s that probably spelled out the
scientists' equivalent of "monkeys."

"They were here, in this place," said Adam. "The giants must have
experimented on them too." He turned his eyes up to the woman and saw
that she was white and drawn. "What happened to them?" he asked. "There
aren't any monkeys here now."

"Exactly," she said. She put on the next picture, and after a moment the
next.

Dogs greeted his eyes, so real he could almost hear them pant; a cow
gazed stolidly at him; a cheetah sat on a mound of straw with clown's
head cocked inquisitively; two cockatoos perched in rigid still life on
the silver rod of the prison box.

"What happened to them?" he asked again.

"The experiments ended," she said.

Then there flashed out a thing like a blue sponge with legs, a thing
which sat in the cat's-cradle they had speculated so much about. From
its center two ruby eyes blazed with three-dimensional fire. _That_
never came from Earth! Mars or Venus could have produced it, maybe, or a
planet so far from Earth that it bore no name. He said as much, his
voice quavering.

She stared at him. Moistening her lips, she said, "If that was here, in
this box, then _where are we_?"

He shook his head. He could not even guess. "What's next?"

The last picture in the slate was a group portrait of himself, the
Fulls, Summersby, Watkins, and Porfirio Villa.

When was that taken? They were sitting in a circle on the straw, eating
something. Peering closely, he thought it must be the vegetables, for
there was a small heap of round things next to Calvin Full which were
probably buckeyes. Sunday night, then.

"They must have taken it through the food panel," he said. "Are there
any more pictures?"

"That's all. I don't know what's in the other ones yet."

Calvin came in. She handed him the first "book" and showed him how to
operate it. He flipped through it and when he came to the monstrosity in
the web his eyes widened. "What is it?" he asked, in the hard twang of
his region.

"A guinea pig, like all the others including us," his wife said.

"The tree trunks are explained now," said Adam, half to himself. "The
sand box, too. That isn't a very scientific-looking treatise, but I
guess it's more of a memento, a record of us all." He raised his brows
in a facial shrug. "Us and the monkeys," he said. "Gosh!"

* * * * *

She took the next big slate on her lap. It was lavender. The first few
pages