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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Exile, by Horace Brown Fyfe
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Exile
+
+Author: Horace Brown Fyfe
+
+Release Date: August 16, 2007 [EBook #22346]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EXILE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Greg Weeks, Alexander Bauer and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                              EXILE
+
+                          BY H. B. FYFE
+
+                       ILLUSTRATED BY EMSH
+
+
+      The Dome of Eyes made it almost impossible for Terrans
+      to reach the world of Tepokt. For those who did land
+      there, there was no returning--only the bitterness of
+      respect--and justice!
+
+
+The Tepoktan student, whose blue robe in George Kinton's opinion clashed
+with the dull purple of his scales, twiddled a three-clawed hand for
+attention. Kinton nodded to him from his place on the dais before the
+group.
+
+"Then you can give us no precise count of the stars in the galaxy,
+George?"
+
+Kinton smiled wrily, and ran a wrinkled hand through his graying hair.
+In the clicking Tepoktan speech, his name came out more like "Chortch."
+
+Questions like this had been put to him often during the ten years since
+his rocket had hurtled through the meteorite belt and down to the
+surface of Tepokt, leaving him the only survivor. Barred off as they
+were from venturing into space, the highly civilized Tepoktans
+constantly displayed the curiosity of dreamers in matters related to the
+universe. Because of the veil of meteorites and satellite fragments
+whirling about their planet, their astronomers had acquired torturous
+skills but only scraps of real knowledge.
+
+"As I believe I mentioned in some of my recorded lectures," Kinton
+answered in their language, "the number is actually as vast as it seems
+to those of you peering through the Dome of Eyes. The scientists of my
+race have not yet encountered any beings capable of estimating the
+total."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+He leaned back and scanned the faces of his interviewers, faces that
+would have been oddly humanoid were it not for the elongated snouts and
+pointed, sharp-toothed jaws. The average Tepoktan was slightly under
+Kinton's height of five-feet-ten, with a long, supple trunk. Under the
+robes their scholars affected, the shortness of their two bowed legs was
+not obvious; but the sight of the short, thick arms carried high before
+their chests still left Kinton with a feeling of misproportion.
+
+He should be used to it after ten years, he thought, but even the reds
+or purples of the scales or the big teeth seemed more natural.
+
+"I sympathize with your curiosity," he added. "It is a marvel that your
+scientists have managed to measure the distances of so many stars."
+
+He could tell that they were pleased by his admiration, and wondered yet
+again why any little show of approval by him was so eagerly received.
+Even though he was the first stellar visitor in their recorded history,
+Kinton remained conscious of the fact that in many fields he was unable
+to offer the Tepoktans any new ideas. In one or two ways, he believed,
+no Terran could teach their experts anything.
+
+"Then will you tell us, George, more about the problems of your first
+space explorers?" came another question.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Before Kinton had formed his answer, the golden curtains at the rear of
+the austerely simple chamber parted. Klaft, the Tepoktan serving the
+current year as Kinton's chief aide, hurried toward the dais. The
+twenty-odd members of the group fell silent on their polished stone
+benches, turning their pointed visages to follow Klaft's progress.
+
+The aide reached Kinton and bent to hiss and cluck into the latter's ear
+in what he presumably considered an undertone. The Terran laboriously
+spelled out the message inscribed on the limp, satiny paper held before
+his eyes. Then he rose and took one step toward the waiting group.
+
+"I regret I shall have to conclude this discussion," he announced. "I
+am informed that another ship from space has reached the surface of
+Tepokt. My presence is requested in case the crew are of my own planet."
+
+Klaft excitedly skipped down to lead the way up the aisle, but Kinton
+hesitated. Those in the audience were scholars or officials to whom
+attendance at one of Kinton's limited number of personal lectures was
+awarded as an honor.
+
+They would hardly learn anything from him directly that was not
+available in recordings made over the course of years. The Tepoktan
+scientists, historians, and philosophers had respectfully but eagerly
+gathered every crumb of information Kinton knowingly had to offer--and
+some he thought he had forgotten. Still ... he sensed the disappointment
+at his announcement.
+
+"I shall arrange for you to await my return here in town," Kinton said,
+and there were murmurs of pleasure.
+
+Later, aboard the jet helicopter that was basically like those Kinton
+remembered using on Terra twenty light years away, he shook his head at
+Klaft's respectful protest.
