Behind him, Eileen caught her breath. "Those things—Fred, are they buildings?"
"Buildings?" Boone hesitated; fumbled. "I don't know. I guess that you might call them that."
"You guess—? Then you recognize them!" Eileen's blue eyes were suddenly worry-shadowed. "Tell me, Fred. Don't hold back. Is something wrong? Where are we?"
For a long, long moment Boone stared away at the distant dome-pile. "No, nothing's wrong," he said at last. "Maybe it's even better luck than we could hope for." And then: "But wherever we are, Eileen, one thing's for certain: That place is a Helgae city!"
CHAPTER III
It was a situation that held Boone tense, uneasy.
On the one hand, the Helgae domes loomed over the paradisaical flowerland where the sphere-ship lay in strange, silent menace.
On the other, aboard the globe, he could not but chill to the recollection of the monsters.
As for Eileen ... Boone wondered. She had said not a word about their earlier trouble—his desperation-born effort to keep her from making the Titan run; its sudden reversal and her triumph. Yet after the first moments of tenderness and relief at their own survival the clash hung like an invisible wall between them. Out of it, a reserve had come into being—a weighing of words, a wary watching.