The Republic had established a colony on Asgard, the second planet of Alpha Centauri A. Joel had seen the three-dimensional reels of its weirdly lovely jungles and grotesque species of plant life.
But so far Asgard's dominant life form had escaped detection!
The Republic's exploring parties had stumbled across strange empty little villages with fires smouldering on clay hearths and the food still hot in clay vessels. Yet not a glimpse of the inhabitants had they ever been able to catch.
By some uncanny means, the natives always eluded them like wraiths.
Anthropologists had been able to reconstruct a theoretical Centaurian though from the evidence that he left behind—artifacts, huts, footprints. He was man-like, they said, and walked upright. He weighed between a hundred and a hundred and twenty pounds, this theoretical creature. He was in a primitive stage of development possessing neither writing nor art.
There was only one thing they couldn't explain. That was why nobody had ever seen one!
Joel grinned sourly. He was letting his imagination run away with him.
At nineteen hours a green panel glowed on the rear wall and letters formed on the glass.
SUPPER—PRESS BUTTON.