Special Deliverance by Clifford D. Simak

out,” said Lansing sharply. “Whatever sent us here made no distinction between a robot and the human. Which makes you one of us.“
    ”Later it may come clear,“ said Mary, ”this common denominator that you mention. Right now I can’t seem to find it.”
    “We’re not the only ones,” said Lansing. “There have been others here before us and there may be others after us. It all spells out to a program or a project. I wish someone would tell us what kind of program or project. I’d feel more comfortable about it.”
    “So would I,” said Mary.
    Jurgens struggled to his feet and, balancing on his crutch, threw more wood upon the fire.
    “Did you hear that?” asked Mary.
    “I heard nothing,” Lansing said.
    “There’s something out there in the dark. I heard it snuffling.”
    All of them listened. There was nothing. The dark was silent.
    Then Lansing heard it—a sniffling. He held up his hand in a warning for the others to stay silent.
    The sniffling stopped, then started again, a short distance from where it had been before. As if some animal had its nose against the ground, sniffing at a spoor. It stopped, then took up again, in a different place, as if whatever was doing the sniffling was circling the camp-fire.
    Jurgens pivoted about, flailing his crutch. Lansing shook his head at him. Jurgens froze.
    They listened. For long minutes there was no sniffling and they relaxed.
    “You heard it?” Mary asked.
    “Yes,” said Jurgens. “It started right behind me.”
    “There was something out there, then?”
    “It’s gone now,” said Lansing. “Jurgens scared it off.”
    “Sandra heard it last night,” said Mary. “It’s been here all the time.”
    “It’s not unusual,” said Lansing. “It’s something we should expect. Wild animals are always attracted to a fire.”
     

 
    F IVE DAYS WERE REQUIRED to reach the city. The trip could have been made in two if they had not been forced to match their pace to Jurgens’s.
    “I should have gone back to the inn,” the robot said. “I could have made it there alone. I could have stayed there and waited for you. That way I wouldn’t hold you up.”
    “Then what would we have done,” said Lansing, “when the time came that we needed you and you weren’t with us?”
    “That day may never come. You may never have any need of me.”
    Lansing, cursing him roundly as a fool, kept the robot going.
    As they progressed, the character of the country changed. The land still was rolling land, but it became more arid. The groves of trees were farther apart and smaller, both in extent and in the size of the trees, which began to tend to scrubbiness. The wind blew hot instead of cool. The little streams on which they depended for water were farther apart and smaller, often no more than trickles.
    Each night the Sniffler prowled the campfire. On one occasion, the second night out, Lansing and Jurgens, armed with flashlights, went out into the darkness to seek some sign of it. There was nothing, not even tracks. The land about the fire was sandy and should have shown tracks, but there were none.
    “It’s following us,” said Mary. “It travels along with us. Even when it isn’t sniffling, I know that it’s out there. It’s out there watching us.”
    “It hasn’t threatened us,” said Lansing, trying to soothe her. “It means no harm. If it had meant any harm, it would have acted before now. It has had all sorts of chances.”
    After the first couple of days, they often sat silent around the campfire, all talked out, no longer needing to talk to keep alive the close association the trip had formed among them.
    At times, in those long silences, Lansing found himself thinking back to his former life and was surprised to discover that the college where he had taught seemed a distant place and the friends he had there were friends of long ago. It has been no more than a week, he reminded himself, forcing himself to remind himself, and already there