The giant world

By Ray Cummings

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The giant world
    
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: The giant world

Author: Ray Cummings

Illustrator: Hugh Rankin
        C. C. Senf

Release date: December 20, 2025 [eBook #77512]

Language: English

Original publication: Indianapolis, IN: Popular Fiction Publishing Company, 1928

Credits: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan & the online Distributed Proofreaders Canada team at https://www.pgdpcanada.net


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GIANT WORLD ***




                            The GIANT WORLD

                            By RAY CUMMINGS

          NOTE--This: serial, while complete in itself, is a
              sequel to _Explorers Into Infinity_, which
          narrated the previous adventures of Brett and Martt
              on the distant world. The story appeared in
               WEIRD TALES for last April, May and June.

           [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
              Weird Tales January, February, March 1928.]




                               CONTENTS

                       1  THE SUMMONS
                       2  STOLEN INTO SMALLNESS
                       3  THE THING IN THE FOG
                       4  THE WILD NIGHT RIDE
                       5  CLIMBING INTO LARGENESS UNFATHOMABLE
                       6  THE BLOOD-RED DAY
                       7  THE FIGHT ON THE PARAPET
                       8  YOUTH!




                              _CHAPTER 1_

                              THE SUMMONS


I was startled. Yet I think that I subconsciously I was prepared for
it; expecting it. The little cylinder flipped out of its tube and
dropped on my desk before me. My name was on it, glowing with tiny
luminous letters: _Frank Elgon, Interplanetary Mails, Division 4,
Great-New York_. It looked just like any other Departmental message
cylinder. But instinctively I knew it was not; and my heart was
beating fast as I clicked it open.

Relayed through Code Headquarters. I saw that on the small rolled tape
inside. And saw the signature, Dr. Gryce. It should not have been
startling, but my fingers were trembling as I unrolled the tape and
hooked it into the automatic decoder. And I stood gripping my chair as
the line of English letters pricked themselves on the blank white sheet
at which I was staring:

    "Frank--I can not bear it any longer. We must go--we must find
    Brett at any cost. Will you stand by us? Come at once. Hurry.

                                                            DR. GRYCE."

My mind leaped back. I sat at my desk staring blankly, while in
the office around me all the bustling activity of the accursed
Interplanetary Mails faded before the surging visions of my memory.
It was four years since that other momentous day when Dr. Gryce had
sent for me. And I had gone to him; and listened amazed at his weird,
fantastic theories. Our sun, planets, and stars--all the vastness of
the star-filled heavens, he had told me then--were but the infinite
smallness of a greater world. All this that we call our Celestial
Universe was no more than an atom--of the giant world encompassing it.

Fantasy! Yet it had proved sober, tragic fact. Tragic, because Dr.
Gryce's older son, Brett, had gone out there to that giant world. Gone,
and never returned. Nor been heard from; four years now, while old Dr.
Gryce at the end of his life waited despairingly.

I had known always that the time would come when Dr. Gryce would wait
no longer. He would send for me--friend of Brett--and friend of his
other two children, Martt and Francine. For a year every cylinder that
had dropped on my desk had made my heart leap that it might contain
this summons which now lay before me.

"_I can not bear it any longer. Will you stand by us?_" So simple
an appeal! But I knew the turgid torrent of heartache--the final
desperation of an old man's suffering--which prompted it.

Young Grante at the desk next to mine was sorting his pile of official
communications newly arrived by the Venus mail. I turned to him.

"I'm going away," I told him. In spite of myself--an unfortunate
mannerism when I am perturbed--my voice sounded gruff, ill-tempered.
"There is no time to argue--will you please notify Official 4 that
my--my post is vacant."

He raised his eyebrows. "Vacant?"

"Yes. I'm going away." I was on my feet. Outwardly calm, but within me
was a seething emotion. Going away! Out there into the immensity of the
Unknown, where my friend Brett had gone, not to return. Young Grante
could not guess. He was thinking Great-London perhaps--or the Asiatic
province. Or perchance, Venus, or Mars.

I laughed harshly. "Don't question me, Grante. Just tell them--my post
is vacant."

I left the room with his amazed stare following me. In the corridor,
through a window I caught a glimpse of the tenth pedestrian level; its
crowd of people moving upon the diverse activities of their tiny lives.
Already I felt apart from them. Frank Elgon, Division 4. Presently, to
such of them as knew me, I would be no more than a memory. "That young,
rather quarrelsome Elgon, who walked out of his office in a temper, and
vanished." They would say that, and then forget me.

I laughed again. But the thought brought a pang of regret, and a
shudder.

In ten minutes I was within a pneumatic cylinder, speeding underground
to the Southern Pennsylvania area, to the home of Dr. Gryce.


                                  II

Martt and Frannie met me at the outer gateway. Their manner held a
singular gravity. I had expected them to be excited, of course. But
their grave, somber smiles of greeting, their instinctively hushed
voices, seemed unnatural. This was no reckless, devil-may-care spirit
of high adventure which I had anticipated the twins of Dr. Gryce would
display. Sober drama. Their involuntary glances at the white house
nestling against the hillside carried a foreboding.

Drama, but it seemed almost to be tragedy. My heart sank. There was
something very wrong here with the Gryces; something more imminent than
the fact of Brett's absence over four years.

But I said nothing. Dear little Frannie gave me her two hands. They
were cold.

Martt said, "Thank you for coming, Frank. Father is--waiting for you."
His voice, usually flaunting, mocking at everything with the reckless
spirit of youth, chilled me with its queerly broken tone.

We crossed the flowering gardens to the white house standing so
peaceful in the afternoon sunlight. Martt led the way. The twins were
twenty-one years old now. Alike physically, and in temperament. Both
smaller than average height; slim and delicate of mold; blue-eyed,
and fair of hair. They were always laughing; carefree--the spirit of
irresponsible youth. But not today. I regarded Martt, trudging ahead
of me--debonair, jaunty of figure in his tight black silk trousers and
loose white shirt, bare-headed, his crisp, curly hair tousled by the
wind. But there was a slump to his shoulders, a heaviness to his tread.
And little Frannie behind him: girlishly beautiful, with her tossing
golden curls, her familiar house costume of gray blouse and widely
flaring knee-length trousers. But there was upon her a preternatural
solemnity; a maturity of aspect indefinable.

At the doorway Martt turned and fixed me with his somber, blue-eyed
gaze. And spoke with the same queer hush to his voice.

"Father is upstairs, Frank. He is--dying. He wants very much to live
until you arrive."

Upon the pillows in the darkened room lay Dr. Gryce's head with its
shaggy, snow-white hair, the mound of the sheet betraying his pitifully
wasted body.

Martt said softly, very gently, "Frank is here, Father. You see he came
in time--plenty of time."

But the head, with face to the wall, did not move; no stirring marked
the fragile body lying there.

Martt gave a cry; with Frannie he rushed to the bedside. It was all
too evident. In a moment Martt stood up, leaned silently against the
bedpost, a hand before his eyes as though dazed. And Frannie knelt at
the bed and sobbed.

We expect death all our lives, yet the instinct of life within us never
ceases to feel a shock, and a revulsion. For a long time these children
of Dr. Gryce did not move or speak. Then Frannie leaped to her feet.
Her face was tear-stained; but her sobs were suddenly checked, and her
eyes were blazing.

"Martt! His last wish--the very last thing he said--was that we go out
ourselves and find Brett. He said it--he said Brett might need us--his
dying wish. And I'm going, and so are you. We've got to, Martt! And
we want Frank with us. Oh, Frank, you'll go with us, won't you? Out
there--to join Brett?"


                                  III

The burial was passed. We had not spoken of our enterprise, but
it had never left my thoughts. This boy and girl so newly come
to maturity--but I was twenty-nine. Upon me would fall the main
responsibility.

We sat at last in Dr. Gryce's study--the three of us alone--to discuss
our task. With the first poignancy of their shock and sorrow already
dulled by time, upon the faces of Martt and Frannie was stamped grimly
their simple purpose.

"But, Martt," I said, "Brett's vehicle was very intricate. It
traveled in Space--but in Time as well. And grew gigantic in size.
Your father's genius built it. But we have no such genius to build
another----"

"You forget," he interrupted. "Think back, Frank. That day you came
here. And we showed you the models of the vehicle. There were four of
them----"

Then I remembered. Dr. Gryce had shown me four small models. One he had
sent back into Time. A flash, like a dissipating puff of vapor it was
gone into the Past; still here in Space above the taboret on which it
was standing, but vanished with centuries of Time to hide it from my
sight.

Another of the models, with Time unchanged, Dr. Gryce had sent into
Infinite Smallness. I remembered watching it dwindling; a speck, a
pinhead, then invisible even to the microscope.

Two of the models were left. Martt and Frannie, but seventeen years old
then, had taken one into the garden. Had started it growing in size. I
recalled our frantic efforts to check its growth, lest it demolish the
house. This was the one in which Martt and Brett had gone to the giant
world and in which Brett had returned alone to that distant part of our
universe.

One model had remained. I had never thought of it since. Martt was
saying, ". . . and we still have that last model. Father kept it
very carefully." Martt's smile was wistful with the memory. "I think
he--Father--had a premonition that he would not live to carry out his
purpose. . . . The model is here."

He opened a locked steel box. Again I gazed silently at that small cube
of milk-white metal--a cube the length of my forearm, with its tiny
tower on top, its glasslike balcony, its windows and its doors.

"It's all complete," said Martt. "And I know how to operate it."

Frannie said with a touch of breathlessness, "For a month past, Father
has been gathering the necessary instruments. And the supplies--you see
he--he really thought he was going to live----"

"We're all ready," Martt added. "We will increase this model to normal
size. Load it with our supplies. We can start tomorrow, Frank."


                                  IV

Five million light-years from Earth! Who of finite human mind can
conceive such unfathomable distance! Yet, as I crouched on the floor of
the vehicle gazing down at the radiance emerging from the black void
which was our first sight of the Inner Surface, the distance had seemed
no more than gigantic. We were, in size, many million times our Earthly
stature. The tiny Earth, from our larger viewpoint, was a little orange
spinning above us in the void--a mere one-twentieth light-year away.

Martt, for all his youth, had proved competent. He had made the trip
once before with Brett; he handled the vehicle carefully, and with
skill. He said now, as we three crouched by the floor window, "We'll
soon be down to the atmosphere, Frank. I'm checking our fall--we want
no errors----"

We were reversed in Time--holding very nearly at a single instant, so
that on the Inner Surface the time now was the same as it had been when
we left the Earth.

We argued the point; Martt said, "I think when we land--we should
choose the point in Time about four years beyond Brett's landing. So
that it will be four years to us--and also to him. Don't you?"

We decided upon that, so that we would reach the Inner Surface and
find Brett had been there four years. It seemed to strike a greater
normality. Find Brett! Would we find him? I wondered, as I knew Martt
and Frannie were wondering. But in our plans we always took it for
granted.

The radiance beneath us grew brighter. And at last we entered the upper
strata of atmosphere, falling gently downward. It was a fair, beautiful
land, as Brett and Martt had said. A sylvan landscape, with an air of
quiet peace upon it. A broad vista of land and water; patches of human
habitation--houses, villages; a city.

Martt was at the telescope. "Pretty good, Frank! I've hit it--I see the
city--off there, isn't it? And the crescent lake."

He changed our direction slightly. As we dropped, the broad crescent
lake lay beneath us. Trees bordered its banks; and to the right was the
city of low-roofed, crescent-shaped buildings banked with flowers. And
beyond the city a rolling country of gently undulating hills, with a
jagged mountain range up near the horizon.

From this height it was a visibly concave surface. And it was gray and
colorless, for we were passing abnormally through its Time. Then Martt
threw off the Time-switch; we took the normal Time-rate of the realm.
And in size we were also normal.

At a height of perhaps a thousand feet Martt held us poised above the
city. "They'll see us now," he said. "If--if Brett is down there he'll
recognize us. I'll land in the grove where we landed before. We'll give
Brett time to get there to meet us."

With the Time-switch off, color and movement had sprung into the scene.
The forests were a somber growth of dull, orange-colored vegetation.
The water was a shimmering purple; and above us was a purple sky, with
faint clouds, and dim stars up there--stars which seemed very small and
very close.

The white houses gleamed and glowed in the starlight. Yet it seemed
not night; nor day either. A queerly shimmering twilight. Shadowless,
as though everything were vaguely phosphorescent.

In the broad city streets there was movement. Vehicles; people. And the
people now were gathered in groups, staring up at us.

We landed in the little clearing at the edge of the lake near the city.
And now at the last, Frannie gave voice to the fear which was within us
all. "Oh Frank, do you think Brett will be here?"

There were human figures in the near-by thickets. I saw them through
the windows, but we were too busy with the landing to look closely. The
vehicle came to rest. Martt and I flung open the door. The vegetation
was thick near by; we stepped from the vehicle onto a soft, mossy
sward, and stood in a timid group, with tumultuously beating hearts.

"Martt! Frannie! Frank!" It was his voice! Brett was here! And we saw
him step from a thicket. His familiar voice; his familiar figure, but
so fantastically garbed that it brought to me a wild desire to laugh,
for I was half hysterical with the relief of seeing him.

Frannie cried, "Brett! My brother! You're all right, Brett, aren't you?
I'm glad you're all right."

Under stress, how inarticulate are we humans! I said awkwardly, "How
are you, Brett? We thought we'd come and see you."

He took Frannie in his arms. And wrung Martt's hand, and mine, while
his strange companions stood in the background among the trees,
watching us.

"Of course I'm all right," he declared. "And terrifically happy." A
shadow crossed his face; his glance went to the vehicle's doorway.
"Father didn't come with you?"

Then Martt showed a wisdom far beyond his years. This was no time to
bring sorrow to Brett. Martt said smoothly, "Father is better than he
has ever been, Brett. We'll tell you--later."

"Good! That's fine!" Brett's face was radiant. "You're just in time,
you three. I'm to be married tonight."

But even then as I wrung his hand again, and congratulated him, I had a
premonition that it was not to be.




                              _CHAPTER 2_

                         STOLEN INTO SMALLNESS


"Life is pleasant here," said Brett. "Pleasant, and indolent. It does
not make for progress, but it is happiness--and I'm beginning to wonder
if that is not best, after all."

We were sitting in an arcaded passage on the roof of the home where
Brett lived. Crescent archways opened to the roof, where stood banks
of vivid flowers, with a vista of the city beyond. The building seemed
of baked earth, rough like adobe, and of dull orange color. It was a
two-storied, crescent-shaped structure, set upon a wide street-corner
near the edge of the city. The home of Leela's father. I had never
forgotten Leela--the girl Brett and Martt had rescued from the giant on
their first visit here. Brett had fallen in love with her. It was she
whom tonight he was to marry. And this was her father's home--Greedo,
the old musician.

"I have lived here with them six months," Brett said.

Martt exclaimed, "Six months! Why Brett, you have been gone four years!"

We had miscalculated the Time-change of the vehicle. Our purpose had
been to strike this realm of the Inner Surface at a point in Time which
to Brett would be four years. But now we found it six months only.

Brett smiled. "I'm glad you didn't postpone your arrival. You've no
idea how pleased I am to have you--tonight of all nights."

We had not yet seen Leela, or her father. Brett said that Leela would
be up presently to greet us. The city was excited over our coming. A
crowd was gathered in the street before the house; Brett had made them
a brief speech; Frannie, Martt and I had stood at the parapet and waved
to them.

Then Brett had spoken of a younger sister of Leela's. Her name was
Zelea--they called her Zee.

Martt sat up at this. "Where was she when we were here before?"

"Away," said Brett. "She was too young to meet a man then. Only now has
she come to be sixteen. You'll like her, Martt. I want you to like her."

"I will," said Martt enthusiastically, "if she's anything like Leela."

"You were telling us about the life here," I suggested. "We always
called this land the Inner Surface----"

"Yes," he agreed. "It is concave, like the inner shell of some great,
hollow globe. Within the space it encloses----" He gestured to where,
through the arcade, a segment of purple, star-filled sky was visible.
"All that which we of Earth called the Celestial Universe is enclosed
by this concave shell. You would think that this must be a gigantic
region----" He smiled again. "It is not. Compared to our present
enormous size, I imagine the circumference of this Inner Surface is
not unduly great. I don't know. These people have not explored very
far. They are not wanderers--they are too indolent, too contented, to
wander."

He paused to drink from a shallow receptacle which stood before us, and
offered Martt and me what appeared to be arrant cylinders to smoke.

"I have learned a little of the language. Proper names are impossible
to translate. But the meaning of their word for this land, I call
in English. Romantica. The romantic land. It is, I fancy, about
five hundred miles square. Beyond it lie forests and mountains. No
one here has ever penetrated them. There are wild beasts, birds,
insect life--and fish and reptiles in the water. But they are not
dangerous--not aggressive. It is not because of them that these people
avoid exploration. It is--just indolence."

"I don't wonder," I said. "This is very peaceful here--I have no
desire to do anything in particular." From the city streets a drone of
activity floated up to us; but it was almost somnolent.

"It's always like this," said Brett. "Almost no change of seasons--the
light always the same. There is no disease here--or very little.
Food--grains, and what we would call vegetables, grow abundantly in
this rich soil. The trees give milk--even the bark and pulp of them are
edible. Life is easy. There is nothing to struggle against.

"Through generations, it has made the people kindly. There is little
crime. No struggle for land, or food or clothing. Crimes involving
sex----" He gestured. "Wherever humans exist there will be crimes of
that origin. But our women here are very sensible, and when a woman
does what is right--well, you know, don't you, that most deeds of
violence into which men plunge over women have a woman's wrong actions
at the bottom of them? There is little of that here, for the women take
care that there shall not be.

