The Glassie, who had been watching them without understanding too much of the rapid-fire quality of normal speech, suddenly said, "Have hunger much. Is food here." He turned his back on the two men, pawed through the scraps on the cave floor, coming up with some of the provisions that Robin had packed with him. "I'm hungry, also," said the Russian. "They have not fed me since they threw me in here. Is this stuff good to eat?" "Try it," said Robin and the three sat down and ate. Robin sat munching and stared at the other man. The first human he had seen in almost two years. A real live man! But where did he come from? How did he get here? And how was it he was a prisoner? For a while after they had finished, they looked at each other. The Russian spoke. "You must have a story to tell me, Robin Carew. How did you say you got here?" Robin briefly outlined what had happened to him, the other listening attentively. When Robin had finished, he asked, "Now I want to know about you? It's your turn." "Yes," said Piotr, "I shall tell you." _14. The Man From Lake Baikal_ "I was an orphan of World War II," said Piotr Ivanovitch Kareff in a quiet voice, speaking precise English with a fair fluency. "My family were all vanished, I know not what happened to them. I was brought back to Russia by our soldiers and sent to a state school in the Urals set up to take care of such as myself. "There I was a good scholar and I made myself good marks. When I was old enough, I qualified for study at a higher institute and was sent to a college for engineers. I was always interested in astronomy and rocket aviation and I was therefore trained along those lines. "When I was eighteen, I was allowed to continue my engineering education as a part of my military duty. I was in the army, yet still studying, only this time I was stationed at one of the big experimental centers we have deep in Siberia. You probably do not know about them. They are very secret. "The one I was at was located near the shores of Lake Baikal, the big inland sea in Central Asia near Mongolia. This was the biggest center for the study of liquid-fuel rockets. While I learned the theory, I also worked on the actual projects and helped fire many of our big rockets. These were designed after the German V-_2, the same designs you Americans are also building on. We, too, had captured German scientists who had worked on these. They had much to show us, and one of the smartest of these men was the Captain Von Borck who even became a member of the party or so he said. "I am not a political man, I am really interested in rockets, so I did not pay too much attention to these things. Von Borck may be truly believing what he desires, I do not know, but I think he is just what you call an opportunity seeker.