is continued. "So--we stared at each other. Finally the creature
went into a series of clackings and twitterings and held out its hands
toward me, empty. I took that as a gesture of friendship."

"Perhaps," suggested Harrison, "it looked at that nose of yours and
thought you were its brother!"

"Huh! You can be funny without talking! Anyway, I put up my gun and said
'Aw, don't mention it,' or something of the sort, and the thing came
over and we were pals.

"By that time, the sun was pretty low and I knew that I'd better build a
fire or get into my thermo-skin. I decided on the fire. I picked a spot
at the base of the Thyle cliff, where the rock could reflect a little
heat on my back. I started breaking off chunks of this desiccated
Martian vegetation, and my companion caught the idea and brought in an
armful. I reached for a match, but the Martian fished into his pouch and
brought out something that looked like a glowing coal; one touch of it,
and the fire was blazing--and you all know what a job we have starting a
fire in this atmosphere!

"And that bag of his!" continued the narrator. "That was a manufactured
article, my friends; press an end and she popped open--press the middle
and she sealed so perfectly you couldn't see the line. Better than
zippers.

"Well, we stared at the fire a while and I decided to attempt some sort
of communication with the Martian. I pointed at myself and said 'Dick';
he caught the drift immediately, stretched a bony claw at me and
repeated 'Tick.' Then I pointed at him, and he gave that whistle I
called Tweel; I can't imitate his accent. Things were going smoothly; to
emphasize the names, I repeated 'Dick,' and then, pointing at him,
'Tweel.'

"There we stuck! He gave some clacks that sounded negative, and said
something like 'P-p-p-proot.' And that was just the beginning; I was
always 'Tick,' but as for him--part of the time he was 'Tweel,' and part
of the time he was 'P-p-p-proot,' and part of the time he was sixteen
other noises!

"We just couldn't connect. I tried 'rock,' and I tried 'star,' and
'tree,' and 'fire,' and Lord knows what else, and try as I would, I
couldn't get a single word! Nothing was the same for two successive
minutes, and if that's a language, I'm an alchemist! Finally I gave it
up and called him Tweel, and that seemed to do.

"But Tweel hung on to some of my words. He remembered a couple of them,
which I suppose is a great achievement if you're used to