"I think there are natives here," David said. "I believe that I saw one."
Renner's eyes lit up with interest. He laid down his knife and fork.
"Are you sure?" he asked.
"It was just a glimpse," David said, "of a hairy face peering around a rock. It looked like one of those pictures of a cave man one used to see in the old texts."
Renner stood up. He moved a little way away, and stood staring out into the growing dark, across the boulder-studded plain.
"On a barren planet like this," he said, "they must lack so many things!"
"I'd swear he almost looks happy," Dr. Thorne whispered to the man next to him. It happened to be Farrow.
"Why shouldn't he be?" Farrow growled, his mouth full of food. "He's got him a planet to play with! That's what he's been aiming for—wait and see!"
The next few days passed swiftly. Dr. Thorne found the water from the little stream not only to be potable, but extremely pure.