y doesn't have to run very far and if
the bowmen don't miss it works well."

"Judging from your beat-up condition," Lake said, "you must have been
the decoy every time."

"Well----" Schroeder shrugged his shoulders. "It was my idea."

"I've been wondering about another way to get in shots at close range,"
Lake said. "Take the skin of a woods goat, give it the original shape as
near as possible, and a bowman inside it might be able to fake a grazing
woods goat until he got the shot he wanted.

"The unicorns might never suspect where the arrows came from," he
concluded. "And then, of course, they might."

"I'll try it before the day is over, on those two unicorns over there,"
Schroeder said. "At this elevation and in this gravity my own method is
just a little bit rough on a man."

* * * * *

Lake found Craig and his men several miles to the west, all of them
gaunt and bearded as Schroeder had been.

"We've had hell," Craig said. "It seems that every time we spot a few
woods goats there will be a dozen unicorns in between. If only we had
rifles for the unicorns...."

Lake told him of the plan to hide under woods goats' skins and of the
decoy system used by Schroeder.

"Maybe we won't have to use Schroeder's method," he said. "We'll see if
the other works--I'll give it the first try."

This he was not to do. Less than an hour later one of the men who helped
dry the meat and carry it to the caves returned to report the camp
stricken by a strange, sudden malady that was killing a hundred a day.
Dr. Chiara, who had collapsed while driving himself on to care for the
sick, was sure it was a deficiency disease. Anders was down with it,
helpless, and Bemmon had assumed command; setting up daily work quotas
for those still on their feet and refusing to heed Chiara's requests
concerning treatment of the disease.

Lake made the trip back to the caves in a fraction of the length of time
it had taken him to reach the plateau, walking until he was ready to
drop and then pausing only for an hour or two of rest. He spotted
Barber's camp when coming down off the plateau and he swung to one side,
to tell Barber to have a supply of the herbs sent to the caves at once.

He reached the caves, to find half the camp in bed and the other half
dragging about listlessly at the tasks given them by Bemmon. Anders was
in grave condition, too weak to rise, and Dr. Chiara was dying.

He squatted down besi