Flaunders could be quite an optimist when he wanted to; he was one of those rare persons who seem to grow stronger with each failure. At least on the surface.
"Only what I see," he replied, not willing to show consternation. "Amazingly rapid growth, but they're still only weeds. It's just going to take a little applied science."
"Maybe." McBride didn't like it. "But I've done a little farming in my time; know what it is to worry a chunk of farmland out of the raw. And the nature of Earth is dead compared to this."
"Bunk!" Flaunders scoffed. "Work, certainly. But we'll be eating fresh corn in two months!"
McBride looked around, seeing little you wouldn't see on Earth. What's wrong with me? he thought. It's my place to keep the spirits of the men up, not to dampen them. Flaunders is right, of course. This stuff is still only vegetation, even if it _is_ styled after Jack's beanstalk. Jack chopped down the beanstalk and killed the giant. Our giant is the threat of starvation, but killing it is still a matter of stalk-chopping. If Jack could do it so can we.
It started out like that. Two weeks of hacking and digging, of specially prepared weed-killer and the aid of every trick known to science, and there was a strip of dark, rich ground all ready for planting. It looked like things were really beginning to roll. They did roll. Right up against a blank wall.
A few days after the planting, Flaunders was looking at a handful of black spider-things and swearing under his breath. The shriveled spider-things were seeds brought from Earth. They were shot through with hairlike roots, and that was the strange thing. It was strange because the roots were not their own.
It took several more days for Flaunders to understand. When he did he took on an attitude faintly remindful of a cornered rat. In a spot, but frustrated to fighting anger. The ship had contained enough food for only about two months to begin with, and more than two weeks had now come out of that. Starvation was becoming a very real possibility in his mind.
"We're up against something big," he said, peeved with himself for having to admit it. "We're fighting millions of years of evolution."
McBride sensed something disturbing in the other's voice. Maybe a trace of fear. "What do you mean?" he said.