Night fell, and with it came a respite from the danger of Formian attack; for these creatures would never venture forth in the darkness without lights, and lights would betray them. Myles spent part of the night in sending his message, part in watching for approaching lights, and part in dozing.
Finally along toward morning he set about wrecking the set, for he did not wish the Formians to get into communication with Cupia and undo the effect of his own message by pointing out its falsity. Accordingly he smashed the tubes, unwound the inductances and transformers, cut all the wiring into little bits, bent the plates of the condensers, chiseled through the coils of the generator, pounded the trophil-engine to pieces, and drained the trophil tank. It would be many sangths before a new radio set could be built, if indeed these Formians knew enough of the art to ever build another.
His work of destruction completed, he sat down to wait; but the inaction palled on him, and before he knew it he had fallen sound asleep.
He awakened with a start. It was broad daylight. He listened. There was much rattling outside. So he walked to the door, unbarred it, and stepped out.
He was not afraid; for on the evening before he had nailed above the door two crossed sticks, the Porovian equivalent of a flag of truce.
At a short distance stood a band of thirty or forty ant-men, their leader holding a pair of crossed sticks. Accordingly the ragged earth-man advanced. Not one of them did he recognize, but this was no indication of their identity.
Were these members of the Yuri faction, he wondered, or of the faction recently captained by the now deceased Doggo? If the former, they were conquerors intent on adding him to their list of conquests; but if the latter, then they might be fugitives like himself. It behooved him to find out.
So he proceeded to a slight depression in the mountain-top, very near the group of Formians. This depression contained soil, and in it he scratched in Porovian shorthand the words: “Yuri or Doggo?” Then pointed to his message and withdrew for a slight distance.
One of the ant-men advanced alone to the depression, stared at the words, rubbed one part of them, and returned to his comrades, at which Cabot in turn advanced.
The one word remaining written in the dirt was “Yuri!”