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read in books of archaeology about the methods of fighting used back in the days before metal and plastic. The stone missile had come first, he thought. Well, that he already had.
    Bow and arrow? No; he’d tried archery once and knew his own ineptness even with a modern sportsman’s durasteel weapon, made for accuracy. With only the crude, pieced-together outfit he could make here, he doubted if he could shoot as far as he could throw a rock.
    Spear? Well, he could make that. It would be useless at any distance, but would be a handy thing at close range, if he ever got to close range. Making one would help keep his mind from wandering, as it was beginning to do.
    He was still beside one of the piles of stones. He sorted through it until he found one shaped roughly like a spearhead. With a smaller stone he began to chip it into shape, fashioning sharp shoulders on the sides so that if it penetrated it would not pull out again like a harpoon. A harpoon was better than a spear, maybe, for this crazy contest. If he could once get it into the Roller, and had a rope on it, he could pull the Roller up against the barrier and the stone blade of his knife would reach through that barrier, even if his hands wouldn’t.
    The shaft was harder to make than the head, but by splitting and joining the main stems of four of the bushes, and wrapping the joints with the tough but thin tendrils, he got a strong shaft about four feet long, and tied the stone head in a notch cut in one end. It was crude, but strong.
    With the tendrils he made himself twenty feet of line. It was light and didn’t look strong, but he knew it would hold his weight and to spare. He tied one end of it to the shaft of the harpoon and the other end about his right wrist. At least, if he threw his harpoon across the barrier, he’d be able to pull it back if he missed.
    He tried to stand up, to see what the Roller was doing, and found he couldn’t get to his feet. On the third try, he got as far as his knees and then fell flat again.
    “I’ve got to sleep,” he thought. “If a showdown came now, I’d be helpless. He could come up here and kill me, if he knew. I’ve got to regain some strength.”
    Slowly, painfully, he crawled back from the barrier.
    * * * *
    The jar of something thudding against the sand near him wakened him from a confused and horrible dream to a more confused and horrible reality, and he opened his eyes again to blue radiance over blue sand.
    How long had he slept? A minute? A day?
    Another stone thudded nearer and threw sand on him. He got his arms under him and sat up. He turned round and saw the Roller twenty yards away, at the barrier.
    It rolled off hastily as he sat up, not stopping until it was as far away as it could get.
    He’d fallen asleep too soon, he realized, while he was still in range of the Roller’s throwing. Seeing him lying motionless, it had dared come up to the barrier. Luckily, it didn’t realize how weak he was, or it could have stayed there and kept on throwing stones.
    He started crawling again, this time forcing himself to keep going until he was as far as he could go, until the opaque wall of the arena’s outer shell was only a yard away.
    Then things slipped away again.…
    * * * *
    When he awoke, nothing about him was changed, but this time he knew that he had slept a long while. The first thing he became aware of was the inside of his mouth; it was dry, caked. His tongue was swollen.
    Something was wrong, he knew, as he returned slowly to full awareness. He felt less tired, the stage of utter exhaustion had passed. But there was pain, agonizing pain. It wasn’t until he tried to move that he knew that it came from his leg.
    He raised his head and looked down at it. It was swollen below the knee, and the swelling showed even half-way up his thigh. The plant tendrils he had tied round the protective pad of leaves now cut deeply into his flesh.
    To get his knife under that imbedded lashing would have been