by Don Wilcox
He hooked a foot under a root, leaned forward almost farther than he dared. They were right below him, about twenty-five feet down. The girl wasn’t screaming, now. She was stricken silent with terror.
The gang of eight closed in, bending for the kill. Their deadly horns were within seven feet—six feet—five—and they sprang!
Joe’s loop of rope fell true, over the girl’s head and shoulders, to tighten around her waist.
He hoisted. His new strength against the light Martian gravity was in his favor. He drew up. She screamed like mad. Her pursuers straightened. Who was this hornless man spoiling their game?
“A demon!” they cried in Martian. “A hornless one!”
The villagers, coming on the run, shouted and swore. Did they want to see her killed?
Joe hesitated. For a moment she hung high in the air, eighteen or twenty feet above her pursuers.
Then she took her fate in her own hand. With a violent twist of her head she slashed at the rope that held her. The central horn of her head was sharp like a knife blade.
She slashed with insane fury. She severed the rope and fell.
Joe, frozen with amazement, watched her descend.
“The horns!” he gasped.
She fell on them—three sets of sharp-pointed horns on the heads of three boys. Their pink tips speared clean through her body. She hung there and her scream died away.
Then their Martian shout broke out afresh. “A demon! A hornless one!”
CHAPTER VI
“Quick, Uncle! We’ve gotta get out!”
Joe’s shout was superfluous. Uncle Keller had seen everything. He had already snatched the binoculars. Now he grabbed the rope that Joe was about to discard, and joined Joe in flight.
With Martian gravity to help and any number of horned Martians to inspire them, they ran six times faster than the best dash record of Bellrap, U.S.A.
They headed eastward, toward that part of the forest where they had originally landed. For several minutes they couldn’t tell whether they were being pursued. They were above the long winding ledge, the Martians were below it. At every break along the way Joe expected to see dozens of horned men surging through to the upper level.
But, happily, his expectations were not fulfilled.
Thirty minutes later, in a deep, sheltered recess among the rocks, they stopped to catch their breath. They were not being followed, after all.
Why not?
Before they could catch their breath to talk it over they were frozen into silence by the sound of voices from somewhere beyond.
“Martian hangmen, most likely,” said Uncle Keller. He was scared white. Not that he considered Joe guilty of man-slaughter in the recent ordeal. The girl had caused her own death, of course. But when people shout, “Demon!” in a strange country you don’t feel like waiting around to argue your innocence.
“Hs-s-sh! There they are. By George! They’re hornless!”
Joe stared. The two men dressed in tan work clothes, were lazying in the sunshine on a table rock, halfway down the cliff, near a slow-burning fire. It was plain that they knew nothing of the recent incident of the girl, and cared less. They might have been camping here for days.
One of them was lying on his back, looking up at the steamy clouds with a contented, if somewhat evil, countenance. His face reminded Joe of a rabbit. The other, a huge tousled man with scarred hands, was leaning on one elbow, idly polishing something that looked like a Martian horn. Joe could have tossed a pebble between the two men.
“Come away,” Uncle Keller whispered.
“They, might be Americans. Listen! They’re speaking English—sort of.”
“Come away. You’re already up to your ears in trouble.”
Joe knew that. But he couldn’t help staring.
“I don’t like their faces,” Uncle Keller whispered.
“I don’t like their accent,” said Joe. “It’s like nothing I ever heard before.
“And they don’t have horns.”
Uncle Keller was becoming acclimated to the way of the Apple Forest, Joe observed. He was already more suspicious of persons who didn’t have horns than persons who did.
“I suppose you’re even suspicious of us,” said Joe sarcastically.
“Dern right. We’re outsiders. We got no business bein’ here. Much less, fallin’ in love with perty girls, or messin’ with savage murder parties.”
A ground squirrel, skipping along the top of the ledge, caused a small pebble to drop. It struck the iron kettle on the fire. Ping!
The tousled man with the scarred hands sprang up, thrusting the horn inside his shirt, and grabbed a small black pistol from his pocket. His eyes combed the cliff.
He growled, “I thought you was keepin’ watch.”
“I am,” said the rabbit faced one. “Put your artillery away.”
Joe, watching every move, was still too much confused by his own recent scare to analyze what was going on here. But Uncle Keller, more wary than ever, saw no good in these hornless men.
“I told you they was mischief makers,” Uncle Keller whispered. “Men don’t jump and grab their guns unless they’re expectin’ trouble.”
“But they do have horns!” Joe exclaimed under his breath. “Removable horns. See, over there by the wall.”
