was still at the camp, she was in a dangerous situation.

There'd been no other car from the camp for a long way now. But there
came a sharp curve ahead. Lockley drove into it. There was a roar, and
a car came from the opposite direction, veering away from the road's
edge. It sideswiped the little car Lockley drove. The smaller car
bucked violently and spun crazily around. It went crashing into a
clump of saplings and came to a stop with a smashed windshield and
crumpled fenders, but the motor was still running. Lockley had braked
by instinct.

The other car raced away without pausing.

Lockley sat still for a moment, stunned by the suddenness of the
mishap. Then he raged. He got out of the car. Because of its small
size, he thought he might be able to get it back on the road with
saplings for levers. But the job would take hours, and he was
irrationally convinced that Jill had been left behind in the
construction camp.

He was perhaps five miles from Boulder Lake itself and about the same
distance from the camp. It would take less time to go to the camp on
foot than to try to get the car on the road. Time was of the essence,
and whoever or whatever the occupants of the landed ship might be,
they'd know what a road was for. They'd sight an intruder in a car on
a road long before they'd detect a man on foot who was not on a
highway and was taking some pains to pass unseen.

He started out, unarmed and on foot. He was headed for the near
neighborhood of the thing Vale had described as coming from the sky.