think I understand," he said. "I think I know what we did to our
environment, through the generations. But it doesn't do much good, just
knowing something."

"You'll never change," Max said.

"No, I don't think we will."

Captain Bernard got up, and MacGregor got up too. They looked at Max.
Slowly he turned his head and smiled at Trina, and then he too stood up.
"Want to come outside and talk, Trina?"

But there was nothing to say. Nothing she could do except break down and
cry in his arms and beg him not to leave her, beg him to spend the rest
of his life on a world she could never leave again.

"No," she said. "I guess not." And then, the memories rushed back, and
the music, and the little lane down by the stream where the magnolias
spread their web of fragrance. "It's--it's almost festival time, Max.
Will you be here for it?"

"I don't know, Trina."

It meant no; she knew that.

* * * * *

The weeks slipped by, until it was summer on the world, until the
festival music sang through the villages and the festival flowers
bloomed and the festival lovers slipped off from the dances to walk
among them. There was a breeze, just enough to carry the mingled
fragrances and the mingled songs, just enough to touch the throat and
ruffle the hair and lie lightly between the lips of lovers.

Trina danced with Aaron Gomez, and remembered. And the wind seemed too
soft somehow, almost lifeless, with the air too sweet and cloying.

She wondered what a festival on the planet would be like.

Max, with Saari MacGregor, perhaps, laughing in the wind, running in the
chill of evening along some riverbank.

I could have gone with him, she thought. I could have gone....

But then the music swirled faster about them, the pulse of it pounding
in her ears, and Aaron swept her closer as they danced, spinning among
the people and the laughter, out toward the terrace, toward the trees
with leaves unstirring in the evening air. All was color and sound and
scent, all blended, hypnotically perfect, something infinitely precious
that she could never, never leave.

For it was summer on the world, and festival time again.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The First Day of Spring, by Mari Wolf

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