor!” she cried.
“Mud!
Get out!
If you come in my house, wash your boots first.”
The man looked in dismay at his muddy boots,
“This,” he said, “is no time for trivialities.
I think,” he said, “we should be celebrating.”
He looked at her for a long time, as if looking might make her understand.
“If you’ve made my crystal buns fall in the oven,” she exclaimed, “I’ll hit you with a piece of wood!”
She peered into a little hot oven.
She came back, red, steamy-faced.
Her eyes were sharp yellow, her skin was soft brown, she was thin and quick as an insect. Her voice was metallic and sharp.
“Wait here.
I’ll see if I can let you have a moment with Mr. Ttt.
What was your business?”
The man swore luridly, as if she’d hit his hand with a hammer.
“Tell him we’re from Earth and it’s never been done before!”
“What hasn’t?”
She put her brown hand up.
“Never mind.
I’ll be back.”
The sound of her feet fluttered through the stone house.
Outside, the immense blue Martian sky was hot and still as a warm deep sea water.
The Martian desert lay broiling like a prehistoric mud pot, waves of heat rising and shimmering.
There was a small rocket ship reclining upon a hilltop nearby.
Large footprints came from the rocket to the door of this stone house.
Now there was a sound of quarreling voices upstairs.
The men within the door stared at one another, shifting on their boots, twiddling their fingers, and holding onto their hip belts.
A man’s voice shouted upstairs.
The woman’s voice replied.
After fifteen minutes the Earth men began walking in and out the kitchen door, with nothing to do.