+
+"But George! It was enough that they were present when you received the
+news. They can talk about that the rest of their lives! You must not
+waste your strength on these people who come out of curiosity."
+
+Kinton smiled at his aide's earnest concern. Then he turned to look out
+the window as he recalled the shadow that underlay such remonstrances.
+He estimated that he was about forty-eight now, as nearly as he could
+tell from the somewhat longer revolutions of Tepokt. The time would come
+when he would age and die. Whose wishes would then prevail?
+
+Maybe he was wrong, he thought. Maybe he shouldn't stand in the way of
+their biologists and surgeons. But he'd rather be buried, even if that
+left them with only what he could tell them about the human body.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+To help himself forget the rather preoccupied manner in which some of
+the Tepoktan scientists occasionally eyed him, he peered down at the big
+dam of the hydro-electric project being completed to Kinton's design.
+Power from this would soon light the town built to house the staff of
+scientists, students, and workers assigned to the institute organized
+about the person of Kinton.
+
+Now, there was an example of their willingness to repay him for whatever
+help he had been, he reflected. They hadn't needed that for themselves.
+
+In some ways, compared to those of Terra, the industries of Tepokt were
+underdeveloped. In the first place, the population was smaller and had
+different standards of luxury. In the second, a certain lack of drive
+resulted from the inability to break out into interplanetary space.
+Kinton had been inexplicably lucky to have reached the surface even in
+a battered hulk. The shell of meteorites was at least a hundred miles
+thick and constantly shifting.
+
+"We do not know if they have always been meteorites," the Tepoktans had
+told Kinton, "or whether part of them come from a destroyed satellite;
+but our observers have proved mathematically that no direct path through
+them may be predicted more than a very short while in advance."
+
+Kinton turned away from the window as he caught the glint of Tepokt's
+sun upon the hull of the spaceship they had also built for him. Perhaps
+... would it be fair to encourage the newcomer to attempt the barrier?
+
+For ten years, Kinton had failed to work up any strong desire to try it.
+The Tepoktans called the ever-shifting lights the Dome of Eyes, after
+a myth in which each tiny satellite bright enough to be visible was
+supposed to watch over a single individual on the surface. Like their
+brothers on Terra, the native astronomers could trace their science back
+to a form of astrology; and Kinton often told them jokingly that he felt
+no urge to risk a physical encounter with his own personal Eye.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The helicopter started to descend, and Kinton remembered that the city
+named in his message was only about twenty miles from his home. The
+brief twilight of Tepokt was passing by the time he set foot on the
+landing field, and he paused to look up.
+
+The brighter stars visible from this part of the planet twinkled back at
+him, and he knew that each was being scrutinized by some amateur or
+professional astronomer. Before an hour had elapsed, most of them would
+be obscured by the tiny moonlets, some of which could already be seen.
+These could easily be mistaken for stars or the other five planets of
+the system, but in a short while the tinier ones in groups would cause
+a celestial haze resembling a miniature Milky Way.
+
+Klaft, who had descended first, leaving the pilot to bring up the rear,
+noticed Kinton's pause.
+
+"Glory glitters till it is known for a curse," he remarked, quoting a
+Tepoktan proverb often applied by the disgruntled scientists to the Dome
+of Eyes.
+
+Kinton observed, however, that his aide also stared upward for a long
+moment. The Tepoktans loved speculating about the unsolvable. They had
+even founded clubs to argue whether two satellites had been destroyed or
+only one.
+
+Half a dozen officials hastened up to escort the party to the vehicle
+awaiting Kinton. Klaft succeeded in quieting the lesser members of the
+delegation so that Kinton was able to learn a few facts about the new
+arrival. The crash had been several hundred miles away, but someone had
+thought of the hospital in this city which was known to have a doctor
+rating as an expert in human physiology. The survivor--only one occupant
+of the wreck, alive or dead, had been discovered--had accordingly been
+flown here.
+
+With a clanging of bells, the little convoy of ground cars drew up in
+front of the hospital. A way was made through the chittering crowd
+around the entrance. Within a few minutes, Kinton found himself looking
+down at a pallet upon which lay another Terran.
+
+A man! he thought, then curled a lip wrily at the sudden, unexpected
+pang of disappointment. Well, he hadn't realized until then what he was
+really hoping for!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The spaceman had been cleaned up and bandaged by the native medicos.
