man--the one who had led the party into the
irregular clearing about the life boat--

Rynch shivered, dug his nails into the wood on which he lay. At the
sight of that man, dream and reality had crashed together, sending him
into panic-stricken flight. That was the man from the room--the man
with the cup!

As his heart quieted he began to think more coherently. First, he had
not been able to find the strong-jaws's den. Then the marks on the
ground at the point from which he had fallen and the L-B were here,
just as he remembered. But not far from the small ship he had
discovered something more--a campsite with a shelter fashioned out of
spalls and vines, containing possessions a castaway might have
accumulated.

That man would come, Rynch was sure of that, but he was too spent to
struggle on.

No, the answer to every part of the puzzle lay with that man. To go
back to the ship clearing was to risk capture--but he had to know.
Rynch looked with more attention at his present surroundings. Deep
mold under the trees here would hold tracks. There might just be
another way to move. He eyed the spread of limbs on a neighbor tree.

His journey through those heights was awkward and he sweated and
cringed when he disturbed vocal treetop dwellers. He was also to
discover that close to the site of the L-B crash others waited.

He huddled against the bole of a tree when he made out the curve of a
round bulk holding tight to the tree trunk aloft. Though it was balled
in upon itself he was sure the creature was fully as large as he, and
the menacing claws suggested it was a formidable opponent.

When it made no move to follow him Rynch began to hope it had only
been defending its own hiding place, for its present attitude
suggested concealment.

Still facing that featureless blob in the tree, the man retreated,
alert for the first sign of advance on the part of the creature above.
None came, and he dared to slip around the bole of the tree under
which he stood, listening intently for any corresponding movement
overhead. Now he was facing that survivor's camp.

Another object crouched in the dark of the lean-to shelter, just as
its fellow was on sentry duty in the tree! Only this one did not have
the self-color of the foliage to disguise it. Four-limbed, its long
forearms curved about its bent knees, its general outline almost that
of a human--if a human went clothed in a thick fuzz. The head hunched
right against the shoul