to extract no new clues from the tracking of the bloodhound by the next forenoon. Neither man could arrive at any means of thwarting the alien machine. Wallace had checked the graph track minutely, looking for signs of a cycle, or cycles, in its movements. He ended up convinced that none existed. It apparently operated entirely at random.

At the mid-day meal Saxton suggested, "Let's pay those fellows in the woods another visit."

"We may as well," Wallace agreed. "We're helpless here until we can come up with some new idea."

They finished eating and strapped on their sidearms. They were not certain that the path they took through the woods was the same they had taken with Al-fin two days before, but at least it led in the same general direction.

An hour later they were lost. Their way had not led them to the tribe of naked savages and they had no idea where else to look. They were debating whether or not to return to their ship when they stepped out into a clearing—one larger than any they had come on earlier.

In the center of the clearing rested a spaceship! From where they stood they could see that its hull was rusted and weather-beaten.

"That hasn't flown in a long time," Saxton said, after the first few minutes of wonder.

"Probably not since it first landed here," Wallace answered.

The clearing about the vessel had been kept free of brush and bushes, and when they went across, and through the open portal of the ship, they found the inside immaculate.

"They certainly keep it clean," Saxton observed.

"It may be a shrine to them," Wallace said. "That would explain why we found Al-fin kneeling when we landed, and yet why he treated us so nonchalantly. He was worshipping our ship, not us."

"I hope they don't find us here," Saxton remarked. "We might be violating some taboo."

Most of the interior fittings of the vessel, they found, had long ago rotted away. Only the metal parts still remained intact. The instrument board was unfamiliar to them. "Pretty definitely an early model," Wallace said.

Saxton found something on one wall that held his absorbed interest. "Come here, Ivan," he called.

"What is it?" Wallace asked, going over to stand 

 Prev. P 11/17 next