Part 10 (1/2)

We heard her small voice.

”What do you want me to do?”

”Stand quiet. Now I put my hand for you.”

His monstrous hand bristled with a thatch of heavy black hair. He slid it carefully along the cus.h.i.+on. Babs was barely the length of one of its finger joints. She climbed upon its palm.

”That iss right, Babs. Now I bring you--hold tight to my finger. Here, I crook the little one. Fling your arms around it.”

With a swoop his hand took her aloft and away. Then we saw her, twenty feet or so in the air, still on his hand as he held it near his face.

”Now we haf a little talk, Babs. When we get to the island, I put you back in your cage.”

I had a sudden flash of realization. There was something I could do. I know now my judgment was bad. I recall it struck me that Alan would want to do it also. And, perhaps, even Glora. But that wouldn't work. My chances, however desperate, were better alone. Glora and Alan--in our present size--could doubtless disembark safely. Glora knew the layout of the island. And she could follow Polter.

Alan and Glora were standing beside me peering over that billowing cus.h.i.+on spread toward the distant giant palm with Babs standing upon it.

I gripped Alan's shoulder.

”See here, Alan,” I whispered vehemently: ”What ever happens, we must follow Polter. Glora knows the way. Some opportunity will come to get large without being discovered. Then we'll rush Polter!”

Alan's white face turned to me. ”Yes, that's what we're planning. But George, here on this boat--”

”Of course not. Can't do it here. Tell Glora, to be sure to follow Polter. Whatever happens, you'll think of nothing else: you won't will you?”

”George, what--”

”We've got to make some opportunity.” I was trembling inside, fearful that Alan would be suspicious of me. Yet I had to make sure that he and Glora would stay as close to Polter as possible.

”All right,” Alan agreed. ”Listen to them.”

Polter was talking to Babs. But I didn't hear the words I moved a trifle away. Rash decision! I hardly decided anything. There was only the vision of Babs before me and my love for her. My desperate need of doing something; getting to her, seeing her, being with her. I wanted her near my own size again as though the blessed normality of that would rationalize and lessen her danger. If only I had been less ras.h.!.+ If only back there in that tunnel I had stopped to see what it was my foot kicked against!

I slid away. Alan and Glora did not notice it; they were whispering together and gazing over the cus.h.i.+on at Babs. In the shadow of the cus.h.i.+on I moved some ten feet. On the undulating top of the cus.h.i.+on the little golden cage stood with its lattice door open. It was a few feet from my face.

I fumbled at my belt for the diminis.h.i.+ng vial. I found one pellet left.

Well, that would be enough. I was hurried. Alan might discover me.

Polter might put Babs back in the cage and close its door. We might be near the island already, and the confusion, the activity of disembarking would defeat me. A thousand things might happen.

I touched the pellet to my tongue. In a few seconds the drug action had come and pa.s.sed. The cus.h.i.+on top loomed well over my head. The side was a ridged, indescribably unnatural vista of cliff wall. The fabric was coa.r.s.e with hairy strands, dented into little ravines and crevices. I climbed and I came panting to the pillow surface. The golden cage was six or eight feet away and was now two feet high.

Again I touched the drug to my tongue; held it an instant. The cage drew away; grew to a normal six-foot height; then larger, until in a moment it stopped. I stood peering at it, trying to gauge its size in relation to me. I wanted so intensely now to appear normal in Babs' eyes. The cage seemed about ten feet high. A little less, possibly. I barely tasted the pellet, and replaced it carefully in the vial. I could only hope its efficacy would be preserved.

I had to chance that I wouldn't be seen while crossing this billowy expanse. I ran. The rope strands of the fabric now had s.p.a.ces between their curving surfaces. The cage was a s.h.i.+ning golden house, set on this wide rolling area. Far in the distance there was a blur--Polter's reclining body.

I reached the cage. It was a room about ten feet square and equally as high. Walled solid, top and bottom, and on three sides. The front was a lattice of bars, with a narrow six-foot doorway, standing open now.

I dashed in. The interior was not wholly bare. There was a metal-wrought couch fastened to the wall, with a railing around it and handles. It suggested a s.h.i.+p's bunk. There was a railing at convenient height all around the wall.

I sought a hiding place. I saw just one--under the couch. It was secluded enough. There was a grillelike lattice extending down from the seat to the floor. I squeezed under one end, and lay wedged behind the grille.