"You could have asked Grandson Richard, 39, to help us!" said Gurder.
"Why did you run away?"
"I don't know," said Masklin. "I suppose I thought we ought to be able tohelp ourselves."
"But you used the Truck. Nomes lived in the Store. You used the Concorde.
You 're eating human food."
Masklin was surprised. The Thing didn't often argue like that.
"That's different," he said.
"How?"
"They didn't know about us. We took what we wanted. We weren't given it.
They think it's their world, Thing! They think everything in it belongsto them! They name everything and own everything! I looked up at him, and I thought, here's a human in a human's room, doing human things. Howcan he ever understand about nomes? How can he ever think tiny people arereal people with real thoughts? I can't just let a human take over. Notjust like that!"
The Thing blinked a few lights at him.
"We've come too far not to finish it ourselves," Masklin mumbled. Helooked up at Gurder.
"Anyway, when it came to it, I didn't exactly see you rushing up, readyto shake him by the finger," he said.
"I was embarrassed. It's always embarrassing, meeting deities," saidGurder.
They hadn't been able to light a fire. Everything was too wet. Not thatthey needed a fire, it was just that a fire was more civilized. Someonehad managed to light a fire there at some time, though, because therewere still a few damp ashes.
"I wonder how things are back home?" said Angalo, after a while.
"All right, I expect," said Masklin.
"Do you really?"
"Well, more hope than expect, to tell the truth."
"I expect your Grimma's got everyone organized," said Angalo, trying to grin.
"She's not my Grimma," snapped Masklin.
"Isn't she? Whose is she, then?"
"She's ..." Masklin hesitated. "Hers, I suppose," he said lamely.
"Oh. I thought the two of you were set to-" Angalo began.
"We're not. I told her we were going to get married, and all she could talk about was frogs," said Masklin.
"That's females for you," said Gurder. "Didn't I say that letting them learn to read was a bad idea? It overheats their brains."
"She said the most important thing in the world was little frogs living in a flower," Masklin went on, trying to listen to the voice of his ownmemory. He hadn't been listening very hard at the time. He'd been tooangry.
"Sounds like you could boil a kettle on her head," said Angalo.
"It was something she'd read in a book, she said."
"My point exactly," said Gurder. "You know I never really agreed with letting everyone learn to read. It unsettles people."
Masklin looked gloomily at the rain.
"Come to think of it," he said, "It wasn't frogs exactly. It was the idea of frogs. She said there are these hills where it's hot and rains all thetime, and in the rain forests there are these very tall trees and rightin the top branches of the trees there are these like great big flowerscalled ... bromeliads, I think, and water gets into the flowers andmakes little pools and there's a type of frog that lays eggs in the poolsand tadpoles hatch and grow into new frogs and these little frogs livetheir whole lives in the flowers right at the top of the trees and don'teven know about the ground, and once you know the world is full of thingslike that, your life is never the same."
He took a deep breath.
"Something like that, anyway," he said.
Gurder looked at Angalo.
"Didn't understand any of it," he said.
"It's a metaphor," said the Thing. No one paid it any attention.
Masklin scratched his ear. "It seemed to mean a lot to her," he said.
"It's a metaphor," said the Thing.
"Women always want something," said Angalo. "My wife is always on about dresses."
"I'm sure he would have helped," said Gurder. "If we'd talked to him.
He'd probably have given us a proper meal and, and-"
"Given us a home in a shoebox," said Masklin.
"And given us a home in a shoebox," said Gurder automatically. "No! I mean, maybe. I mean, why not? A decent hour's sleep for a change. And then we-"
"We'd be carried around in his pocket," said Masklin.
"Not necessarily. Not necessarily."
"We would. Because he's big and we're small."
"Launch in three hours and fifty-seven minutes," said the Thing.
Their temporary camp overlooked a ditch. There didn't seem to be any winter in Florida, and the banks were thick with greenery.
Something like a flat plate with a spoon on the front sculled slowly past. The spoon stuck out of the water for a moment, looked at the nomes vaguely, and then dropped down again.
"What was that thing, Thing?" said Masklin.
The Thing extended one of its sensors.
"A long-necked turtle."
"Oh."
The turtle swam peacefully away.
"Lucky, really," said Gurder.
"What?" said Angalo.
"Its having a long neck like that and being called a Long-Necked Turtle.
It'd be really awkward having a name like that if it had a short neck."
"Launch in three hours and fifty-six minutes.'"
Masklin stood up.
"You know," said Angalo, "I really wish I could have read more of The Spy with No Trousers. It was getting exciting."
"Come on," he said. "Let's see if we can find a way."
Angalo, who had been sitting with his chin in his hands, gave him an odd look.
"What now?"
"We've come too far just to stop, haven't we?"
They pushed their way through the weeds. After a while a fallen log helped them across the ditch.
"Much greener here than at home, isn't it?" said Angalo.
Masklin pushed through a thick stand of leaves.
"Warmer too," said Gurder. "They've got the heating fixed here*."
[* For generations the Store nomes had known that temperature was caused by air conditioning and the heating system;]
like many of them, Gurder never quite gave up certain habits of thinking.
"No one fixes heating Outside, it just happens," said Angalo.
"If I get old, this is the kind of place I'd like to live, if I had to live Outside," Gurder went on, ignoring him.
"It's a wildlife preserve," said the Thing.
Gurder looked shocked. "What? Like jam? Made of animals'?"
"No. It is a place where animals can live unmolested."
"You're not allowed to hunt them, you mean?"
"Yes."
"You're not allowed to hunt anything, Masklin," said Gurder.
Masklin grunted.
There was something nagging at him. He couldn't quite put his finger on it. Probably it was to do with the animals after all.
"Apart from turtles with long necks," he said, "what other animals are there here, Thing?"
The Thing didn't answer for a moment. Then it said, "I find mention of sea cows and alligators."
Masklin tried to imagine what a sea cow looked like. But they didn't sound too bad. He'd met cows before. They were big and slow and didn't eat nomes, except by accident.
"What's an alligator?" he said.
The Thing told him.
"What?" said Masklin.
"What?" said Angalo.
"What?" said Gurder. He pulled his robe tightly around his legs.
"You idiot!" shouted Angalo.
"Me?" said Masklin hotly. "How should I know? How should I know? Is it my fault? Did I miss a sign at the airport saying 'Welcome to Floridia, home of large meat-eating reptiles up to twelve feet long'?"
They watched the grasses. A damp warm world inhabited by insects and turtles was suddenly a disguise for horrible terrors with huge teeth.