"No," the Spider said.
"We'll be leaving soon," the Dog said to the Human. "I will come out and tell you when we have to leave."
There were stars, of course. They came out when the last flush of the sun still flamed along the west. First there were but a few of the brighter ones and then there were more, and finally the entire heaven was a network of unfamiliar stars. But there was no moon. Or, if there was one, it did not show itself.
Chill crept across the ridge and the Human found some sticks of wood lying about, dead branches and shriveled bushes and other wood that looked as if it might at one time have been milled and worked, and built himself a fire. It was a small fire but it flamed brightly in the darkness, and he huddled close against it, more for its companionship than for any heat it gave.
He sat beside it and looked down upon the village and told himself there was something wrong. The greatness of the human race, he told himself, could not have gone so utterly to seed. He was lonely, lonely with a throat-aching loneliness that was more than the loneliness of an alien planet and a chilly ridge and unfamiliar stars. He was lonely for the hope that once had glowed so brightly, for the promise that had gone like dust into nothingness before a morning wind, for a race that huddled in its gadgetry in the backwash of the empire.
Not an empire of humanity, but an empire of Globes and Spiders, of Dogs and other things for which there was scarcely a description.
There was more to the human race than gadgetry. There was destiny somewhere and the gadgetry was simply the means to bridge the time until that destiny should become apparent. In a fight for survival, he told himself, gadgetry might be the expedient, but it could not be the answer; it could not be the sum total, the final jotting down of any group of beings.
The Dog came and stood beside him without saying anything. He simply stood there and looked down with the Human at the quiet village that had been quiet so long, and the firelight flamed along his coat, and he was a thing of beauty with a certain inherent wildness still existing in him.
Finally the Dog broke the silence that hung above the world and seemed a part of it.
"The fire is nice," he said. "I seldom have a fire."
"The fire was first," the Human said. "The first step up. Fire is a symbol to me."
"I have symbols, too," the Dog said, gravely. "Even the Spider has some symbols. But the Globe has none."
"I feel sorry for the Globe," the Human said.
"Don't let your pity wear you down," the Dog told him. "The Globe feels sorry for you. He is sorry for all of us, for everything that is not a Globe."
"Once my people were sorry like that, too," the Human said. "But not any more."
"It's time to go," the Dog said. "I know you would like to stay, but…"
"I am staying," said the Human.
"You can't stay," the Dog told him.
"I am staying," the Human said. "I am just a Human and you can get along without me."
"I thought you would be staying," said the Dog. "Do you want me to go back and get your stuff?"
"If you would be so kind," the Human said. "I'd not like to go myself."
"The Globe will be angry," said the Dog.
"I know it."
"You will be demoted," said the Dog. "It will be a long time before you're allowed to go on a first class run again."
"I know all that."
"The Spider will say that all humans are crazy. He will say it in a very nasty way."
"I don't care," the Human said. "Somehow, I don't care."
"All right, then," said the Dog. "I will go and get your stuff. There are some books and your clothes and that little trunk of yours." "And food," the Human said.
"Yes," declared the Dog. "I would not have forgotten food."
After the ship was gone the Human picked up the bundles the Dog had brought, and, in addition to all the Human's food, the Human saw that the Dog had left him some of his own as well.
II
The people of the village had lived a simple and a comfortable life. Much of the comfort paraphernalia had broken down and all of it had long since ceased to operate, but it was not hard for one to figure out what each of the gadgets did or once had been designed to do.
They had had a love of beauty, for there still were ruins of their gardens left, and here and there one found a flower or a flowering shrub that once had been tended carefully for its color and its grace; but these things had been long forgotten and had lost the grandeur of their purpose, so that the beauty they now held was bitter-sweet and faded.
The people had been literate, for there were rows of books upon the shelves. The books went to dust when they were touched, and one could do no more than wonder at the magic words they held.
There were buildings which at one time might have been theaters and there were great forums where the populace might have gathered to hear the wisdom or the argument that was the topic of the day.
And even yet one could sense the peace and leisure, the order and the happiness that the place had once held.
There was no greatness. There were no mighty engines, nor the shops to make them. There were no launching platforms and no other hint that the dwellers in the village had ever dreamed of going to the stars, although they must have known about the stars since their ancestors had come from space. There were no defenses, and there were no great roads leading from the village into the outer planet.
One felt peace when he walked along the street, but it was a haunted peace, a peace that balanced on a knife's edge, and while one wished with all his heart that he could give way to it and live with it, one was afraid to do so for fear of what might happen.
The Human slept in the homes, clearing away the dust and the fallen debris, building tiny fires to keep him company. He sat outside, on the broken flagstones or the shattered bench, before he went to sleep, and stared up at the stars and thought how once those stars had made familiar patterns for a happy people. He wandered in the winding paths that were narrower now than they once had been and hunted for a clue, although he did not hunt too strenuously, for there was something here that said you should not hurry and you should not fret, for there was no purpose in it.
Here once had lain the hope of the human race, a mutant branch of that race that had been greater than the basic race. Here had been the hope of greatness and there was no greatness. Here were peace and comfort and intelligence and leisure, but nothing else that made itself apparent to the eye.
Although there must be something else, some lesson, some message, some purpose. The Human told himself again and again that this could not be a dead end, that it was more than some blind alley.
On the fifth day, in the center of the village, he found the building that was a little more ornate and somewhat more solidly built, although all the rest were solid enough for all conscience' sake. There were no windows and the single door was locked, and he knew at last that he had found the clue he had been hunting for.
He worked for three days to break into the building but there was no way that he could. On the fourth day he gave up and walked away, out of the village and across the hilts, looking for some thought or some idea that might gain him entry to the building. He walked across the hills as one will pace his study when he is at a loss for words, or take a turn in the garden to clear his head for thinking.
And that is how he found the people.
First of all, he saw the smoke coming from one of the hollows that branched down toward the valley where a river ran, a streak of gleaming silver against the green of pasture grass.
He walked cautiously, so that he would not be surprised, but, strangely, without the slightest fear, for there was something in this planet, something in the arching sky and the song of bird and the way the wind blew out of the west that told a man he had not a thing to fear.