Gradually the passage widened, then abruptly it ended. A bleak vista of volcanic ash dotted with sputter cones opened before them. It was a flat tableland, roughly circular, scarcely half a kilometer across, a desolation of black rock, stunted trees and underbrush, and gray volcanic ash. A crater, somewhat larger than the rest, lay with its nearest edge about two hundred meters away. The rock edges were fire polished, gleaming in the yellow sunshine, and the thin margin of trees and brush surrounding the depression were gnarled and shrunken, twisted into fantastic shapes.

"Hey! what's this?" Kennon asked curiously. "That crater looks peculiar, like a meteor had struck here—but those stunted plants—hmm—there must have been some radioactivity too." He looked at the crater speculatively. "Now I wonder—" he began.

Copper had turned a sickly white. "No!" she said in a half-strangled voice—"oh, no!"

Kennon looked at her. "You know what this is?" he demanded.

"No," Copper said. But her voice was unsteady.

"You're lying."

"But I don't know." Copper wailed. "I'm only guessing. I've never seen this place before in my life! Please!—let's get out of here!"

"Then you know about this," Kennon demanded.

"I think it's the Pit," Copper said. "The redes don't say where it is. But the description fits—the Circle of Death, the Twisted Land—it's all like the redes say."

"Redes?—what are redes? And what is this business about circles of death? There's something here that's peculiar and I want to know what it is."

"It's nothing. Truly. Just let's go back. Let's leave this place. It's no good. It's tabu."

"Tabu? You've never used that word before."

"Forbidden."

"Who forbids it?"

"The Gods—the Old Ones. It is not for Lani. Nor for you." Her voice was harsh. "Come away before it is too late. Before the Silent Death strikes you down."

"I'm going to have a look at this."

"You'll be killed!" Copper said. "And if you die, I die too."

"Don't be foolish. There's nothing here that can hurt me. See those trees and plants growing right up to the crater's edge. If they can take it permanently, I can stand it for a few moments. If there's any radioactivity there, it's not very much."

"But the redes say—"

"Oh, forget those redes. I know what I'm doing. Besides, I'm a Betan and can stand more radiation than most men. A brief exposure isn't going to hurt me."

"You go and I go too," Copper said desperately.

"You'll stay here where it's safe," Kennon said flatly.

"I'm going with you," Copper repeated. "I don't want to live without you."

"I tell you I won't be hurt. And one quick look isn't going to bother whatever's down there."

"That's what Roga the Foolish said when he opened Lyssa's tower. But he brought men to Flora. And your little look may bring an even greater calamity."

Kennon shrugged, and started Walking toward the crater's edge.

Copper followed.

He turned to order her back, but the words died on his tips as he saw the terror and determination on her face. Neither commands nor pleas would move her. If he went she would follow. The only way he could stop her would be with violence, and he didn't want to manhandle her. He felt an odd mixture of pride, tenderness, and admiration for her. Were their situations reversed, he doubted whether he would have the courage she was showing. He sighed. Perhaps she was right. Perhaps he did need an antiradiation suit.

"All right," he said. "You win. I'll get some protective clothing and look at it later."

Her knees sagged, but he caught her before she fell, and held her erect until her strength returned. Belatedly he understood the emotional strain that had been gripping her. "If you come back later, sir, you'll take me with you." The words were a statement, not a question.

He nodded. "Providing you wear a radiation suit," he said.

She grimaced with distaste and he chuckled. Clothing and Copper simply didn't get along together.

"Well?"

"All right," she said unhappily.

"And there's one more condition."

"What's that?" she asked suspiciously.

"That you tell me about this place. You obviously know something about it, and with all your talking, you've never mentioned it to me."

"It is forbidden to talk of these things to men," Copper said—and then, perversely, "Do you want me to tell you now?"

"No—it can wait. We have come a long way and I am hungry. I listen poorly on an empty stomach. Let's go back to the jeep and you can tell me later."

Copper smiled. "That's good," she said. "I'd feel better away from this place."



CHAPTER XIII

"I was a poor learner of the redes," Copper confessed. "And I'll have to skip the Mysteries. I never even tried to learn them. Somehow I was sure I'd never be a preceptress." She settled herself more comfortably on the tawny grass and watched him as he lay on his back beside her.

"Eh?" Kennon said, "Preceptress?"

"The guardians of our traditions. They know the redes and mysteries by heart."

"And you have kept your religion alive that way all these years?"

"It isn't exactly religion," Copper said. "It's more like history, we learn it to remember that we were once a great race—and that we may be again. Someday there will come a male, a leader to bring us out of bondage, and our race will be free of dependence on men. There will be pairings again, and freedom to live as we please." She looked thoughtfully at Kennon. "You might even be the one—even though you are human. You're different from the others."

"You're prejudiced." Kennon smiled. "I'm no different. Well—not very different at any rate."

"That is not my thought," Copper said. "You are very different indeed. No man has ever resisted a Lani as long as you have."

Kennon shook his head. "Let's not go into that now. What are these redes?"

"I do not remember them all," Copper apologized. "I was—"

"You've said that before. Tell me what you do know."

"I remember the beginning fairly well," she said. "It goes back to the time before Flora when everything was nothing and the Master Himself was lonely."

Without warning her voice changed to a rhythmic, cadenced chant that was almost a song. Her face became rapt and introspective as she rocked slowly from side to side. The rhythm was familiar and then he recognized it—the unintelligible music he had often heard coming from the barracks late at night when no men were around—the voiceless humming that the Lani sang at work.

First there was Darkness—starless and sunless

Void without form—darker than night

Then did the Master—Lord of Creation

Wave His right hand, saying, "Let there be light!"

Verse, Kennon thought. That was logical. People remember poetry better than prose. But the form was not what he'd normally expect. It was advanced, a style that was past primitive blank verse or heroic pentameter. He listened intently as Copper went on.

Light filled the heavens, bright golden glowing, Brought to the Void by His wondrous hand; Then did the Master—Lord of Creation— Nod His great head, saying, "Let there be land!" Air, land, and water formed into being, Born in the sight of His all-seeing eyes; Then did the master—Lord of Creation— Smile as He murmured, "Let life arise!" All of the life conceived by the Master, Varied in shape as the grasses and birds; Hunters and hunted, moveless and moving, Came into form at the sound of His words.

"That's a great deal like Genesis," Kennon said with mild astonishment. "Where could you have picked that up?"

"From the beginning of our race," Copper said. "It came to us with Ulf and Lyssa—but what is Genesis?"

"A part of an ancient religion—one that is still followed on some of the Central Worlds. Its followers call themselves Christians. They say it came from Earth, the mother-world of men."

"Our faith has no name. We are children of Lyssa, who was a daughter of the Master."

"It is an odd similarity," Kennon said. "But other races have had stories of the Creation. And possibly there may be another explanation. Your ancestors could have picked this up from Alexander's men. They came from Earth originally and some of them could have been Christians."

"No," Cooper said. "This rede is long before Man Alexander. It is the origin of our world, even before Ulf and Lyssa. It is the first Book—the Book of the God-spell. Man Alexander came in the sixth Book—the Book of Roga."

"There's no point in arguing about it," Kennon said. "Go on—tell me the rest."

"It's going to be a long story," Copper said. "Even though I have forgotten some of it, I can chant the redes for hours."

Kennon braced his back against one of the fat tires of the jeep. "I'm a good listener," he said.

She chuckled. "You asked for this," she said—and took up the verses where she had left off. And Kennon learned the Lani version of creation, of the first man and woman, cast out of Heaven for loving each other despite the Master's objection, of how they came to Flora and founded the race of the Lani. He learned how the Lani grew in numbers and power, how they split into two warring groups over the theological point of whether Ulf or Lyssa was the principal deity, how Roga the Foolish opened Lyssa's tower to find out whether the Ulfians or Lyssans were right, and brought the Black Years to Flora.

He heard the trial of Roga and the details of his torture by the priests of Ulf and the priests of Lyssa—united by this greatest sacrilege. And he heard the Lani version of the landing of Alexander's ship and man's conquest of Flora.

It was a story of savagery and superstition, of blood and intolerance, of bravery and cowardice, of love and beauty. Yet through it all, even through the redes that described the Conquest, there was a curious remoteness, a lack of emotion that made the verses more terrible as they flowed in passionless rhythm from Copper's lips.

"That's enough!" Kennon said.

"I told you you wouldn't like it."

"It's horrible. How can you remember such things?"

"We begin to learn them as soon as we can talk. We know the redes almost our entire lives." Copper was silent for a moment. "There's lots more," she said, "but it's all about our lives since the Man Alexander—the old one—took possession of us. And most of the newer redes are pretty dull. Our life hasn't changed much since the men came. The Book of Man is boring." Copper sighed. "I have dared a great deal by telling you these things. If the others knew, they would kill both of us."

"Then why tell me?" he asked.

"I love you," she said simply. "You wanted to know—and I can deny you nothing."

A wave of tenderness swept over him. She would give her life for him—and what would he give? Nothing. Not even his prejudices. His face twisted. If she was only human, If she wasn't just an animal. If he wasn't a Betan. If, if, if. Resentment gorged his throat. It was unfair—so damned unfair. He had no business coming here. He should have stayed on Beta or at least on a human world where he would never have met Copper. He loved her, but he couldn't have her. It was Tantalus and Sisyphus rolled into one unsightly package and fastened to his soul. With a muttered curse he rose to his feet, and as he did he stopped—frozen—staring at Copper as though he had never seen her before.

"How did you say that Roga was judged responsible for Alexander coming here?" he demanded.

