“We’re on the way back,” he shouted above the roar of the wind. “We’ve got a fairly intelligent human being with us. Expect us in—whoops!—I’m sorry—we just went over a bridge—about ten minutes. What was that? No, of course not. We didn’t have the slightest trouble. Everything went perfectly smoothly. Good-bye.”
Graham looked back only once to see how his passengers were faring. The sight was rather unsettling, for their ears and hair (which had not been glued on very firmly) had blown away and their real selves were beginning to emerge. Graham began to suspect with some discomfort, that his new acquaintances also lacked noses. Oh well, one could grow used to anything with practice. He was going to have plenty of that in the years ahead.
The rest, of course, you all know; but for the full story of the first landing on Earth, and of the peculiar circumstances under which Ambassador Graham became humanity’s representative to the universe at large, has never before been recounted. We extracted the main details, with a good deal of persuasion, from Crysteel and Danstor themselves, while we were working in the Department of Extraterrestrial affairs.
It was understandable, in view of their success on Earth, that they should have been selected by their superiors to make the first contact with our mysterious and secretive neighbours, the Martians. It is also understandable, in the light of the above evidence, that Crysteel and Danstor were so reluctant to embark on this later mission, and we are not really very surprised that nothing has ever been heard of them since.