The Mark of the Meteor
By Ray Cummings
Illustrated by Paul
He was suddenly aware of an object close to him—slowly passing. He twisted to view it. The body of a man!
Three human beings isolated in the immensities of space—death from starvation and suffocation nears. Who will weaken first!
The central glassite dome of the Comet was rolled back. From where he stood, amidships in the peak of the vessel's superstructure, Graham could see down past the main cabin roof to the narrow side-deck where the passengers were coming up the incline from the landing stage. Beneath and beyond the stage lay the lights of the great Martian city, the oval roofs and spires and minarets of its buildings interspersed with the giant mushroom growth of its trees. And beyond the city the great canal-like gash, filled now with the evening water-tide which placidly mirrored the stars—a silver gash like a sword slash across the rolling countryside.
The moment of departure was at hand. Graham Trent was radio-helio operator of the Comet, and at the moment he had no duties to occupy him. The Comet's twenty or thirty passengers seemed all on board; the stage was lined with waving friends. The Comet resounded with bells, moving signal lights; the hum of the dynamos beginning their first low throb. They would be away presently, inward bound on the return voyage to the Earth.
Graham's attention was suddenly drawn to a last arriving passenger. A woman shrouded in the white street robe of a Shahn virgin. She came hastily up the incline, a steward preceding with her handbags. Though Graham leaned forward curiously, he did not realize that his destiny was at a cross-roads. It was too small a figure for a Martian girl. As she reached the deck a hooded tube-light fell by chance upon her face. An Earthgirl. A face framed by dark curls. Even at that distance it seemed to Graham that her face was one of rare and extraordinary beauty.
She had followed the steward toward her cabin and was lost to Graham's view when yet another belated passenger arrived. A Martian man. He was some six feet in height—rather undersized for a Martian. A man of perhaps forty. Sleek, grey-green skin—a native of the Ferrok province. He seemed an important personage. The stage-master deferentially ushered him and his luggage aboard.
Graham watched him idly. A Martian gentleman,
perhaps a man of wealth. A sleek and
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