"Three-four nights after we set out ahead the rest, Pop an' me come onto fresh Injun signs. We move powerful careful through the woods an' right soon we catch sight of camp fires. There's a whole grist of them red devils prancin' around, all fixed out in war paint--more of 'em as I ever see'd afore. Even Pop allows as how it bugs out _his_ eyes--and Pop's a man to do an amount of travelin'." It was a page torn out of technicolor nightmare: three of the world's most important men hanging onto the words of a madman who claimed to be an Eighteenth Century Indian scout in the employ of one of George Washington's generals. Yet the man's every word, every gesture, everything he wore, was as authentic to that period as the powder horn around his neck. "We draw back in the woods aways an' wait. It's gettin' along to'ard sun-up, an' Pop says he aims to get a better idea how many Injuns they is, an' what tribes. Most of the braves got nice new British guns an' General Harmer'll want to know about that." Wetzel's voice began to shake a little, remembering. "Pop an' me are hidin' in a clump of sumac when this here sudden racket starts up, equal to a hundred waterfalls goin' all at oncet. We look up in the air where it's comin' from, and holy hokey if fallin' right out of the sky ain't this round iron thing! Flat as a hoe-cake an' big around as an acre of land, with the fires of Hell breathin' at its edges! "Well sir, them Injuns lit a shuck out of there like the spirits was after them. My legs were tryin' to run, too. But Pop takes a holt on my arm an' says, 'By Janey, I aim to see this if'en I swing for it!' "It drops down," Wetzel continued, demonstrating with a slow graceful movement of his hand, "lookin' no less than a big shiny stove-lid, an' settles in the clearin' as light an' easy as the feather off'en a duck's back. It stands high as a Pennsylvany school house an' twicet the size around, an' no sound from it at all." * * * * * He stood slim and straight as a Shawnee arrow, smooth-faced and solemn, obviously not much past his twentieth birthday, yet by his own account born before the Declaration of Independence was on paper. He went on talking, sounding like a character out of James Fenimore Cooper. His story, boiled down and translated, came out something like this: The sudden arrival of the strange object had literally paralyzed the Indian encampment. The warriors dropped their weapons and called on the spirits to protect them, while a hole opened in the side of what couldn't be anything else but a spaceship. Then out of the opening came huge steel caricatures of men. There were over a dozen of these robots, each the height of two men, and their eyes were strange round circles of faceted glass. In single file they moved down the ramp and stalked through the ranks of fear-frozen Indians, disappearing into the forest.