"The boat itself. Both wings off, radio dead. Couldn't lock the
door...." It was like an Earth landscape. Tall grass carried oatlike
ruddy seed clusters on green stems. The lake was bordered by white
sand except close by, where jungle reached into water. There was
casual buzzing traffic above the grass, reminiscent of bees, wasps,
flies. Far up, something drifted on motionless wings, circling. And
ten or fifteen miles to the west there was the calm of hills--rounded,
old, more green than blue in a sleepy haze, but to paint them, Paul
thought, you would shade off into the purple. Paul went on, absently:
"We'll have the charlesite of the wrecked boat of course. That gives
this one a theoretical twenty hours of jet. We have ammunition for
long enough to learn how to use bow and arrow, I think."