It was nearly winter when the ship arrived. Pete Farnamnever knew if the timing had been planned that way or not.It might have been coincidence that it came just when thecolony was predicting its first real bumper crop of all time.When it was all over, Pete and Mario and the rest tried tofigure it out, but none of them ever knew for sure just whathad happened back on Earth, or when it had actually happened.There was too little information to go on, and practicallynone that they could trust. All Pete Farnam really knew,that day, was that this was the wrong year for a ship fromEarth to land on Baron IV.
Pete was out on the plantation when it landed. As usual,his sprayer had gotten clogged; tarring should have beenstarted earlier, before it got so cold that the stuff clung to thenozzle and hardened before the spray could settle into thedusty soil. The summer past had been the colony's finest in thefourteen years he'd been there, a warm, still summer withplenty of rain to keep the dirt down and let the taaro get wellrooted and grow up tall and gray against the purple sky. Butnow the taaro was harvested. It was waiting, compressed andcrated, ready for shipment, and the heavy black clouds werescudding nervously across the sky, faster with every passingday. Two days ago Pete had asked Mario to see about firingup the little furnaces the Dusties had built to help them fightthe winter. All that remained now was tarring the fields, andthen buckling down beneath the wind shields before the firstwinter storms struck.
Pete was trying to get the nozzle of the tar sprayer cleanedout when Mario's jeep came roaring down the rutted roadfrom the village in a cloud of dust. In the back seat a coupleof Dusties were bouncing up and down like happy five-year-olds.The brakes squealed and Mario bellowed at him fromthe road. "Pete! The ship's in! Better get hopping!"
Pete nodded and started to close up the sprayer. One ofthe Dusties tumbled out of the jeep and scampered across thefield to give him a hand. It was an inexpert hand to say theleast, but the Dusties seemed so proud of the little they wereable to learn about mechanized farming that nobody had theheart to shoo them away. Pete watched the fuzzy brown creatureget its paws thoroughly gummed up with tar before hepulled him loose and sent him back to the jeep with a whackon the backside. He finished the job himself, grabbed his coatfrom the back of the sprayer, and pulled himself into the frontseat of the jeep.
Mario started the little car back down the road. The youngcolonist's face was coated with dust, emphasizing the lines ofworry around his eyes. "I don't like it, Pete. There isn't anyship due this year."
"When did it land?"
"About twenty minutes ago. Won't be cool for a while yet."
Pete laughed. "Maybe Old Schooner is just getting lonesometo swap tall stories with us. Maybe he's even bringing us alocker of T-bones. Who knows?"
"Maybe," said Mario without conviction.
Pete looked at him, and shrugged. "Why complain if they'reearly? Maybe they've found some new way to keep our fieldsfrom blowing away on us every winter." He stared across atthe heavy windbreaks between the fields—long, ragged structuresbuilt in hope of outwitting the vicious winds that howledacross the land during the long winter. Pete picked bits of tarfrom his beard, and wiped