"Why that's just about what happened down at the colony, about the water, I mean," said one of them. "All of a sudden a flood came gushing out of the supply pipe and overflowed the pool and spreading out over the surrounding desert. A funny thing, too, was the way that the merrl plants grew where the water had spread. When we left, our colony had a full fifteen days' stock, and all of it was gathered within a five-minute walk of the caves!"
Peetn had a faraway look in his usually inexpressive, yellow eyes. A quiver was noticeable in his whistle as he replied.
"Can this be the fulfilment of the old legend of Gamtl?" he asked. "Already we owe this alien much; our lives have been made easier to live. Who knows, with the awful burden of food-gathering and water-conserving lifted from our colony, we may be able to gain back some of the lost glory of our ancestors; may again be able to build water-stations and flash-guns! Yes, my friends, the day that stranger staggered into this water-station was the first day of the rebirth of Mars!"
Harrison Clark, for the first time since he had crashed on the Martian desert in the rocket, did not dream so longingly of Earth as he lay in the little hollow he had come to know as home. He had work to do here. A feeling of mingled exultation and determination had possessed him when Peetn had shown him the liquid which resulted from crushing merrl. It was a very heavy and durable vegetable oil, quite capable of continuing the job of lubricating the machinery after his petroleum was gone. Mars could be re-awakened with it; the task was his.
Then, too, some day another rocket might arrive from Earth, one that wouldn't crash. The American Rocket Society wouldn't give up because their first rocket failed to return. In examining the pumps a day or so ago, he thought he found what made them go. A small, ridiculously small box, no larger than his two fists fastened to the eccentric. Obviously atomic power, or something as efficient and ever-lasting. Earth could use something like that.
A sense of warmth and friendship suffused him, in spite of the frigid wind which blew all around, as he thought of the Martian monsters which lay sleeping beside him. They were his people now! For when Peetn had stopped whistling to them, one by one they had filed past, and every damn one had shaken his hand!