"He went into Lyssa's tower—where Ulf and Lyssa tried to call Heaven—and with his foolish meddling set the tower alight with a glow that all could see. Less than a week later the Man Alexander came."

"Where was this tower?"

"Where Alexandria now stands. Man Alexander destroyed it and built his house upon its ruins."

"And what was that place of the Pit?"

"The Shrine of Ulf—where the God-Egg struck Flora. It is buried in the pit, but the Silent Death has protected it from blasphemy—and besides Man Alexander never learned about it. We feared that he would destroy it as he did Lyssa's tower."

A wild hope stirred in Kennon. "We're going home," he announced.

"Good."

"And we're going to get a pair of radiation suits—and then we're coming back. We'll have a good look at that Pit, and if what's in there is what I think it is"—his face was a mixture of grimness and eagerness—"we'll blow this whole operation off this planet!"

Copper blanched. "It is death to meddle with the God-Egg," she said.

"Superstition!" Kennon scoffed. "If that Egg is what I think, it was made by men, and you are their descendant."

"Perhaps you're right, but I can't help thinking you are wrong," she said soberly. "Look at the trouble that came with Roga's meddling. Be careful that you do not bring us a worse fate."

"I'll be very careful. We'll take every precaution."

"We?"

"You're coming, of course. I can't imagine you staying away."

Copper nodded.

"You shouldn't worry so much," Kennon teased. "You know we men live forever."

"That is true."

"And if I'm right you're just as human as I. And you're capable of living as long as I do."

"Yes, sir," Copper said. Her voice was unconvinced, her expression noncommittal.

"You females," Kennon said in quick exasperation. "You drive a man crazy. Get an idea in your head and it takes triatomate to blast it out. Now let's go."

Two hours brought them back to the volcanic area, and knowing what to look for, Kennon located the pockmarked mountain valley. From the air it looked completely ordinary. Kennon was amazed at the perfection of the natural camouflage. The Pit was merely another crater in the pitted ground. He dropped to a lower altitude, barely a hundred feet above the sputter cones. "Look!" he said.

Below them was the crater of the Pit and in its center a smooth bluish-black hemisphere protruded from the crater floor. It would have passed unnoticed by the casual eye—nearly concealed by two gigantic blocks of pumice.

"The God-Egg!" Copper exclaimed.

"Egg—ha! that's a spacer! I thought it would be. I'd recognize durilium anywhere. Let's go down and look this over, but first we want a couple of pictures." He pointed a camera at the crater and snapped the shutter. "There—now let's have a closer look at our baby."

"Do you expect me to get into that thing?" Copper said distastefully as she prodded the shapeless green coveralls with a bare toe. She eyed the helmet, gloves and boots with equal distaste. "I'd suffocate."

"If you want to come with me, you'll wear it," Kennon said. "Otherwise you won't come near that pit. Try it and I'll chain you to the jeep."

"You wouldn't!"

"Just try me."

"Oh—all fight. I'll wear the thing—but I won't be comfortable.''

"Who cares about that? You'll be protected."

"All right—show me how to put it on. I'd rather be with you than worry about what you are doing."

The suit was several sizes too large but it covered her adequately. Too adequately, Kennon decided. She looked like a pile of wrinkles with legs. He chuckled.

She glared. "So I'm funny," she said. "Let me tell you something else that's funny. I'm hot. I'm sweating. I itch. Now—laugh!"

"I don't feel like laughing," Kennon said. "I feel the same way."

They approached the edge of the Pit carefully. Kennon kept checking the radiation counter. The needle slowly rose and steadied at one-half roentgen per hour as he thrust the probe over the rim of the depression. "It's fine, so far," he said encouragingly. "We could take this much for quite a while even without suits." He lowered himself over the edge, sliding down the gentle slope.

"How is it down there?" Copper called. The intercom crackled in his ear.

"Fine—barely over one roentgen per hour. With these suits we could stay here indefinitely." The sigh of relief was music in her ears. "This place is barely lukewarm."

"That's what you think," Copper said.

"I mean radiation warm," Kennon said. "Stay up there and watch me. I may need some things."

"All right." Copper squirmed inside the hot suit. The thing was an oven. She hoped that Kennon didn't plan to work in the daytime. It would be impossible.

Kennon gingerly approached the ship. It was half buried in the loose debris and ash that had fallen or blown into the pit during the centuries it had rested there. It was old—incredibly old. The hull design was ancient—riveted sheets of millimeter-thick durilium. Ships hadn't been built like that in over two thousand years. And the ovoid shape was reminiscent of the even more ancient spindizzy design. A hyperspace converter like that couldn't be less than four millennia old. It was a museum piece, but the blue-black hull was as smooth and unblemished as the day it had left fabrication.

Space travel would have gotten nowhere without durilium, Kennon reflected. For five thousand years men had used the incredibly tough synthetic to build their spacecraft. It had given man his empire. Kennon gave the hull one quick glance. That part of the ship didn't worry him. It was what he would find inside that bothered him. How much damage had occurred from two thousand or more years of disuse? How much had the original travelers cannibalized? How much could be salvaged? What sort of records remained? There were a thousand questions that the interior of that enigmatic hull might answer.

The upper segment of the airlock was visible. It was closed, which was a good sign. A few hours' work with a digger should expose it enough to be opened.

"Copper," he said, "we're going to have to dig this out. There's a small excavator in the cargo bed of the jeep. Do you think you can bring it down here?"

"I think so."

"Good girl!" Kennon turned back to the ship. He was eager to enter it. There might be things inside that would settle the question of the Lani. The original crew had probably recognized the value of the hull as a repository as well as he did. But in the meantime there would be work—lots of it. And every step must be recorded.

It was the rest of the day's work to expose the emergency airlock. The little excavator toiled over the loose ash for hours before it displaced enough to make the port visible, and the ash was not yet cleared away sufficiently to open the portal when darkness brought a halt to the work.

It would be impossible to unearth the spaceship with their low-capacity digger, Kennon decided. It would be difficult enough to clear the emergency airlock in the nose. But if the tubes and drive were still all right, by careful handling it should be possible to use the drive to blast out the loose ash and cinders which surrounded the hull.

Kennon reluctantly gave up the idea of entering the spaceship. That would have to wait until tomorrow. Now they would have to conceal the work and call it a day. A few branches and the big blocks of pumice would suffice for temporary camouflage. Later they could make something better. Anything in the jeep which might be useful was cached along with the radiation suits in the passageway through the lava wall—and in a surprisingly short time they were heading homeward.

Kennon was not too displeased. Tomorrow they would be able to enter the ship. Tomorrow they would probably have some of the answers to his questions. He looked ahead into the gathering night. The gray mass of the abandoned Olympus Station slipped below them as he lined the jeep along the path indicated by the luminous arrow atop the main building, set the controls on automatic, and locked the craft on the guide beacon in Alexandria's tower. In a little less than an hour they would be home.



CHAPTER XIV

Kennon was morally certain that the Lani were of human stock. Evolved, of course. Mutated. Genetic strangers to the rest of humanity. But human. The spaceship and the redes proved it as far as he was concerned. But moral certainty and legal certainty were two different things. What he believed might be good enough to hold up in a Brotherhood court, but he doubted it. Ulf and Lyssa might be the founders of the Lani race, but they had come to Kardon nearly four thousand years ago and no records existed to prove that the Lani weren't here before they came. Redes passed by word of mouth through hundreds of generations were not evidence. Even the spaceship wasn't the absolute proof that would be needed to overturn the earlier legal decision. Other and better proof was needed—something that would stand up in any court in the Brotherhood. He hoped the spaceship would hold that proof.

But Kennon's eagerness to find out what was inside the ancient spacer was tempered by hard practicality. Too much depended on what he might find inside that hull. Every step of the work must be documented beyond any refutation. Some method of establishing date, time, and location had to be prepared. There must be a record of every action. And that would require equipment and planning. There must be no mistake that could be twisted by the skillful counsel that Alexander undoubtedly retained.

He had no doubt that the Family would fight. Too much money and prestige were involved. To prove the Lani human would destroy Outworld Enterprises on Kardon. Yet this thought did not bother him. To his surprise he had no qualms of conscience. He was perfectly willing to violate his contract, break faith with his employers, and plot their ruin. The higher duty came first—the duty to the human race.

He smiled wryly. It wasn't all higher duty. There were some personal desires that leavened the nobility. To prove Copper human was enough motivation—actually it was better than his sense of duty. Events, Kennon reflected, cause a great deal of change in one's attitude. Although not by nature a plotter, schemes had been flitting through his mind with machinelike regularity, to be examined and discarded, or to be set aside for future reference.

He rejected the direct approach. It was too dangerous, depended too much on personalities, and had too little chance for success. He considered the possibility of letters to the Brotherhood Council but ultimately rejected it. Not only was the proof legally insufficient to establish humanity in the Lani, but he also remembered Alexander's incredible knowledge of his activities, and there was no reason to suppose that his present didn't receive the same scrutiny as the past. And if he, who hadn't written a letter in over a year, suddenly began to write, the correspondence would undoubtedly be regarded with suspicion and would probably be examined, and Dirac messages would be out for the same reason.

He could take a vacation and while he was away from the island he could inform the Brotherhood. Leaving Flora wouldn't be particularly difficult, but leaving Kardon would be virtually impossible. His contract called for vacations, but it expressly provided that they would be taken on Kardon. And again, there would be no assurance that his activities would not be watched. In fact, it was probable that they would be.

