resting on his folded forelimbs. He looked like a prize puppy at a pet show, but what a puppy!

In his unfathomable animal mind was that strange capacity for projecting illusions, of making them seem three-dimensional and real. He could blur the viewpane, fill it with unreal star fields, draw shapes of energy from the void.

But he couldn't change his memories by slicklying them over with the pale cast of thought! At bottom he was just a dumb beast. He had the mind of a puppy, a mind that chased fantasms while asleep through a labyrinth of dark alleyways. He twitched and shook while asleep, just like an excitable mutt.

Little agitated noises came from him. His nostrils quivered, his tail vibrated and he rolled over in his sleep and started scratching himself. Thump. Thump. Thump.

What was he thinking about? A girl in a garden with the moonlight in her hair? Stooping to pat him or feeding him yummies? He'd rolled over and was lying with his forelimbs stretched straight out, as though he were reaching for the moon.

But I knew he wasn't seeing the moon. He was reaching for something I couldn't see or hear or touch, something older than the human race maybe.

I was hating him furiously when Pete came into the compartment. He grabbed my arm and started shaking me.

"Jim! Jim, lad! Get a grip on yourself! We'll be hittin' the Heaviside in a minute!"

"What do I care?" I lashed out. "Go away, can't you? Blow!"

"Now, now, son!" he pleaded. "That's no way to act! You can't bring her back! And if you keep eatin' your heart out—"

"Get out!" I shouted, heaving myself from the bunk. "Get out—get out!"

"Don't be a fool, Jim! You've got to get rid of that grievin' look! The skyport Johnnies are funny that way! You walk out of this ship with your eyes burnin' holes in your face, and they'll think you got somethin' to hide!

"Look at yourself in a mirror! Whiskers sproutin' out of your chin, face sooty as a tube fittin' and no fight left in you! You got to get back the look of a fightin' fury, son! A lad who can stand up to a port clearance inspector and say 'Me an' my buddy, here, we're headin' for that gate, and if you want to 

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