over," confirmed Kinton. "It's extremely unusual that anything gets through to the surface, let alone a spaceship. What happened to you?"

Birken's stare was suspicious.

"Then you ain't heard about the new colonies? Naw—you musta come here when all the planets were open."

"We had a small settlement on the second planet," Kinton told him. "You mean there are new Terran colonies?"

"Yeah. Jet-hoppers spreadin' all over the other five. None of the land-hungry poops figured a way to set down here, though, or they'd be creepin' around this planet too."

"How did you happen to do it? Run out of fuel?"

The other eyed him for a few seconds before dropping his gaze. Kinton was struck with sudden doubt. The outposts of civilization were followed by less desirable developments as a general rule—prisons, for instance. He resolved to be wary of the visitor.

"Ya might say I was explorin'," Birken replied at last. "That's why I come alone. Didn't want nobody else hurt if I didn't make it. Say, how bad am I banged up?"

Kinton realized guiltily that the man should be resting. He had lost track of the moments he had wasted in talk while the others with him stood attentively about.

He questioned the doctor briefly and relayed the information that Birken's leg was broken but that the other injuries were not serious.

"They'll fix you up," he assured the spaceman. "They're quite good at it, even if the sight of one does make you think a little of an iguana. Rest up, now; and I'll come back again when you're feeling better."

For the next three weeks, Kinton flew back and forth from his own town nearly every day. He felt that he should not neglect the few meetings which were the only way he could repay the Tepoktans for all they did for him. On the other hand, the chance to see and talk with one of his own kind drew him like a magnet to the hospital.

The doctors operated upon Birken's leg, inserting a metal rod inside the bone by a method they had known before Kinton described it. The new arrival expected to be able to walk, with care, almost any day; although the pin would have to be removed after the bone had healed. Meanwhile, Birken seemed eager to learn all Kinton could tell him about the planet, Tepokt.

About himself, he was remarkably reticent. Kinton worried about this.

"I think we should not expect too much of this Terran," he warned Klaft uneasily. "You, too, have citizens who do not always obey, your laws, who sometimes ... that is—"

"Who are born to die under the axe, as we say," interrupted Klaft, as if to ease the concern plain on Kinton's face. "In other words, criminals. You suspect this Albirken is such a one, George?"

"It is not impossible," admitted Kinton unhappily. "He will tell me little about himself. It may be that he was caught in Tepokt's gravity while fleeing from justice."

To himself, he wished he had not told Birken about the spaceship. He didn't think the man exactly believed his explanation of why there was no use taking off in it.

Yet he continued to spend as much time as he could visiting the other man. Then, as his helicopter landed at the city airport one gray dawn, the news reached him.

"The other Terran has gone," Klaft reported, turning from the breathless messenger as Kinton followed him from the machine.

"Gone? Where did they take him?"

Klaft looked uneasy, embarrassed. Kinton repeated his question, wondering about the group of armed police on hand.

"In the night," Klaft hissed and clucked, "when none would think to watch him, they tell me ... and quite rightly, I think—"

"Get on with it, Klaft! Please!"

"In the night, then, Albirken left the chamber in which he lay. He can walk some now, you know, because of Dr. Chuxolkhee's metal pin. He—he stole a ground car and is gone."

"He did?"