There was nothing that could be done immediately. But there were certain long-range measures that could be started. He could begin preparing a case that could be presented to the Council. And Beta, when it knew, would help him. The situation of the Lani was so close to Beta's own that its obvious merit as a test case simply could not be ignored. If he could get the evidence to Beta, it would be easy to enlist the aid of the entire Medico-Technological Civilization. It would take time and attention to detail; the case, the evidence, everything would have to be prepared with every safeguard and contingency provided, so that there would not be the slightest chance of a slip-up once it came to court.

And perhaps the best method of bringing the evidence would be to transport it under its own power. The thought intrigued him. Actually it wouldn't be too difficult. Externally the Egg wasn't in bad shape. The virtually indestructible durilium hull was still intact. The controls and the engines, hermetically sealed inside the hull, were probably as good as the day they stopped running. The circuitry would undoubtedly be bad but it could be repaired and restored, and new fuel slugs could be obtained for the engine and the converter. But that was a problem for the future.

The immediate problem was to get into the ship in a properly documented fashion.

It took nearly two months, but finally, under the impersonal lenses of cameras and recorders, the entrance port of the God-Egg swung open and revealed the dark interior. Kennon moved carefully, recording every step as he entered the black orifice in the spaceship's side. His handtorch gave plenty of light for the recorders as he moved inside—Copper at his heels, both of them physically unrecognizable in antiradiation suits.

"Why are we moving so slowly?" Copper said. "Let's go ahead and find out what's beyond this passageway."

"From a superstitious coward you've certainly become a reckless explorer," he said.

"The Egg hasn't hurt us, and we've been around it many times," she said. "Either the curse has become too old to hurt us, or there never was any in the first place. So let's see what is ahead. I'm curious."

Kennon shook his head. "In this business we must hurry slowly—very slowly. You know why."

"But I want to see."

"Patience, girl. Simmer down. You'll see soon enough," Kennon said. "Now help me set up this camera."

"Oh, all right—but isn't there any excitement in you?"

"I'm bubbling over with it," Kennon admitted, "but I manage to keep it under control."

"You're cold-blooded."

"No—I'm sensible. We want to nail this down. My future, yours, and that of your people depend upon how carefully we work. You wouldn't want to let us all down by being too eager, would you?"

She shook her head. "No—you're right of course. But I still would like to see."

They moved cautiously through the airlock and into the control room.

"Ah!" Kennon said with satisfaction. "I hoped for this, but I didn't dare expect it."

"What?"

"Look around. What do you see?"

"Nothing but an empty room. It's shaped like half an orange, and it has a lot of funny instruments and dials on the walls, and a video screen overhead. But that's all. Why—what's so unusual about it? It looks just like someone had left it."

"That's the point. There's nothing essential that's missing. They didn't cannibalize the instruments—and they didn't come back."

"Why not?"

"Maybe because that curse you mentioned a few minutes ago was real."

Copper drew back. "But you said it wouldn't hurt us—"

"Not now. The heat's practically gone, but when whoever flew this crate came here, the whole shell could have been as hot as a Samarian summer."

"But couldn't they have come back when it cooled?"

"Not with this kind of heat. The hull was probably too radioactive to approach from the outside. And radioactivity cools off slowly. It might take several lifetimes for its level to become low enough to approach if there was no decontamination equipment available."

"I suppose that's why the early ones thought the Egg was cursed."

Kennon nodded. "Now let's check—oh! oh! what's this?" He pointed to a metal-backed book lying on the control panel.

"It looks like a book," Copper said.

"I'm hoping it's the book."

"The book?"

"Yes—the ship's log. It's possible. And if it is, we may have all the evidence we need—Copper!—Don't touch it!"

"Why not?"

"Because its position has to be recorded first. Wait until we get the camera and recorders set up."

* * *

Gingerly Kennon opened the ancient book. The sheets inside were brittle—crumbling with age—but he could make out the title U.N.S.S. Wanderer with the date of launching and a lower line which read "Ship's Log." Kennon was thankful for his medical training. The four years of Classical English that he had despised so much were essential now. Stumbling over unfamiliar words and phrases, he moved slowly through the log tracing the old ship's history from pleasure craft to short-haul freight tractor to obsolescence in a space dump orbiting around a world called Heaven.

There was a gap of nearly ten years indicated by a blank page before the entries resumed.

"Ah—this is it!" Kennon said.

"What is it?" Copper said curiously. "I can't read the writing."

"Of course you can't. It's in English—a language that became obsolete during the Interregnum. I had to learn it, since most medical terminology is based on it."

"What is an Interregnum?" Copper interrupted. "I've never heard that word before."

"It's a period of confusion when there is no stable government. The last one came after the Second Galactic War—but never mind that—it happened long ago and isn't important now. The important thing that did happen was the Exodus."

"What was that?"

"A religious revival and a tremendous desire to see what was happening beyond the next star. During that century men traveled wider and farther then they ever have before or since. In that outward explosion with its mixed motivations of religion and practicality, colonists and missionaries went starward to find new worlds to tame, and new races to be rescued from the darkness of idolatry and hell. Almost any sort of vehicle capable of mounting a spindizzy converter was pressed into service. The old spindizzies were soundly engineered converters of almost childlike simplicity that could and did carry ships enormous distances if their passengers didn't care about subjective time-lag, and a little radioactivity.

"And that's what happened to this ship. According to this log it was bought by Alfred and Melissa Weygand—a missionary couple with the idea of spreading the Christian faith to the heathen.

"Alfred and Melissa—Ulf and Lyssa—they were a part of this ancient explosion that scattered human seed across parsecs of interstellar space. It seems that they were a unit in a missionary fleet that had gone out to the stars with flame in their hearts and Gospel on their lips to bring the Word to the benighted heathen on other worlds." Kennon's lips curled with mild contempt at their stupid foolhardiness even as his pulse quickened to their bravery. They had been fanatics, true enough, but theirs was a selfless fanaticism that would risk torture and death for what they believed—a fanaticism that was more sublime than the concept of Brotherhood which had evolved from it. They knew nothing of the enmity of race, of the incessant struggle man had since waged with alien intelligences all too willing to destroy intruders who encroached upon their worlds. Mankind's early selflessness had long ago been discarded for frank expansionism and dominance over the lesser races that stood in their way. And in a way it was too bad.

The ship's log, meticulously kept in neat round English script, told a story that was more than the bare bones of flight. There was passion and tenderness and a spiritual quality that was shocking to a modern man steeped in millennia of conquest and self-interest. There was a greatness to it, a depth of faith that had since been lost. And as Kennon slowly deciphered the ancient script he admired the courage even as his mind winced with dismay at the unheeding recklessness.

The Weygands had lost contact with the others, and had searched for them in hyperspace, doubling and twisting upon their course until they had become hopelessly lost, and then, with their fuel nearly exhausted, had broken out into the normal three-space continuum to find Kardon's sun and the world they called Flora.

How little they had known and how lucky they had been.

It was only by the grace of their God that they had found this world before their fuel was exhausted. And it was only by further grace that the planet was habitable and not populated with intelligent life. They had more luck than people were entitled to in a dozen lifetimes. Against odds of a million to one they had survived.

It was fascinating reading.

But it was not proof.

The last entry read: "We have circled this world and have seen no buildings—no sign of intelligent life. We are lost, marooned on this empty world. Our fuel supplies are too low for us to attempt to find the others. Nor could we. The constellations in the sky are strange. We do not know which way to go. Therefore we shall land upon the great island in the center of the yellow sea. And perhaps someday men will come to us since we cannot return to them. Melissa thinks that this is an example of Divine Providence, that the Lord's mercy has been shown to us that were lost in the vastness of the deep—that we have been chosen, like Eve and Adam, to spread the seed of man to yet another world. I hope she is right, yet I fear the radiation level of the ship has become inordinately high. We may well be Eve and Adam, yet an Adam that cannot beget and an Eve that is not fruitful. I am trimming the ship for landing, and we shall leave it immediately after we have landed, taking with us only what we absolutely need. There is too much radiation from the spindizzy and the drive to remain here longer—and God knows how hot the outer hull may be."

And that was all. Presumptive evidence—yes. Reasonable certainty—yes. But not proof. Lawyers could argue that since no direct exploration was made there was no valid reason to assume that the Lani did not already inhabit Kardon. But Kennon knew. His body, more perceptive than his mind, had realized a truth that his brain would not accept until he read the log. It was at once joy and frustration. Joy that Copper was human, frustration that he could not obtain for her and her race the rights to which they were entitled. But the immediate problem was solved. His conditioning was broken now he was convinced that Copper was a member of the human race. It was no violation of his code to love her. The greatest barrier was broken, and with it gone the lesser ones would yield. Relief that was almost pain washed through him and left him weak with reaction.

"What is it?" Copper asked as he turned to her. "What is this thing that has turned your face to joy?"

"Can't you guess?"

She shook her head. "I have seen nothing but you reading this ancient book, yet you turn to me with the look in your eyes that the redes say Ulf had for Lyssa."

"You're human!"

Copper shrugged. "You're mad. I'm a Lani. I was born a Lani—and I shall die one."

"Don't you understand? All Lani are human. You all are the descendants of two humans who came here thousands of years ago."

"Then there is no reason why you cannot love me."

Kennon shook his head. "No," he said. "There is no reason."

Copper laughed. It was a sound so merry and gay that Kennon looked at her in surprise. She looked as happy as she sounded.

Simple and savage, Kennon thought. She cared nothing for the future, and probably very little about the injustice of her present. The thing that mattered was that what had kept them apart was gone. She was probably offering mental sacrifices to the Old Ones who had caused this change in the man she loved. She didn't really care about what had caused the change. To her it was sufficient that it had happened.

