A lot of things had been up to him in the last six months. He’d had to work out a means of search, and organize his few, overworked assistants into an efficient staff, and go out on the long hunt.

They hadn’t covered the country. That was impossible. Their few planes had gone to areas chosen more or less at random, trying to get a cross section of conditions. They’d penetrated wildernesses of hill and plain and forest, establishing contact with scattered, still demoralized out-dwellers. On the whole, it was more laborious than anything else. Most were pathetically glad to see any symbol of law and order and the paradisical-seeming “old days.” Now and then there was danger and trouble, when they encountered wary or sullen or outright hostile groups suspicious of a government they associated with disaster, and once there had even been a pitched battle with roving outlaws. But the work had gone ahead, and now the preliminaries were about over.

Preliminaries—It was a bigger job to find out exactly how matters stood than the entire country was capable of undertaking right now. But Drummond had enough facts for reliable extrapolation. He and his staff had collected most of the essential data and begun correlating it. By questioning, by observation, by seeking and finding, by any means that came to hand they’d filled their notebooks. And in the sketchy outlines of a Chinese drawing, and with the same stark realism, the truth was there.

Just this one more place, and I’ll go home, thought Drummond for the—thousandth?—time. His brain was getting into a rut, treading the same terrible circle and finding no way out. Robinson won’t like what I tell him, but there it is. And darkly, slowly: Barbara, maybe it was best you and the kids went as you did. Quickly, cleanly, not even knowing it. This isn’t much of a world. It’ll never be our world again.

He saw the place he sought, a huddle of buildings near the frozen shores of the Lake of the Woods, and his jet murmured toward the white ground. The stories he’d heard of this town weren’t overly encouraging, but he supposed he’d get out all right. The others had his data anyway, so it didn’t matter.

By the time he’d landed in the clearing just outside the village, using the jet’s skis, most of the inhabitants were there waiting. In the gathering dusk they were a ragged and wild-looking bunch, clumsily dressed in whatever scraps of cloth and leather they had. The bearded, hard-eyed men were armed with clubs and knives and a few guns. As Drummond got out, he was careful to keep his hands away from his own automatics.

“Hello,” he said. ‘‘I’m friendly.”

“Y’ better be,” growled the big leader. “Who are you, where from, an’ why?”

“First,” lied Drummond smoothly, “I want to tell you I have another man with a plane who knows where I am. If I’m not back in a certain time, he’ll come with bombs. But we don’t intend any harm or interference. This is just a sort of social call. I’m Hugh Drummond of the United States Army.”