It felt cold in the observation section. He knew it was only his imagination, but the cold of that deep empty darkness out there seemed to seep through the window and chill him to the bone.
Someone was already there. As Jamie stepped through the open hatch he saw the tall, lithe form of Ilona Malater standing by the long window. She was staring out at the stars, her face solemn, immobile. In the faint light her honey-colored hair looked gray, her tan coveralls nearly colorless.
As Jamie approached the window he almost felt glad that someone else was there. His desire to be alone faded beneath his need for human warmth. He realized that Ilona was tall and slim enough to be a high-fashion model. Her aristocratic face had that magazine-cover haughtiness to it, as well.
“Hello,” he said.
She whirled, startled, then relaxed and smiled. “Jamie. What are you doing up here?”
“Same as you, I guess.”
“I thought this was my private hideaway.” Ilona’s voice was a rich, throaty contralto.
With a rueful grin Jamie said, “Me too.” He hesitated, then offered, “I can go back…”
“No, that’s all right.” She smiled back at Jamie. “Perhaps I need someone to talk to more than I need solitude.”
The only light in the area came from the faintly glowing guide strips on the floor. And the starlight. Barely enough to see her face, to catch the expression in her eyes. The electrical hum that pervaded the spacecraft seemed fainter here, muted.
“You heard about Hoffman?” Jamie asked.
“What has he done now?”
“He’s had a nervous breakdown.”
Ilona arched an eyebrow. “Serves him right, the pig.”
“That’s a hell of an attitude!”
“He was a womanizer. I imagine he’s the terror of the female undergraduates wherever he teaches.”
Jamie blinked at her. He had never thought of Hoffman as anything but a geologist who stood between himself and Mars.
“He tried to seduce every woman he met during training.”
“He hit on you?”
Ilona laughed. “He tried to. I hit him back. I told him that if he could not satisfy his wife why did he think he could satisfy me? He never spoke another word to me.”
Jamie thought it less than funny. There was a fierceness in this woman that he had never suspected, an anger seething within her.
Then it occurred to him. “He must have hit on Joanna too.”
“Yes. Certainly.”
That’s why Joanna wanted him off the mission, Jamie said to himself. Not to get me aboard. Just to get rid of a man who bothered her.
He felt suddenly awkward. There was no place to sit except the chill metal floor, no one to turn to for support. He looked out the non-reflective window and saw nothing but the starry emptiness; the Mars 2 craft was out of sight, literally over their heads.
“Is Hoffman’s breakdown what brought you up here?” Ilona asked.
Jamie nodded. “And you?”
“I had to get away,” she said, her voice lowering. “I am becoming depressed.”
“Why? What’s wrong?”
“Mars is wrong. I am wrong. It was wrong to include a biochemist on this expedition. There is no life on Mars for me to study.”
“We don’t know that for certain,” Jamie said. “Not yet.”
“Don’t we?” Ilona spoke the words with a weary sigh. Then she turned and stretched her arm toward a glowing ruddy point of light swinging past in the starry blackness.
“Look at the planet, Jamie. Think of all the rocks and soil samples and photographs we have studied. We get new photos and data every day from the orbiters they’ve put around the planet. Not a trace of life. Nothing. Mars is absolutely barren. Lifeless.”
He turned from the red glow of Mars to focus on her sorrowing face once more. “But we’ve only had a few dozen samples. You’re talking about a whole world. There must be…”
She laid a long manicured finger on Jamie’s lips, silencing him. “You have heard of Gaia?” Ilona asked.
Jamie said, “The idea that the Earth is a living entity?”
Ilona gave him a scant smile. “That’s close. Not bad for a geologist.”
He found himself grinning back at her. “All right, what about Gaia? And what’s it got to do with Mars?”