For a moment Kennon wished that it could be as simple for him as it apparently was for her. The fact that Copper was human posed a greater problem than the one it solved. The one had been personal. The other was infinitely greater. He could not let it lie. The very morality which had kept him from doing what he wished when he thought she was a humanoid now forced him to do what he did not wish. Every instinct said to leave it alone. The problem was too great for one man to solve, the situation too complicated, the evidence too inconclusive, the opposition too powerful. It would be far better to take his happiness and enjoy it. It was not his problem to solve. He could turn the evidence over to the Brotherhood once his contract was over, and better and more capable people than he could settle the Lani legal status. But the inner voice that had called him bestial now called him shirker, coward, and slacker. And this, too, could not be borne. The case of the Lani would have to be pursued as vigorously as he could do it. They were entitled to human rights—whether they wanted them or not.

His first idea of making the spacer operational was a good one, Kennon decided as they finished the inspection of the ship. Even if it was never used it would make a good means of retreat. He grinned wryly. In a guerrilla operation such as the one he was considering it would be wise to have a way out if things got too hot. The heavy parts, the engines and the controls, were in workable condition and would merely require cleaning and oiling. Some of the optical equipment would have to be replaced and fuel slugs would have to be obtained for the drive—but none of these would be too hard to accomplish. The slugs from any of the power reactors on the island would serve nicely. All that would have to be done would be to modify the fuel ports on the ship's engine. The spindizzy would have to be disassembled and checked, and the main leads, embedded in time-resistant plastic, would have to be examined. The most serious problem, however, wouldn't involve these things. The control board wiring and circuitry was where the trouble would lie. Normal insulation and printed circuitry wasn't designed to last for thousands of years. Each wired circuit would have to be removed, duplicated, and replaced. Every printed panel would have to be cleaned and receive a new coat of insulating varnish. Working full time, a four-man electronics team could do the job in a week. Working part-time the two of them might get it done in three months. And the other jobs would take at least another. Add a month for errors in judgment, lack of materials, and mistakes—and another for unavoidable delays—it would be at least six months before the Egg would be spaceworthy.

Six months.

Not too long if everything went well, but far too long if there were any mistakes. He would have to be careful, yet he must not give the impression of being careful. He shook his head. Being a subversive was going to require a greater amount of acting ability than he had ever been called upon to display.

And what of Copper? How would she behave under the double strain of knowledge that she was human and knowledge of the spaceship? Women weren't noted for their tight-lipped reticence. Would she tell the other Lani? Would she crack under the pressure? Did she have the qualities of a good conspirator?

As it turned out, he didn't need to worry. As a partner in crime, Copper was all that could be wished. Everything was normal. She was still obedient, helpful, and gay as ever. To watch her, no one would ever think that her bright head was full of knowledge that could rock Flora to its foundations. Never by look or word did she betray the slightest trace of strain or guilt.

And in her other moments she was ecstatic in her love and helpful with the repair work on the Egg whenever Kennon could get time to visit the old spaceship.

"You amaze me," Kennon said as they eased the cover of the spindizzy in place and spun the bolts on the lugs that held it to the outer shielding. He picked up a heavy wrench and began methodically to seat the bolts as Copper wiped the white extrusion of the cover sealant from the shining case.

"How?"

"The way you hide your knowledge of this ship from the others. I know you better than anyone else on this island, and yet you would fool me."

"We Lani are used to hiding things. You men have been our masters for centuries, yet you do not know our redes. Nor do you know what we think, We obey you, but there are parts of us you do not own. It is easy to hide a little thing like this."

Kennon nodded. It figured. He seated another bolt. Three more and the drive room would be restored and they could start on the control circuits. "I wish you were as clever about adopting human customs as you are about hiding guilty knowledge," he said.

Copper laughed. "You mean those silly things you have been teaching me? Why should I learn them? I'm happy as I am. I love you, you love me, and that is all that matters."

"It's not all that matters. Can't you get it through your head that civilized customs are necessary in a civilized society?" He gave the next-to-last bolt an extra-vicious wrench. "You'll have to know them if you expect to get along on Beta."

"But I will never see Beta."

"I am going there when my duty here is over. And you're going with me."

"When will that be?"

"Three years."

"So long? Well—we can think of it then, but I don't think Man Alexander will let you take me."

"Then I shall take you without his consent."

She smiled. "It would be easier to stay here. In another fifteen years I will be old and you will not want me."

"I'll never do that. I'll always want you."

"You swear too easily," she said gently. "You men live forever. We Lani are a short-lived race."

"But you needn't be. It's obviously—"

"It's been tried, my love—and those who were treated died. Man Alexander tried many years ago to make us long-lived like you. But he failed. You see, he loved one of us too."

"But—"

"Let us think no more of it. Let us enjoy what we have and be grateful to the Gods for the love we enjoy—or do you have any Gods?"

"One."

"Two are better. More, anyway. And besides, Ulf and Lyssa and the God-Egg are responsible for our joy."

"They are indeed," Kennon said.

"Then why should you think of leaving the place where they rule? You should stay here. There will be other Lani when I am gone. You will be happy always."

"Not without you," Kennon said. "Don't you understand that I love you?"

"And I you. But I am a Lani. You are a man."

"You're as human as I am," Kennon said abruptly.

"That is what you say," Copper replied. "I am not so sure. I need more proof than this." She waved her hand at the ship.

"What proof do you need?"

"The same as the proof you men require. If I should have your child, then I would believe that I was human."

"I've told you a thousand times that the radiation on this ship must have affected Ulf and Lyssa's germ plasm. Can't you understand that?"

"I can understand it all right, but it does not change things. Ulf and Lyssa may have been human before they came here, but they were not when they landed. They were Lani, and their children were Lani."

"But they were of human stock."

"The law that lets men become our masters does not agree with you."

"Then the law is wrong. It should be changed."

Copper shrugged. "Two people cannot change a law."

"They can try—particularly if the law is unjust."

Copper sighed. "Is it not enough for us to love? Must you try to run through a wall?"

"When the wall stands in the way of right and justice I must."

Copper looked at him with pity in her green eyes. "This I do not understand. I know nothing of right and justice. What are these things? Just words. Yet you will endanger our happiness for them. If it is my happiness you wish—then leave this foolishness alone. I have fifteen years I can live with you before I am old and you tire of me. With those years I can be content."

"But I can't," Kennon said. "Call me selfish if you wish, but I want you with me as long as I live. I don't want to live my life without you."

"You want too much," Copper said softly. "But if it makes you happy to try to get it, I shall help. And if we do not succeed you will at least be happier for trying. And if you are happy"—she shrugged—"then the rest makes little difference."

That was the crux of the matter, Kennon reflected bitterly. He was convinced she was human. She was not. And until her mind could be changed on that point she would help him but her heart wouldn't be in it. And the only thing that would convince her that she was human would be a child—a child of his begetting. He could perhaps trick her with an artificial insemination of Lani sperm. There were drugs that could suspend consciousness, hypnotics that would make her believe anything she was told while under their influence.

But in the end it would do no good. All witnesses in Brotherhood court actions were examined under psychoprobe, and a hypnotic was of no value against a lie detector that could extract the deepest buried truth. And he would be examined too. The truth would out—and nothing would be gained. In fact—everything would be lost. The attempt at trickery would prejudice any court against the honest evidence they had so painfully collected.

He sighed. The only thing to do was to go on as they were—and hope that the evidence would hold. With Betan legal talent at their back it might. And, of course, they could try to produce a child as nature had intended. They could try—but Kennon knew it would not succeed. It never had.



CHAPTER XV

Copper had been acting strangely of late, Kennon thought as he rolled over in his bed and watched her standing before the full-length mirror on the bathroom door. She pivoted slowly before the glass, eying herself critically, raising her arms over her head, holding them at her sides, flexing her supple spine and tightening muscles that moved like silken cords beneath her golden skin.

"What are you trying to do—become a muscle dancer?" Kennon asked idly.

She whirled, a crimson blush deepening the tan of her face. "You were supposed to be asleep," she said.

"I'm an unregenerate heel," he replied, "and I don't sleep too well nowadays unless you're beside me."

"Well—I suppose you might as well know now as later," she said. "You'll know in any event."

"Know what?"

"That you're right. I am human."

"And what brought on this sudden change of—" He stopped abruptly, his eyes widening.

"Yes," Copper said. "I am with child. Your child."

"But that's impossible."

She shook her head. "It's a miracle perhaps, but it's not impossible. It's happened. Can't you see the difference?"

"See what? You look just as you always do."

"I suppose you can't see it yet," she admitted. "But I am with child. I'm two weeks past my time."

Kennon's mind leaped to the obvious conclusion. Pseudo-pregnancy. He had seen it before among Lani at Hillside Farm. It was an odd syndrome which occasionally occurred in humans and animals. The brain, desiring children, made demands upon the body and the body responded to its desire by tricking the brain. Lani were fairly subject to its probably because they had better imaginations. He would run a few tests when they went down to the hospital, and once she realized the practical joke her body was playing everything would be all right. No wonder she seemed excited.

"We'll find out about that later," he said equably. "We'll settle this when we get back to the hospital."

Copper smiled confidently and patted her stomach. "I know what you are thinking, but you're wrong. We Lani know about these things. In forty generations I am the first to conceive as the Master intended."

"I hope you haven't," Kennon said with such bitter sincerity that Copper looked at him wide-eyed. "Not now. Because if you have, neither your life nor mine is safe."

"Why?"

"The Alexanders. Do you think they'll take it lying down? We're not ready for them yet. They'll fight, and the first thing they'll do is kill you and erase me so we would never be able to talk. You have been declared an animal, and you will not be allowed to change."

