I thought he gave it a needlessly grim emphasis with such terms as, "quicker than cats", and "devilishly intelligent", but I held my peace.

He summarized, "I do not want to alarm anyone unduly, but we must face up to the fact that we are totally unprepared for such a contingency. The exploration group failed us badly in overlooking these creatures. They may not be inimical to our culture, but until this is established we must consider them prime threats. That is all," he concluded.

No one grumbled aloud, but their faces showed keen disappointment at the resumption of quartering in the ship. Reluctantly, the women began rolling up the still-deflated air-mattresses that were scattered about the soft, deep grass. Sue complained, "Sam, if these people don't get a little privacy pretty soon we'll turn into an ant colony. There'll be lovin' in the streets."

"It's not my idea," I said. "I'll be nailed to a table at the foot of the ramp all day making check marks. Phil is taking this entirely too big. The little people are really charming. He neglected to mention that they are beautifully formed and quite gentle in their—their actions."

"Actions?" she said. "What happened, really?"

I described the conditions under which we first saw the natives, and she laughed a little strainedly. "I can just imagine the look on Phil Benson's face."

I knew what she meant. In trying to enforce the shipboard rule of segregation of the sexes, our leader had developed an oversensitive attitude toward certain aspects of modesty. In the unutterable boredom of space, the pledge we had all taken to complete continence for the voyage was a severe test to all forty couples.

Had propriety and space considerations been the only reasons for the infamous "no-romance" regulation, it would never have held up. But all concerned realized the problem of childbirth in space under the jam-packed living conditions, tight water and food rationing and the fetid, recirculated air.

Now the second honeymoons were over before they started. It was back to the ship and the night-life of monks and nuns.

That night, Sue and I joined the four ship's officers, their wives, Phillip Benson and Jane in the navigation cupola atop our doomed ship that had become a "fortress". The small control room was the only semi-private room in the ship, and even Benson was admitted by invitation only. The meeting was a council of 

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