n't you think his silhouette is so graceful there in the
moonlight? He isn't really puny--just frail."

"Maggie, you're not serious about this holly?"

"What do you mean?" And still he didn't have her full attention. Would
he ever have it again?

"Serious about raising him to be your--your--"

"Why not, Jim?"

"It's impossible."

"Is it? It certainly is far more possible with him, isn't it? That much
I understood from your zoology books."

"I suppose so."

"Besides, I have nothing to lose, have I?"

"But even if it were possible, wouldn't it be humiliating for you? The
creature's mindless!"

Magnolia's leaves rustled in the darkness. She was laughing--a little
bitterly. "Your Phyllis isn't your intellectual equal, Jim, and yet you
say you love her and I suppose you do. Am I not entitled to my follies
also?"

But she couldn't compare Phyllis to a holly plant! It was unreasonable.

"He may die, of course," Magnolia said. "I've got to be prepared for
that. The soil is different, the air is different, the sun is different.
But the chances are, if he survives, he'll turn blue. And if he turns
blue, who knows what other changes might be brought about? Maybe the
plants on your Earth aren't inherently mindless, Jim. Maybe they just
didn't have a chance. 'Know ye the land where the cypress and myrtle
are emblems of deeds that are done in their clime...?' That land isn't
Earth, Jim, so it might just possibly be Elysium."

* * * * *

Again he didn't say anything. What he wanted to say, he had no right to
say, so he kept silent.

"It'll be a chance for me, too, Jim. At least we're both plants, he and
I. That gives us a headstart."

"Yes, I suppose it does."

"Intellect doesn't count for much in the propagation of the species.
Life goes on without regard for reason, and that's mainly what we're
here for, to make sure that life goes on--if we're here for anything at
all. Thanks to your kind, Jim, life will continue on this planet; it
will certainly be your kind of life--and I hope it can be ours as well."

"Yes," he said. "I hope so, too."

And he did, but he wished it didn't have to continue in quite that way.
Perhaps it was a trick of the three moons, but the holly plant's leaves
seemed to have changed color.. They were no longer green, but almost
blue--powder blue.

"You'd best be getting on to your party, Jim," Magnolia said. "You
wouldn't want to be remiss in your duties