"What can we do?" Copper asked. She shivered. "I do not want to die."

"Nor do I want you to," Kennon said.

"I could tell the others."

"And just what would that accomplish?"

"In a week every Lani on the island would know it. There would be revolt. For the Lani would no longer be dependent upon Men to survive. Their greatest hold on us would be gone. And we would be free again on our island world."

"You would not!" Kennon said. "That sort of thinking is foolishness. Alexander would have men here within a week, and a week after that you would be smashed. Don't you realize that there are thousands of millions of men in the galaxy—and to every one of them you would be animals. You know nothing about what you would face. Your puny hundreds couldn't even stand against a fraction of the power Alexander could mount against you. Have you seen a Burkholtz blaster work? Have you seen remote-control antipersonnel missiles? Have you push-pull projectors, atomic warheads? All of these weapons Alexander can command. Don't you realize he's an entrepreneur?—one of the most powerful men in this sector?"

Copper shook her head. "No," she said in a small voice. "I know nothing about these things."

"And do you think forty generations of absolute obedience to men can be overcome because one Lani says she is pregnant by a man?"

Copper frowned. "You put that in a different way. You talk as if it were my belief rather than the truth."

"What is truth?" Kennon said heavily. "Who would believe you? There are hundreds of others with child.

"Sure you're human. You know it. I know it. I've been trying to convince you for the past two months. You're just as human as I am. But pray that you're not pregnant. We can't get out of here in less than four months and by then everybody will know about you. Someone will certainly check the records. And after that will come the psychoprobes. Everything will come to light. The Egg will be destroyed. I will be erased. You will be dead. And that will be the end of it." He looked down at her with an odd expression of pity on his face. "You see?" he demanded harshly.

Copper nodded. "I didn't understand," she said. "Don't be angry with me. I shouldn't have told you. I thought you'd be happy."

"I was never angry with you, but I am with myself. I was stupid. I didn't figure on the remote possibility that we might be genetically compatible. I should have my head examined for putting you in such danger. However there's the possibility—the probability—that your body is playing a trick upon you."

She shook her head. "You are wrong. I am not mistaken. I am with child and the child is yours. But the fault is no more yours than mine. I wanted you before you looked on me. I still do and I do not feel at fault. That I am yours, that my child is yours is a thing of wonder and joy. Never could I have expected so much."

Kennon looked down at her smudged face, streaked with the sudden rivulets of tears, and bitterness galled his throat. Dear God—let her be wrong, he prayed silently. Let it be pseudopregnancy this time. Let the tests be negative.

But they weren't. Unequivocally they confirmed Copper's diagnosis. Here was the proof he needed. The final test that would prove the Lani human. And he had no way of getting it where it would do any good. It would take at least four months of steady labor before the ship was ready, and he didn't have that sort of time. He was needed here and his prolonged absence would cause suspicion and investigation. Something would have to be done—but what? He couldn't take Copper off the island in an airboat. They were checked with microscopic care by Otpen One's IFF. A jeep didn't have enough range to take them to the mainland. And even if they got there they couldn't get off the planet. Alexander knew everything that happened on Kardon's two spaceports. The Egg was the only way, but the Egg was unfinished and unspaceworthy.

Frantically Kennon considered concealing Copper. He shook his head. It wouldn't work. It would be impossible, to hide a baby on a place where every birth was recorded. Nor could one hide evidence of pregnancy in a Lani. Childbearing leaves telltale marks upon the body, and Copper, even if she could be concealed for the duration of her pregnancy, could never survive the sharp-eyed scrutiny of her fellows or the other humans. Questions would inevitably be asked.

There had to be a solution. He rubbed his forehead wearily. It was strange how so little a thing as the union of a spermatozoon and an ovum could produce so much trouble. He looked across the office at Copper placidly filing case cards. She wasn't worrying. With sublime faith, she was sure that he would find the answer, the one that would solve everything. He shuddered. The only logical solution was abortion—and that was unthinkable! He would not murder his child—nor would Copper permit it if he was capable of doing so.

It was almost a relief when his phone rang and Blalok's voice came cheerfully across the wire.

"Tried to get you about an hour ago," the superintendent said, "but your girl said you were busy."

"I was."

"You through now?"

"Yes."

"Well, get up to the fortress. Alexander just flew in and he's calling a meeting. Something important has come up."

Something important! A wave of ice rattled down Kennon's spine, and then he grinned feebly. Alexander didn't know. He couldn't know. It had to be something else.

"I'll be right up," he said, marveling at the calmness in his voice.

Kennon couldn't help comparing this meeting with the one a year ago. The location was different—the conference room in Alexandria was more formal than Blalok's parlor but the same people were present: Alexander, Blalok, Jordan, and himself. Somehow Alexander seemed to have shrunk. He was no longer as impressive as he had been. But the man still radiated force, even though it didn't seem quite so overpowering. The year, Kennon thought, had done much to build his self-confidence. He felt assured rather than nervous.

"Good to see you, Kennon," Alexander said. "Reports say you're doing a good job."

"I can't claim the credit," Kennon said. "Eighty-five per cent of our success is due to co-operation from the operating staff. And that's Blalok's doing—he knocked the heads of the division managers together and they took care of their staffs. Otherwise we could have had a bad time."

"But you didn't," Alexander said. "And you were the motive force."

"I've darn near motivated myself out of a job," Kennon said. "They co-operate all too well nowadays."

"Which goes to prove that my theories on preventive medicine are right," Alexander said, turning to Blalok.

"It looks that way," Blalok admitted, "but that could be because you picked a good man."

"He's good in more ways than one," Alexander said. "Or did he tell you he saved Douglas's life out on Otpen One?"

"He's never said a word."

Alexander smiled. "Another point in his favor. He knows how to keep his mouth shut."

"Not when he's telling someone what to do about disease," Jordon interjected.

"Or telling someone off when they haven't followed directions,'' Blaiok added.

"Better and better. I was sure that he was the one we needed when we first met."

Kennon felt his ears turn flaming red.

"But that's not the reason I brought you here. This isn't a Jac Kennon admiration society. I called you because I want to expand the Lani breeding program."

"Why?" Jordan asked.

Blalok stiffened. "You know my feeling about that, sir. I've never liked the idea of selling them. If that's what's in your mind—"

Alexander shook his head. "Simmer down," he said, as he seated himself at the head of the table. "There's going to be no selling. The Lani are too valuable for that. We'll need them more than the money they'd bring on the market. You see—I've acquired a planet out on the periphery. A place called Phoebe. One of our ships found it, and I staked a discovery claim on the major land mass, and the crew made lesser claims that covered all the available land. Last month the Brotherhood allowed the claims. Last week the crewmen sold me their land. Phoebe's a lovely place—quite a bit like Flora—and the ecological tests show it's capable of supporting mammalian life. Just before I came here I sent three shiploads of exterminators to clean it up and make it ready for us. It should be ready in two years."

"What sort of an ecology are you exterminating?" Jordan asked.

"Not that it makes any difference," Alexander said, "but it's mainly reptilian. Nothing over Group I. We'll restock with Floran animals."

Jordan sighed. "Since that's the way it is, it doesn't make any difference," he said. "But it could have. The Lani are sensitive to things like that. If they thought that they were walking in over a pile of bodies they'd do badly. It'd be like Olympus all over again. And we couldn't keep them from knowing. We talk and we forget, but they'd tell each other—and they'd remember."

"I know," Alexander said, "somehow they've never forgotten that Grandfather trapped the last of the Lani males on Olympus."

Jordan nodded. "They can't stand the place. That's why we had to abandon the station."

"Does this new world have a moon?" Kennon asked abruptly.

"Yes—in fact it has two."

"Habitable?"

"No—they're too small to hold air. But men could live there in domes—but why do you?—oh! I see! I hadn't considered that point." Alexander's hand darted to the phone beside him. "Get me Albertsville," he snapped. "Yes, my offices—I want Mr. Oliver in purchasing and contracting. Hello—Ward? Alexander here. Yes—everything's fine. I have a job for you—use your scrambler-pattern two." Alexander dialed the scrambler code on the second dial at the base of the phone, effectively preventing eavesdropping by beam tappers. "Yes," he went on. "It's Project Phoebe. Have you secured title to the moons? You haven't? Well—you'd better do it before some of our competitors get bright ideas. Sure they know about the project—do you think they're stupid? Warren over at Consolidated practically told me that he was onto our scheme. So get title to those moons. Since they're uninhabitable and within the planet's primary field they come under the Spatial Debris Act and you should be able to get Kardonian title without any great amount of trouble. Naturally we want them.—For defense—what else? We'll have most of our eggs in that basket. No—I don't know how we overlooked that point. But if it wasn't for a bright young man out here we'd have left ourselves wide open. Now get cracking—get that leak plugged!" Alexander dropped the phone back in its cradle and sighed. "Well—that's buttoned up," he said. "Thanks, Kennon."

Kennon looked at Alexander's grinning face, his own impassive, but a shattering certainty exploded in his mind—Alexander was a telepath! That was his difference! That was the thing that made him feared and respected by his business associates. It wouldn't have been enough on the Central Worlds, where men knew of sensitives and took precautions against them. But out here on the periphery it was a deadly advantage.

"So I gave it away," Alexander said. "I suppose I was careless, but your thoughts about the moons shocked me."

"You practically told me once before, when you hired me," Kennon said, "but I never realized it."

"You were too excited then."

"I wouldn't know," Kennon said. "At any rate I didn't add the facts correctly." From somewhere deep in his memory an old quip came floating to the surface: "An executive is a man who picks brains—others' brains." By that definition Alexander was an executive of the first class. Alexander chuckled.

