It was symbols such as these, he thought, which spelled humanity and all that made a human life worth while — elm trees and leaf smoke, street lamps making splashes on the pavement, and the shine of lighted windows seen dimly through the trees.
A prowling cat ran through the shrubbery that flanked the porch; and up the street a dog began to howl.
Street lamps, he thought, and hunting cats and howling dogs — these are all a pattern, the pattern of human life upon the planet Earth. A solid pattern, linked and double-linked, made strong through many years. Nothing can threaten it, nothing can shake it. With certain slow and gradual changes, it will prevail against any threat which may be brought against it.
He unlocked the door and went into the house.
The long walk and the sharp autumn air, he realized now, had made him hungry. There was a steak, he remembered, in the refrigerator, and he would fix a large bowl of salad and if there were some cold potatoes left he would slice them up and fry them.
The typewriter still stood on the table top. The length of pipe still lay upon the draining board. The kitchen was the same old homely place, untouched by any threat of an alien life come to meddle with the Earth.
He tossed the paper on the table top and stood for a moment, head bent, scanning through the headlines.
The black type of the box at the top of column two caught his eyes. The head read:
WHO IS KIDDING WHOM?
He read the story: