The pale glow of the heat-stones filtered through the opening. Kirk saw a box with black marks on it—DANGER. ATOBLAST HIGH EXPLOSIVE—and above that a much smaller box made of metal, on a shelf. The black marks on the first box didn't mean anything to anybody. The father of the Captain's great-grandfather had remembered that there was such a thing as reading.
Samel reached out and took the smaller box, which was at eye level, and locked with a heavy lock, and sealed. He put it down and took the Captain's broken spear and tore the lock away.
The Captain and his yellow daughter stood like dead things, watching. Kirk's heart was pounding in his throat. The secret of the Ship, the sacred thing, the gold and power that had caused the Crash—
Samel's big red hand pulled out a flat bundle of metal sheets, marked with marks like the first box.
Treaty of Alliance between the Sovereign Earth and the Union of Jovian Moons, providing for Earthly colonization and development of the said Moons, and mutual aid against Aggressor Worlds.
A single sheet fell out of the bundle. "... have taken the precaution of sending the treaty secretly in a ship of colonists, in care of the captain who knows nothing of its nature. It has been rumored that our mutual enemy, the Martio-Venusian Alliance, may try to intercept it, possibly with the aid of hired pirates. This would, as you know, mean war. It is my prayer that the treaty will safely...."
Samel stared at the bundle. He shook it, his face looking dazed, like a man just hit in the stomach. Then he threw it down and shook the box. It was empty. In a black fury he turned on the larger box and ripped the cover back, and there was nothing under it but thick transparent bottles with heavy caps, holding a tiny bit of matter in oily liquid.
There was silence in the room, thick with the breathing of stunned and angry men.
"Power," said Samel. "Power, and gold! Nothing! Nothing to make even a spear-head!"
He picked up the empty box and the bundle and hurled them out through the riven wall into the gorge. Then he caught up the larger box and threw it after.