Suddenly Kennon wanted to run. Panic flooded him! What had he been thinking about? Had he thought of—two times two are four, four times four are sixteen, sixteen times sixteen are—let's see, six times sixteen is ninety-six, one times sixteen is—six, five, carry one—two—two hundred fifty-six. Two hundred fifty-six times—

"What's eating you?" Alexander demanded.

"I'm angry," Kennon said. "I told you the conditions I'd sign that contract, and you wrote a Peeper Clause into it. And then you peep in the worst way possible. There's no defense against a Telep unless you know about him; you've had my whole mind bare! You've violated my personal privacy like no man has done before. Sure I'm mad. I expected honesty from you—and you peep!" The anger was stronger now—a wave of raw emotion based on a lifetime of training in mutual respect of a man's privacy—a feeling intensified by his childhood environment of a crowded planetary ecology and the cramped crew quarters on a spaceship. To Kennon, Alexander had committed the ultimate sin.

"I can see I made a mistake by not telling you," Alexander said. His voice was cold. "But you have no right to insult me."

"I'm not saying it, am I?" Kennon snapped. The moonflower on the bookcase behind Alexander was a thing of beauty. Alexander liked beauty. He had said so, and the Great Hall below them bore it out. It was a lovely room. Those four bronze Lani in the fountain were works of art. One of them looked remarkably like Copper. Copper in bronze. The little witch had probably posed for the casting. Maybe it had even been made from her body.

"They're all of Susy," Alexander said. "I can see why you are angry, and I don't blame you. But remember I warned you about Lani."

Copper—Kennon wrenched his thoughts back to the moonflower. It had twelve petals, limpid white on the borders shading to deep blue in the center-from which the cream-colored stamen surrounded by transparent pistils sprang to burst into a golden glory of pollen that dripped in tiny yellow flecks to the broad petals below. It was a magnificent flower. There was nothing like it on Beta. That was a marvelous thing about flowers—wherever one went in the universe, plants used the same methods to fertilize their seed and spread their germ plasm. It was too bad that—Kennon jerked his attention to Alexander's face. He detested the thought that his mind was common property. A man should have something he can call his own. There had been a clinics instructor in Year Six who was a sensitive. The classes had protected themselves against his prying with a circlet—a thought screen—he had done it too. Maybe he had brought the circlet with him. If he did, no one was going to catch him without it. It was a dirty business, this reading of others' thought. Now where had he put that circlet? Was it among his old books—or was it with his instruments?

"Why don't you go back to your house and find it?" Alexander snapped. "As you are, you're nothing but a disruption. I want you in on this meeting, but not the way you're acting."

"I'm not going to act any other way until I get some protection from peeping," Kennon said grimly. "And if you think this is bad wait till I start going through comparative anatomy.''

"What's the matter with you two?" Blalok asked.

"Be quiet," Alexander snapped. "This isn't your problem. Kennon is behaving like a spoiled child!"

"He's a telepath!" Kennon said. "And he didn't tell me."

"So what? I've known that for years."

"And you stand for it?"

"I'm a Mystic, not a Betan," Blalok said. "I don't have your insane desire for privacy."

"Go find that thought screen if you still have it!" Alexander said. "I don't want any more of this. You're making me ill!"

Kennon grinned thinly as he rose to his feet. It was a good thing he remembered Alexander was squeamish and didn't like anatomy. The door was to his left, an iris door with eight leaves—terribly old-fashioned. About ten steps away. Count them—one—two—three—

Alexander sighed as Kennon left the room. "I certainly pushed the panic button on that young man," he said. "He has a pathological attitude toward telepathy. Wonder what he has to hide that he wants privacy so badly? Even for a Betan this reaction was violent."

"Oh, I don't know. He's a pretty emotional sort. Maybe he hates to look like a fool. He's gotten himself mixed up with one of the Lani. Cute little thing by the name of Copper," Blalok said.

"Oh—that's it. I thought that was what he was hiding. A picture of a girl kept popping up." Alexander chuckled. "I suppose that's the trouble. A man hardly likes to look a fool, particularly to someone who has warned him. At that, I don't blame him. They are beautiful and affectionate. And even with their superstitions and tabus they're better than most humans."

"For pets," Blalok said heavily.

"They're not better at anything," Jordan demurred. "They can't be—man is the best and always will be."

"The eternal racial chauvinist," Alexander murmured. He turned his attention to Blalok. "But for awhile, Evald, I'd suggest you keep an eye on our young man. I still don't like his reaction. It was too violent—too defensive. I don't feel right about it. Perhaps Betans are more sensitive than most people but it seems to me that he's trying to conceal something. There was an undertone of fear—and something else—beneath his defenses."

"Couldn't you get any more than that?" Blalok asked. "You're pretty good at this mind-reading business."

"His defenses were remarkably good," Alexander said dryly.

* * *

Well he'd done it now, Kennon thought. He found the thought-screen circlet sandwiched between two books on comparative neuroanatomy which he hadn't bothered to unpack. He slipped it on and connected the lead wires to a portable battery pack. There was a half-forgotten tingling as the weak field heterodyned his thought waves. Kennon sighed. If Alexander wasn't suspicious of him now the man was a fool. He'd done as well as he could with confusion and outrage, but it was hardly possible to hide behind superficialities. Even the most disciplined mind couldn't do that without some preparation. Undoubtedly his concern about Copper had leaked through. He could only hope that other and more important things had not.

Well—he could go back to the conference now, but he would have to be doubly careful from now on. He couldn't make daily trips to Olympus. His reaction had killed that plan. Alexander would be suspicious now—and unusual actions would crystallize suspicion to certainty. Now he needed a reason to be in that area. And then he grinned. He had a reason—a good one—one that would fit in with Alexander's plans and his own. The only problem would be to make Alexander buy it—and that might be difficult. He'd have to work carefully—but with normal luck he could put the idea across. He crossed his fingers as he trudged back up the path to Alexandria.

The conference dragged on. Unlike most meetings, this one accomplished things—which was a tribute to Alexander's ability to keep the subject in hand. Details of the expansion program presented by Alexander were rapidly reduced to workable plans. They involved some rearrangement of existing facilities, and the construction of others. But the obvious snags were rapidly disposed of, and the whole revamped operation was outlined on paper in surprisingly few hours. A deadline date was set, construction was authorized, and in the morning the first steps in the practical implementation of the new program would be taken.

"Well, that's that," Alexander said with a sigh. "I think this calls for a drink."

"There's one more thing," Kennon said. "I know it isn't much, but Jordan's remark started me thinking."

"What remark?" Jordan asked.

"The one you made at the beginning about Phoebe possibly being like the Olympus Station. I've often wondered why that particular location has been so difficult to operate. Sure, I know the accepted explanation, but I think we should learn why it works and how to break a tabu. If we don't, we might be in for trouble."

"That's a good thought," Alexander said. "I tried to find out once, but all I could discover was that it was tabu. The Lani simply didn't like it. And despite the fact that I can read minds, I didn't learn any more than that. There's a certain sex-linkage to telepathy, as you probably know."

Kennon nodded.

"All I could discover was that their dislike of Olympus was a basic emotion rather than reasoned thought. They were nervous, irritable, disobedient, and uncooperative while they were there—and even they didn't know why. It was merely tabu. We even tried youngsters—but the attitude was the same. I'd like to know more about that basic emotion."

"We should understand it," Kennon agreed. "If we transship a large number of Lani to a strange world, we should know their deepest motivations. We cannot take the chance that the transplant won't take, with all the money you're sinking into this project."

"You have a point there. Have you any suggestions about how to accomplish this?" Alexander's voice was interested.

"I have. Hire a psychologist. And reopen Olympus."

"It'll be the same story," Jordan said.

"Not if you apply experimental procedure," Kennon said. "Divide the place into a number of separate units in which groups of—say ten—Lani of various ages are kept. Let every group know where they are, but don't let them come in contact with one another. Observe them constantly. Put spy cells in the units. Couple them to recorders. Prepare a set of test situations and observe how each group performs. Question individuals under narcosynthesis. Observe and record any changes in physical condition—give them the works. Maybe we can collect some basic data that will indicate the answer."

"Not a bad idea," Alexander said.

"I don't like it," Jordan said. "It sounds cumbersome."

"It is," Kennon agreed. "But it may save a great deal of trouble later."

"I think you're right, Kennon," Blalok said. "We should know everything we can."

"What would you do first if you were heading this program?" Alexander asked. He eyed Kennon critically.

"Nothing," Kennon said promptly. "I'm not qualified to run an investigation like this. You need a specialist. I am a practitioner."

"Hmm—but you know experimental procedure."

"Naturally—but I do not have the training to prepare a program or evaluate its results. The only thing I could do would be to check the physical condition of the experimental groups."

"Could you set up the physical facilities?" Alexander asked.

"Possibly—I'd need a set of plans of the station, and I couldn't guarantee that the specialist wouldn't want to make changes. But the physical arrangements should be simple enough to construct."

"How long would it take you to prepare a plan?"

"I could have it by tomorrow, or perhaps a day later."

"If you can do it by then I'll stay over. I'd like to examine this proposal more closely. It has merit. That's the second constructive suggestion you've made tonight. Despite your peculiar desire for privacy, I'm glad you came back." Alexander smiled.

Kennon smiled back. Apparently the entrepreneur had taken the bait. But it was too early to tell whether he had swallowed it without reservation. It all depended upon how much had been given away before he had discovered that Alexander was a telepath. Perhaps Alexander was merely leading him on. There were too many intangibles, and there was no way of predicting how it would turn out. But he felt mildly optimistic.

