"What's that thing?" demanded Borden. "That—that wagon?"
"It's a ground car, sir," Jerry said uncomfortably. "There are thirty or forty of them in a sort of valley about ten miles away. This one was half-buried in mud, and the others are the same or worse. The—er—creatures—took me there and dug this out for me. They apparently wanted us to have it."
"And it runs!" said Borden. There was again no sense to anything. A ground car buried in mud should not run when excavated.
"Yes, sir," said Jerry. "They dug it out for me, and I got in it and found the skeletons and the weapons."
Ellen said, "Skeletons?"
Borden said, "Weapons!"
"Yes, sir. I tried to ask you for advice over the talkie, and like I said, it wouldn't work, so I fiddled around a bit and the car showed signs of life, and I found out how to run it. So I brought it back. The weapons work too, sir. You point them at something and push a knob and they—well, they're pretty deadly."
Borden said flatly, "Sattell's ducked out. With the log and star maps and food. One of the creatures just came in wounded. I thought Sattell had planned to ambush you and get your blaster. If he did trail you—"
Jerry blinked, "I didn't see a sign of him. Just a moment, sir."
He turned to his furry companions. Flushing a little, he pulled something out of his pocket and hung it onto his chin. It was a sock—one of his socks—partly filled with clay.