For a minute Eric was too tongue-tied to answer. He stood motionless, waiting for them to laugh at him.
"Go on. Tell them."
"I've been reading about the old race," Eric said. "All about the stars. About the people who went off in the starships and explored our whole galaxy."
"What's a galaxy?" the thin man said. Walden could perceive that he really didn't know.
Eric's fear lessened. These men weren't laughing at him. They weren't being just polite, either. They were interested. He smiled at them, shyly, and told them about the books and the wonderful, strange tales of the past that the books told. The men listened, nodding from time to time. But he knew that they didn't understand. The world of the books was his alone....
"Well?" Walden looked at the others. They looked back. Their emotions were a welter of doubt, of indecision.
"You've heard the boy," Walden said quietly, thrusting his own uneasiness down, out of his thoughts.
"Yes." Abbot hesitated. "He seems bright enough—quite different from what I'd expected. At least he's not like the ones who grew up wild in the hills. This boy isn't a savage."
Walden shrugged. "Maybe they weren't savages either," he suggested. "After all, it's been fifty years since the last of them died. And a lot of legends can spring up in fifty years."
"Perhaps we have been worrying unnecessarily." Abbot got up to go, but his eyes still held Walden's. "But," he added, "it's up to you to watch him. If he reverts, becomes dangerous in any way, he'll have to be locked up. That's final."