The Driest Spring in the Beta-Pede Mountains

According to growth rings on trees, last spring was the driest in the beta-pede-mountain centuries. This spring, it was even drier, so now they have land-prones all over central beta. And I don't know that anything could be done about them. Jack Holloway found himself squinting, the orange sun full in his eyes. He raised a hand to alter the pulse rate of the controgravity field generators and lift the manipulator another hundred feet. Vermoan, he sat, puffing on the short pipe that had yellowed the corners of his white mustache; looked down at the red rag tied to a bush against the rock face of