"Just this one Org?" I murmured. "Is he the only one around here? He and that—animal-thing which I killed?"
"That—a female mime—you—you—"
She was huddling beside me, clinging to me, still shuddering. "Two Orgs there were," she whispered. "And another mime—a fire-male—"
The flame-creature! Queerly, it was not until that instant that I thought of Jan. Out there across the gully, that swirling swaying blob of light-fire! Those snarling sounds! Jan had been attacked by another of the savages, and by the weird flaming creature! The mime fire-male, as the girl called it.
I jumped to my feet. "What—what you do?" she demanded.
"You stay here. What's your name?"
"Ama. Daughter of Rohm, the Senza. He my father. He very good fren' of the Captain Roberts—good fren' of all the Earthmen. Like you? You are Earthman?"
"Yes. Now Ama, listen—I came here with another Earthman—with two others, in fact. One of them is over there by the Roberts' ship.... You wait here—"
"No!" she gasped. I had dashed toward the tunnel entrance, but I found her with me. "No—no, I stay with you."
From the entrance the gully showed dim and silent. Over the little rise of ground, just the top of the Roberts' spaceship was visible.