Free Stowaway to Mars by John Wyndham Page B

smiled.
    'You needn't look at me like that, Dugan. I'm not going off my rocker. Have a shot at it yourself. Why do you think we are out here in the middle of nothing?'
    Dugan hesitated 'I don't know. I've never really thought about it, but I've a sort of feeling that people grow out of well, out of their conditions just as they grow out of their clothes. They have to expand.'
    Joan's voice surprised them again as she asked Dugan:
    'Did you ever read J. J. Astor's Journey to Other Worlds?'
    'Never heard of him. Why?' Dugan asked.
    'Only that he seemed to feel rather the same about it, right back in 1894, too. As far as I remember he said:
    "Just as Greece became too small for the civilization of the Greeks, so it seems to me that the future glory of the human race lies in the exploration of at least the Solar System." Almost the same idea, you see.'
    The doctor looked curiously at the girl.
    'And is that your own view, too?'
    'My own view? I don't know. I can't say that I have considered the underlying reasons for my being here; my immediate reasons are enough.'
    'I'm sorry you won't confide them. I think you would find us interested.'
    The girl did not reply. She had turned back to the window and was staring out into the blackness as though she had not heard. The doctor watched her thoughtfully for some moments before returning to the rest. Like Dale he was now quite certain that no mere whim had led her to board the Gloria Mundi, and he was equally at a loss to ascribe any satisfactory reason for her presence. His attention was recalled by Froud saying:
    'Surely the cause of our being here really lies in our expectations of what we shall find on Mars. The doc is primarily a biologist, and his reason is easy to understand. I, as a journalist, am after news for its own sake.' 'Superficially that is true,' the doctor agreed, 'but I was wondering at the fundamental urge the source of that curiosity which has sent generation after generation doing things like this without seeming to know why. I suppose we all have our own ideas of what we shall find, but I don't mind betting that not one of those expectations, even if it is fulfilled, is a good enough cause, rationally speaking, for our risking our lives. I know mine isn't. I expect to find new kinds of flora. If I do, I shall be delighted, but and this is the point whether it proves useful or quite useless I shall be equally delighted at finding it. Which makes me ask again, why am I willing to risk my life to find it?'
    Froud broke in as he paused:
    'It is really the same as my reason. News gathering. The difference is that your news is specialized. We are all gatherers of news which is another name for knowledge so now we're back where you started.'
    'Well, what do you expect to find?' the doctor asked him.
    'I don't really know. I think most of all I want evidence of the existence of a race of creatures who built the Martian canals.'
    Dugan broke in. 'Canals! Why, everybody knows that that was a misconception from the beginning. Schiaparelli just called them canali when he discovered them, and he meant channels. Then the Italian word was translated literally and it was assumed that he meant that they were artificial works. He didn't imply that at all.'
    'I know that,' Froud said coldly. 'I learnt it at school as you did. But that doesn't stop me from considering them to be artificial.'
    'But think of the work, man. It's impossible. They're hundreds of miles long, and lots of them fifty miles across, and the whole planet's netted with them. It just couldn't be done.'
    'I admit that it's stupendous, but I don't admit that it's impossible. In fact, I contend that if the oceans of the Earth were to dry up and our only way of getting water was to drain it from the poles, we should do that very thing.'
    'But think of the labour involved!'
    'Self preservation always involves labour. But if you want to shake my faith in the theory that the Martian canals were intelligently