and on the flooring to
uncover another oval depression. But what it all signified or what had
been its purpose, they could not guess.

"Set up the peep-probe here?" Ross asked.

Ashe's head moved in a slow negative. "Look farther ... spread out," the
sonic clicked.

Within a matter of minutes the dolphins reported new remains--two more
saucers, each larger than the first, set in a line on the ocean floor,
pointing directly to Karara's Finger Island. Cautiously explored, these
were discovered to be free of any but harmless life; they stirred up no
more dragons.

When the Terrans came ashore on Finger Island to rest and eat their
midday meal one of the men paced along the beached dragon. Ashore it
lost none of its frightening aspect. And seeing it, even beached and
dead, Ross wondered at his luck in surviving the encounter without a
scratch.

"I think that this one would be alone," PaKeeKee commented. "Where there
is an eater of this size, there is usually only one."

"Mano-Nui!" The girl Taema shivered as she gave to this monster the name
of the shark demon of her people. "Such a one is truly king shark in
these waters! But why have we not sighted its like before? Tino-rau,
Taua ... they have not reported such--"

"Probably because, as PaKeeKee says, these things are rare," Ashe
returned. "A carnivore of size would have to have a fairly wide hunting
range, yet there's evidence that this thing has laired in that den for
some time. Which means that it must have a defined hunting territory
allowing no trespassing from others of its species."

Karara nodded. "Also it may hunt only at intervals, eat heavily, and lie
quiet until that meal is digested. There are large snakes on Terra that
follow that pattern. Ross was in its front yard when it came after
him--"

"From now on"--Ashe swallowed a quarter of fruit--"we know what to watch
for, and the weapon which will finish it off. Don't forget that!"

The delicate mechanisms of their sonics had already registered the
vibrations which would warn of a dragon's presence, and the depth globes
would then do the rest.

"Big skull, oversize for the body." PaKeeKee squatted on his heels by
the head lying on the sand at the end of the now fully extended neck.

Ross had heretofore been more aware of the armament of that head, the
fangs set in the powerful jaws, the horn on the snout. But PaKeeKee's
comment drew his attention to the fact that the scale-covered skull did
dome