ulously tiny
heads swiveled toward the surrogate.

Kio Barra squirmed in his chair. Holding these empty minds was a chore
he had always hated.

Certainly, there was less total effort than that required for the
control of the more highly organized pseudomen, but the more complex
minds reacted with some speed and the effort was soon over. There was a
short, sometimes sharp struggle, then surrender.

But this was long-term, dragging toil--a steady pushing at a soggy,
unresisting, yet heavy mass. And full concentration was imperative if
anything was to be accomplished. The reptilian minds were as unstable
as they were empty and would slip away unless firmly held. He stared
motionlessly at his crystal, willing the huge reptiles to turn--to
waddle back to the safe grasslands of the estate, far from the null.

At last, the herd was again in motion. One by one, the huge brutes swung
about and galloped clumsily toward more usual pastures, their long necks
swaying loosely with their motion.

Switching from surrogate to surrogate, Barra followed them, urged them,
forced them along until they plunged into the wide swamp northeast of
Tibara village.

He signed wearily and shifted his viewpoint to a surrogate which
overlooked the village itself. What, he wondered, had happened to the
herdsmen--and to the guards who should be overseeing the day's work?

* * * * *

Half hidden among ferns and the mastlike stems of trees, the rude huts
of Tibara nestled in the forest, blending with their surroundings, until
only the knowing observer could identify them by vague form. Barra
shifted his viewpoint to the central village surrogate.

There were other open spaces in the village, but this was the largest.
Here was the village well, near which a few children played some
incomprehensible game. An old man had collected a pile of rock and had
started work on the well curb. Now, he sat near his work, leaning
against the partly torn down wall. Spots of sunlight, coming through
the fronds high above, struck his body, leaving his face in shadow. He
dozed in the warmth, occasionally allowing his eyes to half open as he
idly regarded the scene before him.

Before some of the huts surrounding the rude plaza, women squatted on
the ground, their arms swinging monotonously up and down as they struck
their wooden pestles into bowls of grain which they were grinding to
make the coarse meal which was their mainstay of