barely a century before the Earthmen arrived. A factor associated with
the ruins again was that their investigation was the passionately
pursued hobby of First Lieutenant Norman Vaughn, Fort Roye's Science
Officer.

Add to such things the reason Roye was not considered in need of a
serious defensive effort by Earth's strategists--the vast distances
between it and any troubled area, and so the utter improbability that a
Geest ship might come close enough to discover that here was another
world as well suited for its race as for human beings. And then a final
factor: the instrument attached to the lining of Phil's coat--a very
special "camera" which now carried the contact impressions made on it by
Uncle William's souvenir gun. Put 'em all together, Phil thought
cheerily, and they spelled out interesting developments on Roye in the
very near future.

He glanced at his watch again, swung the aircar about and started back
inland. He passed presently high above Aunt Beulah's tupa ranch and that
of the Feeney family two miles farther up the mountain, turned gradually
to the east and twenty minutes later was edging back down the ranges to
the coast. Here in a wild, unfarmed region, perched at the edge of a
cliff dropping nearly nine hundred feet to the swirling tide, was a
small, trim cabin which was the property of a small, trim Fort Roye lady
named Celia Adams. Celia had been shipped out from Earth six years
before, almost certainly as an Undesirable, though only the Territorial
Office and Celia herself knew about that, the Botany Bay aspect of
worlds like Roye being handled with some tact by Earth.

* * *

Phil approached the cabin only as far as was necessary to make sure that
the dark-green aircar parked before it was one belonging to Major Wayne
Jackson, the Administration Officer and second in command at Fort
Roye--another native son and an old acquaintance. He then turned away,
dropped to the woods ten miles south and made a second inconspicuous
approach under cover of the trees. There might be casual observers in
the area, and while his meeting with Jackson and Celia Adams today
revealed nothing in itself, it would be better if no one knew about it.

He grounded the car in the forest a few hundred yards from the Adams
cabin, slung a rifle over his shoulder and set off along a game path. It
was good hunting territory, and the rifle would explain his presence if
he ran into somebody. When he cam