"So they call their country Romantica. They are not a scientific
people. They do not struggle for advancement. Art has taken the place
of science. Painting. Sculpture. Music. They have developed music
very far. It has a soul here. It speaks--it sings--it seems a living
entity. It is--what music ought to be, but seldom is--the pure voice
of love, of romance. . . . I was telling you about our country. Most
of its population live in villages, and in individual dwellings
strewn about the hills. There are but two large cities. This one--the
largest--they call Crescent. Or at least their word for it suggests the
shape of the lake. The other city is about fifty miles from here"--he
gestured again--"off there where you see the line of mountains. They
call it Reaf. It's a quaint city. Built largely over the water--rivers
there--hot, subterranean rivers which rush underground--under the
mountains. They go--who knows where? No one has ever been down them.
The mountains are honeycombed with caves, tunnels, passages leading
within, and up. Always up. But into them no one has ever penetrated.
Legends tell fabulous tales of a great world up there. The giants, we
think----"

When Brett and Martt had first come here, giants had appeared.
Dwindling giants--strange, savage beings of half-human aspect. They
had appeared--no one knew from where. Growing smaller until they were
normal size to this realm. Not many had been seen. Some had kept on
dwindling; they had grown so small, when attacked, that they had become
invisible. At the thought, I moved my foot involuntarily with a shudder
of uneasiness. Here on the floor beside me now, men like beasts might
be lurking, so small I could not see them. Yet in a moment they might
grow to a stature greater than my own. . . .

Men like beasts! . . . And I remembered that, with size gigantic, they
had destroyed the third city of Romantica.

Upon Brett's face lay a cloud of apprehension. "We have never heard
from them since. It is thought--I think myself--that they came from
the subterranean rivers, or through the underground passages of the
mountains. I conceive this concave surface upon which we're living
to be the inner surface of a shell. It may not be very thick--there
at Reaf. Above it--beyond it--up or down are mere comparative
terms--beyond it must lie some vastly greater outside world. This whole
realm is doubtless within an atom of that greater world. It would be a
convex surface up there--with a sky and stars beyond. . . .

"We have never seen the giants since that time when Martt and I rescued
Leela. Everyone here seems to have forgotten them----" Brett's voice
was heavy with apprehension. "These people are so trustful! They forget
so quickly! No one worries. Our rulers here--a venerable man and woman
long past the age when death is expected--are so gentle, kindly, that
they can not imagine harm coming to their people. They have forgotten
the Hill City which the giants destroyed. Trampled upon it! Six or
eight giants--they must have been several hundred feet tall--stamping,
kicking the building! I've been there--I've seen the ruins--strewn for
miles--and with buildings, colonnades and terraces mashed into the
ground! There were no more than half a thousand people surviving that
destruction of the Hill City--and thousands died. But everyone says
now, 'The giants are gone. We are safe.'"

Brett's voice had risen to a swift vehemence. "It's been like living
on a volcano to me, all these months. There are no weapons here. My
own few flash-cylinders--of what use would a tiny flash of lightning
be against beings so gigantic? We've got to do something. For if those
giants come again----"

A step sounded in the oval doorway near at hand. Leela stood
smilingly, deprecatingly before us.


                                  II

Brett said, "Come here, Leela. This is my sister, and my friend, Frank
Elgon. And here's Martt."

Leela advanced hesitantly, her face a wave of color as she met our
gazes. She was smaller, and even slighter than Frannie, her figure
adorned and revealed by its single, simple garment--more like a short,
glistening veil than a dress. Her hair was long and dark, caught by
a band at her neck, and flowing free beneath. Her arms and legs were
bare. At her wrists, gray-blue bands with small tassels; on her feet,
queerly high-heeled wooden sandals, with tasseled thongs crossing on
her ankles. The sandals clacked as she walked; her step was mincing,
with a suggestion of the Orientals of our Earth.

Brett eyed the sandals with a humorous twinkle. "For why are those,
Leela?"

Her blush heightened. "In honor of our guests. I thought you would like
them."

With a swift gesture, she stooped, untied the thongs and cast the
sandals off. Her feet were very white, small and delicately formed,
with rounded, polished nails stained pink. She stood untrammeled, lithe
and graceful as a faun.

"I am glad to meet Brett's sister--and his friend. And you, Martt--I
am glad to see you again." Her voice was soft as a Latin's. She shook
hands with Martt and with me, and returned Frannie's affectionate
embrace.

As I saw them together--these two girls of different worlds--I was
struck with the dissimilarity of them. Pert, vivacious little Frannie,
blue-eyed, fair of hair--brown-skinned from the outdoor life she loved.
And Leela--smooth, white skin, dark hair and luminous eyes, a fragile
grace to her every movement. None of my words are adequate. There was
about her an aura of romance; a strange wild spirit of something for
which every man in his soul has a longing; a beauty with a quality
ethereal--half human, but half divine.

A twinge of conscience came to me that I--Frank Elgon--could think such
thoughts and see such beauty in any girl who was not Frannie.

Leela was saying, "My father would have you come down soon. And Zee is
down there--Zee is very much excited, Brett. There is so much to do
before tonight----"

Brett's arm was around her. "And you--of course you're not excited, are
you, Leela?"

She returned his caress, embarrassed further by his teasing. He added,
"We will be down presently."

"Yes," she said; and with a pretty gesture, she left us.

The sandals lay discarded on the floor. Brett gathered them up,
regarding them tenderly. "She is so easy to tease, I love to do it. But
if you try that with Zee----"

"You shouldn't tease her," said Frannie. "She's a darling. I love her
already."

Brett's wedding day! For all his quiet, whimsical teasing of Leela,
the love he bore her enveloped him like a shining cloak. Yet his
father whom he loved so dearly was dead, and Brett did not know it. I
whispered to Martt about it later.

"I think we should not tell him," said Martt. "Not--until we have to."

And we did not. Looking back on it now, how much was to happen to
Brett--to Martt, to us all! What fearsome things--danger, desperation,
despair--were to be our allotted portion before we even thought again
of old Dr. Gryce who was dead!


                                  III

Brett was to be married that evening--a public festival and ceremony
over which the whole city was in an anticipatory fever.

"The festival of lights and music," said Brett. "They hold it at
periodic times. It is a wonderful sight. It generally includes a
marriage--girls find it romantic. Leela selected it for us. Greedo
is in charge of it--Leela and Zee always take part in its music. We
must go down--they are waiting for us--there is so much for them to do
between now and this evening."

"I'll help," said Frannie. "Come on, Martt--I guess you want to meet
Zee, don't you?"


                                  IV

We found Leela's father to be a grave, black-robed, kind-faced old man
of an age indeterminate. Sixty, or eighty, I could not have told. In
vigorous health, evidently. His figure was spare, straight, but not
tall. His thick, gray-black hair he wore long to the base of the neck.

He greeted us quietly, with an admirable dignity commanding immediate
respect.

"You are a musician," I said, after we had been talking for a time.
"Brett has told us something about your music here. It must be very
beautiful."

He smiled. "Music is a wonderful thing. It ennobles. There is in it
a touch of something beyond our poor human understanding. A touch
of--what you call Divinity."

"You speak our language very well," I exclaimed.

"A language is not difficult. All minds are similar--that is why music
can make so universal an appeal." His voice was earnest, his eyes
sparkling. It was the subject most absorbing to him.

I said, "You teach music----"

He raised a deprecating hand. "Yes. But that is nothing. I teach the
fundamentals"--he struck his breast--"the rest comes from within. For
myself, I am a mere retailer of sound. A peddler of something someone
else has made. The composer--he is the real artist. I have hoped that
some day Leela will compose. Brett has promised that he will urge
her. . . . Just now, she sings." He twinkled at Leela. "I fear she
thinks she sings very well. Pouf! It is nothing! She, too, is only a
sound-peddler."

With a burst, Zee entered the room. A smaller replica of Leela. Yet how
different! She came like a mountain torrent tumbling from the hillside.
Her short, dull-red draperies whirled about her elfin figure. Her dark
eyes were blazing. Black hair, flying over her shoulders with her
tumultuous entrance.

"Father! That is not so!" She stamped one of her bare feet, then rose
on strong, supple toes and whirled half around. The muscles stood out
beneath the smooth satin skin of her calves. "Leela, why do you let him
say such a thing? You sing beautifully." She whirled back. "And what am
I, then?"

The old man was wholly unperturbed. "You, Zee? Why, you are a peddler
of movement. Very swift, tempestuous movement, generally." He added to
me, "She thinks she is an artist. She is not. She is only a dancer."


                                   V

It was what on Earth would have been termed late evening when we
started for the festival. Greedo, with his two daughters, had left half
an hour before.

We were dressed now in the fashion of the country. Brett had suggested
it; Martt had insisted upon it. I remembered with what a jaunty
swagger Martt had worn his clothes upon his return to Earth that
other time. He was dressed similarly now. A cloth shirt of glaring
green, with a high, rolling collar in front, and low in the back;
short trousers very wide and flapping at the knee. The trousers were
a lighter green, with dark green stripes; his stockings were tan; and
his green shoes were long and pointed. Over his shirt was a short tan
jacket, wide-shouldered and with puffed sleeves, and bangles dangling
from elbows and wrists. And there was a skirt to the jacket, rolling
upward at the waist.

My own costume was in the same fashion; and though it was a sober gray,
befitting my more mature years, I felt for a time awkward and foolish
in it. But when in the crowded city streets I found that no one seemed
particularly to remark me, I soon forgot it.

Brett wore a long cloak; I did not see how he was dressed. Frannie also
wore a cloak. Just before leaving she tossed it aside, and stood before
me, waiting for my admiration, with her characteristic twinkle, and her
pert upflung face daring me to disapprove. Even by contrast with Leela
and Zee, to my eyes at least Frannie was very pretty. She wore the
single draped garment with silver cords crossed at her breasts to shape
her figure; and with banded wrists, and tasseled bands above the knees.
Her blond curls were tied with flowing tassels. The whole costume, a
gray and blue, with a single deep-blue flower in her hair. And thin,
flexible sandals on her little feet.

She eyed me. "Do you like me, Frank?"

"I--why, why--Frannie----" I would have told her then that I loved her,
as I had very nearly told her myriad times in ten years past. But who
was I to ask the love of any girl? A sorter of planetary messages, poor
as a towerman in the lower traffic! "I--why yes, Frannie. Of course I
like you. You're--beautiful."

She had a quaint little circular hat, stiff and round, with a dull-red
plume and a tassel. We men wore hats of a solidly wooden aspect--low,
round crowns and triangular brims. Martt's was sea-green, with tassels
all around its brim. But mine and Brett's were sober gray, and
unadorned.

We started on foot. The city streets were dim in the luminous twilight.
Overhead, the sky with its thin-strewn stars was cloudless. A holiday
aspect was everywhere. Crowds of people were in the streets. Young men
and girls, gay with laughter. Most of them were cloaked. A vehicle,
with runners like a sleigh gliding over the grassy pavement, drawn by a
squat, four-legged animal, went by us. It was jammed with girls; one of
them leaned out and waved at me. Her slim white arm came down; her hand
twitched off my hat, sent it spinning. I caught a glimpse of her face;
dark, laughing eyes, a mouth with mocking lips stained red. . . .

The sleigh passed on.

With Brett leading us we turned toward the lake. Most of the crowd
seemed to be heading that way. Occasionally we were recognized. Stares
of interest at us, the strangers, and cheers for Brett.

He said to me, "They're all very happy, Frank. Like children." I
fancied that he sighed--he, for whom this night of all nights should
have been his happiest.

In a group, with the swirling merrymakers about us, we made our way
to the lake shore. The water was rippled by a gentle night breeze;
the stars gleamed on the water surface with tiny silver paths. Boats
were here--double canoes with outriders; and a few sailboats, small,
single-masted, with triangular and crescent sails.

We found a small canoe; Brett sculled it with a broad-bladed paddle.
Other boats were around us. A long canoe with a dozen sweeping
paddles shot by us with the racing strokes of its men, and with
shouts from its laughing girls. Another, smaller, turned over. Its
men swam, and righted it. They climbed aboard, hauling up the girls.
The wet draperies clung to them; they came up like dripping, gleeful
water-sprites, tossing their black hair. . . . A barge went slowly
along, drawn by two canoes. A lighted canopy was over its occupants--a
huge, woven garland of flowers. The canopy gleamed with spots of
vivid-colored lights.

"The luminous flowers," said Brett. And I saw that the large purple
blossoms were gleaming with a purple light--a phosphorescence inherent
in them; and red blossoms, like crimson lanterns; and others orange,
and green. Music floated upward from the barge, soft and sweet over
the water. The tinkle of strings--the voices of girls singing, and men
humming with a deeper background of harmony. . . .

A night for love-making. The night romantic. Brett's wedding night--and
yet, he had sighed. I knew why, for upon my own heart lay a weight
of apprehension, heavier because it was so incongruous. Martt quite
evidently did not feel it--he was shouting and laughing constantly
with his pleasure. A girl from a neighboring boat tossed him a large,
blood-red, glowing blossom. It fell short, went into the water and
slowly sank, staining the water with its red light. Martt all but
turned us over trying to rescue it.

Frannie, too, seemed gay. I tried to smile; but I felt that it was
forced. The depression upon me would not be shaken off. It grew to
seem almost sinister. The very atmosphere of happiness around me seemed
to intensify it. These merrymakers--in the midst of life. . . . At such
a moment as this, death could choose to strike. . . .

"Look!" shouted Martt. "The lights off there--is that where we're
going?"

A patch of gay-colored lights gleamed from over the water ahead. "Yes,"
said Brett. "An island there, where they hold the festival. It's not
far."

It was an irregular circular island, a mile perhaps in extent. The lake
waters indented it with a hundred tiny bays, inlets, and narrow, placid
waterways. We ascended one of them. The surface of the island was
gently undulating, and wooded, with mossy dells--nooks arched with the
luminous flowers. Nooks for love-making.

The whole island was strewn thick with the flowers; they grew upon
tall, single stems--gay-colored lanterns nodding in the breeze. Beneath
them were laughing couples; some hidden, sought and found by groups of
marauding girls, to seize the man and laughingly whisk him away. And
everywhere was music, soft as an echo. . . .

       *       *       *       *       *

We ascended the narrow waterways, came to a lagoon with a glassy
surface wherein a thousand spots of the lantern-flowers were
mirrored like colored stars. Near the shore here, beyond a dock at
which we landed, was a broad enclosed space with an arcade of the
lantern-flowers arching over it. Brilliant with their light. Most of
the crowd seemed congregated there--a milling throng on the level floor
inside, with liquid strains of music mingling with the shouts and
laughter.

"We'll go in there," said Brett. "I'll find seats for you--then I must
leave, to join Leela and her father. There is to be a musical program.
But first--just Greedo, Zee and Leela, and our marriage. Most of the
music comes afterward."

Within the arcade the lights blended into a kaleidoscope of color. All
the cloaks were discarded now. Costumes vividly splashed as a painter's
palette. Heavy perfumes. And that soft, echoing music. I could not tell
its source.

At one end of the room was a raised, canopied platform, with doors
behind it. Most of the crowd were choosing low seats, like stools
ranged in rows. Brett got us settled.

"I'll leave you now--and meet you over there by the right-hand end of
the platform, afterward."

He left us. With Frannie between us, Martt and I sat quiet, watching
and listening. We had not long to wait. The light around us began to
dim; sliding curtains were obscuring the flowers over us. A hush fell
upon the crowd. The soft music was stilled. A hush of expectancy.

The arcade was in gloom. The light on the platform intensified. A
deep-red glow, with a single spot focused upon a small, raised dais.
Into the red glow came Greedo, robed unobtrusively in black. He was
carrying a crescent frame of strings. He seated himself, and in the
silence swept his hands across the strings. His fingers plucked them
like a harp; and then his other hand slid upon them. The staccato
notes rippled clear as a mountain rill, soft, muted to seem an echo of
music. And blended with them was a low, crying melody--a fragment, then
silence.

Leela had appeared. She crossed through the red glow, mounted the
dais, and stood in the silver light--Leela, robed to her feet in a
misty silver veil through which her figure vaguely was outlined. She
stood there drooping--a Naiad veiled in the fountain mist. . . . Then
Greedo's music sounded. And Leela sang.

It was like nothing I had ever heard before. Music, toned strangely,
with strange intervals to make it neither major nor minor. Not
happiness, nor yet sadness. A wistfulness. A longing. But with the
promise of fulfilment.

I listened, breathlessly; and the arcade around me faded. Greedo's
figure in the shadow was forgotten. There was only the white figure of
Leela; her face, the purity of girlhood, her eyes half closed, her lips
parted with the song. Nothing else--save myself. I stood in a void,
stretching out my arms to Romance. All that I had ever dreamed, and
vaguely longed for without understanding what it meant, was upon me.
All that woman could mean to man--the spirit of the ideal never to be
attained in mortal flesh--seemed suddenly attained. Romance--that thing
elusive--intangible as a thought in the vaguest of dreams. It was mine!

The song ended. Applause rang out. Leela was gone.

Martt breathed beside me, "Frank! Wasn't that--wonderful! It was
like----Look, here comes Zee!"

Zee was on the platform--a whirlwind of veils, stained by the red
light, white limbs flashing as she whirled. Greedo's music was faster
now. Snapping staccato, with a thrum of melody. The lights changed to
a mingled riot of color within which Zee was dancing. An elf. A sprite
of the woodland, with tossing hair and fluttering arms; and a laughing
face. . . . A figure in the fairy-tale of a child. . . .

But only for a moment. Then the dance slowed. Maturity came suddenly.
Zee mounted the dais, and the light there was abruptly green. She stood
in an attitude of terror, her eyes wide, hands before her, posturing
with horror.

