otion, just a flicker, on the knoll ahead--about
halfway up.

He laid the rifle carefully on the ground and hitched the binoculars
around. He raised them to his eyes and moved them slowly back and
forth. The animal was there where he had seen the motion.

It was resting, looking back along the way that it had come, watching
for the first sign of its trailers. Duncan tried to make out the size
and shape, but it blended with the grass and the dun soil and he could
not be sure exactly what it looked like.

He let the glasses down and now that he had located it, he could
distinguish its outline with the naked eye.

His hand reached out and slid the rifle to him. He fitted it to his
shoulder and wriggled his body for closer contact with the ground. The
cross-hairs centered on the faint outline on the knoll and then the
beast stood up.

It was not as large as he had thought it might be--perhaps a little
larger than Earth lion-size, but it certainly was no lion. It was a
square-set thing and black and inclined to lumpiness and it had an
awkward look about it, but there were strength and ferociousness as
well.

Duncan tilted the muzzle of the rifle so that the cross-hairs centered
on the massive neck. He drew in a breath and held it and began the
trigger squeeze.

The rifle bucked hard against his shoulder and the report hammered in
his head and the beast went down. It did not lurch or fall; it simply
melted down and disappeared, hidden in the grass.

"Dead center," Duncan assured himself.

He worked the mechanism and the spent cartridge case flew out. The
feeding mechanism snicked and the fresh shell clicked as it slid into
the breech.

He lay for a moment, watching. And on the knoll where the thing had
fallen, the grass was twitching as if the wind were blowing, only
there was no wind. But despite the twitching of the grass, there was
no sign of the Cytha. It did not struggle up again. It stayed where it
had fallen.

Duncan got to his feet, dug out the bandanna and mopped at his face.
He heard the soft thud of the step behind him and turned his head. It
was the tracker.

"It's all right, Sipar," he said. "You can quit worrying. I got it. We
can go home now."

* * * * *

It had been a long, hard chase, longer than he had thought it might
be. But it had been successful and that was the thing that counted.
For the moment, the _vua_ crop was safe.

He tucked the bandanna back i