"You're obstructing my view."

Burton blinked. A man constructed of long bones and caution, he angled
out of the way, looking around to see what he was obstructing view _of_.

He saw the rock and the round hole through it. He stood very still,
staring. So did the rest of us.

"Well, I'll be damned," said Janus, our photographer. "A hole."

"In a rock," added Gonzales, our botanist.

"Round," said Randolph, our biologist.

"An _artifact_," finished Allenby softly.

Burton helped him to his feet. Silently we gathered around the rock.

Janus bent down and put an eye to one end of the hole. I bent down and
looked through the other end. We squinted at each other.

As mineralogist, I was expected to opinionate. "Not drilled," I said
slowly. "Not chipped. Not melted. Certainly not eroded."

I heard a rasping sound by my ear and straightened. Burton was
scratching a thumbnail along the rim of the hole. "Weathered," he said.
"Plenty old. But I'll bet it's a perfect circle, if we measure."

Janus was already fiddling with his camera, testing the cooperation of
the tiny distant sun with a light-meter.

"Let us see _weather_ it is or not," Allenby said.

* * * * *

Burton brought out a steel tape-measure. The hole was four and
three-eighths inches across. It was perfectly circular and about sixteen
inches long. And four feet above the ground.

"But why?" said Randolph. "Why should anyone bore a four-inch tunnel
through a rock way out in the middle of the desert?"

"Religious symbol," said Janus. He looked around, one hand on his gun.
"We'd better keep an eye out--maybe we've landed on sacred ground or
something."

"A totem _hole_, perhaps," Allenby suggested.

"Oh. I don't know," Randolph said--to Janus, not Allenby. As I've
mentioned, we always ignored Allenby's puns. "Note the lack of
ornamentation. Not at all typical of religious articles."

"On Earth," Gonzales reminded him. "Besides, it might be utilitarian,
not symbolic."

"Utilitarian, how?" asked Janus.

"An altar for snakes," Burton said dryly.

"Well," said Allenby, "you can't deny that it has its _holy_ aspects."

"Get your hand away, will you, Peters?" asked Janus.

I did. When Janus's camera had clicked, I bent again and peered through
the hole. "It sights on that low ridge over there," I said. "Maybe it's
some kind of surveying setup. I'm going to take a look."

"Careful," warned Janus. "Remember, it may be