THE STARS ARE OURS

Spread out on the shore several feet above the water level were those gifts the Terrans believed might please sea dwellers. Some nested plastic bowls made a bright-colored spot, a collection of empty bottles of various sizes, hastily assembled from laboratory supplies, golden apples, native grain, all there together. Objects which could be used under water had been hard to find.

"They're coming!" Dessie had been waiting impatiently by the waves' sweep, and now, heedless of the water curling about her legs, she ran forward, holding out her hands to the merchild who threshed up a fountain of spray in its eagerness to meet her. Hand in hand they pattered to dry land where the merchild shrank shyly against the little girl when it saw the men.

But Dessie was smiling, and said importantly, "Ssssat and Ssssutu are coming now."

Dard hid his surprise. How could Dessie so confidently mouth those queer names-how did she know? From all his questioning and Kimber's and Kordov's and Carlee's-last night, they had only been able to elicit that the "sea people thought into her head." They had been forced to accept the concept of telepathy-which could be possible with an undersea race.

So, deciding that Dessie's interpretation might be needed that day, they had schooled her in her part.

Ssssat and Ssssutu-if those were the proper designations of the mermen who were borne in with the next wave came ashore. They both carried the barbed spears and wore long bone daggers at the belts which were their only articles of clothing. Without a sound they seated themselves on the seaside of the gifts, facing Dard, regarding him and the other Terrans with owlish solemnity.

"Dessie!" Dard called, and she came trotting to him.

"Do I give the presents now, Dard?"

"Yes. Try to make them understand that we want to be friends."

She picked out two of the bowls, put an apple and a handful of grain into each, and carried them over to set down before the envoys.

The one on Dard's right held out his hand and Dessie, without hesitation, laid hers, palm down, upon it. For a long moment they made contact. Then both mermen relaxed their tense watchfulness. They put their spears behind them and one ran his hands through the fur on his head and shoulders where it was fast drying into rainbow dotted fluff.

"They want to be friends, too," Dessie reported. "Dardie, if you put your hand on theirs, then they can talk to you. They don't talk with their mouths at all. This is Ssssat-"

Dard got to his feet slowly so as not to alarm the mermen and crossed the strip of shore until he could sit face to face. Then he held out his hand. Cool and damp the scaled digits and palm of the other lay upon his warmer flesh. And, Dard almost broke the contact in his surprise and awe, for the other was talking to him! Words, ideas, swept into his mind-some concepts so alien he could not understand. But bit by bit he pieced together much of what the other was striving to tell him.

"Big ones, land dwellers, we have watched you-with fear. Fear that you have come to lead us once more into the pens of darkness-"

"Pens of darkness?" Dard echoed aloud and then shaped a mental query.

"Those who once walked the land here-they kept the pens of darkness where our fathers' fathers' fathers' " ... -the concept of a long stretch of past time trailed through the Terran's receptive mind-"were hatched. The days of fire came and we broke forth and now we shall never return." There was stern warning, an implied threat, in that.

"We know nothing of the pens, nor do we threaten you," Dard thought slowly. "We, too, have broken out of pens of darkness, he added with sudden inspiration.

"It is true that you are not the color or shape of those who made the pens. And you have shown only friendship. Also you killed the flying death which would have slain my cub. I believe that you are good. Will you stay here?"

Dard pointed inland. "We build there."

"Do you wish the fruits of the river?" came next.

"The fruits of the river?" Dard was puzzled until a dear picture of one of the red spider plants formed in his mind. Then he shook his head to reinforce his unspoken denial.

"We may then come and harvest as we have always done? And," there was a shrewd bargaining note in this, "perhaps you will see that the flying death does not attack us, since your slaying powers are greater than ours?"

"We like the dragons no better than you do. Let me speak with the others now-" Dard broke contact and reported to the Terran committee.

"Sure!" Santee's jovial boom could not be kept to a whisper and at the sound, or its vibration, both mermen started. "Let 'em come in and get their spiders. I'll watch for dragons."

"Fair enough," Kimber agreed. "We don't care for the dragons any more than they do."