+Kinton saw that his left thigh was probably broken. Other dressings
+suggested cracked ribs and lacerations on the head and shoulders. The
+man was dark-haired but pale of skin, with a jutting chin and a nose
+that had been flattened in some earlier mishap. The flaring set of his
+ears somehow emphasized an overall leanness. Even in sleep, his mouth
+was thin and hard.
+
+"Thrown across the controls after his belt broke loose?" Kinton guessed.
+
+"I bow to your wisdom, George," said the plump Tepoktan doctor who
+appeared to be in charge.
+
+Kinton could not remember him, but everyone on the planet addressed the
+Terran by the sound they fondly thought to be his first name.
+
+"This is Doctor Chuxolkhee," murmured Klaft.
+
+Kinton made the accepted gesture of greeting with one hand and said,
+"You seem to have treated him very expertly."
+
+Chuxolkhee ruffled the scales around his neck with pleasure.
+
+"I have studied Terran physiology," he admitted complacently. "From your
+records and drawings, of course, George, for I have not yet had the good
+fortune to visit you."
+
+"We must arrange a visit soon," said Kinton. "Klaft will--"
+
+He broke off at the sound from the patient.
+
+"A Terran!" mumbled the injured man.
+
+He shook his head dazedly, tried to sit up, and subsided with a groan.
+
+_Why, he looked scared when he saw me_, thought Kinton.
+
+"You're all right now," he said soothingly. "It's all over and you're in
+good hands. I gather there were no other survivors of the crash?"
+
+The man stared curiously. Kinton realized that his own language
+sputtered clumsily from his lips after ten years. He tried again.
+
+"My name is George Kinton. I don't blame you if I'm hard to understand.
+You see, I've been here ten years without ever having another Terran to
+speak to."
+
+The spaceman considered that for a few breaths, then seemed to relax.
+
+"Al Birken," he introduced himself laconically. "Ten years?"
+
+"A little over," confirmed Kinton. "It's extremely unusual that anything
+gets through to the surface, let alone a spaceship. What happened to
+you?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Birken's stare was suspicious.
+
+"Then you ain't heard about the new colonies? Naw--you musta come here
+when all the planets were open."
+
+"We had a small settlement on the second planet," Kinton told him. "You
+mean there are new Terran colonies?"
+
+"Yeah. Jet-hoppers spreadin' all over the other five. None of the
+land-hungry poops figured a way to set down here, though, or they'd be
+creepin' around this planet too."
+
+"How did you happen to do it? Run out of fuel?"
+
+The other eyed him for a few seconds before dropping his gaze. Kinton
+was struck with sudden doubt. The outposts of civilization were followed
+by less desirable developments as a general rule--prisons, for instance.
+He resolved to be wary of the visitor.
+
+"Ya might say I was explorin'," Birken replied at last. "That's why I
+come alone. Didn't want nobody else hurt if I didn't make it. Say, how
+bad am I banged up?"
+
+Kinton realized guiltily that the man should be resting. He had lost
+track of the moments he had wasted in talk while the others with him
+stood attentively about.
+
+He questioned the doctor briefly and relayed the information that
+Birken's leg was broken but that the other injuries were not serious.
+
+"They'll fix you up," he assured the spaceman. "They're quite good at
+it, even if the sight of one does make you think a little of an iguana.
+Rest up, now; and I'll come back again when you're feeling better."
+
+For the next three weeks, Kinton flew back and forth from his own town
+nearly every day. He felt that he should not neglect the few meetings
+which were the only way he could repay the Tepoktans for all they did
+for him. On the other hand, the chance to see and talk with one of his
+own kind drew him like a magnet to the hospital.
+
+The doctors operated upon Birken's leg, inserting a metal rod inside the
+bone by a method they had known before Kinton described it. The new
+arrival expected to be able to walk, with care, almost any day; although
+the pin would have to be removed after the bone had healed. Meanwhile,
+Birken seemed eager to learn all Kinton could tell him about the planet,
+Tepokt.
+
+About himself, he was remarkably reticent. Kinton worried about this.
+
+"I think we should not expect too much of this Terran," he warned Klaft
+uneasily. "You, too, have citizens who do not always obey, your laws,
+who sometimes ... that is--"
+
+"Who are born to die under the axe, as we say," interrupted Klaft, as if
+to ease the concern plain on Kinton's face. "In other words, criminals.
+You suspect this Albirken is such a one, George?"
