Adaptation Read online

  “It'll be all right, darling. In a few months you'll be with her again,” he said.

  Marilyn put her other hand against his cheek, but she said nothing.

  Nearly seven­teen years were to pass before any­thing more was heard of the Aurora, but Marilyn was not to know that. In less than two months she was resting for ever in the Martian sands with the tinker­bells chiming softly above her.

  When Franklyn left Mars, Dr. Forbes was the only member of the original team still left there. They shook hands beside the ramp which led up to the latest thing in nuclear-powered ships. The doctor said:

  “For five years I've watched you work, and overwork, Franklyn. You'd no busi­ness to survive. But you have. Now go home and live. You’ve earned it.”

  Franklyn withdrew his gaze from the thriving Port Gilling­ton which had grown, and was still grow­ing out of the rough settle­ment of a few years ago.

  “What about your­self? You've been here longer than I have.”

  “But I've had a couple of vaca­tions. They were long enough for me to look around at home and decide that what really interests me is here.” He might have added that the second had been long enough for him to find and marry a girl whom he had brought with him, but he just added: “Besides I've just been working, not over­working.”

  Franklyn's gaze had wandered again, this time beyond the settle­ment, towards the fields which now fringed the water­way. Among them was a small plot marked with a single up­right stone.

  “You're still a young man. Life owes you some­thing,” the doctor said. Franklyn seemed not to have heard, but he knew that he had. He went on: “And you owe some­thing to life. You hurt only your­self by resisting it. We have to adapt to life.”

  “I wonder—?” Franklyn began, but the doctor laid a hand on his arm.

  “Not that way. You have worked hard to forget. Now you must make a new beginning.”

  “No wreckage of the Aurora has ever been reported, you know,” Franklyn said.

  The doctor sighed, quietly. The Ships that disappeared without trace consider­ably out­numbered those that left any.

  “A new beginning,” he repeated, firmly.

  The hailer began to call “All aboard.”

  Dr. Forbes watched his friend into the entrance port. He was a little surprised to feel a touch on his arm, and find his wife beside him.

  “Poor man,” she said, softly. “Maybe when he gets home—”

  “Maybe,” said the doctor, doubtfully. He went on: “I’ve been cruel, mean­ing to be kind. I should have tried my best to crush that false hope and free him from it. But ... well, I couldn't do it.”

  “No,” she agreed. “You'd nothing to give him to take the place of it. But some­where at home there'll be some­one who has — a woman. Let's hope he meets her soon.”

  Jannessa turned her head from a thought­ful study of her own hand, and regarded the slaty-blue arm and fingers beside her.

  “I'm so different,” she said, with a sigh. “So different from every­body. Why am I different, Telta?”

  “Everybody's different,” Telta said. She looked up from her task of slicing a pale round fruit into a bowl. Their eyes met, Jannessa's china blue in their white setting look­ing questioningly in Telta's dark pupils which floated in clear topaz. A small crease appeared between the woman's delicate silvery brows as she studied the child. “I'm different. Toti's different. Melga's different. That's the way things are.”

  “But I'm more different. Much more different.”

  “I don't suppose you'd be so very different where you came from” Telta said, resuming her slicing.

  “Was I different when I was a baby?”

  “Yes, dear.”

  Jannessa reflected.

  “Where do babies come from, Telta?”

  Telta explained. Jannessa said, scorn­fully:

  “I don't mean like that. I mean babies like me. Different ones.”

  “I don't know. Only that it must have been somewhere far, far away.”

  “Somewhere outside; in the cold?”

  “Yes, Telta.”

  “Well, it must have been one of those twinkles that you came from. But nobody knows which one.”

  “Truly, Telta?”

  “Quite, truly.”

  Jannessa sat still a moment, thinking of the infinite night sky with its myriads of stars.

  “But why didn't I die in the cold ?”

  “You very nearly did, dear. Toti found you just in time.”

  “And was I all alone?”

  “No, dear. Your mother was holding you. She had wrapped you round with every­thing she could to keep the cold away. But the cold was too much for her. When Toti found her she could only move a little. She pointed to you and said: ‘Jannessa! Jannessa!’ So we thought that must be your name.”

  Telta paused, remem­bering how when Toti, her hus­band, had brought the baby down from the surface to the life-giving warmth it had been touch and go. A few more minutes out­side would have been fatal. The cold was a dread­ful thing. She shuddered, recalling Toti's account of it, and how it had turned the un­fortu­nate mother black, but she did not tell that to the child.

  Jannessa was frowning, puzzled.

  “But how? Did I fall off the star?”

  “No, dear. A ship brought you.”

  But the word meant nothing to Jannessa.

  It was difficult to explain to a child. Diffi­cult, for that matter, for Telta herself to believe. Her ex­pe­rience included only the system she lived in. The surface was a grim, in­hospi­table place of jagged rocks and kill­ing cold which she had seen only from the protected domes. The history books told her of other worlds where it was warm enough to live on the sur­face, and that her own people had come from such a world many gene­ra­tions ago. She believed that that was true, but it was never­the­less unreal. More than fifty ances­tors stood between her and life on a planet's surface, and it is difficult for anything that far away to seem real. Never­the­less, she told Jannessa the story in the hope that it would give her some con­so­la­tion.

