"But Klev?"

"Yeast. Just plain yeast. I'd brought one package in the Trailblazer, for cooking. But there is no more yeast on Mars."

"About the water?" Nick asked. "How come your father didn't tell Harmon about that? Colonel Hammer had us drilling all over the planet."

"Luck," Susan replied seriously. "We didn't know where it was ourselves until after we came back from Earth, after we learned more of their language."

"But all our drilling," Nick protested. "Surely at least one—"

"Twice, at least. But each time the water-voras pumped it to other caves. Martians don't drink, but they saw the Exploiters shipping water clear from Earth and realized its importance. We, and they, hoped the Exploiters would eventually give up and leave. Oh, if only Dad had told Harmon that Mars was completely arid!"

Nick got up and prowled restlessly around the room.

"Are they going to starve us?" he asked petulantly. His emergency rations were in his jacket, which Merlo had kept.

"Oh, no." Susan realized she was hungry too. "There's food here."

She led him into the back room, where a series of shelves were carved into the walls. Each shelf was covered with disc-shaped, fungoid-looking growths.

"When they turn pink like this they're ready to eat," she explained.

Nick found them tasteless and unsatisfying. She saw his grimace.

"Dad and I lived on them ever since the Exploiters came," she declared.

"No wonder you're thin," he retorted ungraciously, chewing on the pulpy mass.

It was only at his remark that she realized her face and hands were grimy and her clothing totally inadequate. She blushed.

"Don't stare at me like that!" she snapped.

Nick found the queer faucet-like arrangement in one corner.

"Water!" he said, gulping thirstily.

They both drank and washed, cleaning their skins of the powder-fine sand that could work its way into the pores and cause a tormenting rash.

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