It made my heart leap. For an instant I fancied it had been real. But
the light turned silver. The horror faded into a passion of love,
her white arms extended, her breasts rising and falling beneath the
veils, her red lips parted with passionate longing. The abandonment
of youth--so young, with newly awakened passion as yet but half
understood. Then again she was whirling around the platform, leaping on
her bare toes, light as a faun. . . .

Behind me, suddenly a woman screamed! The reality of a long scream
of terror! Greedo's music ceased. The lights wavered. Zee was gone.
A scream from the audience; then another. A chaos of mingled cries.
Clattering of feet. Stools overturned. . . . Someone fell against me. I
went down, recovered and climbed upright. The audience was in a panic.
I heard Martt shout, "Look, Frank! Look there over the water!"

People were pushing me--surging to escape from the arcade. Shouting.
Calling to one another. And the woman behind me was still screaming.

I saw it then. Through the open side of the arcade, out a mile or
more over the water, the great giant figure of a man was standing,
waist-deep in the lake, his naked torso towering a hundred feet above
it. A giant, wading in the lake, his face grotesque, malevolently
grinning in the starlight!

[Illustration: "The giant grinned malevolently in the starlight."]


                                  VI

The crowd within the arcade was in a wild panic of terror. I was pushed
and shoved, knocked down by heedless, rushing figures. Everyone was
trying to get outside. In a moment I was swept away. I could not get
back to where I was sitting, or even tell where the spot had been.
Martt and Frannie I could not see; the place was all a dim chaos of
disheveled, panic-stricken figures. A moment before they had been so
gay and jaunty! . . .

A girl rushed past me. The veiling had been torn from her shoulders.
Her eyes for an instant met mine, as she searched my face hoping to
recognize in me the companion from whom she had been separated. Her
dark eyes were wide, red-rimmed with fear. Her face, with all the
beauty of youth gone from it, was chalk-white.

She turned and rushed away from me. I thought again, "In the midst of
life . . . why, this is horrible!" That giant off there--he could wade
to the island in a few moments. . . .

I fought my way out of the arcade, out under the trees by the edge
of the lagoon. There was more room out there. In the starlight I
could see figures rushing aimlessly away, scattering under the
lantern-flowers . . . others hurriedly crowding the boats. One boat was
overturned. I wondered vaguely if the struggling figures in the water
would be drowned.

Back near the wall of the arcade I saw a girl's figure running. It
seemed familiar. Was it Frannie? I dashed after her. But people running
in between us blocked me. I lost sight of her; saw her momentarily as
she seemed to dart around the farther arcade corner. But when I got
there, she was not in sight. Was it Frannie? Had she gone this way? Or
into that door, back into the rear of the arcade?

I stood in doubt. Then I saw Brett, running past me, out under the
lantern-flowers some fifty feet away. His cloak was discarded; he was
bare-headed. Brett in his marriage robe! Black and white, with golden
tassels gayly dangling from the rolled skirt of his jacket. He was
disheveled; as he ran, I saw him tear off the jacket impatiently and
toss it away.

"Brett! Oh, Brett!"

He stopped; whirled toward me. "Frank! Where's Frannie--and Martt?"

"I do not know," I said. "I lost them. That giant----"

"The giant is wading the other way now." He pulled me past a thicket,
and pointed. I could see the back of the giant's naked shoulders,
towering up against the stars. He was going the other way--wading
toward the far-distant opposite lake shore. And now against the
island's banks, the waves the giant made were beginning to pound.

Brett said: "I don't know where Leela is. I was in there with her--and
with Zee. I rushed out when the alarm came--when I went back they were
gone." He stood irresolute. "We must find them, Frank. And get back
home." He drew a long breath. "It has come, you see, as I feared."

"I thought I saw Frannie," I said. "Running--that way. But I'm not
sure. I lost sight of her----"

From behind the pavilion came a scream. The scream of a girl.
Familiar. . . . The blood drained from Brett's face. "Leela!"

And then I heard Frannie screaming from there also. We ran. The two
girls were standing there clinging to each other. They seemed unharmed.
But they were trembling, shuddering, arms gripping one another.

"Leela! What is it?" Brett held her off, regarding her. "You're not
hurt, are you? What is it?"

We four seemed alone here beside the arcade. Lantern-flowers were over
us; a thicket was near by. Frannie's arms were around me.

"Frank--oh----" She choked; she seemed struggling to tell me something.

I held her close. "You're not hurt, Frannie. Just frightened. What
became of Martt?"

Oh, horrible! What gruesome, horrible thing was this! Within my arms I
could feel her sensibly shrinking! Her shoulders within my encircling
arm, melting . . . palpably dwindling.

Horrible! And there was a great cry from Brett. "Leela! My God,
Leela----"

At the horror of it, Brett and I stood dumbly staring; and again the
girls clung together. They seemed dizzy; they swayed, almost fell, then
steadied themselves.

Visibly smaller now, like beautifully formed little children, clinging
together, no taller than my waist.

Dwindling!

Then Frannie pointed to the thicket. Two small human figures stood
there--a foot high, no more. A grinning gnomelike man, with black
matted hair on his naked chest; and a woman--a woman thick and
shapeless. A foot in height. But they were shrinking very fast. And
beside them were four small animals with horns--grotesque like a dream
mingling dog and horse and moose. The animals, too, were dwindling.

Brett saw them; but neither he nor I made a move. At our feet Frannie
and Leela, no higher than our ankles now, were gazing up at us, with
tiny upraised arms, pleading.

"Leela! Frannie!" We knelt by them. Then Brett in an agony of terror
lifted Leela in his hand. "Leela! Don't--don't get any smaller!"

Then he put her down. She ran, half fell the distance of my foot to
reach Frannie. And I heard Frannie's tiny voice calling up to us in
gasps, "We're going! He--that man there with the woman--caught us.
Forced--down our throats--a drug. We--going----"

Smaller than my finger. Then so small we knelt to see them. They were
huddled against the side of a pebble. Then they seemed struggling
toward the pebble. Behind it. Under it. Under its curve. . . .

Brett cried, "Don't move, Frank! My God, we might trample on them!
Don't move!"

The figures in the thicket had vanished. By the pebble which Brett
guarded so carefully I thought I saw Leela and Frannie. Saw a movement,
as though an ant were there, hiding under the pebble.

Then--they were not visible. We did not dare look too closely. They
were gone! Still there within a foot of our straining eyes--but so
immeasurably distant! Lost! Gone! Stolen into smallness!




                              _CHAPTER 3_

                         THE THING IN THE FOG


Within the arcade, when the alarm had sounded, Martt leaped to his
feet, dragging Frannie after him. He saw me knocked to the floor, but
could not reach me. A press of panic-stricken people was sweeping him
away, but he clung to Frannie. Then he saw me regain my feet; saw me
looking around. But I did not see him; and though he shouted at me, in
the noise and confusion his words were lost.

Frannie gasped, "What is it? What's the matter, Martt? What is it?"

Martt did not know. But he guessed, and his heart went cold with fear.
"We must get outside, Frannie. Hold tight! This way--it's nearer! There
goes Frank--we'll join him outside."

Martt was forcing a way for them through the crowd. Frannie stumbled.
Her hold on him was broken. She fell; and before he could reach her
he was knocked backward by a running man. When he regained his feet a
swift-moving group was between him and Frannie. He saw two girls stop
and help her up; then discard her. Saw her turn, confused, and run
into a space where the crowd was thinner. He was being shoved away from
her.

"Frannie! Wait! This way!"

But she did not hear him. And then he could no longer see her; there
were too many people in between. He struggled in that direction, then
he thought he saw me, and turned momentarily the other way. . . .

Martt found himself alone, outside the arcade. The crowd was thinner.
Still he was not certain of the cause of all this panic. Then he saw
the giant. Stood, and stared with tumultuously beating heart.

A man bumped into him; for an instant he thought that it was Brett.
Memory of Brett reminded him that Brett was probably within the arcade,
back of the platform-stage. He saw an opening, there in the arcade
wall; he thought it was a doorway, leading back of the stage. He
started for it, ran headlong into a girl standing there, staring out
over the water to where the giant now had faced about and was wading
away.

"Martt!"

"You, Zee! Where's Brett? Where are Leela and your father?"

She clung to him, her draperies drooping, her hair tumbling in great
dark waves over her white shoulders as she shook her head.

"I do not know. They were in there a moment ago. Frannie came in--she
and Leela were at the other door. Martt--that giant----"

"He's going away, Zee. Look! You see him turned about? Don't be
frightened. We must find Brett. I don't know where Frank is--I lost
him. There he is--isn't that Frank? Oh--Frank!"

They ran toward a man's figure, passing along a distant line of trees.
But when they caught up with it, the man was a stranger. Ahead of them,
hidden by a thicket, voices were shouting. A rhythmic call. Martt and
Zee listened; but Martt could not understand the shouted words.

"What is it, Zee? Can you understand them?"

"They're saying, 'The messenger from Reaf!' Some messenger from Reaf
has come with news."

"Come on. Let's go see what it is."

He gripped her hand. They ran swiftly through the woods. They were
already several hundred feet from the arcade. The lagoon was on
its other side; ahead of them was a patch of woods, dark, for the
lantern-flowers did not grow along here. And beyond the woods, the
shore of the island where the shouting sounded.

They ran. Soon Zee was ahead, leaping like a young chamois, her veils
and hair flying.

"Wait!" he called. "Not so fast!"

She stopped abruptly. And Martt stopped. There was a pounding on the
shore; waves rolling up, as though the peaceful lake were torn by a
storm.

"What's that, Zee?" But the shouting began again; and without
answering, Zee started ahead.

The starlit lake came into view. Like a distant, monstrous shadow, the
retreating giant was visible against the stars. On the shore, white
waves were rolling up. A boat was here, with its sail flapping. A wave
caught it, turned it over.

On the strand a group of people were standing with the man who had come
in this boat from Reaf. Zee joined the group. In a moment she returned.

"He says--the messenger says--that giants are in Reaf! The city is
emptied--the people have scattered into the country. The road to
Crescent is crowded with people coming here."

"Giants! There--as well as here----"

"Yes. They did not attack. There were two giants. They stood in the
lake and laughed while the people fled from the city. Hundreds were
killed in the rush to get out--hundreds were swept away into the
subterranean rivers and the giants stood and laughed. The city is
deserted, and the two giants are there now."

Men were helping the messenger right his boat. The group on the shore
scattered back over the island, calling, "Giants! Giants are in Reaf!"

The messenger climbed into his boat, headed it out over the now calmer
lake.

Martt and Zee momentarily were alone. He stared at her. He was stunned,
confused. Giants, everywhere. This thing that had been worrying Brett
for so long had come. Death, everywhere.

"Let's get back, Zee. We must find Brett."

It seemed shorter along the shore--a turn of the island near by,
into the lagoon, and thus back to the arcade. They started off,
running again. It was deserted along here. Zee was leading. Suddenly
she stopped in full flight, gripped Martt, drew him behind a huge,
pot-bellied tree trunk which stood near the water's edge.

"Zee, what----?"

"There, over there."

"Where? I don't see anything."

She whispered insistently, "Over there--in that open space. Back from
the shore."

She was crouching, and he crouched beside her; followed her gesture
with his gaze--and saw what she saw.

Tiny moving figures on the ground. Four of them, small dark blobs
against the white sand. They were about a hundred feet away from where
Martt and Zee were crouching. They had come out of the woods evidently,
and were crossing this patch of white sand, heading for the water.
Martt blinked and rubbed his eyes, staring at them. They moved in tiny
leaps, bounding soundlessly over the sand. Each of them a foot long
perhaps. Strange in shape; animal or human, he could not say.

"What are they, Zee?"

But she did not answer. Her little body was shrinking against him; he
could feel her shudder.

The figures seemed long and thin, horizontal to the ground, with
something sticking upright like a tower from the middle of them. Martt
gasped. He had thought them four animals, with humps like upright
towers. They were not. He saw them now as running dogs with horns, each
with a tiny human figure on its back. And he gasped again. They were
growing larger!

They crossed the sand in bounds and momentarily stopped. Already they
were fully half normal size. Four horned animals that might have been
grotesque dogs, or horses. Saddled; and mounted upon them, a heavy-set,
half-naked man; a strange, shapeless woman--and two girls!

Normal size now! No, already they were larger! Growing rapidly larger!
Frannie and Leela!

Martt half started to his feet. He opened his mouth to shout
impulsively, but Zee drew him back and silenced him. The four animals
were taking to the water. Swimming with heads stretched out. Martt
could see Frannie and Leela bending forward, each clutching the horn of
her mount. In single file the animals swam swiftly out into the starlit
lake. They did not seem to be growing any further. Twice normal size
perhaps. Soon they were four dark blobs on the shining water. Visually
seeming smaller by distance. V-shaped lines of silver phosphorescence
streamed out in the water behind them with their swift forward
progress.

And presently they were vanished.

       *       *       *       *       *

Martt and Zee stood up. They could not explain it. They tried to, but
could not. But the main facts were clear. That had been a man and
woman giant, and four of their animals. They had captured Frannie and
Leela. Had made the girls and the animals change size like themselves.
They had all, just now, been very small in size. To escape observation
coming across the island to its shore, Martt concluded.

He said, "We must get to Brett--tell him about this. And then--go after
them----"

Again they started running along the shore, intending to turn at the
lagoon-mouth for the arcade. Martt's thoughts flew swift as his legs.
Leela and Frannie captured . . . they must be rescued . . . then all
of them would get into the vehicle and go to Earth--get out of this
danger. . . .

Zee was saying, "That is Reaf, off that way where they went."

The wading giant had also gone that way. The messenger had said that
Reaf was deserted, that giants were there. Evidently Reaf was the place
at which these giants first appeared. Evidently it was the point of
entrance and departure for them into and out of this realm. Leela and
Frannie were being taken to Reaf. . . .

Martt's heart leaped. An idea was forming in his mind. A plan--a mad,
reckless plan. But it seemed possible of success. . . . He thought of
the vehicle. It would be of no use against these giants. It was too
unwieldy. Besides, shut up in it one could not attack. And when they
stopped it to disembark, the giants would overwhelm it. Or, if at the
moment it was too gigantic for them, then they would escape before
the occupants of the vehicle could get out to stop them. . . . And
besides, the vehicle was too precious--no chances like that should be
taken with it.

Martt told himself that he must get Brett to hide the vehicle. Guard it
somehow. . . .

A mad idea, this plan he was pondering. . . . They came to the
lagoon-mouth; and here, to crystallize Martt's plan, to make it seem
feasible--here lay a small sailboat, deserted by its owner. It lay,
half pulled up on the sand, around the bend of the lagoon.

"Zee! Stop! Wait! I want to talk to you."

Zee had been bounding ahead of him. She stopped, waited, faced him. He
was breathless.

"That sailboat," he said. "It's one of the fast kind, isn't it?"

"Yes." She regarded it. "Yes. Very fast."

It was no more than a shell. A flat, spoon-shaped affair, with a small
cockpit just large enough for two; and it had a very tall, flexible
mast, and an overlarge crescent sail. The sail was flapping. Out on the
lake the wind had risen. It was blowing directly toward Reaf.

"Zee, listen--could you sail that boat?"

"Oh, yes."

"You could handle it in that wind out there?"

"Yes. Of course."

"And it would go--how fast, Zee?"

"You mean--to Reaf?" She was as excited as he.

"Yes. To Reaf. We could get there. Go after them. Cautiously. We could
hide before we got there. I've a plan----"

"How long to Reaf?" She pondered. "Three--what you call hours. We go
fast in a wind like that."

"Yes. That's it. Fast. Three hours. Zee, listen. Reaf must be where
the giants go to leave for their own world. They're taking Frannie
and Leela there. You see? And if we can get there--get into Reaf"--he
gestured--"Zee, if they--those giants are very big, then we to them are
small. Tiny. And it's quite dark. It would be dark in the caverns near
Reaf--the houses there near the subterranean rivers. We would be so
small the giants might not see us."

He drew a long breath. "My plan, Zee, is to get in there, hide, and
find a giant from whom we can steal the drugs. With the drugs----"

She was trembling with excitement. No fear now. Reckless as only youth
can be. "Oh Martt, if we could get the drugs! Brett said the giants
must be using drugs. And make ourselves larger than the giants----"

"Yes. Then I can fight them. Rescue Leela and Frannie. We've got to do
it. Bring Leela and Frannie safely back. We'll say, 'Here they are,
Brett.' But if we wait, if we stop now it will be too late."

Before Martt's eyes was the vision of himself and Zee returning
victoriously with the rescued girls. And with the drugs in his
possession. There would be no danger then. The giants, knowing the
drugs were stolen, would not dare remain. . . . They would all escape
up into their own world. . . .

"Will you do it, Zee? Shall we go?"

"Yes."

Martt thought of his flash-cylinder. "I wish I had it, Zee."

"Where is it?"

"In the vehicle. But we have no time to get it."

"I think it would not be of much use."

"No. I don't think so either. But all I've got is this." He displayed a
knife whose blade, as long as his hand, slid back into its handle for a
sheath.

"Good," she said. He replaced the knife. They climbed into the boat.
Martt shoved it off.

In a moment they were beyond the quiet lagoon, heading out into the
starlit lake, with the lights of the island fading behind them.


II

The wind was strong when they were beyond the island. The sail bellied
out in front of them like a great crescent dish; the spoon-shaped boat,
barely skimming the surface of the water, rode high on a white wave
beneath it. Zee lay on her side, upraised upon an elbow with her hand
on the knife-blade rudder that trailed the water behind them. Beside
her, hunched with arms wrapping his upraised knees, Martt sat and
peered ahead under the sail.

The lake was dim in the starlight; its concavity rose to the horizon.
It seemed empty ahead. No boats. The wading giant had vanished; the
swimming figures were gone.

As they sailed with the wind, the night seemed windless and calm, save
that the lake boiled under them, swiftly passing. Martt was in no mood
to talk. Zee, too, was silent, engrossed with her task of guiding the
boat.

