iss Kitty went through the door first and
down the steps. The two men followed.

They stood on the ground of New Earth, and looked at one another the way
they had in the ship. In the minds of each there was the thought that
some kind of a ceremonial speech should be made, but no one volunteered
it.

"I suppose we should have a campfire," Miss Kitty said doubtfully.

They did not realize it at the time, but it was the most effective
speech which could have been devised. It was a symbol. Man had
discovered and taken possession of New Earth. His instinctive thought
was to place his brand upon it, an artificial fire.

All of them missed the significance of the fact that it was Miss Kitty
who had made the first move in the domestication of this New Earth.

* * * * *

In the weeks which followed, Miss Kitty began to be dimly aware of the
significance. At first they had lived a sort of Robinson Crusoe kind of
life, leaning pretty heavily upon the stores of the liferaft.

It had been she who had converted it over into more of the Swiss Family
Robinson pattern of making use of the resources about them.

The resources were abundant, bountiful. Yet the two men seemed little
interested, and appeared content to live off the stores within the
liferaft. They devoted almost all their time, except that little for
bringing up firewood and trapping game, to fiddling with that gadget
they called a warp motor. They were trying to hook it up to the radio
sets, they said.

Miss Kitty detested women who nagged at men, but she felt compelled to
point out that this was the fall season upon New Earth, and winter would
soon be upon them. It should not be a severe winter at this latitude,
but they must be prepared for it with something more substantial than
her uncomfortable sleeping place in the liferaft; nor would the two of
them continue to enjoy sleeping out under the trees, if a blanket of
snow fell some night.

"I was hoping we could be back home before winter sets in, Miss Kitty,"
Lt. Harper apologized mildly.

She had not nagged them. She had simply shut her lips and walked away.

The next day they began cutting logs.

It was odd, the basic pleasure she felt in seeing the sides of the cabin
start to take form. Certainly she was not domestic by nature. And this
could, in no sense, be considered a home. Still, she felt it might have
gone up faster, if the men had used their muscles--their brute
s