and slim, her pale gold hair clinging to her body
and gleaming like polished metal in the sun, she stood for a moment,
while the spray frothed at her thighs. Behind her, crouching below the
surface, I could distinguish two other forms. She had returned, and
not alone!

One long, slim arm shot out toward me, held level with the shoulder:
the well-remembered gesture of greeting. Then she too crouched below
the surface that she might breathe.

As I ran out onto the wet sand, the waves splashing around my ankles
all unheeded, she rose again, and now I could see her lovely smile,
and her dark, glowing eyes. I was babbling--I do not know what. Before
I could reach her, she smiled and sank again below the surface.

I waded on out, laughing excitedly, and as I came close to her, she
bobbed up again out of the spray, and we greeted each other in the
manner of her people, hands outstretched, each gripping the shoulder
of the other.

She made a quick motion then, with both hands, as though she placed a
cap upon the shining glory of her head, and I understood in an instant
what she wished: the antenna of Mercer's thought-telegraph, by the
aid of which she had told us the story of herself and her people.

* * * * *

I nodded and smiled, and pointed to the spot where she stood, trying
to show her by my expression that I understood, and by my gesture,
that she was to wait here for me. She smiled and nodded in return, and
crouched again below the surface of the heaving sea.

As I turned toward the beach, I caught a momentary glimpse of the two
who had come with her. They were a man and a woman, watching me with
wide, half-curious, half-frightened eyes. I recognized them instantly
from the picture she had impressed upon my mind nearly a year ago. She
had brought with her on her journey her mother and her father.

Stumbling, my legs shaking with excitement, I ran through the water.
With my wet trousers flapping against my ankles, I sprinted towards
the house.

I found Mercer in the laboratory. He looked up as I came rushing in,
wet from the shoulders down, and I saw his eyes grow suddenly wide.

* * * * *

I opened my mouth to speak, but I was breathless. And Mercer took the
words from my mouth before I could utter them.

"She's come back!" he cried. "She's come back! Taylor--she has?" He
gripped me, his fingers like steel clamps, shaking me with his amazing
st