The alien shook his head foggily a few times and slowly climbed to his feet.
Barnhart bit at his under lip. That hadn't been a wise thing to do at all. He should know that unorthodox moves like that led only to certain disaster. He fumbled for his force-field projector, and with a flush of adrenalin discovered he had lost it.
Now, he thought, the alien will signal the rest of them. And they, all one hundred of them (now does that include the one I first saw in the clearing or not?) they will converge on me and—
The qurono marched off into the forest.
Everyone was still ignoring Barnhart.
Barnhart munched on a steak sandwich listlessly and watched the aliens through the faint haze of the force field.
He had found the projector half stamped into the earth and he was testing it. But even a test was foolish. None of them was close enough to him to harm him with so much as a communicable disease. He might as well quit roughing it and get back to the cottage.
In the last few days he had had time to think. He took up his journal.
Eighth Day