Occasionally, with a surreptitious, sidelong glance, Martt regarded her
intent little face, earnest and solemn. Long, dark lashes, tendrils of
dark hair around the slim white column of her throat; her outstretched
limbs revealed by the stirring draperies. . . . A lock of her hair flew
across his cheek. He touched it, cast it away.

"Zee?"

"Yes, Martt?"

"I was thinking--you dance very beautifully."

She turned to him, and smiled; a whimsical smile, and her eyes were
dark woodland dells of fairyland. "Father does not think so. A peddler
of movement--violent, tempestuous movement! Do you think that, Martt?"

"No," he assured her. "Of course I don't." As she turned back to her
steering, his fingers furtively caught a hem of her robe and held it.

There was a long silence. Then he said, as though there had been no
silence, "Of course I don't. I think you dance beautifully." And he
added, "It made me----" His tongue was about to say, "It made me love
you," but his beating heart smothered the words. He amended, "It made
me think that your father was very wrong to say that. And about Leela,
too."

At the mention of Leela he saw a shadow cross Zee's face. He tensed
himself; set his jaw grimly. This was no time for thoughts of love.
Leela, and his sister Frannie, were captured by giants. There was work,
danger for him and for Zee, up ahead in this starlit night. He would
need all his wits, all his resourcefulness. . . .

He remembered the one visit he had formerly made to Reaf; tried to
recall how the city lay. Tried to plan what he and Zee would do, now
when they got there.

He said, "Zee, the rivers at Reaf that plunge into the mountains--no
one has been in them very far?"

"No," she said.

"Can you walk along their banks, inside, under the mountains?"

She nodded. "In some places there are narrow ledges beside the water.
But how far--no one knows."

"And in other places--near Reaf, I mean--there are tunnels?
Passageways?"

"Yes. Back into the caves and beyond."

"I think," he said, "that back through there is the way to the giants'
huge outer world. They've come down, and through the ground behind the
mountains. Do you suppose they'll take Leela and Frannie up to their
own realm? Or keep them in Reaf?"

"I think--we do not know anything about it," she said.

He smiled grimly. "You're right, we don't. Why the giants should come
here at all I don't know. But we're going to know more about it before
we get through with them, Zee. What I'm hoping is that we might find
one of them alone. We've got to get the drugs away from them somehow.
We've got to."

Martt remembered once arguing with Brett about the giants. Brett
had thought that they used some drug--two drugs--one to shrink
proportionately each of their body cells, and the other similarly to
increase the size of the cells. Drugs of the kind had already been
sought for on Earth. Nitrogen was the basis for growth. And the new
element, Parogen, had been found to cause a shrinkage. In Mars they had
developed such drugs further--but they were still impractical for human
use.

These giants evidently had something of the kind. And it must be
radio-active--it must cause a radiation affecting vegetable or animal
matter in near proximity to the changing body. The garments of the
giants expanded and contracted with their bodies. But Brett had said
that a weapon in your hand--particularly one of mineral--would not
change size. . . . The thought was to some slight degree, at least,
comforting to Martt; the giants would be unarmed.

Zee's voice broke in on his thoughts. "Look, there are the mountains
behind Reaf."

Over the lake, ahead of them the distant horizon was a haze of
phosphorescence. But to the left a line of shore had become visible;
and now Martt saw up ahead the vague, dark outlines of the mountains.
Sharp, jagged peaks, tinged with a green-white.

Another hour. The shore to the left was nearer. Undulating land along
the lake. A ribbon of road along the water . . . Martt thought he could
see blobs moving along it. Away from Reaf, moving toward Crescent.

"The refugees from Reaf," said Zee. "The messenger said all the roads
were crowded."

Another half-hour. Ahead the mountains frowned, rising sheer from
the water. The lake was more shallow here; they began passing flat,
muddy islands, with river channels flowing between them as in a delta.
A blur there, at the foot of the mountains, was Reaf. The silver
phosphorescence of the lake was darkening; the water looked muddy,
turgid. In a narrow channel between two islands, Martt noticed a quite
visible current flowing toward Reaf. It rippled the water as it passed
over a bar which Zee skilfully avoided.

There were other islands, with water bubbling up from them, and clouds
of steam rising. Zee trailed her hand overboard.

"We are in the warm water now. Feel it, Martt."

The lake water, fed by boiling springs from all this region, was
noticeably warmer. And every moment the current toward Reaf was
becoming stronger. Martt knew that all this part of the lake converged
to the mouths of the subterranean rivers at Reaf; converged and plunged
under the ground.

       *       *       *       *       *

The city of Reaf was now in sight. It spread sidewise over an area of
a mile or two. The houses were perched on stilts, like flat, awkward,
long-legged birds squatting in the water.

During all this time Martt and Zee had been watching closely for any
sign of giants. There were none in sight--nothing that seemed alive
over this turgid water, the disconsolate group of houses, the sheer
cliffs with the sullen mountains above them. Two yawning black openings
showed where the rivers entered. . . .

A deserted city, its inhabitants fled. Some had been drowned, the
messenger said. There would be no floating bodies; the current would
have sucked them all into those yawning black mouths. . . . A deserted
city. But somewhere in there among the houses, giants might be
lurking. . . .

Martt said abruptly, "We'd better get the sail down. They can see it
too easily." They were still some two miles from the outskirts of the
city. But no more than half a mile from the nearer shore. It swung past
them to the left; perpendicular black cliffs rising from the water with
a narrow rocky strip along the bottom against which the water sucked.

Zee helped Martt lower the sail. There were poles aboard; the lake here
was no more than five feet deep. They could pole the boat ashore. Walk
unobserved toward the nearer river-mouth. Into the city, to hide among
its buildings.

With a thrill of apprehension Martt realized that they might already
have been seen. But he thought it unlikely. From the hot water, vapor
was rising in a fog. It hung like a white shroud over Reaf. Once in it,
surrounded by the fog, they would be comparatively safe.

"Zee, can you swim?"

"Oh, yes," she said. "But Martt, if you get in the water, be very
careful of the rivers."

Silently they poled the boat to shore. Drew it up from the current,
left it on a shelving rock ledge. The strip here was some ten feet
wide; the hot, black lake in front, sluggishly surging toward Reaf;
and above them the smooth cliff-face.

The wind had turned--a swirling current turned by the mountains. The
fog from Reaf came rolling down upon them. It grew dark; the stars were
obscured. In the humid steam they could see no more than twenty feet.

"Good," said Martt. "This is what we want." He spoke in a half-whisper;
stoutly, but his heart was beating fast. He drew his knife and opened
its blade. "Come on, Zee. And listen, you keep close to me. Whatever
happens, we must keep together. And if you see anything--or hear
anything--don't speak. Just touch my arm."

       *       *       *       *       *

They started, creeping silently along the rocks in the fog. It seemed
miles. The water was hot beside them. The fog, like a gray curtain,
opened reluctantly before their advance. Presently the ghostly outlines
of houses were visible, a group of them clinging forlornly together
near the shore. Wooden platforms like balconies connected them. A
bridge came over and down to the rocks.

Then other buildings. A large one of two stories, backed against the
cliff-face. Martt and Zee went under it, groping in the blackness among
its piling. The close, heavy air smelt of fish.

They came out to find that the rocky shore had ended. A narrow incline
walk led out and up over the water to another group of ghostly
buildings. They were some thirty feet away, standing on stilts some ten
feet high. In the gray darkness of the fog their shadowy outlines were
barely visible.

Martt stopped. "Zee," he whispered, "how far are we from the nearest
river-mouth?"

"Not far," she said. "Listen."

In the silence he heard the rush of water. As he stood there, suddenly
this whole adventure seemed impractical. There were no giants here.
They had all gone on, up into largeness unfathomable, taking Leela
and Frannie with them. How could he follow? Even if he dared plunge
under the mountains, he could never reach that outer realm. It was
gigantic--compared to his present size it might be a million miles away.

Or, if there were giants still lurking here in Reaf, of what use to
seek them out and be killed by them?

For an instant Martt hopelessly considered turning back. But he never
reached the decision; Zee's fingers gripped his arm--cold, shuddering
fingers. He stared, as he saw her staring, and within him his blood
seemed to stop its flow.

Something was coming down the narrow incline bridge at the foot of
which Martt and Zee were standing frozen, transfixed with horror.
Something . . . in all the dark murk of fog Martt could not make it
out. An animal? It seemed oblong, the size of a large dog. He could see
its moving legs--eight or ten legs, moving as it walked. He felt Zee
stir beside him; he withstood his impulse to run. That would make too
much noise; the thing would bound after them--catch them. . . .

There was a rotting post beside Zee. She and Martt crouched there and
watched with a horrified fascination the thing as it came padding down
the incline. It was vaguely green-white; it seemed luminous. As it
approached, Martt saw it was a sleek body, moving lithe like a panther.
A green-white thing. And then he saw that it was headless. A blunt end,
with a gaping, dripping mouth and a shining green eye on a protruding
stalk. It stopped, turned the eye to look upward and back.

Martt's breath was stopped. In the silence he seemed to hear his own
tumultuously beating heart, and Zee's. The thing was coming on again.
Now Martt could hear sounds from it. A whining; a babbling. And from
the houses, up there at the end of the incline, came another sound. A
great, heavy breathing. A giant was up there asleep! This thing--like
nothing of Zee's world--belonged to the giants! Martt's heart, for all
his horror, leaped with exultation. A giant, asleep! A giant smaller in
size now, if he were up in those houses. He would have the drugs; they
could steal the drugs from him while he slept.

The thing on the incline was quite close. It glowed with its own light,
greenly phosphorescent, like the ghost of something in a dream, leprous
with its missing head.

Another moment. It was passing close beside Martt. A luminous liquid
dripping from the gaping slit of its mouth. Its eye on the stalk peered
ahead. Its voice was clearly audible. A whine; and babbling sounds like
words.

Revulsion, even more than fear, swept Martt. This thing was muttering
words! Animal, or human--it was talking, babbling to itself. Strange
words of an unknown tongue--but human words. Babbling them as though
with reason unhinged. Gruesome! This leprous thing--leprous of body;
and leprous of mind!

It passed within an arm's length of Martt as he crouched. And suddenly,
without conscious thought, he struck at it with his naked knife.
Horrible! The knife sank, but the thing was scarce ponderable! Martt's
hand with the knife went down and through the luminous green body, with
a feeling of warmth and a wet stickiness, but no more.

The force of the blow, unresisted, threw Martt off his balance. He
fell forward, but still clutched the knife. The thing, with a sharp,
horrible cry of pain, lurched backward. Then stood with its eye
quivering, poised for its attack.




                              _CHAPTER 4_

                          THE WILD NIGHT RIDE


Frannie forced her way out of the crowded arcade, with its struggling,
panic-stricken occupants. She was confused, terrified. Separated from
me, and then from Martt, her only idea was to find us again; or find
Brett. Outside the arcade she turned aimlessly to where the crowd
momentarily was least dense. Panic-stricken people--all strangers. Then
she saw Leela in the shadow of a doorway of the arcade, and ran to her.

"Leela! What is it? What has happened?"

People around them were shouting. Leela said, "Giants. There is a
giant off there in the lake. I was looking for Brett. He came out
here. Oh, Frannie----"

The two girls clung to each other. It was dark where they stood. At
the moment the crowd had surged the other way. Suddenly Frannie became
aware of a dark form looming beside her. A man twice the size of
herself. She tried to scream, but a great palm went over her face. She
felt herself being jerked from her feet. . . .

She half fainted; recovered to find herself in a thicket within a few
feet of the arcade. Leela was beside her. Leela panted, "Don't scream,
Frannie! They'll--kill us if we scream!"

The man was with them, and a thick-set lump of a woman. Not so large
now. Almost normal in size, for they were dwindling. The man was naked
to the waist, a gray-white, barrel-like chest matted with hair. A face,
fearsome with menacing eyes, and a head of matted black locks.

And in the thicket were four horned animals; saddled, like large horses
with spreading antlers. The animals were dwindling. . . .

The man rasped a command at Leela. From his belt he drew small pellets,
white like tiny pills of medicine. He thrust one at Leela, forced it
down her throat. Leela gasped, "You must take it, Frannie. He says--it
is harmless--but if we resist--he will kill."

Then the man thrust his fingers into Frannie's mouth, his arm holding
her roughly. She gulped, swallowed. It was an acrid taste. . . .

The man pushed her roughly from the thicket. And pushed Leela. His
triumphant laugh was the rasp of a file on metal. Leela and Frannie
stumbled to the wall of the arcade, stood clinging together. And
suddenly, with the realization of what was upon her, Leela screamed.
And Frannie screamed, though she did not yet understand.

A wave of nausea possessed Frannie. Her head was reeling. Voices
sounded near by--familiar men's voices. My voice, and Brett's! We came
running at the sound of the screams.

Frannie held tight to the swaying Leela as Brett and I rushed up. And
I took Frannie in my arms. Brett was demanding, "Leela, what is it?
You're not hurt, are you? What is it?"

Frannie wanted to try and tell me. "Frank--oh----" She choked; her
throat was constricted.

And then Frannie really knew! Within my arms she felt herself
shrinking! Growing smaller; but it was not so much that; rather was it
that my encircling arm was expanding, holding her more loosely.

With the horror of it, Brett and I stood apart. Frannie's nausea was
passing; her head was steadier, but dizzy with the strange movement of
the scene around her. She clung to Leela, and, of everything within her
vision, only Leela was unchanging. The wall of the arcade was slowly
passing upward; its nearer corner was moving slowly away; Brett and
I were growing. Our waists reaching to Frannie's head; and then our
knees. She gazed upward to where, fifteen or twenty feet above her, our
horrified faces stared down.

The mind always takes its personal viewpoint. Frannie and Leela were
dwindling into smallness. But now that the nausea and dizziness
were past, to them, they alone were normal. Everything else seemed
changing . . . the whole scene, growing gigantic. . . .

It was a slow, crawling growth--a steady, visible movement. The ground
beneath their feet was a fine white sand. To Frannie's sight this patch
of sand had originally been some ten feet, with the arcade wall on one
side, and a thicket on the other. But the ground was shifting outward
with herself as a center. Under her bare feet she could feel its steady
movement--drawing outward, shifting so that her feet were drawn apart.
She had to move them constantly.

Beside her now she saw my foot and ankle as large as herself; the
towering shafts of my legs--my face a hundred feet or more above her.
The arcade wall stretched up almost out of sight--lantern-flowers
loomed up there like great colored suns. . . . The thicket was a
hundred feet away--a tangle of jungle.

Then Frannie saw the giant Brett reach down and pick Leela up on his
hand--saw Leela whirled gasping into the air. A moment, then Brett set
her gently back on the ground. She was some twenty feet from Frannie.
She ran, half stumbled across the rough white ground until again the
girls were together.

The arch of my sandaled foot was now as tall as Frannie. The arcade
wall was very distant; the thicket was a blur in the distance. That
small patch of white sand had unrolled to a great stony plain. Rough;
yellow-white stones strewn everywhere. Frannie saw my feet and
Brett's--as large as the arcade once had been--moving away with great
surging bounds up into the air and back. A boulder was near by--a rock
as tall as Frannie. It was visibly growing. She gripped Leela--together
they crept to the boulder's side, huddled there.

But they could not remain still. The boulder was expanding. It towered
over them; but it was drawing away as well, for the ground was
expanding. Constantly they shifted their position to remain close to
it, to huddle under its protecting curve. It had been a rock taller
than their heads; it was now a mountain. It loomed above them--a
bulging cliff-face of naked, ragged rock.

Then it was no longer moving. Everything now had steadied; the ground
was motionless. A normality came to Leela and Frannie. Their terror
faded into apprehension, and a desire, a determination to do what they
could to help themselves. They stood up and looked around them.


                                  II

They were in the midst of a vast, rock-strewn plain, illumined by a
half twilight. It seemed miles in extent--a rolling country of naked
rock over which, for a sky, hung a remote murk of distance. A naked
landscape, rolling upward to a circular horizon, with the circular
mountain of rock standing beside them at its center.

Leela now seemed quite calm. She said, "We are not unfathomably small.
Too small for Brett to see us, but not if he gets a glass to magnify.
He will mark the spot where we are--he will do something, Frannie--we
must not be too much frightened."

There seemed nothing that they could do to help themselves. No use to
wander; though no great harm either, for they could roam for miles over
this rocky waste to cover no more than a foot or two of the white sand
Brett would be guarding.

To Frannie's imagination came the thought of insects! A crawling ant in
that white sand would now be a monster gigantic! She gazed around in
terror, but there was nothing of the kind in sight.

A desolate landscape, empty of movement. Frannie's heart leaped. In the
distance something was moving! She gripped Leela.

"There's something out there--something moving out there!"

Tiny moving specks. Too terrified to run, the girls stood staring.
A mile or two away, specks were moving across the rocky plain. They
seemed coming nearer. They separated into four specks. Four gray
blobs, coming swiftly forward.

In a few moments they were distinguishable. Four running animals,
bounding, leaping over the rocks. Animals with horns. Two of them
running free; two with riders.

Leela gasped, "That's the giant! And the woman! They're coming to find
us!"

For a moment the two girls stood transfixed, heedless that they would
be discovered. To Frannie came the thought: The giant, the woman and
the four animals had been dwindling. They had stood in the thicket,
hiding from Brett. They were coming from the thicket now, riding over
the vast rocky plain headlong to regain their captives. Brett could not
see them; they were too small. Brett was probably standing a few feet
from here on the sand--afraid to come closer for fear of treading upon
the girls; and those few feet were miles away across this naked desert.

The four animals came leaping forward. They ran low to the ground,
necks extended like huge dogs on a trail. Already they were no more
than half a mile away. The figures of the riding man and woman showed
plainly. They all seemed about normal size as compared to Frannie and
Leela.

