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trees when a small troop-deploying ship landed amidst the cluster of houses from which she had fled. Screams broke out but they were cut short, one by one. Her eyes welled with tears and she stumbled many times but kept going.
After what seemed an eternity she came upon the narrow path, branching left and gradually rising toward an outlying spur of the hills. But by now she could go no further. She had just strength and wits enough left to move a short way off it and collapse into a long dry rill, overhung with bushes. There for a time, dizziness and fatigue pinned her. She was too physically spent to feel much sorrow, but at intervals the knowledge of her husband's death came back to her like a hollow blow in places she could not defend. At last grief wholly overcame her.
"Oh, Eric. What am I going to do without you?" She lay there weeping. Then slowly, like a memory, his words began to come back to her.
"If you get to the deep woods and I still haven't come, you've got to hide." I'M HIDDEN ERIC. "But that won't do for long. They'll be out with heat sensors, so you've got to get to the graves." She started to rise, then fell back. ERIC, I CAN'T. "You must."
She staggered to her feet, found the path, went forward and began looking for the cluster of gray stones which marked the turnoff. She found it just as she was ready to quit.
Leaving the path once more, she picked her way through vaguely familiar landmarks till she came to two bare oblong mounds of earth. THEY DO LOOK LIKE GRAVES. She fumbled about the edge of one till she found the handle. It took all her strength to lift it, and the thick red earth on top did not move. She slid her way into the opening and lay in the shallow hole, the lid thudding to above her.
She felt for the dead-blanket, covered the length of her body with it and shivered in the darkness. The cutting whir of a search-ship overhead sounded dully around her. She clutched together like a child, hardly daring to breathe. But the sh