"All right with me. I'd just as soon have a full day, anyway."

"If Ndomi will be spending a day alone up here, how about having String take me to the other place, and settle that point once and for all?" asked Mitsuitei as the helicopter eased downward toward the camp. "That would still leave Hans and you to form another team for whatever else you want to do."

"That should be all right. It'll depend, though, on whether String thinks it's safe for a man to work alone on that shelf."

The proposition was put to McLaughlin as soon as the machine was landed. To Lampert's surprise, the guide gave a qualified approval.

"Remember," he concluded, "I don't know what lives on the cliffs. It's country I've never covered. All I'm saying is that no Viridian animal I know of could get there, except flying ones; and they're nothing to worry about, especially in the day-time. I'd like to go with you to look over the place when you take him up tomorrow, and strongly recommend that he carry a communicator as well as a weapon; but unless I see something you haven't mentioned when I do go, I would say it was all right...."

Once more the Felodon reached the river, but this time it did not cross. It was no longer heading straight for the helicopter. Hills had not altered its course, but the cliffs had. They formed a wall on its right which was too nearly vertical for its agility and strength. Even this barrier, however, had caused no visible hesitation or doubt. It had swerved, followed the base of the wall to the point where the river emerged and plunged in as promptly as it had done before. Few amphibians have ever lost the art of swimming when their larval gills vanished; the feeble current meant nothing to the Felodon.

It turned upstream and went on its way.

IV

Ndomi Sulewayo had pursued his occupation on terraces of Earth's Grand Canyon, on cliffsides of Fomalhaut Four's highest range and in badlands on the dimly lighted Antares Twelve. The physical hazards of his present position troubled him little. McLaughlin had agreed that the ledge where the paleontologist had been left was inaccessible to the larger carnivores, and had merely issued a final warning about poisonous "lizards." The primary danger, as nearly as Sulewayo could see, was that something might happen to the helicopter. He certainly could not rejoin the others on foot. He was facing a sheer wall some sixty feet high. A score of yards 

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