Abruptly Frannie recovered her wits. "We must hide! They must not find
us!"

They hid, out of sight around a corner of the lower rock-face of the
mountain; crouched, waiting with wildly beating hearts.

But it was useless. Either they had been seen or the animals scented
them. Soon they heard the man calling his mount. No noise of galloping
hoofs, for the beasts ran lightly on padded feet. A moment, then the
animals burst into view around the jutting rock; bounded up and stopped
before the crouching girls.

The man dismounted. His grin was a leer of triumph. He spoke to
Leela--a harsh, guttural command in her own language, as he had spoken
before when he forced the drug upon her.

Leela dragged herself to her feet, and Frannie after her. The man spoke
again. Less harshly this time, and at greater length. He gestured at
Frannie.

Leela said, with a quiver in her voice that she tried to hold to
calmness, "He tells me that his name is Rokk. This woman here is his
mate--he calls her Mobah. He says they come from a very big world--down
here to our world of infinite smallness. Oh, Frannie, what can we do?
He says they are going to take us with them, up there to that Giant
World."

Frannie, too, strove for calmness. "Ask him--why? What harm have we
done to him? Tell him--we don't want to go----"

Leela turned to this man who had called himself Rokk. Then she appealed
to the woman--but the woman stared dumbly and turned away.

"Frannie--he says we will learn later what he wants. He says--we will
not be harmed if we cause no trouble. We are going--he says he is going
to take us----"

"Which way?" Frannie interrupted.

"I don't know. I suppose to Reaf."

"Ask him."

Leela asked him. "Yes, by way of Reaf. He says we will mount the
animals--he calls them dhranes. They run very swiftly--as Brett
describes your wolves of the northern ice-fields of your Earth."

Frannie demanded, "He says we go to Reaf?"

"Yes. We will cross the island--out the lagoon--riding the dhranes as
they swim."

Memory of the island--the arcade--the lagoon and the lake came to
Frannie. The island! It seemed so remote, so gigantic. This vast rocky
waste surrounding them now was only a small patch of white sand beside
the arcade wall.

She said swiftly, "Leela, ask him how we can ever do that when we are
so small? Why, it must be hundreds of miles--for us in this size--just
to reach the shore of the island."

"I told him that. He said, 'Of course.' He said he has been riding from
the thicket ever since he got small enough to avoid Brett's sight.
While they were still diminishing they were riding. He was afraid Brett
would see them--but he had to take that chance."

"I mean," said Frannie breathlessly, "tell him we must get larger. It
is too far in this small size. Tell him you know the island and the
lake well--we will help him escape----"

Leela nodded eagerly. "So that if we get large, Brett may see us?"

"Yes. Try and get him to make us large at once--now. Tell him we'll
help him----"

Rokk grinned sardonically at Leela's words. Leela turned to Frannie in
chagrin.

"He says he will do as he thinks best--and we will do as we are told."

Rokk added another command. Leela said, "We must mount the dhranes,
Frannie. I think we had better do as he says--and not talk. Can you
ride a saddle like that?"

From Frannie's viewpoint, the dhranes were now about the size of
small horses--four-legged, long-haired, shaggy beasts with crooked,
wide-spreading antlers. They moved as though on springs. Frannie was
reminded by their movements of giant leopards she had seen in cages on
Earth. But they seemed gentle, docile enough. The saddles were oblong,
padded with fur, with a high and a low foot-rail, both upon the same
side, on which the rider's feet could rest.

"I can ride that," said Frannie; and nimbly mounted. There was no
bridle; Frannie leaned forward and clutched the antlers. Leela mounted.
Rokk moved his dhrane about by spoken words, and by slapping its
haunches with his hands.

Leela said, "He is going to give us some of the drug, Frannie. Some
now--to make us larger. But before we are very large he says we will
be beyond the arcade, in the woods where Brett can not see us. We will
ride very fast----"

The animals lapped their drug eagerly. The man and woman took theirs,
with Leela and Frannie. To Frannie again came a moment of nausea--a
reeling of the senses. But it was quickly passed.

Rokk shouted. Frannie tensed herself. The dhrane under her bounded
forward. The ride began.


                                  III

At first Frannie clung tensely to the antlers; but soon she found it
was not necessary to do so. The dhrane ran with long, smooth bounds;
sure-footed on the rocks as a chamois, noiseless, lithe as a great cat.
It ran, with head extended, low to the ground; beneath her, Frannie
could feel the play of its smooth muscles, rippling under its shaggy
skin.

The woman Mobah rode her dhrane behind Frannie. Leela was directly
ahead, with Rokk leading. In single file they bounded forward. Leela's
black hair and draperies flew in the wind. She rode, bending forward,
her body loosely responsive to the animal's bounds.

The wind of their forward movement sang in Frannie's ears. The ground
fled by under her with a blur of yellow movement. And all around her
was the murky night, rushing at her, passing, and closing in behind.

A wild, night ride like the fairy dream of a child. Wild, and
free . . . a fairy dream. . . .

An exaltation was upon Frannie; she urged her mount to greater speed.
And thought of the drug she had taken. . . .

The drug was acting. The rushing night seemed shrinking. Everywhere
the murk was contracting. The ground was smoothing and turning from
its yellow to white. Overhead a remote--very remote--spot of red light
shone like a dying sun in the heavens. A lantern-flower! Frannie's
heart leaped with triumph. They were growing larger. . . .

She heard Rokk shout to his dhrane; felt her own mount stretch
closer to the ground as the speed was increasing. The rushing night
contracting . . . they seemed riding up . . . and up . . . the ground,
the night was shrinking under them. . . .

A wild, night ride up through a fairy's dream . . . it seemed endless.
Wildly free, with the exaltation of a child's fancy upon it. . . .

Frannie became aware that the vast rocky plain was shrunken to a
smoother level. And ahead now, she saw a great forest, with colored
suns about it. Soon they were in the forest. A jungle. Flat, orange
stalks of grass twenty feet high. The dhranes bounded through them.
Shaggy outlines of tree trunks, each vast as a mountain. They rose into
unfathomable murky distance overhead. But these were all dwindling. The
giant jungle was shrinking . . . passing slowly, but ever faster.

A fantasy . . . the dream of a child. . . .

Rokk called again. Their pace slackened. Frannie saw an open space
ahead. Coarse white sand--a patch of it half a mile in extent. Beyond
it a broad beach. Water shining off there. The lake, with stars above
it.

The dhranes ran more slowly. The white open space shrank as they
traversed it. The beach rushed at them. It had narrowed. Frannie saw
it as almost of normal aspect--the narrow shore of the island. The lake
was starlit--beautiful.

Rokk paused a moment at the water's edge. Frannie gazed around.
The woods were behind them. A large, dark tree-trunk was near by
on the shore. Frannie gazed that way idly; and though she did not
know it, Martt and Zee were crouching there, staring with a confused
fascination. A moment. The shore shrunk further; the water had advanced
to lap the stamping, impatient feet of the dhranes. Rokk spoke softly.
His dhrane waded in, with the others following.

Frannie again gripped her beast's horns. The water rose almost to the
saddle. It was warm and pleasant. The dhrane swam smoothly, swiftly,
with neck stretched out, nose skimming the surface.

A dwindling silver lake. Ripples of silver-green phosphorescence; lines
of silver fire diverging behind the swimming animals. . . .

Frannie turned to gaze at the receding island. An island already
shrunken, dotted with shrinking colored lights. And ahead, the empty
starlit lake.


                                  IV

Riding over the land, it had been a breathless whistling of wind, a
swift surging of the ground beneath Frannie's feet. Here in the lake it
was quiet and calm; the warm lapping of the silver-streaked water; the
quiet stars overhead. Frannie heard Rokk talking back over his shoulder
to Leela, and then Leela drew in her mount and spoke to Frannie.

"He says the giants have all gone back through Reaf to their own world.
One was wading out here toward Reaf. He was very large then; he is to
stay in Reaf on guard, while we go on. He is there now--it is not far."

"How big are we, Leela? Did he say?" There was no way, here in the
lake, by which size could be compared. The exaltation of the ride--its
swift, tempestuous movement--the wild, romantic fantasy of it--all this
was leaving Frannie. A depression was upon her. She added, "Oh, Leela,
Brett did not see us! And Frank--will we ever see them again?"

Leela said, "We are about twice normal size--it will not be far to
Reaf, swimming like this." In the starlight, Frannie could see that
Leela was smiling; a wistful, heavy-hearted smile. She was trying to be
brave. And Frannie smiled back.

"We mustn't get frightened, Leela. Just watch our chance--try to
escape. You stay by me all you can. I mean--when we get"--there was a
catch in her voice--"when we get--under the mountains beyond Reaf."

Leela nodded. Rokk was calling, and Leela urged her dhrane forward.

Soon the left-hand shore and the mountains ahead were visible. The
water grew warmer. Small islands appeared. The dhranes panted with the
heat of the water; in the muddy channels between the islands, sometimes
they floundered. Steam was in the air; ahead it lay like a bank of fog,
with the frowning mountains rising above it.

Presently, through the fog, the houses of Reaf came into view. Small
ghostly outlines of houses on stilts. To the right of them was a
yawning black mouth where one of the rivers plunged into the mountain.
The turgid current was swinging that way; Rokk urged the dhrane across
it, to the left.

Soon they were swimming among the houses. These seemed very small.
Frannie reached up from the dhrane's back and laid her hand on the
roof of one as she passed it. Rokk was heading inshore. The mountain
here was a frowning cliff-face, with a very narrow ledge at the water
level. The ledge ended in a wooden incline bridge leading upward to a
group of buildings near shore. Six or eight small houses with doors
and rectangles of windows, clustered there together, perched on stiff
wooden legs over the water. The incline bridge connected them with the
shore, and they were strung together by a broad wooden platform.

Rokk shouted, and from behind the buildings a giant appeared. He had
been sitting in the water. He stood up, with mud and slime dripping
from him. A man, like Rokk, but younger. His hair was sleek and black,
and fell long to his bared chest, across which a skin was draped. His
face was broad and flat, and hairless. He stood with the water to his
knees, beside the buildings with his arm arched over their roofs as he
leaned against them.

He smiled. He called, "_Ae_, Rokk!" And Rokk answered, "_Ae_, Degg."

They spoke together. Then they spoke in Leela's language. Leela
murmured to Frannie, "This man Degg is to remain here until we are
safely above."

Rokk issued his commands. Degg sat down again in the water, waist-deep,
with his arms holding his hunched-up knees. He yawned and waved his
hand as Rokk swam his dhrane away.

Again in single file, they swam. As they passed the buildings Frannie
chanced to glance up. On the porch-like platform up there she caught
a glimpse of a green-white shape--a thing stretched out somnolent--a
thing, headless!

It was only a glimpse. Frannie's swimming dhrane carried her beyond
sight of it. . . . She was shuddering.

The water now was unpleasantly hot. The current was strong. It was
beginning to ripple the water. Ugly, white ripples . . . sinister.

The dhranes swam with the moving water. But they tossed their heads,
uneasy. . . . Rokk was continually shouting, forcing his mount forward.

There were no houses here. The cliff-face was moving swiftly past. And
then a black mouth swept into view. A hundred feet high and twice as
broad. A mouth, with steam like the fetid breath of a monster. . . .

The water was sweeping that way. Surging in a torrent. White water,
leaping over jagged rock-points that split it into foam. . . .

And from the mouth came a sullen roaring. . . .

Frannie's dhrane lifted its head with a sharp bleat of fear. Its body
was swung sidewise by the tumbling water, but it recovered and swam
desperately.

The roaring rose to a deafening torrent of sound. White water was
leaping everywhere. Frannie half closed her eyes; she could see a
whirling blob which was Leela ahead of her. Then the black mouth opened
to encompass the world as Frannie was swept into it.

An inferno of roaring blackness. . . .




                              _CHAPTER 5_

                 CLIMBING INTO LARGENESS UNFATHOMABLE


In the fog and darkness at the foot of the incline, Martt stood tense,
with upraised knife. The green-white thing was poised for its leap. It
was not babbling now; its eye on the stalk glared balefully. A shudder
swept Martt, as Frannie had shuddered an hour before when she and Leela
passed this way, and she had caught a glimpse of this thing lying
somnolent on the platform above.

Martt muttered, "Stay back, Zee." And then the headless thing leaped.
Martt caught it on his outflung hand and knife, but did not stop it. He
felt his hand sinking within it--a soft, sticky warmth. Its body came
on, and struck his chest--a blow as though a soft, yielding pillow had
struck him.

There was a moment, there in the darkness, of unutterable horror as
Martt felt and saw his body mingled with the body of this gleaming
thing clawing at him. He struck wildly, fighting, kicking in a panic of
futility. Wet, warm and sticky! He seemed to tear its body apart. But
the glowing, lurid outlines, wavering, came back always into shape.

The thing itself was in a panic. Lunging, twisting. Its claws scraped
Martt's face, too imponderable to scratch. The slit of its mouth
opened to grip his throat; its teeth sank impotently within his flesh.
Pressing against him . . . the slime of it was warm, with a stench,
noisome. . . .

Horrible! A nausea made Martt reel. And the thing now was crying with
terrible, frightened cries. But they were low, suppressed.

Martt staggered. And suddenly the lurid green shape gathered itself and
fled. Martt saw a quivering dark wound in its side. It fled whimpering
along the rocks of the shore and disappeared.

Martt relaxed. He was unhurt. He stooped to the water and washed the
stickiness from him. He felt a wild, hysterical desire to laugh.

"Zee, it--that thing was as frightened as I was!"

"Are you all right, Martt? It's gone! What was it?" She clutched at him
anxiously.

"Yes--all right. It couldn't hurt me and I couldn't hurt it. Not much."
He laughed again, but suddenly sobered. "Zee, there's a giant up there
asleep. Hear him?"

They listened. From up there in the fog the deep, heavy breathing
still sounded. Martt whispered, "You wait here, Zee. I'll creep up on
him--get the drugs." He turned to her tensely. "Zee, you stay here.
Close against the rocks. Whatever happens, you stay here. I'll--if I
get the drugs--I'll make myself very large. Kill him--then I'll come
back to you. Don't move--whatever happens."

He left her. The wooden incline sloped sharply upward. The fog
momentarily seemed clearing. Martt saw above him the outlines of the
houses, a broad platform connecting them. And stretched the length
of the platform was the huge, recumbent figure of a man. He seemed
about forty feet tall. He lay hunched, cramped for space, with one arm
upflung to the roof of a house, and one leg dangling nearly to the
water.

Martt reached the platform. He crept past the giant's legs. The waist,
wrapped in a skin, was rising and falling with the giant's breathing.
Martt's own breath was held. His heart was thumping wildly. The giant
stirred; Martt stepped nimbly aside to avoid the movement of the great
body.

At the giant's waist he paused, reached up, fumbling. There seemed a
belt here, with pockets. The drugs should be there. The bulge of the
giant's middle was nearly as high as Martt's chest as he stood upright.
He reached up, and over, feeling with careful fingers.

With a thrill of triumph, Martt found two cylinders, each as long
as his forearm. In the starlight he opened them, drew from each a
flat, square tablet of compressed powder. The drugs! But which was
for growth and which for shrinkage? One was larger than the other. It
suggested growth. It was flat and square--the length of Martt's thumb.
Impulsively he would have crushed it in his mouth and swallowed it.
But a thought gave him pause. This giant was nearly seven times larger
than himself. This expanded dose of the drug then would be too great.
Martt bit off a corner of the white tablet. Swallowed it. An acrid
taste. . . . He replaced the remainder in the cylinder and put both
cylinders in his pocket, tying his jacket close around them. Would they
expand with his body? He could only hope so.

Expand? How did he know but that he had taken the wrong drug? Well, he
could soon rectify that. . . . A panic swept Martt that the giant might
awaken too soon. . . . The drug was taking effect; Martt was sick and
dizzy. He reeled to a post at an outer corner of the platform. Clung
there. He all but slipped and fell into the water ten feet below.

A moment, then the sickness passed. He was growing! He could feel
the post shrinking within his grip. The outlines of the houses were
contracting. The knife in his hand, already tiny, slipped and fell into
the water with a splash.

The post soon was too small for Martt to hold. He reached over and
steadied himself upon the grass roof of the nearest house. It was
melting under his hands. The sleeping giant lay at his feet, a giant no
longer; a man, like himself--the two of them crowding a tiny, flimsy
platform with toy houses beside it, and black water flowing sluggishly
close underneath.

A sense of power swept Martt. A triumph. He was not afraid of this man,
unarmed like himself. Already the man was undersized. . . . Why, Martt
could grip him, choke him! . . . These toy houses--a sweep of Martt's
arm would have scattered them.

Martt was bending awkwardly over the roof-tops. A ripping, tearing
noise sounded. The platform, the houses, quivered, wavered, collapsed!
The whole structure, bending beneath the weight of the two huge bodies,
gave way. Martt found himself floundering in warm, muddy water,
entangled in a debris of splintered wood and grasslike house-roofs.

And with him, his antagonist, awakened to a startled confusion,
floundering, struggling to get upon his feet.

Martt rose to his knees. The shallow lake bottom was sticky with mud.
A house-roof hung upon his shoulder. He heaved it off; stood upright,
dripping, breathless. The other man was up also. In the starlight, amid
the floating wreckage, they faced each other. Martt was the taller; and
he was still growing. He saw his enemy shrinking before him. A slim
young fellow, with long black hair. A broad, flat face, with a startled
surprize on it.

Martt laughed. And shouted, "I've got you now!" He would have leaped.
But abruptly he recalled Zee, tiny in size, huddled there by the shore.
A lunge of his body--or of this other man's body--a flip of one of
these torn housebeams--and Zee would be killed. . . .

