For example, a statue of this mythological creature exists at the front, or "gates" of their family home, which is itself located at 666 Saltimbanque, this number having associations with the underworld dating back to the Greek manuscripts of the Book of Revelation.

Sainte Anne was (perhaps) once home to an indigenous aboriginal culture (at an apparently pre-paleolithic level of technology) of shapeshifters, who may – or may not – have been wiped out by the human incomers.

Norbert Slepyan, an editor at Scribner's, was impressed by the story and proposed that Wolfe write two more, related novellas, to be published in a single book.

[2] The title story is in the form of a biographical study, the narrator of which looks back on his boyhood and youth on the planet of Sainte Croix, and the events which led to his long, harsh incarceration, and eventual freedom.

He meets his aunt for the first time, who seems to know about Veil's Hypothesis (the theory that the Sainte Anne aboriginals could mimic the human settlers so perfectly that they killed them and took their places) and is given light duties in the running of the family business.

Befriending a girl, she, he, and David get involved in amateur dramatics; money being short, they decide to break into a slave trader's warehouse to steal some cash.

In this hallucinatory tale from pre-contact Sainte Anne, Sandwalker sets out on a dreamquest to find "the priest", in his lonely cave, to commune with him.

Waking, Sandwalker goes out to hunt, where he meets the Shadow Children, an ethereal, nocturnal race, and they make an alliance by sharing food and learning each other's songs.

Followed by the Shadow children, they are all, themselves, captured and thrown into a large pit, where he finds his mother and friends; they are all due to be sacrificed by the marshmen, so their souls will enter the river and carry messages from them to the stars.

After a few years of captivity, all of it in solitary confinement, Marsch's case is being reviewed by an unnamed security official who must go over the files and determine the next stage in his punishment.

These files consist of Marsch's logs from his previous anthropological visit to Sainte Anne, interspersed with taped recordings of his interrogation sessions.

The vital inference of this story is that Veil's hypothesis is indeed correct, the boy assuming Marsch's identity, a wound suffered from the cat being a convenient explanation for the marked decline in hand-writing quality, the native Annese being renowned for their inability to use tools.