+
+"It is not impossible," admitted Kinton unhappily. "He will tell me
+little about himself. It may be that he was caught in Tepokt's gravity
+while fleeing from justice."
+
+To himself, he wished he had not told Birken about the spaceship. He
+didn't think the man exactly believed his explanation of why there was
+no use taking off in it.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Yet he continued to spend as much time as he could visiting the other
+man. Then, as his helicopter landed at the city airport one gray dawn,
+the news reached him.
+
+"The other Terran has gone," Klaft reported, turning from the
+breathless messenger as Kinton followed him from the machine.
+
+"Gone? Where did they take him?"
+
+Klaft looked uneasy, embarrassed. Kinton repeated his question,
+wondering about the group of armed police on hand.
+
+"In the night," Klaft hissed and clucked, "when none would think to
+watch him, they tell me ... and quite rightly, I think--"
+
+"Get on with it, Klaft! Please!"
+
+"In the night, then, Albirken left the chamber in which he lay. He can
+walk some now, you know, because of Dr. Chuxolkhee's metal pin. He--he
+stole a ground car and is gone."
+
+"He did?" Kinton had an empty feeling in the pit of his stomach. "Is it
+known where he went? I mean ... he has been curious to see some of
+Tepokt. Perhaps--"
+
+He stopped, his own words braying in his ears. Klaft was clicking two
+claws together, a sign of emphatic disagreement.
+
+"Albirken," he said, "was soon followed by three police constables in
+another vehicle. They found him heading in the direction of our town."
+
+"Why did he say he was traveling that way?" asked Kinton, thinking to
+himself of the spaceship! Was the man crazy?
+
+"He did not say," answered Klaft expressionlessly. "Taking them by
+surprise, he killed two of the constables and injured the third before
+fleeing with one of their spears."
+
+"_What?_"
+
+Kinton felt his eyes bulging with dismay.
+
+"Yes, for they carried only the short spears of their authority, not
+expecting to need fire weapons."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Kinton looked from him to the messenger, noticing for the first time
+that the latter was an under-officer of police. He shook his head
+distractedly. It appeared that his suspicions concerning Birken had been
+only too accurate.
+
+Why was it one like him who got through? he asked himself in silent
+anguish. After ten years. The Tepoktans had been thinking well of
+Terrans, but now--
+
+He did not worry about his own position. That was well enough
+established, whether or not he could again hold up his head before the
+purple-scaled people who had been so generous to him.
+
+Even if they had been aroused to a rage by the killing, Kinton told
+himself, he would not have been concerned about himself. He had reached
+a fairly ripe age for a spaceman. In fact, he had already enjoyed a
+decade of borrowed time.
+
+But they were more civilized than that wanton murderer, he realized.
+
+He straightened up, forcing back his early-morning weariness.
+
+"We must get into the air immediately," he told Klaft. "Perhaps we may
+see him before he reaches--"
+
+He broke off at the word "spaceship" but he noticed a reserved
+expression on Klaft's pointed face. His aide had probably reached a
+conclusion similar to his own.
+
+They climbed back into the cabin and Klaft gave brisk orders to the lean
+young pilot. A moment later, Kinton saw the ground outside drop away.
+
+Only upon turning around did he realize that two armed Tepoktans had
+materialized in time to follow Klaft inside.
+
+One was a constable but the other he recognized for an officer of
+some rank. Both wore slung across their chests weapons resembling
+long-barreled pistols with large, oddly indented butts to fit Tepoktan
+claws. The constable, in addition, carried a contraption with a
+quadruple tube for launching tiny rockets no thicker than Kinton's
+thumb. These, he knew, were loaded with an explosive worthy of respect
+on any planet he had heard of.
+
+To protect him, he wondered. Or to get Birken?
+
+The pilot headed the craft back toward Kinton's town in the brightening
+sky of early day. Long before the buildings of Kinton's institute came
+into view, they received a radio message about Birken.
+
+"He has been seen on the road passing the dam," Klaft reported soberly
+after having been called to the pilot's compartment. "He stopped to
+demand fuel from some maintenance workers, but they had been warned and
+fled."
+
+"Couldn't they have seized him?" demanded Kinton, his tone sharp with
+the worry he endeavored to control. "He has that spear, I suppose; but
+he is only one and injured."
+
+Klaft hesitated.
+
+"Well, couldn't they?"
