The Mad Planet Page 2

marked with the black and odorous formic acid exudedfrom the bodies of their comrades. Burl waited until they had passed,then went on.

  He came to the bank of the river. Green scum covered a great deal of itssurface, scum occasionally broken by a slowly enlarging bubble of somegas released from decomposing matter on the bottom. In the center of theplacid stream the current ran a little more swiftly, and the wateritself was visible.

  Over the shining current, water-spiders ran swiftly. They had not sharedin the general increase of size that had taken place in the insectworld. Depending upon the capillary qualities of the water to supportthem, an increase in size and weight would have deprived them of themeans of locomotion.

  From the spot where Burl first peered at the water the green scum spreadout for many yards into the stream. He could not see what swam andwriggled and crawled beneath the evil-smelling covering. He peered upand down the banks.

  Perhaps a hundred and fifty yards below, the current came near theshore. An outcropping of rock there made a steep descent to the river,from which yellow shelf-fungi stretched out. Dark red and orange above,they were light yellow below, and they formed a series of platformsabove the smoothly flowing stream. Burl made his way cautiously towardthem.

  On his way he saw one of the edible mushrooms that formed so large apart of his diet, and paused to break from the flabby flesh an amountthat would feed him for many days. It was too often the custom of hispeople to find a store of food, carry it to their hiding place, and thengorge themselves for days, eating, sleeping, and waking only to eatagain until the food was gone.

  Absorbed as he was in his plan of trying his new weapon, Burl wastempted to return with his booty. He would give Saya of this food, andthey would eat together. Saya was the maiden who roused unusual emotionsin Burl. He felt strange impulses stirring within him when she was near,a desire to touch her, to caress her. He did not understand.

  He went on, after hesitating. If he brought her food, Saya would bepleased, but if he brought her of the things that swam in the stream,she would be still more pleased. Degraded as his tribe had become, Burlwas yet a little more intelligent than they. He was an atavism, athrowback to ancestors who had cultivated the earth and subjugated itsanimals. He had a vague idea of pride, unformed but potent.

  No man within memory had hunted or slain for food. They knew of meat,yes, but it had been the fragments left by an insect hunter, seized andcarried away by the men before the perpetually alert ant colonies hadsent their foragers to the scene.

  If Burl did what no man before him had done, if he brought a wholecarcass to his tribe, they would envy him. They were preoccupied solelywith their stomachs, and after that with the preservation of theirlives. The perpetuation of the race came third in their consideration.

  They were herded together in a leaderless group, coming to the samehiding place that they might share in the finds of the lucky and gathercomfort from their numbers. Of weapons, they had none. They sometimesused stones to crack open the limbs of the huge insects they foundpartly devoured, cracking them open for the sweet meat to be foundinside, but they sought safety from their enemies solely in flight andhiding.

  Their enemies were not as numerous as might have been imagined. Most ofthe meat-eating insects have their allotted prey. The sphex--a huntingwasp--feeds solely upon grasshoppers. Others wasps eat flies only. Thepirate-bee eats bumblebees only. Spiders were the principal enemies ofman, as they devour with a terrifying impartiality all that falls intotheir clutches.

  Burl reached the spot from which he might gaze down into the water. Helay prostrate, staring into the shallow depths. Once a huge crayfish, aslong as Burl's body, moved leisurely across his vision. Small fishes andeven the huge newts fled before the voracious creature.

  After a long time the tide of underwater life resumed its activity. Thewriggling grubs of the dragonflies reappeared. Little flecks of silverswam into view--a school of tiny fish. A larger fish appeared, movingslowly through the water.

  Burl's eyes glistened and his mouth watered. He reached down with hislong weapon. It barely touched the water. Disappointment filled him, yetthe nearness and the apparent practicability of his scheme spurred himon.

  He considered the situation. There were the shelf-fungi below him. Herose and moved to a point just above them, then thrust his spear down.They resisted its point. Burl felt them tentatively with his foot, thendared to thrust his weight to them. They held him firmly. He clambereddown and lay flat upon them, peering over the edge as before.