Martt turned and waded rapidly away. He wondered if the other man would
follow him. Martt wanted to get him farther out into the lake. It was
an error; for as Martt turned to look back, he saw his antagonist's
hand go to his belt; and then to his mouth. More of the drug! Martt
thought that he had in his own pocket all there was of it here. But
the giant had more. Already he was growing. As Martt stood undecided,
he saw the giant growing like himself. He was smaller than Martt now,
but growing more swiftly. He stood for an instant with his arms upflung
toward the stars; then he came wading forward.

The mountains were at Martt's right hand. Shrinking, swiftly
contracting. The water now came not much over his ankles; a small patch
of wreckage marked where the collapsed buildings had stood.

Martt retreated slightly; he turned, moved to the cliff-face with his
back against it.

Then, with a swirl of water, his enemy rushed at him. Martt met the
rush unyielding. They locked. Swaying, struggling each to throw the
other. The lake at their ankles was lashed white. They fought silently,
grimly. The fellow was strong; he pushed Martt backward against the
Mountain. His hands strove for Martt's throat. But Martt ripped them
away. With a body-hold he bent his adversary backward; but always he
could feel the man's body swelling within his grasp.

A desperation seized Martt. If he could not win now, at once, he would
lose. This fellow was growing too large. Beside them, as they swayed,
Martt caught a glimpse of the mountain. It was now a cliff not much
higher than his head. At his feet Martt was dimly aware of a small
black hole in the cliff into which water was rushing.

One of Martt's legs was wrapped around the legs of his adversary; and
suddenly the man tipped. They went down together, Martt on top. It was
like falling into a puddle of water. They lunged, rolled over. And then
the giant rose, with Martt clinging to him. He was much larger than
Martt now; he heaved himself upward, flung Martt against the cliff.
Martt's head and shoulders went over its top. Jagged spires of rock;
loose rocks lying there. The giant jerked Martt back; he fell on his
feet; saw his antagonist towering over him.

But in Martt's hand now was a jagged lump of rock which he had snatched
from the cliff. He flung it, and it caught the giant full on the
forehead. He staggered, and as his grip on Martt loosened, Martt leaped
away.

And the giant came crashing down, his huge body falling before the hole
in the mountain; blocking it so that the surging lake backed up with a
deepening torrent of the hot, black water.


                                  II

Martt stood panting in the starlight. He had won. The scene around
him was still dwindling, but in a moment it stopped. Cliffs to his
shoulder. A shrunken, shallow lake. Its tiny flat islands were no
bigger than his foot. Along its shore where the cliff ended he could
see the open country. Tiny threads of roads. An island with points
of colored light--the island of the festival. At his feet, miniature
houses on stilts, many of them strewn on the water, trampled by this
combat of giants in which he had been victorious.

And the fallen giant there in the water, blocking the river-mouth, the
water deepening against his side.

Martt took a cautious step. Zee was down there somewhere. Then he saw
her figure, dimly, in the mist which hung over the lake at his ankles.
She seemed about the size of his finger. She was standing at the
water's edge, waving up to him.

He bent down--carefully. He said softly, "I see you, Zee. You must get
larger. I'll give you some of the drug to take."

She shouted, "Yes." It was a very tiny voice, echoing from far away.

Martt's jacket had been partly torn from him. One of his shoulders was
bare, bleeding from where he had been thrown against the cliff-top. He
stooped and dashed water upon the wound; and saw Zee crouch and shield
herself from the deluge of water he splashed.

He thought, "Careful, Martt;" and from his pocket drew one of the
cylinders. The tablets of the drug still were the size of his thumb.
He took one, laid it carefully at the water's edge, near Zee. It was
nearly the size of her body. She walked to it, examined it.

"Break it," he said. "Eat some--about the size of your thumb."

He could hardly have seen a speck of it so small. Zee found a loose
rock. She pounded at the white tablet. Ate a fragment. And presently
Martt gave her some of the other drug to stop her growth; and she was
his own size, standing beside him, gazing at the shrunken scene in
wonderment.


                                  III

They stood consulting over what they should do. They had the precious
drugs. Should they return with them to Brett, or go on and rescue
Frannie and Leela? Martt was confident. With the drugs in his pocket,
all sense of fear was passed. It was obvious that the world here was in
no danger. This fallen giant at their feet was the last. But Frannie
and Leela were captured; were taken up to that other realm. To delay
following would be most dangerous of all.

And Zee agreed. Her eyes were sparkling. She stretched out her white
arms. She said, "With this power we would be cowards to turn back----"

The giant still had some of the drugs about his person. Martt bent over
him.

"Zee! He isn't dead!"

The young giant's face was white; blood was on his forehead where the
rock had struck. He opened his eyes; rolled over in the water. The
dammed river surged again into its black hole.

"Zee, look! He isn't dead!"

He sat up; smiled in a daze, struggled to rise to his feet but could
not.

The rock which Martt had hurled lay like a great boulder in the lake.
Martt seized it, but Zee caught his wrist.

"Martt! Don't----"

A sense of shame struck at Martt; he dropped the rock. "Zee, can you
talk to him--try if he understands your language."

She spoke, and the young giant answered. He was trying to smile,
grateful for the words. Zee stooped and splashed water on his wounded
forehead.

"Martt, he says his name is Degg--he has seen Leela and Frannie--a man
and woman took them into the river-mouth."

The fellow did not seem greatly hurt. He was frightened, watchful, but
docile enough. Martt took the drugs from him. "Ask him the way up to
his world--it will help us----"

It was the one thing that would help them! Martt realized it.

Degg, outwardly at least, seemed friendly enough. When Zee promised
that they would not hurt him--would take him to his own world, the only
way he would ever get there, since he had no drugs--he agreed readily
to lead them.

"But we must be careful," said Martt. "Never let him get larger than
ourselves. And watch him, always."

At Degg's direction, first they diminished their stature until,
compared to the buildings of Reaf, they were about fifty feet tall.
Degg said, in Zee's language, "We wade now into the black river. Rokk
likes to swim--but wading is easier."

They were ready to start. Soon they would be beyond this world--up into
largeness unfathomable. Martt said, "We must leave some message for
Brett. Let him know what became of us."

There was no way to leave a written message. Conspicuously on a rock
near the shore, Martt left the broad belt of his jacket. As he turned
away, Degg was calling softly, "_Ae!_ Eeff! Eeff, come here!" The
green-white, headless thing was lurking among the rocks. "Eeff, come
here!"

It advanced, whimpering. Compared to Martt's fifty-foot stature it
seemed now no bigger than a rat. Martt conquered his aversion and stood
waiting while it approached. In the starlight it glowed unreal; its eye
on the stalk pointed distrustfully at Martt. It stood at Degg's feet;
whimpering--and mumbling words.

Degg said to Zee, "It is afraid of your man. I tell it you will do no
harm. It wants to come with us." He stooped over. "Eeff, you come with
us?"

It understood, partly the words spoken in Zee's language, and partly
the gesture. It said mouthingly, "Yes, Eeff come--with you."

Uncanny! Horrible! Martt shuddered. Degg was saying, "It is a very good
friend to me. May we take it?"

"All right," said Martt shortly, when Zee translated. But it worried
him. He resolved more than ever to watch Degg carefully, and to watch
this headless thing Degg called a friend.

They fed a small morsel of the drug to Eeff, until it had grown to a
size normal to them. Then they started. The black mouth of the river,
to them in this size, seemed a passageway ten or twelve feet high and
twice as broad. The river swirled about their legs; hot, with steam
rising. Soon they were in darkness, following the river around a bend.
But only for a moment. Martt and Zee were hand in hand. Degg was in
advance; Martt could just distinguish Degg's figure with the shining
blob of Eeff in the water beside him.

Darkness. But Martt's eyes were growing accustomed to it. And now the
rocks of the caverns seemed to be giving light--a dim phosphorescence.
The cavern expanded. They waded across a broad, shallow lake where
the water was calm. Then again into a tunnel. Miles down its tortuous
course with the river swirling and tumbling about them.

Sometimes there was a dry ledge upon which they could walk. Sometimes
the river deepened, and they had to swim. Always Degg advanced grimly,
steadily, and silently. A foreboding grew upon Martt. Were they going
right? Was this the way Frannie and Leela had gone? Once he whispered,
"Do you think, Zee, that he's tricking us?"

She shook her head. "You have all the drugs. He would not dare."

They had waded for hours. Then ahead of them they saw Degg pause. The
river here plunged straight down into a black abyss. To the left a
passageway turned upward. It was some ten feet high and two or three
times as wide. It went up at an incline into the green, luminous
darkness. They followed Degg. A mile perhaps, steadily climbing. Martt
calculated. They had already walked possibly fifteen miles--and they
were more than eight times the normal size of Zee's world. That was
more than a hundred and twenty miles underground--most of it downward.

Martt realized that he was tired. And hungry. Before leaving Reaf he
had thought of food necessary for this trip. Degg had a concentrated
food--a dull brown powder. Martt promptly had appropriated it--had
tested it to make sure it was not a size-drug. . . .

The passageway abruptly opened into black, empty space. A rocky slope
rolling gently upward, strewn with huge black boulders. It extended as
far as Martt could see, upward into a luminous darkness. Overhead was a
black sky--murky with distance.

Degg stopped. "We begin getting large here."

Zee translated it to Martt.

"Let's eat, then," said Martt. "Zee, aren't you tired and hungry?"

There was water lying in flat pools on the rocks. It was clear, cold
and sweet. They sat down, talking and eating. Then Zee slept. And Degg
slept also.

Martt sat alert, watching, while the headless thing stretched itself
somnolent on a rock near by, its single eye on the stalk wilting
downward in drowsiness.

Martt strove to master his revulsion. He called softly, "Eeff! Eeff,
come here!"

But it would not come. It moved farther away, whimpering to itself.


                                  IV

"Zee, wake up! We've got to get started. You've slept hours."

The real size-change now began. In single file they walked up the black
slope. It shrank beneath them--creeping, crawling, dwindling away under
their feet. The boulders shrank into rocks, into pebbles. In an hour
they were walking upon a smooth surface.

The black void was no longer empty. Mountains showed ahead--and to the
sides. Giant faces of rock, looming into unfathomable distance of the
black sky. The mountains were drawing closer; contracting, rushing down
with a violent movement.

Martt apprehensively glanced behind. A wall of dwindling rock was
coming after them. The drug in these larger doses seemed acting with a
multiplied power. The scene was a dizzy swirl of movement. Mountains
closing in everywhere. To Martt came a flash of terror. They would
be crushed. Their bodies were growing tremendously to fill this
constricted space. . . .

Degg had stopped walking. They were gathered in a group. They were now
in the center of a circular valley, with a ring of mountains closing
in. A ten-mile valley . . . a mile . . . a hundred feet. . . .

But the mountains shrank to hills; to a low cliff-wall--a ridge. . . .
It closed in. . . .

"Now!" shouted Degg. They leaped over the low ledge of encircling rock;
scrambled over it and fell on a level ground above. . . .

Beside them Martt saw a small jagged hole in the ground. . . . The size
of his waist . . . his fist . . . his finger. . . . It dwindled, closed
and was gone; while again, above them and all about, were black, empty
spaces, filled soon with shrinking canyons out of which hastily they
climbed. . . .

A fantasmagoria of climbing, struggling upward to avoid being crushed
by their own growth. . . .

There was a canyon too narrow, with sides too high. . . . They had to
stop their growth, and climb its jagged, precipitous side. The climb
took hours. There was another meal, while Martt slept and Zee remained
on guard.

Then another valley. Broad, with a steeply inclined floor. They grew
out of it; into another; and another. . . .

Martt became conscious of a change in the air. Cooler, with a dankness.
And now at last, overhead the void was no longer black. A suggestion
of purple. And suddenly as they leaped from a chasm which shrank and
closed under them, Martt saw a sky. Somber purple, with stars.

A new conception of it all swept Martt. His Earth--the stars of its
Universe. The Inner Surface of the Atom, Zee's realm--millions of times
larger. And now--compared to Reaf . . . was he now a million times the
size of Reaf? . . . Or a million million? Largeness, unfathomable. A
convex world out here. The surface of a globe, whirling in Space. And
overhead, still other stars, so gigantic--so remote!


                                   V

Martt gazed curiously around. They were at last in Degg's world--the
region of the Arcs. A tumbled land of crags upon which lay a gray-black
snow. Martt's heart sank before its utter desolation--a tumbled waste,
upheaved as though by some cataclysm of nature. Desolation! And as
though to veil it, a fall of blackish snow--a somber, tragic shroud.

It was night. And, Martt surmised, a winter season. Yet the air was not
cold; merely dank. And the snow seemed not cold, congealed perhaps by
the dank, heavy air; but to Martt's touch, not cold, no more than chill.

With her bare limbs and filmy veiling, Zee was shivering. Martt
discarded his jacket, but she did not want it.

He said, "But you must be cold, Zee."

"I'm not." She shook herself. "I'm--frightened. This--night up
here--it's like a tomb, Martt."

Tomblike, indeed. A dank, chill silence brooded over the night. And
then, almost unheralded, it was not night, but day. A small, cold-red
sun leaped up from the distant black horizon. A day of dull, flat
light. It stained the snow with blood. . . .

Blood everywhere. . . .

Degg said somberly to Zee, "Always blood. It is an omen. . . . My land,
doomed----" There was a quiver in Zee's voice as she repeated his words
to Martt.

They had come now not to mistrust Degg. He seemed a well-meaning youth.
Simple-minded. He had told them something of his world--of Rokk, and
the woman Mobah. Degg, in his heart, hated and feared Rokk.

"Why?" demanded Zee.

He turned his dark, solemn eyes upon her. "You are too gentle, little
girl Zee, to understand. We have many--horrible things here in Arc. I
would not talk of them with you."

It had been Rokk's plan, Degg said, to take Leela and Frannie to the
place where he lived. Degg was to join Rokk there. . . . It was not
so very far. . . . Degg called it Rokk's mound. They were headed that
way now. Soon it would be night again--Martt could do what he thought
was best toward rescuing the two girl prisoners. And Martt promised he
would protect Degg.

Vaguely in Martt's mind had been the idea that he could use the
drugs again now--make himself still larger--catch Rokk unawares. But
the large drug would take no further effect. The maximum size had
been reached. Degg did not know why; save that these drugs were for
smallness--the large one merely an antidote to the other.

Martt was left without tangible plan. But his first desire was to get
near Rokk's mound--whatever sort of place that might be. And he would
decide then what could be done.

The blood-red sun came swiftly up in a low arc, and plunged as swiftly
down again. To Martt, it had been some half an hour of daylight. Now
came the brooding night--and in another half-hour the sun would again
make its low sweep.

Martt urged Degg forward. Eeff was leading--lurid, green-white against
the black of the ground. Then it stopped. Its eye quivered; it
screamed--a long, shuddering, half-human cry of fright.

Degg stood frozen--a statue in the gloom. And then Martt--and Zee also,
for she uttered a low, suppressed cry--saw what had frightened Eeff.

It was about a hundred feet away--a dull, glowing red as though the
blood of sunlight were upon it. A thing which might have been a long,
blood-red vine. Not animal, but vegetable. It lay on the ground--a
great, thick stem, with upflung leafy branches waving like tentacles.
At intervals, upon long stalks, were round spots of green light.
Gleaming, baleful eyes.

The thing was lying its length upon the ground. Not quiescent, but
everywhere in quivering, undulating, snakelike movement. Its eyes
seemed all turned this one way. Eyes suggesting an intelligence--a
reasoning behind them. A thing, not animal but vegetable! Its brain,
lacking even the least vestige of human or animal restraint, cast in a
mold unutterably horrible.

Eeff was crouching at Degg's feet, babbling with terror. Degg muttered,
"It is unrooted! Free! It--I told Rokk they would break free some
time--before he was ready!"

"Unrooted!" Zee echoed.

Unrooted! It was slithering, out there in the darkness. . . . It shrank
to a blood-red blur. . . . It vanished. . . .

They went on again. Degg would not talk, save to reiterate fearsomely,
"I knew they would cast off their roots! Roaming, everywhere. And Rokk
thought he dared to grow them----"

A rise of ground lay ahead. Beyond its crest only the purple sky was
visible, with stars sweeping in rapid, low arcs. Martt, Degg and Zee
were walking together, with Eeff close before them.

Eeff began whimpering again; then screamed. And ahead, from over the
crest of the hill, as though in answer came an echoing scream! Yet not
an echo! A scream, human! It drove the blood to Martt's heart; stopped
his breathing. The scream of a voice familiar--a girl's voice--Frannie!

For all the horror surging over him, Martt leaped forward. And stopped,
stricken on the hill-crest.

Beneath him in the gloom lay a shallow, bowl-like depression. The
starlight illumined it wanly. Frannie was down there, struggling in
the grip of a blood-red, vegetable thing! A segment of it was wrapped
around her, dragging her forward. The light of it drenched her with
blood; its myriad green eyes glared throughout its waving length.

[Illustration: "Frannie struggled in the grip of the blood-red,
vegetable thing."]

And ahead of it was a line of others of its kind, leading the way,
slithering up and over the opposite slope!




                              _CHAPTER 6_

                           THE BLOOD-RED DAY


To Frannie, the subterranean river was an inferno of roaring blackness.
Her dhrane was whirled along, sometimes swimming, sometimes floundering
desperately. Frannie clung to its antlers and closed her eyes. . . .
An eternity. . . . She heard Rokk shouting; felt the dhrane scrambling
upon solid ground. The water dropped away from its sides. . . .

Frannie found herself and her dhrane standing in a dull, luminous
darkness upon a ledge by the river. The other dhranes were there. Rokk
spoke to Leela.

"What does he say?" Frannie demanded.

"He says we must get larger--this is too dangerous."