+
+The aide looked away, out one of the windows at some sun-dyed clouds
+ranging from pink to orange. He grimaced and clicked his showy teeth
+uncomfortably.
+
+"Perhaps they thought you might be offended, George," he answered at
+last.
+
+Kinton settled back in the seat especially padded to fit the contours
+of his Terran body, and stared silently at the partition behind the
+pilot.
+
+In other words, he thought, he was responsible for Birken, who was a
+Terran, one of his own kind. Maybe they really didn't want to risk
+hurting his feelings, but that was only part of it. They were leaving
+it up to him to handle what they considered his private affair.
+
+He wondered what to do. He had no actual faith in the idea that Birken
+was delirious, or acting under any influence but that of a criminally
+self-centered nature.
+
+"I _shouldn't_ have told him about the ship!" Kinton muttered, gnawing
+the knuckle of his left thumb. "He's on the run, all right. Probably
+scared the colonial authorities will trail him right down through the
+Dome of Eyes. Wonder what he did?"
+
+He caught himself and looked around to see if he had been overheard.
+Klaft and the police officers peered from their respective windows, in
+calculated withdrawal. Kinton, disturbed, tried to remember whether he
+had spoken in Terran or Tepoktan.
+
+Would Birken listen if he tried reasoning, he asked himself. Maybe if
+he showed the man how they had proved the unpredictability of openings
+through the shifting Dome of Eyes--
+
+An exclamation from the constable drew his attention. He rose, and room
+was made for him at the opposite window.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the distance, beyond the town landing field they were now
+approaching, Kinton saw a halted ground car. Across the plain which was
+colored a yellowish tan by a short, grass-like growth, a lone figure
+plodded toward the upthrust bulk of the spaceship that had never flown.
+
+"Never mind landing at the town!" snapped Kinton. "Go directly out to
+the ship!"
+
+Klaft relayed the command to the pilot. The helicopter swept in a
+descending curve across the plain toward the gleaming hull.
+
+As they passed the man below, Birken looked up. He continued to limp
+along at a brisk pace with the aid of what looked like a short spear.
+
+"Go down!" Kinton ordered.
+
+The pilot landed about a hundred yards from the spaceship. By the time
+his passengers had alighted, however, Birken had drawn level with them,
+about fifty feet away.
+
+"Birken!" shouted Kinton. "Where do you think you're going?"
+
+Seeing that no one ran after him, Birken slowed his pace, but kept
+walking toward the ship. He watched them over his shoulder.
+
+"Sorry, Kinton," he shouted with no noticeable tone of regret. "I figure
+I better travel on for my health."
+
+"It's not so damn healthy up there!" called Kinton. "I told you how
+there's no clear path--"
+
+"Yeah, yeah, you told me. That don't mean I gotta believe it."
+
+"Wait! Don't you think they tried sending unmanned rockets up? Every one
+was struck and exploded."
+
+Birken showed no more change of expression than if the other had
+commented on the weather.
+
+Kinton had stepped forward six or eight paces, irritated despite his
+anxiety at the way Birken persisted in drifting before him.
+
+Kinton couldn't just grab him--bad leg or not, he could probably break
+the older man in two.
+
+He glanced back at the Tepoktans beside the helicopter, Klaft, the
+pilot, the officer, the constable with the rocket weapon.
+
+They stood quietly, looking back at him.
+
+The call for help that had risen to his lips died there.
+
+"Not _their_ party," he muttered. He turned again to Birken, who still
+retreated toward the ship. "But he'll only get himself killed _and_
+destroy the ship! Or if some miracle gets him through, that's worse!
+He's nothing to turn loose on a civilized colony again."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A twinge of shame tugged down the corners of his mouth as he realized
+that keeping Birken here would also expose a highly cultured people to
+an unscrupulous criminal who had already committed murder the very first
+time he had been crossed.
+
+"Birken!" he shouted. "For the last time! Do you want me to send them to
+drag you back here?"
+
+Birken stopped at that. He regarded the motionless Tepoktans with a
+derisive sneer.
+
+"They don't look too eager to me," he taunted.
+
+Kinton growled a Tepoktan expression the meaning of which he had deduced
+after hearing it used by the dam workers.
+
+He whirled to run toward the helicopter. Hardly had he taken two steps,
+however, when he saw startled changes in the carefully blank looks of
+his escort. The constable half raised his heavy weapon, and Klaft sprang
+forward with a hissing cry.
