"Don't get up because of me," she informed him. "It's my turn to cook, but I saw you out here beneath the trees. Dinner can wait. Jonathan do you know that you are irresistible?" She seized his shoulders, stared into his eyes. He couldn't have felt any more uncomfortable had a hungry boa constrictor draped itself in his arms. He mopped his brow with his sleeve. "Suppose the rest should come," he said in an embarrassed voice. "They're busy. They won't be here until I call them to lunch. Your eyes," she said, "are like deep mysterious pools." "Sure enough?" said Jonathan with involuntary interest. He began to recover his nerve. She said, "You're the best looking thing." She rumpled his hair. "I can't keep my eyes off you." Jonathan put his arm around her gingerly. "Ouch!" He winced. He had forgotten his sore muscles. "I forgot," said Ann Clotilde in a contrite voice. She tried to rise. "You're hurt." He pulled her back down. "Not so you could notice it," he grinned. "Well!" came the strident voice of Billy from behind them. "We're _all_ glad to hear that!" * * * * * Jonathan leaped to his feet, dumping Ann to the ground. He jerked around. All twenty-six of the girls were lined up on the path. Their features were grim. He said: "I don't feel so well after all." "It don't wash," said Billy. "It's time for a showdown." Jonathan's hair stood on end. He felt rather than saw Ann Clotilde take her stand beside him. He noticed that she was holding her spear at a menacing angle. She said in an angry voice: "He's mine. I found him. Leave him alone." "Where do you get that stuff?" cried Olga. "Share and share alike, say I." "We could draw straws for him," suggested the green-eyed blonde. "Look here," Jonathan broke in. "I've got some say in the matter." "You have not," snapped Billy. "You'll do just as we say." She took a step toward him. Jonathan edged away in consternation. "He's going to run!" Olga shouted. Jonathan never stopped until he was back in the canyon leading to the plain. His nerves were jumping like fleas. He craved the soothing relaxation of a smoke. There was, he remembered, a carton of cigarettes at the wreck. He resumed his flight, but at a more sober pace. At the spot where he and Ann had first crawled away from the centaurs, he scrambled out of the gulley, glanced in the direction of his space ship. He blinked his eyes, stared. Then he waved his arms, shouted and tore across the prairie. A trim space cruiser was resting beside the wreck of his own. Across its gleaming monaloid hull ran an inscription in silver letters: "INTERSTELLAR COSMOGRAPHY SOCIETY." Two men crawled out of Jonathan's wrecked freighter, glanced in surprise at Jonathan. A third man ran from the cruiser, a Dixon Ray Rifle in his hand. "I'm Jonathan Fawkes," said the castaway as he panted up, "pilot for Universal. I was wrecked."