ldster with the silver bar and the
keystone-shaped red patch on his left shoulder replied. "It is a
shocking habit--destructive to the logical faculties. What seems
strange to you is only so because you do not follow my train of
thought.

"For example, the wheels and their framework under your flying
machine are splashed with mud which seems to be predominantly
brick-dust, mixed with plaster. Obviously, you landed recently in
a dead city, either during or after a rain. There was a rain here
yesterday evening, the wind being from the west. Obviously, you
followed behind the rain as it came up the river. And now that I
look at your boots, I see traces of the same sort of mud, around
the soles and in front of the heels.

"But this is heartless of us, keeping you standing here on a
wounded leg, sir. Come in, and let our medic take a look at it."

"Well, thank you, lieutenant," Loudons replied. "But don't bother
your medic. I've attended to the wound myself, and it wasn't
serious to begin with."

"You are a doctor?" the white-haired man asked.

"Of sorts. A sort of general scientist. My name is Loudons. My
friend, Mr. Altamont, here, is a scientist, too."

There was an immediate reaction: all three of the elders of the
village, and the young riflemen who had accompanied them,
exchanged glances of surprise.

Loudons dropped his hand to the grip of his slung auto-carbine
and Altamont sidled away from his partner, his hand moving as if
by accident toward the butt of his pistol. The same thought was
in both men's minds, that these people might feel, as the
heritage of the war of two centuries ago, a hostility to science
and scientists.

There was no hostility, however, in their manner as the old man
came forward with outstretched hand.

"I am Tenant Mycroft Jones, the Toon Leader here," he said. "This
is Stamford Rawson, our Reader, and Verner Hughes, our Toon
Sarge. This is his son, Murray Hughes, the Toon Sarge of the
Irregulars.

"But come into the Aitch-Cue House, gentlemen. We have much to
talk about."

* * * * *

By this time, the villagers had begun to emerge from the log
cabins and rubble-walled houses around the plaza and the old
church. Some of them, mostly the young men, were carrying rifles,
but the majority were unarmed. About half of them were women, in
short deerskin skirts or homespun dresses. There were a number of
children, the younger ones almost completely nak