Or let us say, I thought, playing with the thought, that man did not let them in, but they came in all the same, that man made no bargain with them, but they became the wheat and grass and all the other plants of Earth surreptitiously, killing off the native plants of Earth and replacing them with an identical plant life, in all its variations. In such a case, I thought, the result could be the same.

If we let them in, or if we didn't let them in (but couldn't keep them out), we were in their hands. They might kill us, or they might not kill us, but even if they didn't kill us, there'd still remain the fact they could at any time they wished.

But if the Flowers were bent on infiltrating Earth, if they planned to conquer Earth by wiping out all life, then why had they contacted me? They could have infiltrated without us knowing it. It would have taken longer, but the road was clear. There was nothing that would stop them, for we would not know. If certain purple flowers should begin escaping Millville gardens, spreading year by year, in fence corners and in ditches, in the little out-of-the-way places of the land, no one would pay attention to them. Year by year the flowers could have crept out and out and in a hundred years have been so well established that nothing could deny them.

And there was another thought that, underneath my thinking and my speculation, had kept hammering at me, pleading to be heard. And now I let it in: even if we could, should we keep them out? Even in the face of potential danger, should we bar the way to them? For here was an alien life, the first alien life we'd met. Here was the chance for the human race, if it would take the chance, to gain new knowledge, to find new attitudes, to fill in the gaps of knowing and to span the bridge of thought, to understand a non-human viewpoint, to sample new emotion, to face new motivation, to investigate new logic. Was this something we could shy away from? Could we afford to fail to meet this first alien life halfway and work out the differences that might exist between the two of us? For if we failed here, the first time, then we'd fail the second time, and perhaps forever.

Tupper made a noise like a ringing telephone and I wondered how a telephone had gotten in there with that lone, lost cat of his. Perhaps, I thought, the cat had found a telephone, maybe in a booth out in the dark and dripping woods, and would find out where it was and how it might get home.

The telephone rang again and there was a little wait. Then Tupper said to me, most impatiently, "Go ahead and talk. This call is for you."

"What's that?" I asked, astonished.

"Say hello," said Tupper. "Go ahead and answer."

"All right," I said, just to humour him. "Hello." His voice changed to Nancy's voice, so perfect an imitation that I felt the presence of her.

"Brad!" she cried. "Brad, where are you?" Her voice was high and gasping, almost hysterical.

"Where are you, Brad?" she asked. "Where did you disappear to?"

"I don't know," I said, "that I can explain. You see…"

"I've looked everywhere," she said, in a rush of words. "We've looked everywhere. The whole town was looking for you. And then I remembered the phone in Father's study, the one without a dial, you know. I knew that it was there, but I'd never paid attention to it. I thought it was a model of some sort, or maybe just a decoration for the desk or a gag of some sort.

"But there was a lot of talk about the phones in Stiffy's shack, and Ed Adler told me about the phone that was in your office. And it finally dawned on me that maybe this phone that Father had was the same as those other phones.

"But it took an awful long time for it to dawn on me. So I went into his study and I saw the phone and I just stood and looked at it — because I was scared, you see. I was afraid of it and I was afraid to use it because of what I might find out. But I screwed my courage up and I lifted the receiver and there was an open line and I asked for you. I knew it was a crazy thing to do, but… What did you say, Brad?"

"I said I don't know if I can explain exactly where I am. I know where I am, of course, but I can't explain it so I'll be believed."

"Tell me. Don't you fool around. Just tell me where you are."

"I'm in another world. I walked out of the garden…"

"You walked where!"

"I was just walking in the garden, following Tupper's tracks and…"

"What kind of track is that?"

"Tupper Tyler," I said. "I guess I forgot to tell you that he had come back."

"But he couldn't," she told me. "I remember him. That was ten years ago."

"He did come back," I said. "He came back this morning. And then he left again. I was following his tracks…"

"You told me," she said. "You were following him and you wound up in another world. Where is this other world?" She was like any other woman. She asked the damndest questions.

"I don't know exactly, except that it's in time. Perhaps only a second away in time."

"Can you get back?"

"I'm going to try," I said. "I don't know if I can."

"Is there anything I can do to help — that the town can do to help?"

"Listen, Nancy, this isn't getting us anywhere. Tell me, where is your father?"

"He's down at your place. There are a lot of people there. Hoping that you will come back."

"Waiting for me?"

"Well, yes. You see, they looked everywhere and they know you aren't in the village, and there are a lot of them convinced that you know all about this…"

"About the barrier, you mean."

"Yes, that's what I mean."

"And they are pretty sore?"

"Some of them," she said.

"Listen, Nancy…"

"Don't say that again. I am listening."

"Can you go down and see your father?"

"Of course I can," she said.

"All right. Go down and tell him that when I can get back — if I can get back — I'll need to talk with someone. Someone in authority. Someone high in authority. The President, perhaps, or someone who's close to the President. Maybe someone from the United Nations…"

"But, Brad, you can't ask to see the President!"

"Maybe not," I said. "But as high as I can get. I have something our government has to know. Not only ours, but all the governments. Your father must know someone he can talk to. Tell him I'm not fooling. Tell him it's important."

"Brad," she said. "Brad, you're sure you aren't kidding? Because if you are, this could be an awful mess."

"Cross my heart," I said. "I mean it, Nancy, it's exactly as I've said. I'm in another world, an alternate world…"

"Is it a nice world, Brad?"

"It's nice enough," I said. "There's nothing here but flowers."

"What kind of flowers?"

"Purple flowers. My father's flowers. The same kind that are back in Millville. The flowers are people, Nancy. They're the ones that put up the barrier."

"But flowers can't be people, Brad." Like I was a kid. Like she had to humour me. Asking me if it was a nice world and telling me that flowers never could be people. All sweet reasonableness.

I held in my anger and my desperation.

"I know they can't," I said. "But just the same as people. They are intelligent and they can communicate."

"You have talked with them?"

"Tupper talks for them. He's their interpreter."

"But Tupper was a drip."

"Not back here he isn't. He's got things we haven't."

"What kind of things? Brad, you have to be…"

"You will tell your father?"

"Right away," she said. "I'll go down to your place…"

"And, Nancy…"

"Yes."

"Maybe it would be just as well if you didn't tell where I am or how you got in touch. I imagine the village is pretty well upset."

"They are wild," said Nancy.

"Tell your father anything you want. Tell him everything. But not the rest of them. He'll know what to tell them. There's no use in giving the village something more to talk about."