Early next morning, he was back at the pool. By this time, the body within the partly disintegrated chrysalis was so definitely outlined that he could almost be certain of its human shape. The exposed portions were still hard and rigid to the touch. He restrained his impatience to break away the encrusting clay. Experience had shown that attempts to hasten the process usually resulted in injury or death to the enclosed creature. Yet by mid-afternoon enough of the deposit had dissolved to assure Marlin, not only that the body was human, but that it was quite probably feminine. The head and upper portion were still encrusted with the clay. He could only hope that they would be free by morning. Had it not been for questions it would arouse in DuChane's mind, he would have remained all night by the pool. When he forced himself to return to camp, DuChane regarded him sourly. Suspicion mounted as Marlin set about unaccustomed preparations. * * * * * Selecting the sharpest of his stone implements, he ground it to a still keener edge. Then, painfully and methodically, he began scraping his beard. The coming of darkness made little difference, since he was working by sense of touch. When the growth had been removed from his face, after a fashion, he hacked at his tangled locks until something that might be termed a haircut had been achieved. Long before he had finished, DuChane was snoring, but in the morning he looked at his companion with undisguised amusement. "Why the beauty treatment?" "We're civilized beings," retorted Marlin defensively. "Why look like savages?" Restraining his impatience until he was sure DuChane had gone his own way, he gathered some food and all the animal skins they had accumulated between them and hastened to the pool. A tide had risen and ebbed during the night, leaving the water comparatively clear. The body of the girl was floating on the surface, face and shoulders entirely freed of clay but submerged. A desperate fear clutched Marlin's vitals. He should have been there when the last of the clay dissolved, ready to drag her clear of the water. What if the delay had allowed her to drown? Dropping his armful of skins on a flattened rock, he plunged into the pool and bore her to the improvised couch. The skins with the softer fur he spread beneath, and with those remaining he covered the slender body. Not until then did he look at the wan face with any impulse of curiosity. It had not especially mattered who she was. It was enough that she was a member of the human species--a girl. Now he realized that she was Norma, the moody outlaw maiden. And with the realization came a stab of dismay. Norma had been dead before the crash. The barest accident alone had saved her body from the incinerator. The life-maintaining clay had closed over her too late to preserve a vital spark already fled. No wonder she lay so inert and motionless.