"Tell me of your world," I said.

The telling took a long time but not a word of it was dull. According to Lo-as-ro, his world was a planet revolving about one of the stars in the Big Dipper. It was slightly smaller than Earth, with about the same climates and development of life. It was peopled with only one race, the Orbiwah, who lived much as the Indians in America did before the arrival of the white man. Recently s.p.a.ceships from another planet in the same solar system had landed on the Orbiwah world. These newcomers were friendly, had no thought of conquest, and possessed a science and culture of amazing proportions.

From them the Orbiwah learned of a planet on which were men of their own kind. Lo-as-ro, fired by the thought of establishing contact with people like himself, had borrowed s.p.a.ceships manned by robots and crossed the void to Earth. For weeks they had hovered in our atmosphere, at first saddened, then angered, by the fate meted out to the Indians.

Since the s.p.a.ceships were able to move through Time into the past, Lo-as-ro hit on the idea of going back to the days when the Indian was still in control of most of America. With the power at his control he could force the white man from the continent and restore the land to those who owned it.

Arriving near the close of the Eighteenth Century, he found a sizeable encampment of Indians, brought the ship down among them, and summoned the chiefs to a Council of War, where he outlined to them his plan. To his astonishment he found the chiefs suspicious of outside help and confident that they could defeat the white man alone. In vain did Lo-as-ro explain that they were doomed; they could not, or would not, believe that he had visited the future. He offered to take them ahead and let them see for themselves--an offer that was quickly refused.

Whereupon Lo-as-ro decided to return to the Present and wrest the land from the white man and hand it over to the downtrodden remnants of a once-powerful race. It was on that return trip that Wetzel had arrived in the present century.

When Lo-as-ro finished, I leaned back against the side of the ship and lit a cigarette, bringing a startled grunt from the chief. I said, "You cannot defeat the white man, Lo-as-ro. He has weapons such as you have never dreamed: machines that can throw things that explode and kill hundreds of braves at one time, machines that travel through the air as does the one you came in, things that can wipe out all life within a circle as wide as a brave can ride around in one day on a fast horse.

"No, n.o.ble Lo-as-ro. Return to your world and leave this one to the white man. He took it long ago and he will never give it up. I have spoken."

The chief of the Orbiwah smiled grimly. "In the ship in which I arrived on your world is a small machine. It is working for me now.

Within its reach no weapon is useful, no explosion can take place, no signal can be sent. Only Man is not touched by this machine, but when it works he has no weapons with which to fight. Each hour the influence of this machine widens. Soon all this land will be helpless.

Then the robots will take charge and those who oppose them will be slain."

I thought of the "dead spot" I had first heard about on the newscast the night before, and how it was steadily growing. I remembered the slain farmer with the missing scalp, the two companies of soldiers helpless without radio, guns and transportation. I thought of a mechanized America helpless before a few score of these s.p.a.ceships ...

and I knew that counter-violence would be useless.

"Give the country back to the Indians!" The cry of the over-burdened citizen. It seemed it was about to come to that!

For a long time I sat there, thinking, trying to hit on an answer that would save my country. And when the answer finally stirred at the back of my mind, it was so completely bizarre that I almost missed it entirely....

"n.o.ble Lo-as-ro," I said, "I must return to the Great White Father and tell him what I have learned. I will tell him that there is nothing to be done to oppose the Chief of the Kornesh. Within a few hours I will return with his reply."

Lo-as-ro inclined his fine head in a.s.sent. "Let it be so."

"Until my return," I said, "let the influence of the machine draw back until it holds helpless only a small section of land about your ship.

Only in this way will I be able to return quickly to the White Chief."

Again Lo-as-ro agreed. I took my leave of him ceremoniously, and a few minutes later Wetzel and I were hurrying back toward the highway.

Four hours later I was on my way back, this time with four companions.

The plane landed us at the edge of the newly set "dead spot" and the five of us forced our way through the forest until we reached the clearing where the s.p.a.ceship still crouched.

A silent group of Indians watched us as we crossed the open ground.

This time the two robots flanking the doorway did not leave their posts. As I came up the ramp with my companions, Lo-as-ro appeared in the doorway of the ship.