  The large fish, as long as Burl's arm, swam slowly to and fro below him.Burl had seen the former owner of his spear strive to thrust it into hisopponents, and knew that a thrust was necessary. He had tried his weaponupon toadstools--had practiced with it. When the fish swam below him, hethrust sharply downward. The spear seemed to bend when it entered thewater, and missed its mark by inches, to Burl's astonishment. He triedagain and again.

  He grew angry with the fish below him for eluding his efforts to killit. Repeated strokes had left it untouched, and it was unwary, and didnot even try to run away.

  Burl became furious. The big fish came to rest directly beneath hishand. Burl thrust downward with all his strength. This time the spear,entering vertically, did not seem to bend. It went straight down. Itspoint penetrated the scales of the swimmer below, transfixing that lazyfish completely.

  An uproar began. The fish, struggling to escape, and Burl, trying todraw it up to his perch, made a huge commotion. In his excitement Burldid not observe a tiny ripple some distance away. The monster crayfishwas attracted by the disturbance, and was approaching.

  The unequal combat continued. Burl hung on desperately to the end of hisspear. Then there was a tremor in Burl's support, it gave way, and fellinto the stream with a mighty splash. Burl went under, his eyes open,facing death. And as he sank, his wide-open eyes saw waved before himthe gaping claws of the huge crayfish, large enough to sever a limb witha single stroke of their jagged jaws.

  * * * * *

  He opened his mouth to scream--a replica of the terrible screams of hisgrandfather, seized by a black-bellied tarantula years before--but nosound came forth. Only bubbles floated to the surface of the water. Hebeat the unresisting fluid with his hands--he did not know how to swim.The colossal creature approached leisurely, while Burl struggledhelplessly.

  His arms struck a solid object, and grasped it convulsively. A secondlater he had swung it between himself and the huge crustacean. He felt ashock as the mighty jaws closed upon the corklike fungus, then felthimself drawn upward as the crayfish released his hold and theshelf-fungus floated to the surface. Having given way beneath him, ithad been carried below him in his fall, only to rise within his reachjust when most needed.

  Burl's head popped above water and he saw a larger bit of the fungusfloating near by. Less securely anchored to the rocks of the river bankthan the shelf to which Burl had trusted himself, it had been dislodgedwhen the first shelf gave way. It was larger than the fragment to whichBurl clung, and floated higher in the water.

  Burl was cool with a terrible self-possession. He seized it andstruggled to draw himself on top of it. It tilted as his weight cameupon it, and nearly overturned, but he paid no heed. With desperatehaste, he clawed with hands and feet until he could draw himself clearof the water, of which he would forever retain a slight fear.

  As he pulled himself upon the furry, orange-brown upper surface, a sharpblow struck his foot. The crayfish, disgusted at finding only what wasto it a tasteless morsel in the shelf-fungus, had made a languid strokeat Burl's wriggling foot in the water. Failing to grasp the fleshymember, the crayfish retreated, disgruntled and annoyed.

  And Burl floated downstream, perched, weaponless and alone, frightenedand in constant danger, upon a flimsy raft composed of a degeneratefungus floating soggily in the water. He floated slowly down the streamof a river in whose waters death lurked unseen, upon whose banks wasperil, and above whose reaches danger flutt
ered on golden wings.

  It was a long time before he recovered his self-possession, and when hedid he looked first for his spear. It was floating in the water, stilltransfixing the fish whose capture had endangered Burl's life. The fishnow floated with its belly upward, all life gone.

  So insistent was Burl's instinct for food that his predicament wasforgotten when he saw his prey just out of his reach. He gazed at it,and his mouth watered, while his cranky craft went downstream, spinningslowly in the current. He lay flat on the floating fungoid, and stroveto reach out and grasp the end of the spear.

  The raft tilted and nearly flung him overboard again. A little later hediscovered that it sank more readily on one side than on the other. Thatwas due, of course, to the greater thickness--and consequently greaterbuoyancy--of the part which had grown next the rocks of the river bank.

  Burl found that if he lay with his head stretching above that side, itdid not sink into the water. He wriggled into this new position, then,and waited until the slow