and swam lazily the 300 yards in to shore.

"Let's try to find that thing we saw. It shouldn't be too far from
here," said Carol the moment they hit the beach.

They climbed inland on the rocky island. Little green lizards scooted
underfoot and vines scratched at their ankles.

Bill was leading, when suddenly he called, "Carol, I see something up
ahead! There's something lying on the ground!" He hurried toward what he
had seen.

The dying sun reflected on a luminescent bolt of cloth, somewhat like a
spun-aluminum fabric. Thin wire lines were entangling it, and about ten
feet away lay three fragments of what appeared to have been a dull metal
box.

Carol knelt at the closest piece, evidently a corner of the box. It was
lined with wiring and tubes.

"It looks like electronic equipment," decided Carol, peering intently at
the strange piece. Bill had approached the second and largest fragment.

He carefully turned it over. It was filled with black and yellow ...
fur?

"Oh no!" he cried, knowing in a flash, yet denying it in his mind at the
same time. Stunned, he stared at the perky ears, the dull staring and
unseeing eyes, the leather thongs that held the head and body of a dog
to the metal encasement. Carol saw it the next instant.

"It's some horrible joke!" she gasped. "It couldn't be the second
Russian satellite, it couldn't be Muttnik! My God, no, it couldn't be!"

Bill kept staring, his thoughts racing. There were rumors of an ejection
chamber for Muttnik. But they had been denied by the Russians. But
suppose the Russians _had_ planned an ejection chamber for the dog Laika
when they launched the satellite and had only denied it after they
thought it had failed?

But if it _had_ worked, why had it taken so long to find its way to
earth? The satellite itself was supposed to have disintegrated months
ago.

"Damn," thought Bill. "I wish I were a scientist right now instead of a
know-nothing artist!"

He touched the dog with his toe. It was perfectly preserved, as though
it had died just a few hours before. It was rigid, but it had not
started to decompose.

"Carol, are we crazy? Is this some dream, or do you believe we are
looking at the ejection chamber of the Russian satellite?" he asked,
doubting even what he was saying.

"I don't know." Carol was wide-eyed. "But what shall we do now? We'd
better contact the authorities immediately!"

Bill tried to keep reason from overcoming his disbelief of thei