Spender shifted, put out his hand to remember, squinted silently a moment; then, remembering, his slow quiet voice repeated the words and the men listened to everything he said:
“So we’ll go no more a-roving So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.”
The city was gray and high and motionless.
The men’s faces were turned in the light.
“For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And love itself must rest.
Though the night was made for loving,
And the day returns too soon,
Yet we’ll go no more a-roving
By the light of the moon.”
Without a word the Earth Men stood in the center of the city.
It was a clear night.
There was not a sound except the wind.
At their feet lay a tile court worked into the shapes of ancient animals and peoples.
They looked down upon it.
Biggs made a sick noise in his throat.
His eyes were dull.
His hands went to his mouth; he choked, shut his eyes, bent, and a thick rush of fluid filled his mouth, spilled out, fell to splash on the tiles, covering the designs.
Biggs did this twice, A sharp winy stench filled the cool air.
No one moved to help Biggs.
He went on being sick.
Spender stared for a moment, then turned and walked off into the avenues of the city, alone in the moonlight. Never once did he pause to look back at the gathered men there.
They turned in at four in the morning.
They lay upon blankets and shut their eyes and breathed the quiet air.
Captain Wilder sat feeding little sticks into the fire.
McClure opened his eyes two hours later.
“Aren’t you sleeping, sir?”
“I’m waiting for Spender.”
The captain smiled faintly.
McClure thought it over.
“You know, sir, I don’t think he’ll ever come back.
I don’t know how I know, but that’s the way I feel about him, sir; he’ll never come back.”
McClure rolled over into sleep.
The fire cradded and died.
Spender did not return in the following week.
The captain sent searching parties, but they came back saying they didn’t know where Spender could have gone.
He would be back when he got good and ready.
He was a sorehead, they said.
To the devil with him!
The captain said nothing but wrote it down in his log…
It was a morning that might have been a Monday or a Tuesday or any day on Mars. Biggs was on the canal rim; his feet hung down into the cool water, soaking, while he took the sun on his face.
A man walked along the bank of the canal.
The man threw a shadow down upon Biggs.
Biggs glanced up.
“Well, I’ll be damned!” said Biggs.
“I’m the last Martian,” said the man, taking out a gun.