Murchison said: “Captain, this one’s a woman.”
He was looking through the wall of the next building. Craigie, Ives and Carlsen joined him. The figure strapped to the bed was indisputably female. That would have been apparent even without the evidence of the breasts that swelled under the covering. The lips were still red, and there was something indefinably feminine about the modelling of the face. None of them had seen a woman for almost a year; all experienced waves of nostalgia, and a touch of a cruder physical reaction.
“Blonde too,” Murchison said. The short-cropped hair that covered the head was pale, almost white.
Craigie said: “And here’s another.” It was a dark-haired girl, younger than the first. She might have been pretty, but the face was corpselike and sunken.
Each building stood separate; it struck Carlsen that they were like a group of Egyptian tombs. They counted thirty in all. In each lay a sleeper: eight older men, six older women, six younger males and ten women whose ages may have ranged between eighteen and twenty-five.
“But how did they get into the damn things?”
Murchison was right; there were no doors. They walked around the buildings, examining every inch of the glass surface. It was unbroken. The roofs, made of semi-transparent crystal, also seemed to be joined or welded to the glass.
“They’re not tombs,” Carlsen said. “Otherwise they wouldn’t need furniture.”
“The ancient Egyptians buried furniture with their dead.” Ives had a passion for archaeology.
For some reason, Carlsen felt a flash of irritation. “But they expected to take their goods to the underworld. These people don’t look that stupid.”
Craigie said: “All the same, they could hope to rise from the dead.”
Carlsen said angrily: “Don’t talk bloody nonsense.” Then, as he caught Craigie’s startled glance through the glass of the helmet: “I”m sorry. I think I must be hungry.”
Back in the Hermes, Steinberg had cooked the meal intended for Christmas Day. It was now mid-October; they were scheduled to leave for earth in the second week of November, arriving in mid-January. (At top speed, the Hermes covered four million miles a day.) No one had any doubt that they would be leaving sooner than that. This find was more important than a dozen unknown asteroids.
The atmosphere was now relaxed and festive. They drank champagne with the goose, and brandy with the Christmas pudding. Ives, Murchison and Craigie talked almost without pause; the others were happy to listen. Carlsen was oddly tired. He felt as if he had been awake for two days. Everything was slightly unreal. He wondered if it could be the effect of radioactivity, then dismissed the idea. In that case, the others would feel it too. Their spacesuits were now in the decontaminator unit, and the meter showed that absorption had been minimal.
Farmer said: “Olof, you’re not saying much.”
“Tired, that’s all.”
Dabrowsky asked him: “What’s your theory about all this? Why did they build that thing?”
They all waited for Carlsen to speak, but he shook his head.
“Then let me tell you mine.” Farmer said. He was smoking a pipe and used the stem to gesture. “From what you say, all those stairways couldn’t serve any practical purpose. Right? So, as Olof said this morning, it’s probably an impractical purpose — an aesthetic or religious purpose.”
“All right,” Steinberg said, “so it’s a kind of floating cathedral. It still doesn’t make sense.”
“Let me go on. We know these creatures aren’t from within the solar system. So they’re from another system, perhaps another galaxy.”
“Impossible, unless they’ve been travelling for a hundred million years or so.”
“All right.” Farmer was unperturbed. “But they could have come from another star system. If they could reach half the speed of light, Alpha Centauri’s only nine years away.” He waved aside interruption. “We know they must have come from another star system. So the only question is which one. And if they’ve travelled that far, then the size of the ship becomes logical. It’s the equivalent of an ocean liner. Our ship’s no more than a rowboat by comparison. Now. . .” He turned to Ives. “If people migrate, what’s the first thing they take with them?”
“Their gods.”
“Quite. The Israelites travelled with the Ark of the Covenant. These people brought a temple.”
Steinberg said: “And it still doesn’t make sense. If we all migrated to Mars, we wouldn’t try to take Canterbury Cathedral. We’d build another on Mars.”