He eyed me and the others without expression. I said, "n.o.ble Lo-as-ro, I have brought with me four of my world's...o...b..wah. They have come to hear your plan for them and their people. I have told them nothing of what you said to me, only that you have come from another world and are of their blood."

One by one I presented my companions. Yellow Arm was Johnny Armin, an old school friend of mine; Iron Eagle, with whom I had spent a year in Korea, had his telephone listed under the name of Luke Riegel; Strong Wind was Sidney Storm, whom I had met while spending a year in Southern California; and Lone Pine, known as Lionel Patterson, lived a few doors down the street from me in Washington and shot eighteen holes any day in the low seventies.

The color of their skins, the unmistakable cast of their features, made up the only pa.s.sport they needed. At the chief's invitation we squatted in a rude circle at the top of the ramp, and the peace-pipe was brought out and pa.s.sed around.

Presently Lo-as-ro began to speak. The magnificent voice rolled out in tones like a cathedral organ, explaining how the American Indian was to a.s.sume his rightful place in a world of his own. It was a vivid picture, painted by an orator equal to any of the almost legendary Indian speakers, and they don't come any better.

Unfortunately I was the only one present who could understand him.

When it was over and Lo-as-ro was smiling in confident expectation of their gratified excitement, Johnny Armin gave me a baffled glance.

"What the h.e.l.l was _that_ all about, Sam?"

I said, "You guys don't know how lucky you are. The chief, here, is going to fix it up for you to go back to the good old days. Be n.o.ble red men. No more taxes, no more taxis. Live out in the fresh air, sleep under the star-studded sky, drink the unchlorinated spring water."

"_What!_"

"You heard me. And he can do it, too. He's got the tools to flatten the country."

They stared at me and at each other, horror and anger hardening their faces. Lo-as-ro had stopped smiling and was glancing about the circle in obvious bewilderment.

"You mean he's doing all that for _us_?" Storm demanded.

"For all Indians," I said. "Free them from the iron heel of the oppressor, and all that."

"Nuts, brother!" Iron Eagle snapped. "Tell him I'm a graduate of Carnegie Tech, make twenty-five grand a year with Standard Oil, and vote the Republican ticket. If he thinks for a G.o.ddam minute I'm going to chasing around on a pinto pony hunting buffalo, he's got rocks in his head!"

"And that goes for me--double!" Lone Pine growled. "I never heard anything so screwy!"

I repeated what they had said, putting it into words Lo-as-ro could understand. He had the look of a man who couldn't believe his ears.

"They speak with stupid tongues," he cried. "Do they deny the blood of their fathers?"

"They live as they want to live, n.o.ble chief," I said. "They are grateful for your wish to help but they ask me to decline the offer."

He came to his feet with a bound, his lean face hardening into a copper mask of anger. "These are not true Orbiwah!" he thundered.

"These are as women, soft with idleness and pleasure, weakened by their white conquerors. The land is not for them; it is for those forced to live in degradation and squalor, dying of hunger and disease, ignored by the white chiefs. It is they who shall be given back the ways of their fathers, that they may become a great Orbiwah nation once more. I have spoken!"

"Look at these braves," I said. All of us were standing now. "Of all the Orbiwah in this world it is such as these who could hope to survive under the conditions you wish to establish. The Orbiwah _you_ describe would starve amid a thousand buffalo, they would fall from their horses, they would flee in battle. Take away the protection of the white chiefs and they would die."

The chief of the tribe of Kornesh curled his lips in a sneer. "The protection given by the white chiefs is the protection of death. They do not care what happens to the Orbiwah. I have seen it with my own eyes."

"You're right," I said promptly. "The Orbiwah has been badly treated too long. I shall return to the Great White Chief and tell him this: unless the life of the Orbiwah is made good, unless he has fine shelter, plenty of food, warm clothes for his back and the right to be as other men, you will return and force the white man from this land.

It will take much time, but it shall come to pa.s.s. _I_ have spoken."

Doubt flickered in his eyes. "Perhaps your words are empty. How do I know they are true?"

"When twenty summers have pa.s.sed," I said, "come back again. Look upon the Orbiwah and learn if they still suffer want and privation. If their life is not better for what has happened today, then you need never trust the white man again."