cultivated pose of boredom by the fresh beauty of a jungle flower.

And it had done something to Flint too. He ran to meet them, caught the girl as she fell toward him. "Are you all right?"

She was too breathless to speak. "We all right," Greeno said. "But almost weren't." He held out his arm. From shoulder to wrist was a wide deep scratch, a claw mark.

Then the sudden sound of rockets turned all their faces skyward. High over the trees, circling lower, came three patrol planes and Flint's ship.

Flint's fingers tightened on the girl's arm. "Greeno," he said, "we have to get out of here, hide in the woods." He said it sadly, tired of the game now. He had forgotten it wasn't over. He looked down into the girl's face. "Miss Vaun," he said quickly, "this was all my fault. I won't ask you to forgive me but I want you to know I'm sorry, not for trying to do what I could to protect the feather-deer, but because this business came so close to ending in a tragedy much worse than your slaughtering them all."

He dropped his hands, turned to the jungle. Greeno was standing at the edge of the woods, waiting for him. He started walking slowly.

Then suddenly he turned, came back to the girl quickly. "Might as well be shot for a sheep as a lamb," he said. He put a hand under her chin, kissed her soundly on the lips, then ran toward the woods.

When he was halfway there, he heard her cry, "Mr. Flint! Wait!" It occurred to him that she probably didn't even know his first name. He didn't look back. And Miss Karen Vaun did a very strange thing.

She had one hand behind her as Flint ran away. Now she brought it forth and in it was Flint's own ice pistol. She raised it, took careful aim and pulled the trigger.

Flint's legs stopped in midstride, knees bent one before the other, like a stop-motion movie. He sprawled forward.

Before he could get up, the girl was beside him. She sat down on his back, pinning him to the ground. "Next time you kiss a girl without knowing whether she wants to be kissed or not," she said, "hang onto your gun."

Then the police, with Hudson and Leggett, were crowded around them.

"Are you all right, Miss Vaun?"

Flint lay there feeling very foolish.

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