Mijok released the hands of his deity and sat back on his haunches, foggy-eyed. Wright stroked the great furry head, troubled and amazed. "It won't do," Wright said. "We'll have no gods on this planet. Unless human nature can make itself a little godlike. And no final Armageddon--for that's within too, and always was. Well, he'll learn language fast. As he does, the first thing he must discover is that we're all one flesh." But Mijok was gazing up in adoration at the sound of the voice, trembling, not in fear, smiling when he saw Wright smile. "I believe he never had a god before--hadn't reached the stage of personalizing the forces of nature. They're just forces, and himself a bundle of perception, not even realizing that he's more knowing and sensitive than other animals. Not arrogant yet, not sophisticated enough to be cruel, or mean, or even ambitious...." Dorothy pushed her fists into her cheeks, brown eyes upturned to study the old man: a way she had, carrying Paul back eleven years to the day he had come aboard the ship and seen her for the first time and loved the woman who was, even then, manifest in the leggy, awkward child. "Doc, why did you do that, out there in the meadow?" "Why, Dorothy, we must make contact with those pygmies too. They are--advanced. It'll be more difficult. They'll have traditions--maybe some very ancient ones. But we must make contact." "Mijok hates them though. If they come here--" Wright grinned. "Temporary advantage of being little tin deities. I think Mijok will do whatever we indicate--until we're able to teach him independence." Paul said, "Don't think for a minute I'm not with you. But Doc, with the others helpless we're only three--" "Four." "Yes, four. There's our own survival to think of. It's a big planet. Seems to me you're taking it on all at once." Wright slouched, loose-limbed, at the barrier, where he could watch the meadow, and Mijok stayed close to him. "I think we must, Paul. If we start right perhaps we can go on right. A mistake at this point could go on burning for a thousand years.... Why do you think he broke out into worship when he did? Our superior achievements--lifeboat, guns, the rescue from that reptile? The fact that I wasn't afraid of a poor pygmy's bones? All that, sure, but something else. Ed would say I was daydreaming--but I think Mijok's heart knows what his brain can't yet interpret. Sears would agree, I think--his own heart's bigger than Lucifer. Mijok hasn't the least conscious idea why I invited those pygmies to come and get their dead. Down deeper, in the part of him that made him bring the moss and the meat and take care of us, I think he knows very well." "You're proposing," Dorothy said, "to take a chance on love?"