Webber pulled out a snub-nosed instrument that looked enough like a gun
to be very convincing. He pointed it at Kieran's middle.
"Reason one," he said. "If the Sakae catch Paula and me here we're in
very big trouble. Reason two--this is a closed area, and you're with us,
so _you_ will be in very big trouble." He looked coldly at Kieran. "The
first reason is the one that interests me most."
Kieran shrugged. "Well, now I know." He ran.
Only then did he hear the low heavy thrumming in the sky.
6.
The sound came rumbling very swiftly toward them. It was a completely
different sound from the humming of the flitter, and it seemed to Kieran
to hold a note of menace. He stopped in a small clearing where he might
see up through the trees. He wanted a look at this ship or flier or
whatever it was that had been built and was flown by non-humans.
But Webber shoved him roughly on into a clump of squat trees that were
the color of sherry wine, with flat thick leaves.
"Don't move," he said.
Paula was hugging a tree beside him. She nodded to him to do as Webber
said.
"They have very powerful scanners." She pointed with her chin. "Look.
They've learned."
The harsh warning barks of the men sounded faintly, then were hushed.
Nothing moved, except by the natural motion of the wind. The people
crouched among the trees, so still that Kieran would not have seen them
if he had not known they were there.
The patrol craft roared past, cranking up speed as it went. Webber
grinned. "They'll be a couple of hours at least, overhauling and
examining the flitter. By that time it'll be dark, and by morning we'll
be in the mountains."
The people were already moving. They headed upstream, going at a steady,
shuffling trot. Three of the women, Kieran noticed, had babies in their
arms. The older children ran beside their mothers. Two of the men and
several of the women were white-haired. They ran also.
"Do you like to see them run?" asked Paula, with a sharp note of passion
in her voice. "Does it look good to you?"
"No," said Kieran, frowning. He looked in the direction in which the
sound of the patrol craft was vanishing.
"Move along," Webber said. "They'll leave us far enough behind as it
is."
* * * * *
Kieran followed the naked people through the woods, beside the tawny
river. Paula and Webber jogged beside him. The shadows were long now,
reaching out across the water.
Paula kept glancing at him anxiously, as though to detect any sign of
weakness on his part. "You're doing fine," she said. "You should. Your
body was brought back to normal strength and tone, before you ever were
awakened."
"They'll slow down when it's dark, anyway," said Webber.
The old people and the little children ran strongly.
"Is their village there?" Kieran asked, indicating the distant
mountains.
"They don't live in villages," Paula said. "But the mountains are safer.
More places to hide."
"You said this was a closed area. What is it, a hunting preserve?"
"The Sakae don't hunt them any more."
"But they used to?"
"Well," Webber said, "a long time ago. Not for food, the Sakae are
vegetarians, but--"
"But," said Paula, "they were the dominant race, and the people were
simply beasts of the field. When they competed for land and food the
people were hunted down or driven out." She swung an expressive hand
toward the landscape beyond the trees. "Why do you think they live in
this desert, scraping a miserable existence along the watercourses? It's
land the Sakae didn't want. Now, of course, they have no objection to
setting it aside as a sort of game preserve. The humans are protected,
the Sakae tell us. They're living their natural life in their natural
environment, and when we demand that a program be--"
She was out of breath and had to stop, panting. Webber finished for her.
"We want them taught, lifted out of this naked savagery. The Sakae say
it's impossible."
"Is it true?" asked Kieran.
"No," said Paula fiercely. "It's a matter of pride. They want to keep
their dominance, so they simply won't admit that the people are anything
more than animals, and they won't give them a chance to be anything
more."
There was no more talking after that, but even so the three outlanders
grew more and more winded and the people gained on them. The sun went
down in a blaze of blood-orange light that tinted the trees in even more
impossible colors and set the river briefly on fire. Then night came,
and just after the darkness shut down the patrol craft returned, beating
up along the winding river bed. Kieran froze under the black trees and
the hair lifted on his skin. For the first time he felt like a hunted
thing. For the first time he felt a personal anger.
The patrol craft drummed away and vanished. "They won't come back until
daylight," Webber said.
* * * * *
He handed out little flat packets of concentrated food from his pockets.
They munched as they walked. Nobody said anything. The wind, which had
dropped at sundown, picked up from a different quarter and began to blow
again. It got cold. After a while they caught up with the people, who
had stopped to rest and eat. The babies and old people for whom Kieran
had felt a worried pity were in much better shape than he. He drank from
the river and then sat down. Paula and Webber sat beside him, on the
ground. The wind blew hard from the desert, dry and chill. The trees
thrashed overhead. Against the pale glimmer of the water Kieran could
see naked bodies moving along the river's edge, wading, bending,
grubbing in the mud. Apparently they found things, for he could see that
they were eating. Somewhere close by other people were stripping fruit
or nuts from the trees. A man picked up a stone and pounded something
with a cracking noise, then dropped the stone again. They moved easily
in the dark, as though they were used to it. Kieran recognized the
leader's yellow-eyed daughter, her beautiful slender height outlined
against the pale-gleaming water. She stood up to her ankles in the soft
mud, holding something tight in her two hands, eating.
The sweat dried on Kieran. He began to shiver.
"You're sure that patrol ship won't come back?" he asked.
"Not until they can see what they're looking for."
"Then I guess it's safe." He began to scramble around, feeling for dried
sticks.
"What are you doing?"
"Getting some firewood."
"No." Paula was beside him in an instant, her hand on his arm, "No, you
mustn't do that."
"But Webber said--"
"It isn't the patrol ship, Kieran. It's the people. They--"
"They what?"
"I told you they were low on the social scale. This is one of the basic
things they have to be taught. Right now they still regard fire as a
danger, something to run from."
"I see," Kieran said, and let the kindling fall. "Very well, if I can't
have a fire, I'll have you. Your body will warm me." He pulled her into
his arms.
* * * * *
She gasped, more in astonishment, he thought, than alarm. "What are you
talking about?"
"That's a line from an old movie. From a number of old movies, in fact.
Not bad, eh?"
He held her tight. She was definitely female. After a moment he pushed
her away.
"That was a mistake. I want to be able to go on disliking you without
any qualifying considerations."
She laughed, a curiously flat little sound. "Was everybody crazy in your
day?" she asked. And then, "Reed--"