“Quiet, everybody!” she cried. “Reena — leave those shells alone — someone went to a lot of trouble arranging them! Time you were in bed, anyway! Billy — off the table! Now!”

The surprising speed with which order was restored showed that, for once, the villagers were anxious to hear what their mayor had to say. She switched off the insistent beeping of her wrist-phone and routed the call to the message centre.

“Frankly, I don’t know much more than you do — and it’s not likely we’ll get any more information for several hours. But it certainly was some kind of spacecraft, and it had already reentered — I suppose I should say entered — when it passed over us. Since there’s nowhere else for it to go on Thalassa, presumably it will come back to the Three Islands sooner or later. That might take hours if it’s going right round the planet.”

“Any attempt at radio contact?” somebody asked.

“Yes, but no luck so far.”

“Should we even try?” an anxious voice said.

A brief hush fell upon the whole assembly; then Councillor Simmons, Mayor Waldron’s chief gadfly, gave a snort of disgust.

“That’s ridiculous. Whatever we do, they can find us in about ten minutes. Anyway, they probably know exactly where we are.”

“I agree completely with the councillor,” Mayor Waldron said, relishing this unusual opportunity. “Any colony ship will certainly have maps of Thalassa. They may be a thousand years old — but they’ll show First Landing.”

“But suppose — just suppose — that they are aliens?”

The mayor sighed; she thought that thesis had died through sheer exhaustion, centuries ago.

“There are no aliens,” she said firmly. “At least, none intelligent enough to go starfaring. Of course, we can never be one hundred per cent certain — but Earth searched for a thousand years with every conceivable instrument.”