+
+By the time Kinton's aging muscles obeyed his impulse to sidestep, the
+spear had already hurtled past. It had missed him by an error of over
+six feet.
+
+He felt his face flushing with sudden anger. Birken was running as best
+he could toward the spaceship, and had covered nearly half the distance.
+
+Kinton ran at the Tepoktans, brushing aside the concerned Klaft. He
+snatched the heavy weapon from the surprised constable.
+
+He turned and raised it to his chest. Because of the shortness of
+Tepoktan arms, the launcher was constructed so that the butt rested
+against the chest with the sighting loops before the eyes. The little
+rocket tubes were above head height, to prevent the handler's catching
+the blast.
+
+The circles of the sights weaved and danced about the running figure.
+Kinton realized to his surprise that the effort of seizing the weapon
+had him panting. Or was it the fright at having a spear thrown at him?
+He decided that Birken had not come close enough for that, and wondered
+if he was afraid of his own impending action.
+
+It wasn't fair, he complained to himself. The poor slob only had a
+spear, and a man couldn't blame him for wanting to get back to his own
+sort. He was limping ... hurt ... how could they expect him to
+realize--?
+
+Then, abruptly, his lips tightened to a thin line. The sights steadied
+on Birken as the latter approached the foot of the ladder leading to the
+entrance port of the spaceship.
+
+Kinton pressed the firing stud.
+
+Across the hundred-yard space streaked four flaring little projectiles.
+Kinton, without exactly seeing each, was aware of the general lines of
+flight diverging gradually to bracket the figure of Birken.
+
+One struck the ground beside the man just as he set one foot on the
+bottom rung of the ladder, and skittered away past one fin of the ship
+before exploding. Two others burst against the hull, scattering metal
+fragments, and another puffed on the upright of the ladder just above
+Birken's head.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The spaceman was blown back from the ladder. He balanced on his heels
+for a moment with outstretched fingers reaching toward the grips from
+which they had been torn. Then he crumpled into a limp huddle on the
+yellowing turf.
+
+Kinton sighed.
+
+The constable took the weapon from him, reloaded deftly, and proffered
+it again. When the Terran did not reach for it, the officer held out a
+clawed hand to receive it. He gestured silently, and the constable
+trotted across the intervening ground to bend over Birken.
+
+"He is dead," said Klaft when the constable straightened up with a curt
+wave.
+
+"Will ... will you have someone see to him, please?" Kinton requested,
+turning toward the helicopter.
+
+"Yes, George," said Klaft. "George...?"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"It would be very instructive--that is, I believe Dr. Chuxolkhee would
+like to--"
+
+"All right!" yielded Kinton, surprised at the harshness of his own
+voice. "Just tell him not to bring around any sketches of the various
+organs for a few months!"
+
+He climbed into the helicopter and slumped into his seat. Presently, he
+was aware of Klaft edging into the seat across the aisle. He looked up.
+
+"The police will stay until cars from town arrive. They are coming now,"
+said his aide.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Kinton stared at his hands, wondering at the fact that they were not
+shaking. He felt dejected, empty, not like a man who had just been at
+a high pitch of excitement.
+
+"Why did you not let him go, George?"
+
+"What? Why ... why ... he would have destroyed the ship you worked so
+hard to build. There is no safe path through the Dome of Eyes."
+
+"No predictable path," Klaft corrected. "But what then? We would have
+built you another ship, George, for it was you who showed us how."
+
+Kinton flexed his fingers slowly.
+
+"He was just no good. You know the murder he did here; we can only guess
+what he did among my own ... among Terrans. Should he have a chance to
+go back and commit more crimes?"
+
+"I understand, George, the logic of it," said Klaft. "I meant ... it is
+not my place to say this ... but you seem unhappy."
+
+"Possibly," grunted Kinton wrily.
+
+"We, too, have criminals," said the aide, as gently as was possible in
+his clicking language. "We do not think it necessary to grieve for the
+pain they bring upon themselves."
+
+"No, I suppose not," sighed Kinton. "I ... it's just--"
+
+He looked up at the pointed visage, at the strange eyes regarding him
+sympathetically from beneath the sloping, purple-scaled forehead.
+
+"It's just that now I'm lonely ... again," he said.
+
+
+
+   Transcriber's Note:
+
+   This e-text was produced from Space Science Fiction February
+   1953. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the
+   U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Exile, by Horace Brown Fyfe
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