“You forget that the cathedral’s also a home. Suppose they land on Mars? It’s an inhospitable place. It might take them years to establish a city under a glass dome. But they’ve brought their dome with them.”
The others were impressed. Dabrowsky asked: “But why the stairways and catwalks?”
“Because they’re the basic necessities of a new city. Their size is limited. As the population increases, they have to expand upwards. It’s the only direction. So they’ve built the skeleton of a multilevel city.”
Ives said with excitement: “I’ll tell you another thing. They wouldn’t be alone. They’d send two or three ships. And they wouldn’t land on Mars, because it doesn’t support life. They’d land on earth.”
They all stared at him. Even Carlsen suddenly felt more awake. Craigie said slowly: “Of course. . .”
They sat in silence. Murchison whistled.
Steinberg voiced their thought. “So those creatures could be our ancestors?”
“Not our ancestors,” Craigie said. “They were the ones who reached earth. But the brothers and sisters of our ancestors.”
They all began to speak at once. Farmer’s slow Northumberland voice emerged after a few seconds. “So we’ve explained the basic problem of human evolution — why man is so unlike the apes. We didn’t evolve from apes. We evolved from them.”
Carlsen asked: “And what about Neanderthal man and all the rest?”
“A different line entirely.”
He was interrupted by the radio buzzer. Craigie switched it on. They all listened intently. Zelensky’s voice said, “Gentlemen, I have a surprise for you. The Prime Minister of the United European States, George Magill.”
They looked at one another in pleased surprise. If the world could be said to have one statesman who emerged head and shoulders above the others, it was Magill, the architect of World Unity.
The familiar deep voice came into the room. “Gentlemen, I daresay you have realised this already, but you are now the most famous human beings in the solar system. I’m relaying this message immediately after seeing your film of the inside of the ship. Even with some truly infuriating interferences, it is the most remarkable film I have ever seen. You are to be congratulated on your extraordinary adventure. You will have. . .” At this point, his voice was drowned with static. When it again sounded clearly, he was saying: “. . .agrees with me that the first and most important task is to bring back to earth at least one of these beings, and if possible, more than one. Of course, we shall have to rely upon your judgement as to whether this is feasible. We realise that when you break into the tombs, they may crumble to dust like so many mummies. On the other hand, it should be possible for you to ascertain whether these tombs contain an atmosphere, or whether they are vacuums. If they are vacuums, then you should have no problem. . .”
Carlsen groaned. “Why does the idiot want to rush things?” He subsided as he saw the others straining their ears to catch the rest of Magill’s message. He sat there gloomily for the next five minutes while Magill boomed on, spelling out the scientific and political implications of their discovery.
Then Zelensky came on again. “Well, boys, you heard what the man said. I agree with him. If it’s possible, we want one or two of these creatures brought back to earth. Cut your way into one of the tombs. Bear in mind they may not be dead, but only in a state of suspended animation. If you get them into the ship, seal them in the freezing compartment, and leave it sealed until you get back to moonbase. Leave them untouched.”
Carlsen stood up and left the room. He went to his own quarters and used the lavatory, then lay down on the bed. Almost instantly, he was asleep.
He woke up to find Steinberg standing over him. He sat up. “How long have I been asleep?”
“Seven hours. You looked so tired we decided not to wake you.”
“What’s happening?”
“Four of us have just got back. We’ve opened one of the tombs.”
“Oh, Christ, why? Why couldn’t you wait until I woke up?”
“Zelensky’s orders.”
“I give the orders while I’m captain.”
Steinberg was apologetic. “We thought you’d be pleased. We’ve cut a doorway in the tomb, and it’s a vacuum. The body didn’t crumble to dust. There shouldn’t be any problem getting him into the freezer.”
Five minutes later, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he went down to the control room. Through the port, he could see the familiar blue-green glow. The ship had been manoeuvred opposite the chamber of the humanoids: he could see the tombs clearly.