Part 21 (1/2)

”As near as I can learn from his sign language and a dozen words, this is about as good a spot as we can find. He says the ape-men never cross the big divide; something spooky about it I judged. However, we must remember this: the fact that Towahg came across shows that the rest of them would if they found it could be done.”

”That was why he led us so far while we waded up that stream,” offered Diane. ”Trailing Towahg would be like trying to follow the wake of an airs.h.i.+p.”

”And I asked him about the red vampires that jumped us down by the s.h.i.+p,” Chet continued. ”He gave me the clear sign on that, too.”

Diane was not anxious for more wanderings, as Chet could see. ”There is game here,” she suggested, ”and the edge of the jungle is simply an orchard of fruit, as you know. And having a lake to bathe in is important--oh, I must not try to influence you. We must do what is best.”

”No,” said Chet, ”our own wishes don't count; the s.h.i.+p's the deciding factor. You had better build your house here, Walt. Happy Valley will be headquarters for the expedition; we've got a whale of a lot of country to explore. And, of course, we will slip back and check up on Schwartzmann; find out where he went to--”

”Count me out;” Harkness interrupted; ”count me out. You go and hunt trouble if you want to; Diane and I will have our hands full right here.

Great heavens, man! We've got to learn to make clothes; and, by the way, that uniform you're wearing is no credit to your tailor. If we are to call this home, we must do better than the savages. I intend to find some bamboo, split it, make some troughs, and bring water down here from the spring. I've got to learn where Kreiss is getting his metal and find some soft enough to hammer into dishes. We can't call the department store by radiophone, you know, and have them shoot a bunch of stuff out by pneumatic tube.”

”That's all right,” Chet mocked; ”by the time you have built a house with only a stone ax in your tool kit, you'll think the rest of it is simple.”

The barricade, or _chevaux de frise_ as Chet insisted upon calling it, to show his deep study of the wars of earlier days, was built in the form of a U. The knoll itself sloped on one side directly to the water's edge: they had left that side open and carried their line of sharp stakes down to the water, that in the event of a siege they would not be conquered by thirst.

On the highest point of the knoll, some few weeks later, a house was being built--a more pretentious structure, this, than the other little huts. The aerial roots that the white trees dropped from their high-flung branches were not impossible to cut with their crude implements; they made good building material for a house whose framework must be tied together with vines and tough roots. This would be the home of Harkness and Diane.

The two had been insistent that this structure would be incomplete without a room for Chet, but the pilot only laughed at that suggestion.

”It's an old saying,” he told them, ”that one house isn't big enough for two families. I think the remark is as old as the inst.i.tution of marriage, just about. And it's as true on the Dark Moon as it is on Earth. And, besides, I intend to build some bachelor apartments that will make this place of yours look pretty cheap, that is, if I ever find time. I am going to be pretty busy just roaming around this little world seeing what I can see. Even Herr Kreiss has got the wanderl.u.s.t, you will notice.”

”He has been gone four days,” said Diane. Her tone was frankly worried.

Chet finished tying a sapling to a row of uprights and slid to the ground.

”Don't be alarmed about Kreiss,” he rea.s.sured her. ”He has been all-fired mysterious for the past several weeks. He's been working on something in that cave of his, and visitors have not been admitted. When he left he told me he would be gone for some time, and he looked at me like an owl when he said it: his mysterious secret was making his eyes pop out. He has a surprise up his sleeve.”

”Wedding present for Diane,” Harkness suggested.

”Well, he showed me some darn nice sapphires,” Chet agreed. ”Probably found some way to cut them and he's setting them in a bracelet of soft gold: that's my guess.”

”I wish he were here,” Diane insisted.

And Chet nodded across the clearing as he said fervently: ”I wish I could get all my wishes as quickly as that. There he comes now with his bow in one hand and a bag of something in the other.”

The tall figure moved wearily across the open ground, but straightened and came briskly toward them as he drew near. He seemed more gaunt than usual, as if he had finished a long journey and had slept but little.

But his eyes behind their heavy spectacles were big with pride.

”You have--what do you Americans say?--'poked fun' at my helplessness in the forest,” he told Chet. ”And now see. Alone and without help I have made a great journey, a most important journey.” He held up a bladder, translucent, filled with something palely green.

”The gas!” he said proudly.