They followed then the methods used afterward by Degg in guiding Martt
and Zee. Wading, in a large size, they went down the river. Then into
the passageway leading upward.

And then the climb into largeness. To Frannie it seemed unending; but
though they were only an hour or two ahead of Martt in starting, they
were several hours ahead when they reached the giant world. Frannie and
Leela were near to exhaustion, even though they had ridden most of the
way. Rokk had not paused to sleep.

It was day when they reached the desolate land of the Arcs. Then a
tomblike night; then blood-red day again.

Rokk rode now with Frannie and Leela beside him, and the woman Mobah
behind. Rokk was jubilant. He talked swiftly to Leela. At intervals,
Leela translated.

"He says he is glad to have us. He is taking us to his house--his
mound, he calls it. He says, very soon there is something important
happening up here. He is going to take us--show us it--happening."
Leela shuddered.

"What is going to happen?" Frannie demanded.

"I don't know. Something--sinister, horrible. You saw his face when he
told me?"

Frannie had seen it, indeed, but she was striving to master her fear.
There was something queerly sinister, inhuman, about Rokk. And his
smile had a leer to it. Shining in his dark eyes, which often were
fixed thoughtfully on Leela, there was a look Frannie could not fail
to understand. The woman, Mobah, had noticed it. Once, over her broad
expressionless face a torrent of passion had swept. Hate? Jealousy? It
flashed at Leela--and at Frannie--and was instantly gone.

Frannie said now, "Ask him what he wants of us. Why did he ever go
down into our world?"

Leela listened to Rokk's smiling explanation. The man's voice was soft,
caressing. Leela went white.

"He says, Frannie--he says his world here is very harsh--not good to
live in. There is very little food--he says that he and some other
men--his followers--are planning to descend into my world and conquer
it. Kill all its men--Frannie, don't you understand?--kill, just the
men of my world----"

There was a silence. Then Leela added, with a frightened hush to her
voice, "Up here all is bleak and terrible. The women are all like this
woman behind us--unbeautiful----"

Rokk was riding faster now, and soon, as they ascended a rise of
ground, his home came into view. It lay on a falling slope, with paths
trodden in the snow about it--a bulging mound built of pressed blocks
of the gray-black snow. It rose above the surface perhaps ten feet--an
oblong mound twenty feet wide and five times as long, like the grave of
some giant buried there, with a small upright chimney at its farther
end for a headstone. A few rectangles of white marked its doors and
windows as though one might care to stand on the ground and gaze down
at the coffin entombed within. Near by, two other mounds lay like the
graves of children, with beaten paths connecting them.

Rokk's home was set alone in the midst of this snowy waste! Frannie's
heart was cold with apprehension. What was to be her fate--and
Leela's--within?

       *       *       *       *       *

At Rokk's call a half-grown boy appeared in a doorway of the main
mound. He led the dhranes away. Frannie and Leela were taken down a
crude flight of icy steps and into the mound. It was much longer than
it appeared; it seemed to extend at least another story underground,
for Frannie saw an incline leading downward.

They had entered the top story. Rokk led them along a passageway;
Frannie saw low-roofed rooms, with ceilings curved to the mound. Each
with a window opening at the ground level; and with crude furniture
seemingly fashioned from stone blocks.

Into such a room Rokk ushered them. He was smiling, bowing like a
friendly host; his words to Leela were suave. But in his eyes there
was an unmistakable irony, and when Frannie hesitated at the door, he
pushed her roughly.

Mobah had disappeared. Rokk stood a moment talking to Leela. The door
to the passageway was open. Rokk and Leela had their backs to it.
Frannie became aware that beyond the door Mobah was standing listening.
And in the dimness there, Frannie caught a glimpse of the woman's
intense face. It was torn with a jealous passion--a torrent of loosed
passion debasing its calm stolidity into an aspect almost bestial.

As Rokk turned slightly, the lurking woman silently fled. Rokk bowed
to Frannie, and to Leela--a bow ceremoniously grotesque, but with a
dignity, nevertheless. His hand lingered on Leela's white arm, but
Leela jerked away. He shrugged, smiled, and went through the door,
barring it after him.

"Oh, Frannie!" Leela at last gave way. She sobbed with fright
unrestrained; and this gave Frannie additional strength to be calm. She
sat Leela on the couch--a railed slab of stone, with a litter of furs
on it like the bed of an animal. She tried to comfort Leela. Then left
her; tried the door softly. It was stoutly barred.

Then she tried the window. It had a pane as transparent as glass, but
evidently unbreakable. Frannie struck it recklessly with her fist. And
there seemed no way to open the window. Through it Frannie could see
along the snow-covered ground outside. The night had just come. The
ground was dark, with faint stars showing above.

Frannie sat on the bed with Leela. They were both so exhausted that for
a time they slept. Hours, perhaps--Frannie never knew. Then she awoke.
The scene in the room was unchanged. It was night again. Leela was
awake. Frannie began questioning her as to what Rokk most recently had
said. Leela was outwardly calm now.

"He--insists we are not to be harmed, Frannie. He told me--just before
he left--that he wanted me to like him." A shiver ran over Leela's
frail body. "He will work to make me like him--he will be very good to
me. And you--he says there is a young man--that man he left back in
Reaf--named Degg. He is sure Degg will like you, Frannie."

"Did he say any more about that important thing which is going to
happen?"

"Yes. He said he is going to take us somewhere--as soon as we have
rested, and Degg has come to join us here. Take us somewhere--where we
shall see a wonderful awesome sight. Frannie, he told me the men here
in this world do not like their women. He has brought me and you--to
show us to the men--that they may see how beautiful women can be.
Then--they will join him to go down into smallness--to conquer----"

Leela choked. She added, and a hush fell upon her voice: "Frannie, this
Rokk has planned it all. He says there is too little food here. The
women--and the children that the men no longer want to feed--are all
placed apart. Exiled to a city--where he is going to take us. And show
us----"

A tapping at the window checked her. The girls stared at each other
with the blood draining from their faces. A gentle tapping from
outside. A scraping, fumbling as though soft fingers were working at
the window.

Frannie stood up, trembling. Then she moved along the wall, and with
her face to the window, peered out. The tapping had stopped. Outside
she saw a faint, lurid red glow. And three gleaming spots of green.
Moving, peering. And then like the tendrils of a creeping vine, a
leafy something, with a red sheen upon it, gently beating at the pane;
tapping--fumbling.

Frannie drew back. "Leela--out there----" But another sound stopped
her. Someone--something--was unbarring the door of their room! The
two girls were frozen with terror, incapable of sound or movement.
A bar dropping with a muffled thump! The door slowly began opening
inward. . . .

It was the woman Mobah. Her face was grim; her dull eyes were
smoldering green-black coals. She flung a menacing glance at the girls,
moved swiftly across the room. Her fingers at the pane touched some
hidden lock. The window swung open.

Mobah darted back, seized Leela, tried to shove her toward Frannie
and the window. Leela screamed, resisted, fought with all her little
strength and called a warning to Frannie.

But it was too late. Through the window a thick, red-glowing tentacle
came slithering. Its green eyes were waving triumphantly. It caught
Frannie; rolled back upon itself, jerking her upward.

Heavy steps sounded in the passageway outside the room, and Rokk's
alarmed voice, shouting. Rokk burst in. He knocked Mobah aside with a
blow of his fist, and swept Leela protectingly backward.

The segment of red thing within the room slithered out the window,
carrying Frannie with it.


                                  II

"She is gone, my lady Leela. It is unfortunate, but we can not help it.
She is lost--we shall never see her again."

Leela and Rokk were alone in the room. Leela shrank upon the couch;
against his gaze she huddled with a corner of the robe drawn to shield
her white limbs. He stood before her.

"Gone, Leela. Dead, by now. . . . Don't shudder, little white woman. It
is the law of life--some live, some die. . . . But Degg will be sorry."

She had no words, no heart with which to answer.

He went on, with a frown crossing his face. "That vegetable thing
coming here has changed my plans. It has no right to be unrooted.
I grew it, Lady Leela--and many others of its kind--for a certain
purpose. But now it has broken away, before I was quite ready to dig it
up. It thinks it is full-grown. It is conscious of its power. And that
which during all its growth I have taught it to do----" He shrugged.
"I suppose they have all broken loose. All roaming----" A horrible
grimness came to Rokk's voice. "Well, they will do what I taught
them--we shall have to hurry if we wish to see it, Lady Leela."

Leela summoned words. "To see--what?"

He smiled. "You are impatient--and as becomes only a woman--curious!
You shall see, little white woman--blood-red things----" He gestured.
"Enough of that. But you shall realize how great is Rokk. I planned it
all. But now I shall have to change my plans a little. I had wanted
to show you and your friend--the little Frannie--to the men of this
world. So that they--our men--would know how beautiful women can be.
There is no time now, with the red things broken loose. We shall have
to be careful, my Leela. I shall send word to all the men everywhere
to have a care. . . . I wish Degg would come--but we can not wait for
him now. . . . There are animals, too, who should be guarded from these
roaming red vines I have grown. You have not seen our animals, Leela?
Degg has one--a very friendly thing; we call it Eeff. It is but half
human--and only half materialized into substance. A loyal friend, if it
likes you. But its mentality is that of an imbecile. . . . I talk too
much, like a loose-tongued woman. There is no time--we must start."

He called roughly, "Mobah! Come here at once!"

The woman appeared, sullen, defiant. On the flesh of her heavy gray
shoulder was a red bruise where Rokk had struck her.

"Mobah! Bring the dhranes. We are leaving for the Ice City. Tell my boy
here to have Degg follow us when he comes. . . . Hurry! . . ."


                                  III

They rode fast. Alternate night and day--endless frozen wastes.
Occasionally they passed single mounds, isolated like that of Rokk.
Others in groups; blood-stained graveyards by day--eery and gruesome
in the starlight. Leela saw many of the green-white animals, lurking
like werewolves prowling among the mounds. And there were men gazing
curiously at the travelers. To them often Rokk gave a warning that the
vegetable things were loose.

But he said to Leela, "There really is no danger. These things I have
grown will do my purpose in the Ice City. Then I will command them back
to their fields. Let them rot there harmlessly in a red welter. I can
control them. They know me for their creator--their master."

There were few women or girls to be seen about the mounds. Rokk said,
with a horrible irony, "We have sent most of them to the Ice City.
It is a very beautiful place--we men have sent our women there. The
women----" He laughed sarcastically. "They are very stupid. They do
not guess our purpose."

They rode in silence. Then Rokk spoke again. "My woman, Mobah"--he
glanced behind at the patient figure riding behind them--"I have kept
Mobah with me. She is good to work in the mound. But you, my Lady
Leela----" He chuckled. "We shall get rid of Mobah all in good time. We
do not want her around, do we? But I will not make you work, Leela. In
your city of Crescent, little white woman, you and I will be very great
people. I shall be the leader of all our men----"

Again Leela did not answer.

A red day plunged into night. Far to the left across the snowy wastes
to the distant horizon, Leela saw a white radiance in the sky. A vague
patch of silver, as of light reflected from some remote distance below
the horizon. Rokk waved his hand.

"You see that, Leela? That is where I found the drugs. This globe is
very fair, off there. Longer days and nights. A warm, fruitful summer.
Food is there. Trees, with fruit. But it is all owned by another race
of people. They will not let us in. They are very powerful--very far
advanced in civilization. A wonderful age of science. . . . They know
everything. I crept into one of their cities and stole the drugs."

To Leela then was driven home the conception of how vast is God's
great plan of the Universe. This miserable region owned by Rokk's
people was no more than the Polar waste of this globe. A fairer land of
science lay there where the distant radiance showed. A great, cultured
civilization perhaps. And farther beyond it--other races--all on this
one tiny globe whirling among these stars. . . .

       *       *       *       *       *

They came at last within sight of the City of Ice. In the starlight
it glittered with a pale sheen. It stood on a broad plateau above the
surrounding valleys--a place of white spires, glittering under the
stars, the whole surrounded by a high white wall of ice.

And as they came closer, Leela saw within the city a yellow-red glare.
Behind it, a high tower of stone dominated the scene; the glare painted
the tower a yellow-red upon one side. "The pit of fire," said Rokk.
"The one place in all our realm where the fires underground come near
the surface. It brings a warmth--a beauty. You shall see." He laughed
his horrible laugh. "That is why we tell the women they should like it
here----"

They approached the wall. Rokk gazed around. "We are but just in time."
In the farther distance beyond the city was a red sheen against the
ground. Rokk understood it, though at the moment Leela did not. "Just
in time, little woman. I had thought we might better enter by the
tunnel under the wall. But that is not necessary."

They rode through a gate, plunged at once into a passageway, and
emerged presently within the stone tower, left the dhranes there, and
mounted the tower. At its top, Rokk stood with Leela. Mobah sullenly
was behind them. Rokk glanced back at her. He said softly, "I think
perhaps she guesses what is to happen. But she can do nothing about it."

Presently Mobah moved away and disappeared. Rokk patted his belt.
"I have all the drugs here, Leela. All there are in this whole
realm--except a very little of each which I left with Degg. We must
guard them carefully."

To Leela came the thought that she might gain possession of the drugs
and thus escape. But Rokk was very watchful.

They stood upon a broad balcony, with the single tower room behind them
and a breast-high parapet in front. At the parapet, Leela gazed down.
From this height the city lay spread beneath them. It was still night.
A simple, placid scene, quiet, and in a measure beautiful. A few broad
streets of packed, gray-black snow. Flat, oblong houses of ice blocks
which were white and glittering, with spires and minarets occasionally
adorning them.

Directly beneath Leela, at the foot of the tower, was a yawning
yellow-red pit. She could see directly down into it; a glare, some
great distance down to where the fires of the earth were broken out.
Rising wisps of smoke . . . a sulfurous, fiery breath . . . and a
torrent of grateful heat surging upward.

Around the pit, the city was built of stone for a distance, like
a broad, square park. Trees were growing there; huge, graceful
ferns; blue-green leaves like great flopping ears of an animal. And
giant palms, hung with purple fruit. . . . A tropical garden, with
flower-lined, winding paths. . . . By contrast with all this bleak
region Leela had seen, the single little park was very beautiful.

There were a few women moving about the city--dull, heavy-looking,
shapeless women robed in a monotone of drab garments. Uninspired of
aspect. Yet each had a soul . . . desires . . . longings. . . .

In the park a woman sat and played with a little girl. There was
another woman, newly arrived here, with a baby at her breast. . . .

Rokk's voice broke upon Leela's thoughts with a rasp. "But who is to
feed them? It gets very tiresome, giving them food. . . . Ah! Now you
shall see my solution, Lady Leela----"

Beyond the city walls, out over the starlit, snowy wastes, spots of red
sheen were visible. Moving. Coming nearer. Spots of red sheen resolving
into long, thin lines of red. Undulating, twisting, slithering forward.
Green spots of eyes, waving, peering.

Red, growing things unrooted. Coming monstrously to do that for which
during all their growth they had been trained. There seemed thousands
of them. Over every distant slope they came closing in upon the city.
Thick red vines a hundred feet long. Others grown into a tangled
clump, every separate tendril of which was in slimy movement. A red
boll, like the bulging trunk of a tree. It rolled, leaped. Another of
a flat, round central growth, with prickling spines like huge needles
standing erect, and waving, groping tentacles. It hitched itself along,
awkwardly.

They came from everywhere. Red, gleaming monsters of the ground,
advancing with a grim, uncanny silence, closing in upon the city.

Leela watched, with the blood freezing in her veins. Within the city no
alarm had sounded. The woman in the park played with her little girl.
But the baby at the other woman's breast was crying. . . .

The first of the red things reached the city wall. Slithered up like
some monstrous red ivy growing there. A thing of dangling green pods
from which a slimy juice was dripping. A segment of it raised high over
the wall, with green eyes staring down.

In a near-by street a headless, friendly animal gave out its imbecilic
cry. The two women in the park looked and saw, and screamed. . . .

The red thing rose and slithered over the wall. Stretched its length
down a street; then encircled a house, its wide-flung segments
slithering into every door and window. Screams from in there sounded
over the silent, starlit city. Shrill, throat-tearing screams of
women . . . and the piping, terrified cries of children. . . .

The alarm spread. The cries were caught up, echoed from everywhere
about the city. Women and girl children were rushing in a panic from
the houses. . . .

Over the wall at its every point, the red things were climbing . . .
spreading over the city . . . filling the streets . . . climbing with
a red, leafy growth into houses . . . green peering eyes, searching
everywhere. . . .

One of the flat, round growths with prickling spines--needles each
as long as a human body--lurched itself into the park. With a sudden
spring it caught a running woman. Its tentacles tossed her aloft. She
fell, impaled upon its swordlike spines. Its tentacles pulled an arm
from her body . . . tossed the arm away. . . . The woman was still
screaming--horribly. . . .

Leela, sickened, covered her face with her hands. She heard Rokk's
gloating voice, "You see--my solution? Look, little white woman! Make
your heart stout, like Rokk's. This is the law of life. Some live, some
die. We--you and I--will live, for love, when this blood-red day is
over."

Day! The dawn had come. The red sun rose from the horizon in its low
arc. Red, staining everything.

Leela, with a fascination, again involuntarily stared. The city was a
chaos of terror. From windows, with reason fled, women were leaping.
The red things caught them as they fell. . . . On a flat housetop a
woman crouched with a baby in her arms, and a little girl huddling at
her knees. A slim red arm came up over the parapet of roof. Other red
things came up, and poised with watching green eyes. The woman fought
the red arm with all her meager strength. It seized the baby, waved the
small, gray-white body aloft, dashed it to a red pulp against the stone
of the parapet. Other arms jerked the little girl away. A flat, red
thing engulfed the woman and sat mouthing and tearing. . . .

