Griswold shrugged his shoulders. "We speak an entirely different language, Mr. Berkeley."

"I'm afraid you're right, Captain," Berkeley sighed. "And it might be a tragic thing that we do. Remember, European man spoke a different language from that of the American Indian, the Mayan, Polynesian, African, Indonesian—" He broke off as if the list were endless. "I ask only that we don't hasten into the same errors all over again."

"We can't hover here above the surface forever," Griswold said irritably. "We have quartered the globe. The other experts are anxious to land, so they can get to their work. We have made a search for your civilization and we have not found it."

"I withdraw all objections to landing, Captain. You are entirely correct. We must land."

The intercom on the wall squawked into life.

"Observation to Control. Observation to Control. Network of canals forming a junction ahead."

"Prepare for landing, Lieutenant Atkinson," Griswold commanded sharply. "At the junction." He turned and watched the screen. "There, Mr. Berkeley, dead ahead. A dozen—at least a dozen of your canals joining at one spot. Surely, if there were a civilization at all, you would find it at such a spot." Slowly and carefully, he constructed the pages of history. "I do not wish the implication ever to arise that this ship's commander, or any of its personnel, failed to cooperate in every way with the scientific authorities aboard."

"I know that, Captain," Berkeley answered. "And I agree. The junction, then."

The sigh of servo-mechanism, the flare of intolerably hot blue flame, and the ship stood motionless above the junction of canals. Ponderously, slowly, she settled; held aloft by the pillars of flame beneath her, directly above the junction, fusing the sand in the canals to glass, exploding their walls with steam. Within their warm and protected burrows beside the canals, slitted nostrils closed, iris of eyes contracted, fluted layers of skin opened and pulled tight, and opened again convulsively in the reflexes of death.

There was a slight jar only as the ship settled to the ground, bathed in the mushrooming flame.

"A good landing, Lieutenant," Captain Griswold complimented. "A good landing, indeed."

His head came up and he watched the screen to see the 

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