At length he found some charts and listings. He had been certain that there must be uranium mines– man-mines– in those mountains. But all he found were notations that where they had existed they were mined out.

What? No uranium mines? No active ones, anyway.

Yet he was dead certain that there must be uranium in those mountains. Otherwise, why would the Psychlos avoid them? Maybe they just thought there was. No, there must be uranium in those mountains.

Some of his plans began to crumble at the edges and he fell into something like despair.

He began to search in the books, looking for any references at all to uranium.

And then he hit, as Ker would say, pay dirt of a sort.

It was a book on mine toxicology, a subject he made out as “poisons in mines affecting miners.” And there it was in the index: “Uranium; radiation poisoning.”

For the next half-hour he struggled through the entry. It seemed that you had better damn well be clothed in lead shielding when you fooled around with radium or uranium or radiation. All sorts of terrible things happened if you weren't. Rashes, hair falling out, burns, blood changes...

And then he had it: people bombarded with radiation experienced changes in their genes and chromosomes, and birth defects and sterility resulted.

That was what was wrong with his people.

That was why children seldom came and why those that did were often imperfect at birth.

That was the reason for the lethargy of some of them.

And that could also be the “red sickness.” And the crumbling away of his father's bones.

It was all there. It described exactly what was happening to his people. Why they did not multiply.

There was radiation in the village valley!

He went back hurriedly to the mine maps. No, there was not even a worked-out uranium mine anywhere around the village.

But radiation was what it was. The symptoms were unmistakable.

He knew now why the Psychlos stayed away from there. But if there were no mines, where was the radiation coming from? The sun? No, not that. Goats on the higher ridges had no trouble multiplying and he had never seen a deformed goat.

Well, he had an answer of sorts. It was not a clean-cut one. There was radiation but no mines.

It struck him abruptly that man must have had a way of detecting radiation; he seemed to know so much about it. Eventually he found that, too. It was called a "Geiger counter” after somebody named “Geiger,” who was born and died on dates that Jonnie had no trace or inkling of. It seemed that radiation or “ionizing particles,” if present, passed through a gas. The radiation generated a current in the gas that made a needle react. Radiation somehow generated a current in certain gases.

The schematic diagrams were unintelligible to him until he found a table that gave the abbreviations. He could then translate them across into Psychlo, which he did laboriously. He wondered whether he could make a Geiger counter. He decided, given the Psychlo electronics shop, that he could. But after he escaped, that wouldn't be available. Despair began to creep in on him.

He finally put the books away and in the small hours fell into an exhausted sleep. He had nightmares. Chrissie mauled and smashed to bits. His people wasted and truly extinct. And the world of the Psychlos come alive and laughing at him.

But it wasn't the whole world of the Psychlos laughing. It was Terl.

Midmorning sunlight filled the cage as Jonnie awoke. Terl was standing at the second table, turning over the man-books and laughing.

Jonnie sat up in his robes.

“You finished with these, animal?”

Jonnie went over to the artificial pond and washed his face. A month back he had persuaded Terl to keep a trickle running in so he could get clean water at the intake. It was cold and refreshed him.

There was a shattering crash in the air and for a moment he thought something had blown up. But it was only the recon drone passing overhead.

For some days now it had been making midmorning sweeps. Ker had explained to him what it was. It was an ore detection, activity surveillance craft, capable of taking continuous pictures. It was regulated by remote control.

All his life Jonnie had seen such craft overhead and had supposed they were natural phenomena such as meteors or the sun and moon. But those had passed every few days and this one was passing daily. The old ones did not rumble in the distance as they approached and did not make an explosion as they went by. This one did. Ker hadn't really known why, but it had to do with speed. They were very fast. You couldn't turn one in the air or stop one. You could only guide it, and it had to go all the way around the planet to get back. So this one– if it was the same one– was circling the planet daily. The harsh boom was very unpleasant.

Terl looked up at it and then carefully ignored it. Minesite personnel didn't like it.

“Why every day?” said Jonnie, looking up at it. It was an element in his escape planning. It only took pictures but that would be enough.

“I said,” snarled Terl, “are you finished with these books?”

The recon drone was fading, its rumble losing itself across the eastern plains. It s path had been from the mountains.

Jonnie made a breakfast of cold meat and water. Terl stacked the books up in his arms and went to the cage door.

Terl halted, indifferently. "lf you're so keen on data about those mountains,” said Terl, “there's a whole relief map of them in the library of that town up north. You want to look at it?”

Instantly alert, Jonnie nevertheless kept on with his breakfast. An accommodating Terl always has something else in mind. But this was a chance Jonnie had scarcely dared hope for. In his planning he had gone over ways to get Terl to take him out in the car. It would be a simple matter to throw a door catch, swing a blast of air into the car, hit the emergency stop button, and hold a gun on Terl.

Desperate, but it was a chance.

“I got nothing to do today,” said Terl. “Your machine training has ended. We might run up to the town. Look at that relief map. Do a little hunting. Maybe look some more for your horse.”

A rambling Terl was not within Jonnie's experience. Did the monster know something? “I want to show you something, anyways,” said Terl. “So get your things together and I’ll be by in about an hour and we'll take a ride. I’ve got to check some things. I’ll be back. Be ready, animal.”

Jonnie scrambled. This was a bit premature and it upset his planning, but he looked on it as a heaven-sent chance. He had to get away and get to his people, both to stop Chrissie, if she attempted to keep her promise, and to move the village to a safer place. There were only two weeks left before the constellation returned to it’s place.

He put the small gun in his belt pouch, put the metal cutter alongside his ankle, packed a supply of smoked beef. He dressed in buckskin.

When the hour was up, a vehicle rumbled into sight and stopped. Jonnie stared at it, wondering what was going on. This was not the Mark III tank. It was a simple equipment truck normally used for transporting machinery. It had an enclosed, pressurized cab. The back was large and open, surrounded by stakes. It s only similarity to a tank was that it had no wheels but skimmed a varying distance up to three feet above ground.

Then Jonnie realized that this might work to his advantage. It had no heat-seekers, no guns.

Terl got out and opened the cage.

“Throw your things into the back, animal. And ride in the back.” He unfastened the leash and boosted Jonnie over the tailgate. He took out a pocket welder and fastened the leash to the cab.

“This way,” said Terl, “I won't have to smell those hides!” He was laughing when he got into the cab, took off his mask, and turned on its system. Suddenly Jonnie realized he had no way of immobilizing Terl– he couldn't open the door on him.