  “Because of the cold?”

  “That — and other things. But in the end they made it possible for you to live here. They had to work very hard and cleverly for you. More than once we thought we were going to lose you.”

  “But what were they doing?”

  “I don't understand much of it. But you see you were intended for a diffe­rent world. It must have been one where there was more weight, thicker air, more humi­dity, higher tempe­ra­ture, different food and — oh, lots of things you'll learn about when you're older. So they had to help you get used to things as they are here.”

  Jannessa considered that.

  “It was very kind of them,” she said, “but they weren't very good, were they?”

  Telta looked at her in surprise.

  “Dear, that's not very grateful. What do you mean?”

  “If they could do all that, why couldn't they make me look like other people? Why did they leave me all white, like this? Why didn't they give me lovely hair like yours, instead of this yellow stuff?”

  “Darling, your hair's lovely. It's like the finest golden threads.”

  “But it's not like anyone else's. It's different. I want to be like other people. But I'm a freak.”

  Telta looked at her, unhappily perplexed.

  “Being of another kind isn't being a freak,” she said.

  “It is if you're the only one. And I don't want to be different. I hate it,” said Jannessa.

  A man made his way slowly up the marble steps of the Venturers' Club. He was middle-aged, but he walked with a clumsy lack of certainty more appro­priate to an older man. For a moment the porter looked doubt­ful, then his expression cleared.

  “Good evening, Dr. Forbes,” he said.

  Dr. Forbes smiled.

  “Good evening, Rogers. You've got a good memory. It's twelve years.”

  “So now you're home for good — and
loaded with medical honours,” Franklyn said.

  “It's a curious feeling,” Forbes said. “Eighteen years altogether. I'd been there almost a year when you came.”

  “Well, you've earned the rest. Others got us there, but it's your work that's enabled us to build there and stay there.”

  “There was a lot to learn. There's a lot yet.”

  “You never remarried?” he asked.

  “No.” Franklyn shook his head.

  “You should have. I told you, remember? You should have a wife and family. It's still not too late.”

  Again Franklyn shook his head.

  “I've not told you my news yet,” he said. “I've had word of Jannessa.”

  Forbes stared at him. If he had ever thought any­thing more un­likely he could not recall what it was.

  “Had word,” he repeated, care­fully. “Just what does that mean?”

  Franklyn explained.

  “For years I have been adver­tising for news of the Aurora. The answers came mostly from nuts, or from those who thought I was crazy enough for them to cash in on — until six months or so ago.”

  “The man who came to see me then was the owner of a spaceman's hostel in Chicago. He'd had a man die there a little while before, and the man had some­thing he wanted to get off his chest before he went out. The owner brought it to me for what it was worth.”

  “The dying man claimed that the Aurora was not lost in space, as every­one thought; he said that his name was Jenkins and he had been aboard her, so he ought to know. According to his story, there was a mutiny on the Aurora when she was a few days out from Mars. It was on account of the captain deciding to hand some of the crew over to the police on arrival, for crimes un­speci­fied. When the muti­neers took over they had the support of all but one or two of the officers, and they changed course. I don't know what the ulti­mate plan was, but what they did then was to lift from the plane of the ecliptic, and hop the asteroid belt, on a course for Jupiter.”

  “The owner got the impression that they were not so much a ruth­less gang as a bunch of despe­rate men with a grie­vance. They could have pushed the officers and the passengers out into space since they had all quali­fied for a hang­ing any­way. But they didn't. Instead, like other pirates before them, they elected to maroon the lot and leave them to make out as best they could — if they could.”

  “According to Jenkins, the place chosen was Europa, somewhere in the region of its twentieth parallel, and the time some­where in the third or fourth month of 1995. The party they stranded consisted of twelve persons — including a coloured girl in charge of a white baby.”

  Franklyn paused.

  “The owner bears a quite blame­less character. The dying man had nothing to gain by fabri­ca­tion. And, on looking up the sailing list, I find that there was a space­man named Evan David Jenkins aboard the Aurora”

  He concluded with a kind of cau­tious triumph, and looked expec­tantly across the table at Forbes. But there was no enthu­siasm in the doctor's face.

  “Europa,” he said, reflectively. He shook his head.

  Franklyn's expression hardened.

  “Is that all you have to say?” he demanded.

  “No,” Forbes told him, slowly. “For one thing I should say that it is more than unlikely — that it is almost impos­sible that she can have survived.”

  “Almost is not quite. But I am going to find out. One of our pros­pect­ing ships is on her way to Europa now.”

  Forbes shook his head again.

  “It would be wiser to call her off.”

  Franklyn stared at him.

  “After all these years — when at last there is hope—”

  The doctor looked steadily back at him.

  “My two boys are going back to Mars next week,” he said.

  “I don't see what that has to do with it.”

  “But it has. Their muscles ache conti­nu­ally. The strain of that makes them too tired either to work or to enjoy life. The humidity here also exhausts them. They com­plain that the air feels like a thick soup all around and inside them. They have never been free of catarrh since they arrived. There are other things, too. So they are going back.”

