Suppose, that was, that he were a human plague-carrier. He thought of
the vermin that had infested the clothing he had taken from the man he
had killed on the other side of the mountain; they had not troubled him
after the first day.
There was a throbbing mechanical sound somewhere in the air; he looked
about, and finally identified its source. A small aircraft had come over
the valley from the other side of the mountain and was circling lazily
overhead. He froze, shrinking back under a pine-tree; as long as he
remained motionless, he would not be seen, and soon the thing would go
away. He was beginning to understand why the search for him was being
pressed so relentlessly; as long as he remained alive, he was a menace
to everybody in this First Century world.
He got out his supply of food concentrates, saw that he had only three
capsules left, and put them away again. For a long time, he sat under
the dying tree, chewing on a twig and thinking. There must be some way
in which he could overcome, or even utilize, his inherent deadliness to
these people. He might find some isolated community, conceal himself
near it, invade it at night and infect it, and then, when everybody was
dead, move in and take it for himself.
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