ly a mass of green. The
end to the weird chase came so suddenly that he was not prepared, and
it was over before he caught a good look at the quarry. Something
moved down on the river bank and in that same instant the box hurtled
earthward as might a spear. It struck, and the creature who had just
crawled out--out of the ground as far as Raf could see--toppled into
the stream. As the waters closed over the body, the box slued around
and came to rest on the bank. The party in the boat sent their small
craft flying toward the spot where the crawler had sunk.

One of the paddlers abandoned his post and slipped over the side,
diving into the oily water. He made two tries before he was successful
and came to the surface with the other in tow. They did not try to
heave the unconscious captive into the boat, merely kept the lolling
head above water as they turned downstream once more and vanished from
Raf's sight around the end of a pier, while the second party on the
bank reclaimed the now quiet box and went off.

But Raf had seen enough to freeze him where he was for a moment. The
creature which had popped out of the ground only to be struck by the
box and knocked into the river--he would take oath on the fact that it
was not one of the furred animals he had seen on the sea island.
Surely it had been smooth-skinned, not unlike the aliens in
conformation--one of their own kind they had been hunting down, a
criminal or a rebel?

Puzzled, the pilot moved along from roof to roof, trying to pick up
the trail of the party in the boat, but as far as he could now see,
the river was bare. If they had come ashore anywhere along here, they
had simply melted into the city. At last he was forced to use the
homing beam, and it guided him back across the deserted metropolis to
the field.

There was still activity about the globe; they were bringing in the
loot from the warehouse, but Lablet and Hobart stood by the flitter.
As the pilot came up to them, the captain looked up eagerly.

"What happened?"

Raf sensed that there had been some change during his absence, that
Hobart was looking to him for an explanation to make clear happenings
here. He told his story of the hunt and its ending, the capture of the
stranger. Lablet nodded as he finished.

"That is the reason for this, you may depend upon it, Captain. One of
their own people is at the bottom of it."

"Of what?" Raf wanted to ask, but Soriki did it for him.

Hobart smiled