  “And you stay here. That's tough.”

  “It's tougher on Annie. She adores those boys. But that's the way life is, Frank.”

  “Meaning?”

  'That it's conditions that count. When we produce a new life, it is some­thing plastic. Inde­pen­dent. We can't live its life as well as our own. We can't do more than to see that it has the best condi­tions to shape it the way we like best. If the condi­tions are in some way beyond our control, one of two things happens; either it becomes adapted to the condi­tions it finds — or it fails to adapt, which means that it dies.

  “We talk airily about conquering this or that natural obstacle — but look at what we really do and you'll find that more often than not it is our­selves we are adapting.”

  “My boys have been accli­ma­tized to Martian condi­tions. Earth doesn't suit them. Annie and I have sustained Martian con­di­tions for a while, but, as adults, we were in­cap­able of thorough adapt­ation. So either we must come home — or stay there to die early.”

  “You mean, you think that Jannessa—”

  “I don't know what may have happened — but I have thought about it. I don't think you have thought about it at all. Frank.”

  “I've thought of little else these last seven­teen years.”

  “Surely ‘dreamed’ is the word, Frank?” Forbes looked across at him, his head a little on one side, his manner gentle. “Once upon a time some­thing, an ancestor of ours, came out of the water on to the land. It became adapted until it could not go back to its relatives in the sea. That is the process we agree to call progress. It is inherent in life. If you stop it, you stop life, too.”

  “Philosophically that may be sound enough, but I'm not interested in abstrac­tions. I'm interested in my daughter.”

  “How much do you think your daughter may be interested in you? I know that sounds callous, but I can see that you have some idea of affinity in mind. You're mis­taking civilized custom for natu­ral law, Frank. Perhaps we all do, more or less.”

  “I don't know what you mean.”

  “To be plain — if Jannessa has survived, she will be more foreign than any Earth foreigner could possibly be.”

  “There were eleven others to teach her civilized ways and speech.”

  “If any of them survived. Suppose they did not, or she was some­how sepa­rated from them. There are authen­ticated instances of children reared by wolves, leopards and even antelopes, and not one of them turned out to be in the least like the Tarzan fiction. All were sub­human. Adaptation works both ways.”

  “Even if she has had to live among savages she can learn.”

  Dr. Forbes faced him seriously.

  “I don't think you can have read much anthro­pology. First she would have to unlearn the whole basis of the culture she has known. Look at the different races here, and ask your­self if that is possible. There might be a veneer, yes. But more than that—” He shrugged.

  “There is the call of the blood—”

  “Is there? If you were to meet your great-grand­father would there be any tie — would you even know him?”

  Franklyn said, stubbornly:

  “Why are you talking like this, Jimmy? I'd not have listened to another man. Why are you trying to break down all that I've hoped for? You can't, you know. Not now. But why try?”

  “Because I'm fond of you, Frank. Because under all your success you're still the young man with a romantic dream. I told you to remarry. You wouldn't — you preferred the dream to reality. You've lived with that dream so long now that it is part of your mental pattern. But your dream is of finding Jannessa — not of having found her. You have centred your life on that dream. If you do find her, in what­ever condi­tion you find her, the dream will be finished — the purpose you set you
r­self will have been accomp­lished. And there will be nothing else left for you.”

  Franklyn moved uneasily.

  “I have plans and ambitions for her.”

  “For the daughter you know nothing of? No, for the dream daughter; the one that exists only in your mind, what­ever you may find, it will be a real person — not your dream puppet, Frank.”

  Dr. Forbes paused, watching the smoke curl up from his cigarette. It was in his mind to say: “Whatever she is like, you will come to hate her, just because she cannot exactly match your dream of her,” but he decided to leave that unspoken. It occurred to him also to enlarge on the un­happi­ness which might descend on a girl removed from all that was familiar to her, but he knew that Franklyn's answer to that would be — there was money enough to provide every luxury and conso­la­tion. He had already said enough — perhaps too much, and none of it had really reached Franklyn. He decided to let it rest there, and hope. After all, there was little like­li­hood that Jannessa had either survived or would be found.

  The tense look that had been on Franklyn's face gradu­ally relaxed. He smiled.

  “You've said your piece, old man. You think I may be in for a shock, and you want to prepare me, but I realize all that. I had it out with myself years ago. I can take it, if it's necessary.”

  Dr. Forbes' eyes dwelt on his face for a moment. He sighed, softly and privately.

  “Very well,” he agreed, and started to talk of some­thing else.

  “You see,” said Toti, “this is a very small planet—”

  “A satellite,” said Jannessa. “A satellite of Yan.”

  “But a planet of the sun, all the same. And there is the terrible cold.”

  “Then why did your people choose it?” Jannessa asked, reasonably.

  “Well, when our own world began to die and we had to die with it or go some­where else, our people thought about those they could reach. Some were too hot, some were too big—”

  “Why too big?”

  “Because of the gravity. On a big planet we could scarcely have crawled.”

  “Couldn't they have ... well, made things lighter?”

  Toti made a negative move­ment of his head, and his silver hair glistened in the fluor­escence from the walls.