Alexander closed the meeting, and Kennon left promptly. He had a good excuse. There was plenty of work to do if he was going to prepare an adequate plan for utilizing Olympus Station. Jordan went with him, but Blalok stayed behind. It was natural enough. Blalok was the administrator, but Kennon felt uneasy. Nor would he have felt any better if he could have heard what went on after he left.

Alexander looked quizzically at Blalok after the door closed behind the two men.

"Well, Evald, what do you think? Does it strike you that Kennon's sincere—or does it sound as though he has something up his sleeve?"

"If he does," Blalok said, "I don't know what it could be. I wouldn't take a job on Olympus if you gave it to me."

"If he doesn't know about the place," Alexander said thoughtfully, "it's probable that his suggestion was honest. I think it is but I'm not sure. He worries me now that I can't read him. I think I'll send Douglas back here to watch him."

"Why? In my book that'd be a poor choice. After all, you said Kennon saved his life. He should be grateful."

"You don't know Douglas," Alexander said. "He hates Kennon's guts for what he did."

"What did he do?"

"He made Douglas feel inferior. And there's no surer way to gain my cousin's undying enmity." Alexander laughed. "I know," he said. "He'd like to kill me, too."

Blalok shrugged.

"But in the meantime I want you to keep an eye on Kennon. If his outline is all right, I'm going to authorize him to set up this experiment. I want to give him every possible chance. I like him—and he's done good work. I wouldn't want him to feel that I distrust him."

"Which you do, of course," Blalok said dryly.

Alexander smiled. "Actually," he said with equal dryness, "I distrust everyone."



CHAPTER XVI

"If you think this job is easy, you have another think coming," Kennon said bitterly. "I hired out as a veterinarian, not as a nursemaid for a bunch of psychoneurotic humans and superstitious Lani. The place is jinxed, they tell me.—Ha! Jinxed! Sure it's jinxed! What job wouldn't be with a bunch of goofballs like these I've got working on it.

"I can't keep a Lani here for two weeks without having her throw a catfit, and the superstitious idiots are affecting the men—who ought to know better! I wish I'd never have opened my big mouth to Alexander! As far as I'm concerned he can take this job and—"

"Hey—take it easy, man!" Blalok said. "You're heading straight for a nervous breakdown."

"And why shouldn't I?" Kennon asked. "Nothing goes right. There's always trouble. I order materials—they don't arrive. There's worker trouble, equipment trouble, installation trouble. Everybody's cutting corners, trying to get done faster and away sooner—and all they do is mess up work that should have been done right the first time. We should have been finished last week, but we have another week to go, at least unless some bumble-fingered beanbrain gets another bright idea that sets us back again. I'm sick to death of it!"

"I know, I know," Blalok said soothingly, "and I'm sorry."

"Sorry? What good is that? You and Jordan come up here in relays. Just what do you think you'll find? Or has Alexander dragged you into keeping an eye on me because I don't like someone snooping inside my skull?"

"It's not that," Blalok said. "It's just—"

"Oh, don't make excuses. You know and I know the Boss-man is suspicious." Kennon shrugged. "Normally I wouldn't blame him but it's a damned nuisance with things the way they are. All we have is one more bay and a hall to finish—but if—"

"Now wait a minute," Blalok said. "Get the kink out of your neck and simmer down. Sure—the Boss-man told us to keep an eye on you—but that's not why I'm here this time."

"Well?"

"Douglas came back this morning."

"What for?"

"I don't know." Blalok's face wore the noncommittal look it always wore when he was taking liberties with the truth.

"You're probably the worst liar in the galaxy," Kennon chuckled. "He's here to breathe down my neck, isn't he?"

Blalok nodded.

"Keep him off my back for another week and he can breathe all he wants to. I'll be done then."

"I can't promise a thing."

Kennon shrugged. "It's too much to ask, I guess."

"But I can try," Blalok added.

"That's enough for me." Kennon grinned. "Has he turned Alexandria into a shambles yet?"

"Not yet, but everyone's uneasy."

"I can't blame them. That young fellow's undiluted poison. By the way, how does he look?"

"About the same."

"The medics must have done a good job," Kennon said.

"The Boss-man shipped him to Beta for treatment," Blalok said. "He didn't trust the docs out here."

"That figures. At any rate Douglas couldn't have gone to a better place."

"What happened to him?"

"He stuck his nose where he shouldn't," Kennon said pointedly.

Blalok stiffened.

"I'm sorry, Evald. Even if you knew, I couldn't talk about it. What I know about Douglas is classified!"

"Well—Douglas is doing plenty of talking. Claims his stay in the hospital was all your fault."

Kennon shrugged. "That's his opinion. And as long as he stays out of my way he's welcome to it."

Blalok looked at Kennon's haggard face with mild concern, "Doc," he said, "you'd better take it easy. You're going to pieces."

"I'll be through here in another week, I'll have this all wrapped up."

"Providing you're not wrapped up first."

"Eh?"

"In a shroud. You look like a walking corpse."

Kennon chuckled wearily. "Sometimes I feel like one. But I'd like to get this job finished."

"Well, I'll do what I can," Blalok said. "I'll try to keep him down at Alexandria for a few days."

"It'll be enough," Kennon said. More than enough—he added mentally. The coils of fuel wire were ready to load, and the power slugs for the ship's reactor were already stored in the power plant building here at Olympus. Three more days and the old spacer would be as ready to fly as she would ever be. And after that, it was in the lap of fate.

He ushered Blalok to his jeep and watched until he disappeared.

"I'm getting to be a first-class liar," he remarked wryly to himself as he turned back to the temporary quarters he was occupying at the station. "And the bad thing about it is that I'm actually enjoying it."

A few weeks ago an admission like that would have been inconceivable. It was odd, he thought, how one thing led to another and produced an end that could not be foreseen. Now he could lie and dissemble with the best. He had no compunction about falsifying a requisition, or stealing what he could not obtain with apparent honesty. His character had sunk to an all-time low, he reflected with grim humor as he walked into the shadow of the main building. Neither Blalok's nor Jordan's frequent visits bothered him. Both men were creatures of habit and both were married. They stayed home at night—and it was nighttime that he worked on the spacer. The project afforded him a perfect cover and it was only minutes by jeep away from the crater.

Even so, the double duty was an appalling task. And it would have been impossible if it wasn't for Copper. Her quick fingers, keen eyesight, and uncanny memory made the work seem simple, and neither the tediousness of repairing miles of circuitry nor the depressing environment of Olympus Station seemed to bother her. While he worked with the men on the project she restored and reassembled circuits in his quarters and at night they replaced them in the old ship. And the God-Egg was rapidly becoming operational.

Kennon wondered what it was about Copper that made her so different from the rest. Olympus didn't bother her at all. In fact she seemed to thrive on the depressing atmosphere that filled the Station. Perhaps it was because she had violated the tabu about the God-Egg so often that ordinary superstition had no effect upon her. He shrugged. He had troubles enough without worrying about Copper's motivations, and not the least of these was taking the God-Egg into space.

Kennon looked forward to blast-off with distinct misgivings. There was too much about the ancient spacer that was strange—and too much that was terrifying.

Basically the ship was an ion-jet job with atomic primaries and a spindizzy converter that might possibly take her up as high as middle yellow Cth—far enough to give her a good turn of speed, but not enough to compensate for timelag. Her screens were monstrosities, double polyphase lattices that looked about as spacetight as so many sieves. There were no acceleration dampers, no temporal compensators, no autopilot, no four-space computer, and the primaries operated on nuclear rather than binding energy. The control chairs weren't equipped with forcefields, but instead had incredibly primitive safety webs that held one in place by sheer tensile strength. Taking a ship like that into space was an open invitation to suicide. A man needed a combination of foolhardy bravery and incredible fatalism to blast off in a can like this. He had the stimulus, but the knowledge of what he would face troubled him more than he cared to admit. More and more, as he understood the ship, he was amazed at the courage of the ancients who had blithely leaped into hyperspace in these flying coffins with no more motivation than to see what was beyond the nearest star. And in ships more primitive than this men had swept through the star systems nearest Earth in the outward expansion of the First Millennium.

He sighed. The breed of man must have been tough in the old days—and he'd soon be finding out if any of that ancient toughness remained.

He opened the door to his quarters.

Copper was sitting in his favorite chair, a pile of completed assemblies neatly stacked beside her, and a disorderly file of crumpled cloth at her feet. Her face was sullen as she looked up at him. "I've had about all of this I'm going to take," she said mutinously as she stirred the heap of cloth with a bare foot. "Not even you are going to make me wear those—things!"

Kennon sighed. It was the same old story. For months he had been trying patiently to indoctrinate Copper with a minimum of civilized habits, but she was quite literally a savage. In her entire lifetime she had never worn clothing, and to encase her body in hose, kilts, blouse, and sandals was a form of torture. She scratched, wiggled, and twisted at the garments until she looked as bad as she felt, and would usually finish a session by tearing off the offending clothes and sulking. She was doing it now.

"You must act like a civilized human being," Kennon said mildly. "You're simply going to have to learn to wear these clothes properly."

"Why? I'm more comfortable as I am."

"That's not the point. You are going to be living in human society and you must act human. The only planet where you could get away with nudity is Santos, and we're not going there."

"Why not?"

"I've explained it time and again. We'll have to go to Beta. That's the only place I know where you'll have a fair hearing. And on Beta people wear clothes. They have to. It's cold, even in summer, and in the wintertime, there's snow."

"What's snow?"

