midnight
First the ruins , and then the Martians themselves , always elusive , gnomelike , goblinlike , flitting away into the dissolving dusk . You 're a comparative archaeologist and you 're on Mars with the first batch of rugged youngsters to come tumbling out of a spaceship with stardust in their eyes . You see those youngsters digging wells and sweating in the desert . You see the prefabricated housing units go up , the tangle of machinery , the camp sites growing lusty with midnight brawls and skull-cracking escapades . You see the towns in the desert , the law-enforcement committees , the camp followers , the reform fanatics . You 're a sober-minded scholar , so you start digging in the ruins . You bring up odd-looking cylinders , rolls of threaded film , instruments of science so complex they make you giddy .