Somehow he knew what she meant. When he got to Heaven he would understand life, but not until. That seemed to be what she meant. She nodded, as if that was close enough. He wondered, that alarm in his breast tugging at his nerves, setting his eyes to roving for the jaws of the trap he felt about him.
Days passed, and his wonder increased. It was like living in a mirror, or in an instant of frozen time. It was idyllic, yet ... nothing happened! The beautiful creature was alone here, with her few cows and animals; the garden and the cows produced her living. The cellar was full of stored food, and she seemed to possess everything one could want ... except change. One day was exactly like another.
No one came. No one left. The smoky sky overhead coiled and uncoiled those odd clouds; the sun shone ... a large red sun, warm ... but not too warm. No one came. No one left. There was himself, puzzling, thinking. There was the calm woman, beautiful as a picture, busy as a housewife, making everything sweet and clean and comfortable for ... Steve Donay?
And Donay couldn't stand it. Out there sat his ship, unharmed, unsmashed. All it needed was fuel. And he couldn't pull himself out onto that meandering road that went over the hill and look for the civilization behind this little farm house and this perfect ... robot.
It was then he gave up trying to learn her language. Gave up waiting for the neighbors, for contact with intelligent members of her race. She could not be a living creature, and she could not be even flesh. She must be some kind of maintenance robot ... and Donay shivered. What lay over the hill? If even the tiny farms of this world were peopled with maintenance robots, what wonders lay over the hill?
Then he wondered where were the produce trucks to take away the milk, the butter, the fruit and vegetables? And even as he wondered, his feet took him at last out of the clutching beauty and peace and neat contentment of that little home. His feet led him along that road, winding over the hill.
Looking back, he saw Her standing in the doorway, the upper part swung open, her eyes even at this distance seeming blurred with tears. She waved one hand, a little gesture of farewell, and that snowy apron she wore over her strange spotless garments came up to her face. She was weeping!
With a tug at his heart as strange as any emotion he ever knew, he realized the creature was weeping to see him go! But he made an effort, and his mind assured him it was but a trick of his own fleshly emotions, that that woman of the steel-hard lovely form was not able to weep, or to do anything but tend her cows and weed her garden and can her fruits and open the door to any knock that came. She must be a robot, his mind said. But his heart shouted—She is woman, perfection in womanhood, and you are leaving your home!
His feet led on, and he reached the top of the hill and sat down to look over the view that spread out beneath his eyes. There were other farmsteads, very like the one he had just left. Dotted here and there were herds of cattle. The whole land lay dreaming under his eyes, and he knew the mist of the far horizon only shut off a repetition of the same thing. But hope led him on, and he rose and went along a little used trail.