ttle snub nose. It was sitting on its
haunches, and in that position it was about a foot high. It had two tiny
hands with opposing thumbs. He squatted to have a better look at it.

"Hello there, little fellow," he greeted it. "I never saw anything like
you before. What are you anyhow?"

The small creature looked at him seriously and said, "Yeek," in a timid
voice.

"Why, sure; you're a Little Fuzzy, that's what you are."

He moved closer, careful to make no alarmingly sudden movements, and kept
on talking to it.

"Bet you slipped in while I left the door open. Well, if a Little Fuzzy
finds a door open, I'd like to know why he shouldn't come in and look
around."

He touched it gently. It started to draw back, then reached out a little
hand and felt the material of his shirt-sleeve. He stroked it, and told it
that it had the softest, silkiest fur ever. Then he took it on his lap. It
yeeked in pleasure, and stretched an arm up around his neck.

"Why, sure; we're going to be good friends, aren't we? Would you like
something to eat? Well, suppose you and I go see what we can find."

He put one hand under it, to support it like a baby--at least, he seemed
to recall having seen babies supported in that way; babies were things he
didn't fool with if he could help it--and straightened. It weighed between
fifteen and twenty pounds. At first, it struggled in panic, then quieted
and seemed to enjoy being carried. In the living room he sat down in his
favorite armchair, under a standing lamp, and examined his new
acquaintance.

It was a mammal--there was a fairly large mammalian class on
Zarathustra--but beyond that he was stumped. It wasn't a primate, in the
Terran sense. It wasn't like anything Terran, or anything else on
Zarathustra. Being a biped put it in a class by itself for this planet. It
was just a Little Fuzzy, and that was the best he could do.

That sort of nomenclature was the best anybody could do on a Class-III
planet. On a Class-IV planet, say Loki, or Shesha, or Thor, naming animals
was a cinch. You pointed to something and asked a native, and he'd gargle
a mouthful of syllables at you, which might only mean, "Whaddaya wanna
know for?" and you took it down in phonetic alphabet and the whatzit had a
name. But on Zarathustra, there were no natives to ask. So this was a
Little Fuzzy.

"What would you like to eat, Little Fuzzy?" he asked. "Open your mouth,
and let Pappy Jack see what you have to chew with.