t can't think beyond the elementary. If they
don't smell it, it isn't there. If something is after us it's coming
up-wind, the way any hunting animal works. A couple of the men ought to
circle around and--"

"Come on," said Webber wearily.

* * * * *

They followed the people beside the river. The cluster was high now, a
hive of suns reflected in the flowing water, a kaleidoscopic rippling of
colors.

Now the women were carrying the smaller children. The ones too large to
be carried were lagging behind a little. So were the aged. Not much,
yet. Kieran, conscious that he was weaker than the weakest of these,
looked ahead at the dim bulk of the mountains and thought that they
ought to be able to make it. He was not at all sure that he would.

The river made another bend. The trail lay across the bend, clear of the
trees. It was a wide bend, perhaps two miles across the neck. Ahead,
where the trail joined the river again, there was a rocky hill.
Something about the outlines of the hill seemed wrong to Kieran, but it
was too far away to be sure of anything. Overhead the cluster burned
gloriously. The people set out across the sand.

Webber looked back. "You see?" he said. "Nothing."

They went on. Kieran was beginning to feel very tired now, all the
artificial strength that had been pumped into him before his awakening
was running out. Webber and Paula walked with their heads down, striding
determinedly but without joy.

"What do you think now?" she asked Kieran. "Is this any way for humans
to live?"

The ragged line of women and children moved ahead of them, with the men
in the lead. It was not natural, Kieran thought, for children to be able
to travel so far, and then he remembered that the young of
non-predacious species have to be strong and fleet at an early age.

Suddenly one of the women made a harsh, shrill cry.

Kieran looked where she was looking, off to the left, to the river and
the curving line of trees. A large black shadow slipped across the sand.
He looked behind him. There were other shadows, coming with long easy
bounds out of the trees, fanning out in a shallow crescent. They
reminded Kieran of some animal he had once seen in a zoo, a partly
catlike, partly doglike beast, a cheetah he thought it had been called,
only the cheetah was spotted like a leopard and these creatures were
black, with stiff, upstanding ears. They bayed, and the coursing began.

"Nothing