intelligent," the doctor answered, busy with his stethoscope.

"Animals like Schaughtowl are used for steeds or pets," said Curtis. "The Ladonai are pretty much like mankind, only smaller."

"Why did you stay so long?"

"After I left, the Ladonai told me, they were going to shut off any possible communication with Earth until we advance more. They think we're at a very dangerous animal-like stage of development. Once I came home, I knew I couldn't go back, so I wanted to learn as much as I could before I left them."

"Stand up for a minute," ordered the doctor.

"Not right now," said Curtis. "I'm too tired."

"You'd better get to bed, then."

"I think not. It's merely caused by the difference in gravity and heavier air. The Ladonai told me to expect it, but not to lie down. After a while I'll try to take a short walk."

So Clyde wasn't going to die, after all, Stern thought. He had come home with a message, and, remembering the determination of the man, Stern knew he wouldn't die until he had given it. But he had to die. He would die, and who was competent enough to know that it wasn't from the shock of having come home to denser air and a heavier gravity?

There were ways—an oxygen tube, for example. Pure oxygen to be inhaled in his sleep by lungs accustomed to a rarified atmosphere, or stimulants in his food so it would look like a little too much exertion on a heart already overtaxed. There were ways.

Stern's scalp tingled unpleasantly, and he saw the Martian looking at him intently, coldly. In that moment Stern knew without question that his mind was being read. Not his idea, perhaps, but his intent toward Curtis. The Martian would have to be attended to first.

"Is it true, Dr. Anderson? Will he be all right?" Beryl was sitting on the arm of the chair next to Schaughtowl, and she was looking at Clyde almost as adoringly as the Martian. A few hours had undone all that Stern had managed to do in four years.

If Stern had been uncertain, that alone would have decided him.

"I think so," said the doctor. "He seems to be uncomfortable, rather than in pain. I'll send you a prescription for his heart, if he breathes too heavily. Be sure, though, not to give him more than one pill in three hours."

"Of course." Beryl was never that solicitous toward Stern.

"And you'll be in quarantine here until the government decides what, if any, diseases he and the Martian may have brought back with them."

"None at all, Doctor." Curtis's voice was markedly more slurred, and he stared intently with unblinking eyes at the blank wall.

"Well, that's something we can't tell yet. Well have to keep out the press and television men, anyway, because of your health. If I'm not detained, I'll be back tomorrow morning. Call me if there's any change."

On his way out, the physician was besieged by reporters and photographers, baulked of better subjects. Shortly after the doctor's departure, police sirens came screaming up. The men waiting around the house were moved outside the gate and a guard was set at every entrance.

Later, a messenger came, was interrogated by the police sergeant who took a small package from him and brought it to the house.

"Medicine," the sergeant said, handing it gingerly to Stern. "You can't leave here without permission." And he walked hurriedly away.

This might be the answer. Stern had a good idea of what the doctor had prescribed—something he'd said, for the heart. It must have been pretty powerful, too, for the doctor to warn against an overdose. Two at once might do it, or another two a little later.

But there was Schaughtowl.

"Al," said Beryl, "stay with Clyde while I fix something for him to eat."

She was more beautiful than ever. Emotions, he thought wryly, become a woman; they thrive on them. In a few minutes a woman could change like this. It was enough to make a man lose