ould go faster on the highway, but this Renault would not be
daunted by water, plowed fields, or steep hillsides.

Rastignac climbed into the driver's seat, seized the wheel and pressed
his foot down on the accelerator. The nerve-spot beneath the pedal
sent a message to the muscles hidden beneath the hood and the legs
projecting from the body. The Renault lurched forward, steadied, and
began to pick up speed. It entered a broad paved highway. Hooves
drummed; sparks shot out from the steel shoes.

Rastignac guided the brainless, blind creature concealed within the
body. He was helped by the somatically-generated radar it employed to
steer it past obstacles. When he came to the _Rue des Nues_, he slowed
it down to a trot. There was no use tiring it out. Halfway up the
gentle slope of the boulevard, however, a Ford galloped out from a
side-street. Its seats bristled with tall peaked hats with outspread
glowworm wings and with drawn epees.

Rastignac shoved the accelerator to the floor. The Renault broke into
a gallop. The Ford turned so that it would present its broad side. As
there was a fencework of tall shrubbery growing along the boulevard,
the Ford was thus able to block most of the passage.

But, just before his vehicle reached the Ford, Rastignac pressed the
Jump button. Few cars had this; only sportsmen or the royalty could
afford to have such a neural circuit installed. And it did not allow
for gradations in leaping. It was an all-or-none reaction; the legs
spurned the ground in perfect unison and with every bit of the power
in them. There was no holding back.

The nose lifted, the Renault soared into the air. There was a shout, a
slight swaying as the trailing hooves struck the heads of mucketeers
who had been stupid enough not to duck, and the vehicle landed with a
screeching lurch, upright, on the other side of the Ford. Nor did it
pause.

Half an hour later Rastignac reined in the car under a large tree
whose shadow protected them. "We're well out in the country," he said.

"What do we do now?" asked impatient Archambaud.

"First we must know more about this Earthman," Rastignac answered.
"Then we can decide."

VII

Dawn broke through night's guard and spilled a crimson swath on the
hills to the East, and the Six Flying Stars faded from sight like a
necklace of glowing jewels dipped into an ink bottle.

Rastignac halted the weary Renault on the top of a hill, looked down
over the landscape spre