"Ice crystals that fall like rain, but I've told you this before."

"And I still don't believe it."

"Believe it or not you're going to wear those things. Now put them on!"

She looked at him with mutiny on her face. "All right, slave driver," she muttered as she picked up the clothing, "but I hope you'll itch someday and be unable to scratch."

"And try to wear those garments more gracefully. You make them look like a sack."

"They feel like one. I keep thinking that all I need is a tag around my neck."

"You haven't much time to get used to them," Kennon said. "We're leaving this week."

"So soon?"

"Yes—and you'll wear those things to the ship, into the ship, and all the time we're on the ship. You'll keep wearing clothing until it looks right."

"Slave driver!" Copper hissed.

"Slave," Kennon answered equably.

Copper giggled. The sound was utterly unexpected, and completely incongruous. That was the wonder of her, Kennon reflected. Her mercurial temperament made life something that was continually exciting She was a never-ending delight.



CHAPTER XVII

It was the last trip. Kennon loaded the jeep with the last-minute items he would need. The four reactor cores in their lead cases went aboard last and were packed inside a pile of lead-block shielding.

He helped Copper in and looked back without regret as the bulk of Olympus Station vanished below him in the dusk. The last of the work crew had left that afternoon. The station was ready for occupancy. His assignment had been completed. He felt an odd pleasure at having finished the job. Alexander might not be happy about his subsequent actions, but he could have no complaint about what he did while he was here.

"Well—say good-bye to Flora," he said to Copper.

"I don't want to," she said. "I don't want to leave."

"You can't stay. You know that."

She nodded. "But that doesn't make me any less regretful."

"Regretful?"

"All right—scared. We're going to try to make the God-Egg fly again. Not only is it sacrilege, but as you've often said, it's dangerous. I have no desire to die."

"You have two courses—"

"I know—you've pointed them out often enough," Copper said. "And since you decided to go I'd go with you even though I knew the Egg would blow up."

"You're quite a girl," Kennon said admiringly. "Did I ever tell you that I love you?"

"Not nearly often enough," Copper said. "You could do it every day and I'd never get tired of hearing it."

The jeep settled over the lava wall. "We'll leave it in the passageway when we're through," Kennon said. "Maybe it will survive blast-off."

"Why worry about it?" Copper asked.

"I hate destroying anything needlessly," Kennon said.

"And since we have plenty of time, we might as well be neat about our departure."

He was wrong, of course, but he didn't know that.

* * *

Douglas Alexander checked the radarscope and whistled in surprise at the picture it revealed. "So that's where he's going," he said softly to himself. "Cousin Alex was right as usual." He grimaced unpleasantly. "He's up to something—that's for sure." His face twisted into an expression that was half sneer, half triumph. "This is going to be fun." He moved the control, and his airboat, hovering silently at five thousand meters, dropped toward the ground in free fall as Douglas loosened the Burkholtz in the holster at his waist. "But what is he doing?" he muttered. The question hung unanswered in the still air of the cabin as the airboat dropped downward.

Douglas hadn't been impressed with Blalok's attempt at a delaying action. Normally he might have been, but his fear of his cousin was greater than his respect for Blalok. The superintendent had only succeeded in accomplishing something he had not intended when he had tried to dissuade Douglas from visiting Kennon. He had made Douglas cautious. The airboat and long-range surveillance had been the result. For the past two nights Douglas had hung over Olympus Station, checking the place—to leave at dawn when the new day's work began. For two nights Kennon had been lucky. He had departed for the Egg shortly before Douglas took up his station, and had returned after the watcher had called it a night and had returned home. But this last night, Kennon left late—and his departure was noted.

"Wonder who's the girl with him?" Douglas said as the boat plunged down. "Well, I'll be finding out in a minute."

Kennon's head jerked upward at the sound of air whistling past the airboat's hull, and a wave of icy coldness swept through his chest. There was no question that he was discovered. His shoulders sagged.

"Well—it was a good try," he said bitterly as Copper looked at him with sudden terror on her face.

"I don't want to die," she wailed.

"You won't—not if I can help it," Kennon said. "Move away from me—quickly!"

"But—"

"Do as I say!" Kennon's voice was sharp. "And keep that hood over your face."

The airboat settled softly on the ash in front of him, the door snapped open and Douglas dropped to the ground, Burkholtz jutting from his pudgy fist.

"My, my," Douglas said, "what have we here? Dr. Kennon and a woman! I thought better of you than that, Doctor. And all dressed up in antiradiation suits. This is interesting. Just what are you doing up here on the mountain so late at night—prospecting?"

"You might call it that," Kennon said. His body sagged with relief. Douglas thank Ochsner it was Douglas! He was running true to form—talking when he should have been shooting.

Douglas jerked his head toward Copper, standing a few feet to his left. "Who is she?"

"None of your business," Kennon snapped, hoping that his outburst covered Copper's gasp of surprise and fear, and knowing that it didn't.

"I'm making it my business. There's something funny going on around here."

Kennon blinked. Could it be that Douglas didn't know? Had he been watching them on radar? Durilium was radar-transparent. It absorbed and dissipated electromagnetic waves rather than reflecting them. For a second he felt a tiny surge of hope.

"Stand where you are," Douglas said as he stepped over to the half-paralyzed Copper and jerked the hood back from her face. For a moment he looked puzzled. "Just who are you?" he demanded. "I don't recall seeing you before." And then recognition dawned. "Old Doc's Lani!" he gasped.

"She works for me now," Kennon said.

Douglas laughed. It wasn't a nice sound. "All dressed up?" he asked. "Nice work."

"That's my fault," Kennon said.

"You know the rules," Douglas said. "I could blast you both."

"Go ahead," Kennon said, "but if you do, you'll never find out what we're doing up here."

Douglas hesitated. Kennon's voice was flat and filled with utter conviction.

"There's a reason why Copper's wearing that suit," Kennon continued, "and you won't know that either."

The Burkholtz swiveled around to point at Kennon's belly. "I've had about enough of this. Let's have it. Tell me what you're doing here!"

"I'll do better than that," Kennon said promptly. "I'll show you. You'll be surprised at what we've uncovered." He made his muscles relax, and forced himself to speak naturally. Copper, he noted, was still rigid with terror. The Alexanders—any of them—were everything he had said they were. They were the masters here. And despite Copper's boast, she was as susceptible to their influence as any other Lani.

"All right," Douglas said, "show me this thing I'd never be able to find without your help." He half turned to Copper. "Stay where you are, Lani," he said. "Don't move until I come back."

"Yes, Man Douglas," Copper replied. Her voice was flat, colorless, and submissive.

Kennon shuddered. He had never heard precisely that tone from her before. One word from Douglas and she had become a zombie—a mindless muscle preparation that existed only to obey. Anger filled him—anger that one he loved could be ordered by someone who wasn't worth a third of her—anger that she obeyed—anger at his own impotence and frustration. It wasn't a clean anger. It was a dark, red-splashed thing that struggled and writhed inside him, a fierce unreasoning rage that seethed and bubbled yet could not break free. For an instant, with blinding clarity, Kennon understood the feelings of the caged male Lani on Otpen One. And he sympathized.

"Follow me," he said and started around the ship.

"Stay—no—go ahead," Douglas said, "but remember, I'm right behind you."

Kennon walked straight up to the pit and pointed down at the dark bulk of the Egg., concealed in the shadows of the bottom.

"That's it," he said.

"What? I don't see anything," Douglas said suspiciously.

"Here—I'll shine a light." Kennon reached for his belt.

"No you don't! I know that trick. You're not going to blind me. Take that torch loose carefully—that's it—now hand it to me." Douglas' hand closed over the smooth plastic. Cautiously he turned on the beam and directed it downward.

"A spacer!" he gasped. "How did that get here?" He leaned forward to look into the pit as a dark shadow materialized behind him.

Kennon choked back the involuntary cry of warning that rose in his throat. Copper! His muscles tensed as her arm came up and down—a shadow almost invisible in the starlight. The leaning figure of Douglas collapsed like a puppet whose strings had been suddenly released. The torch dropped from his hand and went bouncing and winking down the wall of the pit, followed by Douglas—a limp bundle of arms and legs that rotated grotesquely as he disappeared down the slope. Starlight gleamed on the Burkholtz lying on the lip of the crater, where it had fallen from his hand.

"I told you that not even Man Alexander could order me since I gave my love to you," Copper said smugly as she peered over the edge of the pit, a chunk of lava gripped in one small capable hand. "Maybe this proves it."

"Douglas isn't Alexander," Kennon said slowly as he picked up the blaster, "but I believe you."

"Didn't I act convincingly?" she said brightly.

"Very," he said. "You fooled me completely."

"The important thing was that I fooled Douglas."

"You did that all right. Now let's get him out of that pit."

"Why?"

"The jet blast will fry him when we take off."

"What difference would that make?"

"I told you," Kennon said, "that I never destroy things unnecessarily—not even things like Douglas."

"But he would have destroyed you."

"That's no excuse for murder. Now go back to the jeep and fetch a rope. I'll go down and get him out."

"Do we have to bother with him?" Copper asked, and then shrugged. It was an eloquent gesture expressing disgust, resignation, and unwilling compliance in one lift of smoothly muscled shoulders.

"There's no question about it," Kennon said. "You're becoming more human every day."

He chuckled as he slid over the edge of the pit following the path Douglas had taken a moment before. He found him sitting on a pile of ashes, shaking his head.

"What happened?" Douglas asked querulously. There was fear in his voice.

"Copper hit you on the head with a rock," Kennon said as he bent over and retrieved the torch, still burning near Douglas' feet.