In the park a crowd of the women were huddled. Some were trying to
climb the high railing at the pit of fire, but could not. The red
things slithered among them. . . .

The blood-red day! A white, glittering city, stained crimson now.
Splashed and stained; and upon it the red sun poured a polluting, gory
light. . . .

The blood-red day. . . .




                              _CHAPTER 7_

                       THE FIGHT ON THE PARAPET


Martt stood in the starlight at the top of the slope, frozen into
immobility with horror. Frannie was struggling in the grip of the red
vine, being dragged along, with others of its kind leading the way.
Grown and taught for nothing but the blood-red day of the Ice City,
these things with single purpose were dragging Frannie there.

Martt stood stricken for an instant. The red thing paused. All
its green eyes turned. Beyond it the other things came to a stop,
irresolute, and then slithered on. But the one with Frannie lay
momentarily quiescent; only its eyes were quivering.

Martt became aware that Zee and Degg were beside him. Eeff was
crouching at its master's feet, whimpering with terror. Martt shouted,
"Zee, run back! Come on, Degg!"

He caught a glimpse of Degg's face, gray with fright. But his eyes
showed a sudden determination. And Degg leaped, with Martt after him.

The red thing flung up its forward tentacles, and shoved Frannie
farther back within its folds. Degg leaped for the clump of its
branches where Frannie was entangled.

Martt, running forward, abruptly stopped. One of the drug cylinders
within his pockets had bumped his thigh. A thought swept him--the
drug for smallness! He stopped; recklessly poured from the cylinder
nearly half its contents. And stood, with a huge buckle of his jacket,
crushing the white tablets into a powder in his hand.

Degg had fought his way to Frannie. He had torn her loose, thrust her
violently away, but was himself entrapped. He fought, ripping, tearing
at the red branches, struggling to avoid the sinuous tentacles which
curled back at him. A thick tendril of the vine had wound itself about
his legs. . . .

With the powder in his left hand, Martt rushed forward. There was a
part of the red thing which seemed of lesser size and strength. Martt
rushed in among its lashing brambles. They entwined him. He ducked the
sweep of a tentacle thick as his body. Eyes on the branches peered
into his face. He seized one, pulled it off. A slime with a red
phosphorescence was on his fingers. A pod struck his face; he tore it
open and scattered its seeds. A red, noisome juice spattered him. . . .

Martt was fighting only with his right hand. One of his legs was
gripped and held; he kicked, striving to free it.

These smaller branches were easily broken. They mashed, some of them
like a porous, tropical plant, oozing sap. They were spongy. Martt
scattered a little of the white powder; sifted it through his fingers.
The vegetable growth sucked it up--the drug mingled with the sap of its
bruises.

The branches were dwindling. Upon vegetable the drug acted more
swiftly than upon animal cells. The smaller tendrils shriveled. Then
branches of greater thickness. Martt could feel them letting go their
hold--shrinking, loosening their grip.

Around him in a moment was a shriveled, shrunken bramble. He kicked
himself free. A huge tentacle from another portion licked back and
seized him; whirled him aloft. But he kept his wits. Tore at it with
his fingers; rubbed the drug into its bruised bark. Along all its
length, the drug acted. Martt's weight brought its shriveled strength
to the ground. He fell upon his feet; tore himself loose again. Stamped
and tore, and leaped away.

Throughout all the length of the monstrous vine, now, the drug was
acting. Martt momentarily stood inactive, panting. He saw that Degg had
freed Frannie--saw her and Zee huddled at a distance on the slope near
by. Degg was still fighting; one of his legs seemed queerly twisted; an
arm of the red vine held him, but he kept his feet. Eeff was darting
forward and back, too much terrified to approach, yet anxious to help.

The vine everywhere was shrinking. Martt ran to free Degg. But he was
too late. The largest remaining tentacle lashed forward; it caught
Degg, whirled him up in the air and flung him heavily to the ground.
Degg lay still.

A moment. Then the vine was so shriveled that Martt waded throughout
its lashing length. Tore it apart. Scattered it. Stamped upon its
twisting, slithering red segments.

All dwindling. Separate, dismembered segments quivering around
him . . . smaller . . . red, twisting lines, with tiny green
eyes. . . . They winked and vanished into smallness. . . .


                                  II

"Is he dead? Oh, Martt, do you think he is dead?"

They bent over Degg and he opened his eyes. Martt knelt and lifted
his head. It was evident that he was dying; and evident, too, that he
knew it. He spoke, laboriously whispered words in Zee's language. He
tried to gesture toward Zee; on his face was an earnestness, almost a
desperation lest he might fail to give his dying message.

Martt said, "Zee, he's trying to talk to you. Bend closer--he's
talking."

Zee knelt at his head. He was panting, struggling breathlessly with
each word. "Rokk--was going to take your sister Leela to the--City of
Ice. Now that the red things are loose--I think you will find--him and
her--there."

His breath ended with a long sigh. But he began again. "Eeff will lead
you. Tell Eeff--to take you through the--tunnel into the--stone tower.
And--hurry!"

His eyes closed. Then they opened very wide. They tried to focus on
Zee's face. She bent lower to hear his faint whisper. "Hurry! You
understand--about Leela, there with Rokk. He means, for her, a thing
very terrible. You must--hurry." He added, with a breath so faint she
barely heard his words, "You are--so very beautiful, little Zee. I
never saw--any woman so beautiful. But I am not Rokk--I could not have
harmed you."

He stiffened just a trifle; then went limp, his head with staring eyes
dangling backward over Martt's arm.

Martt laid him gently on the ground. Eeff went and sat by him, crying
softly.


                                  III

It was red day when they approached the City of Ice. Eeff had led them,
as Degg suggested. They saw the city from far off, with a red glow
staining its white glitter. Then Eeff plunged them into a black tunnel.
It seemed miles. Then it ascended, and they emerged into a wave of
heat, with a yellow-red glare beside them.

They were at the bottom of a tall stone tower; a doorway was near at
hand. Martt gazed up the tower's side. A man was up there, behind a
parapet, gazing out at the city: a man's head and shoulders, queerly
foreshortened. But Martt recognized him.

Rokk!

Martt pushed Zee and Frannie hastily into the tower. He commanded, "You
two stay here, with Eeff. I'm going up. You stay here."

Again Martt thought of the drug cylinders he was carrying. He drew them
from his pockets, handed them swiftly to Zee. "Keep these. Whatever
happens--if I don't come back--use them. Eeff will lead you home. To
Reaf. Ask it if it can lead you."

Zee said, in her own language, "Eeff, come here. Can you lead me
back--down there where we met Degg in that place called Reaf? You
remember? Where the water was?"

The headless thing turned its eye upon her. It chattered, "Yes, I
remember. I can go there--but I want Degg. I want to go back to Degg."

Martt, alone, mounted the circular incline softly, and as swiftly
as he dared. Had Rokk seen him? He did not think so. Was Leela up
there? . . . If he could get behind Rokk unobserved. . . .

Half-way up there was an oval window in the tower through which Martt
caught his first view of the interior of the city.

The sun was sinking at the horizon. The end of the blood-red day! A
silence had fallen with the falling sun. A crimson city, strewn with
what had once been living, human flesh and blood--dismembered now . . .
strewn . . . unnamable. . . .

And climbing the walls, red monsters slithering away--seeking other
horrors.

The silent nightfall of the blood-red day.

Martt's gorge rose. He turned from the window, and mounted the incline.

The room at the top was circular, with many windows. An empty room of
stone, almost dark, with the starlight streaming in dimly to illumine
it.

Martt crept softly. Through a doorway he could see Rokk's figure on the
balcony outside. And another figure. Leela, white of face, with her
black hair streaming, and her tattered, dirt-stained veiling falling
about her. Leela! She was standing, half turned, shuddering with
horror. She saw Martt! Surprize, wonderment, joy mirrored her face.
His fingers went to his lips warningly. But not quite in time. She
uttered a low cry, instantly checked.

Rokk swing about. He, too, saw Martt; he stiffened, with his shoulders
flung back against the parapet and his jaw dropping. Martt had
instantly leaped, but Rokk met him squarely, surged forward, and they
fell.

Rokk was the stronger; Martt knew it at once. He rolled, desperately
struggling to come on top, with his legs braced against the floor. But
Rokk flung him off and regained his feet.

Instantly Martt was up, quicker, lighter than his antagonist. He struck
for Rokk's face, missed and then caught Rokk full on the chest with
his fist. The man staggered, but he was not hurt. Rokk's swing went
wide, as Martt nimbly ducked. Again they came together. Surged across
the balcony, kicking, tearing, seeking each other's throats. Locked,
with legs entwined they struck the parapet, rebounded, fell and rolled
together to the opposite wall. A primitive struggle of men using only
the weapons with which nature had endowed them. Fighting grimly, almost
silently, each with no thought but to kill.

[Illustration: "He had no other thought but to kill."]

Leela, near by, stood helpless, confused, a hand pressed against her
mouth in terror. There was a sound, a startled outcry. Frannie and Zee
were in the tower room, with Eeff cowering behind them.

Martt momentarily was on top of his adversary, with Rokk's hairy hand
beneath his chin, pressing his head back. Martt ripped the hand away.
He called, "Run! Run--all of you!"

Rokk heaved him backward, half rose, and surged over on top. Martt
saw vaguely another figure appear on the balcony. A heavy, gray-faced
woman. He heard Rokk pant, "Mobah!"

The woman leaped upon the scene. She avoided Zee and Frannie. She
strove to get at Martt. She kicked; she tried to strike at him. He
heard Zee's voice, "Frannie! Leela! Help me!" As he fought, he was
aware that the three girls were pulling at the woman--pulling her away,
holding her.

Martt momentarily had slackened his efforts. Rokk's fist caught him in
the face, dazed him. Martt felt Rokk lifting him up, heaving him. His
body struck the three-foot-wide, level top of the parapet. He clung
desperately, as Rokk leaped up to throw him off.

They were locked together, rolling on the parapet top! Martt at its
edge, his head momentarily over, felt a wave of heat--saw, far down,
the red-yellow glare. Rokk suddenly tried to cast him loose. Then was
pushing. They were both lying at the edge.

Scrambling. Panting. And suddenly Zee was up on the parapet,
crouching--her frail white hands gouging at Rokk's face. It confused
him. He relaxed. Martt gave one last desperate surge. He saw, and felt
Rokk's body slipping, sliding over the edge, feet first. Rokk's hold on
Martt was torn away, by his own weight and by Zee's frenzied, plucking
fingers. His face, close to Martt's for an instant, showed wide,
terrified eyes; a mouth that gaped.

His hold broke. His body slid. He was gone! Martt lay panting at the
edge, with Zee's steadying grip upon him. A cry sounded. A wail. The
woman Mobah had torn loose from Frannie and Leela. She leaped to the
parapet. Poised for an instant--a grim, gray statue of despair. Bereft
of reason, she called, "Rokk! Rokk!" And with a long, shuddering cry,
she plunged.

There was silence for a moment on the parapet. No one looked down. And
from over the distant, desolate horizon, presently the red sun came up
with the dawn of a new day.




                              _CHAPTER 8_

                                YOUTH!


Life is very strange. Brett and I--Frank Elgon of the Interplanetary
Mails--of full maturity, at the peak of our physical and mental
strength--how inglorious were the parts we played! So inconsequential I
scarcely have the heart to recount our futile actions. Yet we thought
always that we were doing our best.

We stood there beside the arcade, helplessly watching Frannie and Leela
disappear into smallness. Brett left me to guard the spot. He rushed
away; came back to tell me that the giant wading in the lake was gone,
that he could not find Martt or Zee.

For a time we watched the small pebble beneath which Leela and Frannie
had vanished. We even dared to move it carefully, but we could not see
them.

The island was emptying of its people. We thought that Martt and Zee
might have gone home. We decided to go and join them. Perhaps to take
our vehicle, make it small to search for Leela, since we had no drugs.

I told Brett of his father's death. And it was well advanced into the
morning before we learned that people on the island had seen Martt and
Zee sailing for Reaf. Hours during which we had aimlessly searched, and
prepared the vehicle for its trip into smallness to try and find Leela
and Frannie.

Martt and Zee had sailed for Reaf! Following the giant! We had thought
of doing that, to try and obtain the drugs. But it had seemed reckless,
foolhardy, impossible of success. Yet Martt had done it without
hesitation. There is a caution comes at thirty which does not hamper
twenty-one.

We procured a boat. Provisioned it. And sailed for Reaf, armed with our
flash-cylinders. And there we found a huge belt lying on the rocks
near a scattered wreck of buildings strewn upon the water.

Martt's belt, of a size which showed us he had used the drug! He had
left the belt to explain that he had gone on to the giant world.

But we were utterly helpless! We could not follow him. We were starting
aimlessly toward the river, when along the rocks there, we saw four
moving figures. Normal in size. Martt, returning with the three girls!
All of them tattered, bruised, blood-stained, their garments dirty and
torn. But unharmed.

They waved at us. We landed and ran along the rocks. Martt's smile was
tired, but very happy.

"Here they are, Brett. I brought them back--Zee and I did--here they
are." He added, "We had a headless thing named Eeff. It led us back,
but just now at the last, it ran away. It said it wanted to find Degg.
It ran, forgetting it needed the drugs. A half-witted, cowardly sort of
thing, but I liked it. Oh, there is so much to tell you----"

Deeds of youth! No caution, no pondering! Glorious deeds of youth,
unfettered by maturity! No theory--just accomplishment!

Frannie was saying to me, "Oh Frank----" I held out my hand, but she
flung herself upon me. "Frank, I--I've wanted so to get back to you!"

She clung to me. Her arms went around my neck. She was kissing me! Me,
Frank Elgon! Poor as a guider of the lower traffic, and just now proved
so inglorious of action. But Frannie was kissing me! And whispering,
"Oh, Frank, I love you! Don't you know it? Haven't you always known it?
You'd never say it to me. Please--please say it now!"

I murmured, "I love you, Frannie!" And held her close. That this could
happen to me, ineffectual Frank Elgon!


                                  II

Our last evening in Crescent. We were all going to the Earth--all
but old Greedo. Brett and Leela had decided to be married on Earth.
Frannie and I also, for Frannie did not seem to care how poor I was.
Greedo wanted to go; but he said he was too old. A visit to Earth for
his daughters, and then he hoped we would come back. Our last evening.
I chanced to go alone to the roof-top of Greedo's home. Its banks of
flowers were vivid in the twilight. A breeze rustled the tall potted
ferns. The stars overhead were glowing with a silver radiance, mirrored
in the distant, placid waters of the lake. Within the house downstairs,
Leela's softly singing voice floated up.

Two figures sat in the starlight, among the flowers. Zee and Martt;
close together, with his arm around her, and her head against his side,
the tangle of her dark hair enveloping him.

I heard him say, awkwardly but very tenderly, "Three couples can be
married at once, on Earth, Zee. Let's do that. Shall we?"

And heard her answering whisper, "Yes. Let's."

I tiptoed silently away.


                                THE END



*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GIANT WORLD ***


    

Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.

Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright
royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™
concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following
the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use
of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for
copies of this eBook, complying with the trademark license is very
easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation
of derivative works, reports, performances and research. Project
Gutenberg eBooks may be modified and printed and given away—you may
do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected
by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark
license, especially commercial redistribution.


START: FULL LICENSE

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE

PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK

To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
Project Gutenberg™ License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.

Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg™
electronic works

1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg™
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in your
possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
Project Gutenberg™ electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person
or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.

1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg™ electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works if you follow the terms of this
agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg™
electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.

1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works. Nearly all the individual
works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting
free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg™
works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
Project Gutenberg™ name associated with the work. You can easily
comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg™ License when
you share it without charge with others.

1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg™ work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.

1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:

1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg™ License must appear
prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg™ work (any work
on which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the
phrase “Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed,
performed, viewed, copied or distributed:

    This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
    other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
    whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
    of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
    at www.gutenberg.org. If you
    are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws
    of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
  
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg™ electronic work is
derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg™
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg™ electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg™ License for all works
posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
beginning of this work.

1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg™
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg™.

1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg™ License.

1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg™ work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
version posted on the official Project Gutenberg™ website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg™ License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.

1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg™ works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg™ electronic works
provided that:

    • You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
        the use of Project Gutenberg™ works calculated using the method
        you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
        to the owner of the Project Gutenberg™ trademark, but he has
        agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
        Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
        within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
        legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
        payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
        Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
        Section 4, “Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
        Literary Archive Foundation.”
    
    • You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
        you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
        does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™
        License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
        copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
        all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™
        works.
    
    • You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
        any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
        electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
        receipt of the work.
    
    • You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
        distribution of Project Gutenberg™ works.
    

1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work or group of works on different terms than
are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
from the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of
the Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set
forth in Section 3 below.

1.F.

1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.

1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right
of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.

1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
without further opportunities to fix the problem.

1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.

1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
remaining provisions.

1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
providing copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in
accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
or any Project Gutenberg™ work, (b) alteration, modification, or
additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg™ work, and (c) any
Defect you cause.

Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg™

Project Gutenberg™ is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.

Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg™’s
goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg™ collection will
remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
and permanent future for Project Gutenberg™ and future
generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.

Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation

The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
Revenue Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification
number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
U.S. federal laws and your state’s laws.

The Foundation’s business office is located at 809 North 1500 West,
Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up
to date contact information can be found at the Foundation’s website
and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact

Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation

Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without widespread
public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
status with the IRS.

The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.

While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.

International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.

Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.

Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg™ electronic works

Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
Gutenberg™ concept of a library of electronic works that could be
freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
distributed Project Gutenberg™ eBooks with only a loose network of
volunteer support.

Project Gutenberg™ eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.

Most people start at our website which has the main PG search
facility: www.gutenberg.org.

This website includes information about Project Gutenberg™,
including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.