Atop the bluff, he looked across a stretch of rolling prairie, with only occasional clumps of trees. Far to the north was what once had been a group of farm buildings, standing in a small grove. Of the buildings there was little left. Through the glasses he could make out what once had been a barn, apparently a sturdily built structure. Part of the roof had collapsed, but otherwise it still stood. Beyond it was a slight mound that probably marked the site of another, less substantial building. Part of a pole fence still existed, raggedly running nowhere.
Squatting in a clump of brush that would serve to break up his outline if anyone should be watching, he patiently and methodically glassed the prairie, taking his time, working from the west to the east.
A small herd of deer were feeding on the eastern side of a small knoll. He caught a badger sitting at its burrow's mouth. A red fox sat on a stone that jutted from a low hillside, watching the countryside for any game that might be picked up easily.
Cushing kept on watching. There must be no sloppiness, he told himself; he needed to be sure there was nothing but the animals. He started in the west again and moved slowly eastward. The deer were still there, but the badger had disappeared. More than likely it had popped into its den. The fox was gone, as well.
To one side he caught a sense of motion. Swiveling the glasses smoothly, he caught the motion in the field. It was far off, but seemed to be moving fast. As it came nearer, he saw what it was: a body of horsemen. He tried to count them, but they were still too far away. They were not, he saw, coming directly toward him, but angling to the southeast. He watched in fascination. Finally he could count them. Either nineteen or twenty; he could not be absolutely sure. They were dressed in furs and leathers, and carried shields and spears. Their little, short-coupled horses moved at a steady lope.
So Meg had been right. The horde was on the move. The band out of the prairie were perhaps no more than out flankers for the main force, which probably was to the north.
He watched until they had moved out of sight, then searched the prairie again for other possible bands. None showed up, and satisfied, finally, he replaced the glasses in the case and moved off the hill and down the bluff. There might be other small bands, he knew, but there was no point in waiting for them. Meg was probably right: they'd stay out on the prairie, headed for the city and away from the river valley.
Halfway down the bluff side a voice spoke to him from the tangle of fallen trees.
"Friend," it said. Not a loud voice, but clearly spoken, pitched to reach his ear.
At the sound, he froze his stride, glanced swiftly about.
"Friend," the voice spoke again, "could you find it in your heart to succor a most unfortunate?"
A trick? Cushing wondered. He reached swiftly over his shoulder for an arrow from the quiver.
"There is no need to fear," the voice spoke again. "Even had I the wish, lam in no position to bring you any harm. lam hard pinned beneath a tree and I would be grateful for any help that you could render me.
Cushing hesitated. "Where are you?" he asked.
"To your right," the voice said. "At the edge of the fallen trees. I can see you from where I lie. Should you hunker down, you undoubtedly could glimpse me."
Cushing put the arrow aside and hunkered down, squinting into the maze of fallen branches. A face stared out at him and at the sight of it he sucked in his breath in astonishment. Such a face he had never seen before. A skull-like face, fashioned of hard planes that shone in the sunlight that filtered through the branches.
"Who are you?" he asked.
"I am Rollo, the robot."
"Rollo? A robot? You can't be a robot. There are no longer any robots."
"There is I," said Rollo. "I would not be surprised if I were the last of them."
"But if you're a robot, what are you doing here?"
"I told you, remember? I am pinned beneath a tree. A small tree, luckily, but still impossible to escape from it. My leg is caught, and free I've tried to pull it, but that's impossible. I have tried to dig the soil to release my leg by which I'm trapped, but that is impossible as well. Beneath the leg lies a ledge or rock; upon it lies the tree. I cannot squirm around to lift the tree. I've tried everything and there is nothing I can do."
Cushing bent over and ducked beneath the overhanging branches. Squirming forward, he reached the fallen robot and squatted on his heels to look at the situation.
There had been imaginative drawings of robots, he recalled, in some of the magazines he'd found in the library—robots that had been drawn before there were any actual robots. The drawings had represented great, ungainly metal men who undoubtedly would have done a lot of clanking when they walked. Rollo was nothing like them. He was a slender creature, almost spindly. His shoulders were broad and heavy and his head atop the shoulders seemed a bit too large, somewhat out of proportion, but the rest of him tapered down to a narrow waist, with a slight broadening of the hips to accommodate the sockets of the legs. The legs were trim and neat; looking at them, Cushing thought of the trim legs of a deer. One of the legs, he saw, was pinned beneath a heavy branch that had split off the mighty maple when it had struck the ground. The branch was somewhat more than a foot in diameter.
Rollo saw Cushing looking at the branch. "I could have lifted it enough to pull my leg out," he said, "but there was no way I could twist around to get a good grip on it."
"Let's see what I can do," said Cushing.
He moved forward on hands and knees, got his hands beneath the branch. He hefted it gingerly, found he could barely move it.
"Maybe I can lift it enough," he said. "I'll let you know when I'm ready to lift. Then you try to pull the leg out."
Cushing crept closer, settling his knees solidly under him, bent and got both arms around the branch.
"Now, ~ he said. Straining, he heaved up, felt the branch move slightly, heaved again.
"I'm out," said Rollo. "You didn't have to move it much." Carefully, Cushing slid his arms free, let the branch drop back into place.
Rollo was crawling around on the ground. He retrieved a leather bag from where it lay beneath a pile of leaves, scrabbled around some more and came up with an iron-tipped Spear.
"I couldn't reach them before," he said. "When the branch fell on me, they flew out of my hands."
"You all right?" asked Cushing.
"Sure, I'm all right," the robot said. He sat up, hoisted the formerly trapped foot into his lap and examined it.
"Not even dented," he said. "The metal's tough."
"Would you mind telling me how you got into this mess?"
"Not at all," said Rollo. "I was walking along when a storm came up. I wasn't worried much. A little rain won't hurt me. Then the tornado hit. I heard it coming and I tried to run. I guess what I did was run right into it. There were trees crashing all around me. The wind started to lift me, then set me down again. When I came down, I fell, sort of sprawled out. That's when I was pinned. The limb broke off and caught me. Then it was all over. The storm passed on, but I couldn't move. I thought at first it was just a small inconvenience. I was confident I could work free. But, as you see, there was no way of working free."
"How long ago did all this happen?"
"I can tell you that exactly. I kept count. Eighty-seven days. The thing I was worried about was rust. I had some bear oil in my bag
"Bear oil?"
"Sure, bear oil. First you kill a bear, then build a fire and render out his fat. Any fat will do, but bear oil is the best. Where else would you get oil except from animals? Once we used a petro-product, but there's not been any of that for centuries. Animal fat isn't good, but it serves its purpose. You have to take care of a body such as mine. You can allow no rust to get a start. The metal's fairly good, but even so, rust can get a start. The eighty-seven days were no great problem, but if you hadn't come along, I'd have been in trouble. I had it figured out that in time the wood would rot and then I could work free. But that might have taken several years. I don't know how many.