There were three sets of head and shoulder harnesses. The single horn which Scar Hands was polishing had been removed from one of these sets. From the tan color of each harness, and its head-and-shoulder-shaped contour, it was easy to guess that a set was to be worn as a deception. A hornless man thus might appear to be a native.
“Let’s stick around,” said Joe. “I want to see what these phonies are up to.”
“Three sets of horns and only two men,” said Uncle Keller. “Maybe they carry a spare.”
For the next hour Joe was torn between two courses of action. He wanted to steal down the cliff for better eavesdropping. He wanted to scout back to the cave to see if Donna had returned. But neither seemed safe, and Uncle Keller persuaded him to stay in his present hiding place.
Together they got one big earful. There was to be a festival soon. The people were only waiting for the popular Donna Londeen to return from some mysterious visit “Up North.”
They needed her approval—and her Uncle’s—before they gave the new young judge from “Up North” the authority to preside in this region.
Part of this discussion was carried on in such quiet voices that Joe couldn’t hear. Then, too, there were numerous mysterious allusions. The big man would speak in the Apple Forest language part of the time. Joe could understand a part of this. He had studied it on the ship and had caught its similarities to English.
The men fell into a dispute over the laws. Donna Londeen was involved.
One declared that she could be required to choose a husband at the Festival. The other said she couldn’t. They finally agreed that it depended on whether her uncle, Londeenoko, ran the festival or someone else.
“Anyway,” said Rabbit Face, “She will choose, this time. The people are gonna force her into it. She’s been runnin’ off to other lands and they’re afraid they’ll lose her.”
“I look for a fight if she does choose,” said Scar Hands. “These Horn Folks ain’t gonna like her choice.”
That remark shot through Joe like ice.
Hours later, with a new daylight dawning over the Apple Forest, Joe was in deep turmoil.
He and Uncle Keller had slipped back to their cave above the village, and he had slept—but feverishly.
“I’m in a devil of a stew,” he admitted. “I follow a girl through thousands of miles of space. Then she hides me here and walks off and forgets me. And now—”
“Now you’re actin’ like a chicken with its head off.”
“Now I hear that she’s got to choose a husband, and I know darned well who it will be.”
“Who?”
“That Venus Scientist she’s: always talking about.”
“How do you know?”
“From what those yeggs said yesterday. They said the people aren’t going to like her choice. That means she’s going to choose someone without horns. That must mean him.”
“Too bad,” said Uncle Keller. “She ought to choose someone with horns.”
Joe whirled angrily. “But I don’t have horns.”
“You figure she oughta choose you?”
“I didn’t come to Mars for the joyride.”
“Hmm.” Uncle Keller puffed at his wool-filled pipe. “If you married her, what do you figure your children would look like?”
“Do you have to bring that up?” Joe snarled.
“Can’t you just see those youngsters of yours goin’ to school an’ knockin’ the other kids down with their horns and scarin’ the teacher into the corner?”
“Shut up.”
“An’ when they git into high school they could play football. They’d be perty good at that—if they didn’t ram into the goal post.”
“Stop it!” Joe shouted.
“All right, you get sensible,” said Uncle Keller. “You and she are two different breeds of humans, an’ if you start mixin’ up its gonna get complicated.”
Joe slept some more, and dreamt.
When he awoke, Donna Londeen stood before him.
CHAPTER VII
“Hello, Mr. Earth Man,” said Donna, smiling. Her face was radiant, catching the pink sunlight. The flowing silky gauntlets rustled at her wrists as she reached her hand out to him. But he didn’t notice.
“Am I dreaming?” he said, coming slowly to his feet.
“You were sleeping very soundly,” said Donna. “I hated to disturb you, but I have only a few minutes to talk to you.”
He was conscious that his hair was tousled and his clothes were unpressed from being slept in. Hotel accommodations in this cave were nothing to brag about. Here was his chance to complain to the management.
“You don’t by any chance have a cave with hot and cold running water and a mattress, do you?”
At a small pool of water among the rocks near the cave entrance, he washed. She watched him as he combed his blonde hair.
“The Earth Man is good to look at,” she said. “Does he ever smile? What is the matter, Joe?”
Again she offered her hand to him. This time he took it, and they walked back to-the cave together.
“Where did Uncle Keller go?” he asked.
“Out to get more naggie wool for his pipe. He is such a funny creature. When I lived at his house on the Earth, he and his wife were very friendly to me. They were the first Earth people I ever knew and they taught me so much. I will always like Earth people when I think of them.”
They sat down together. Joe avoided her smiling eyes.
“I didn’t think you liked Earth people,” he said. “I thought you preferred Venus people.”
“You are in a very strange mood,” said Donna. “Is it because your cave does not have a barber shop and a swimming pool? After I have gone you may walk to the river and have a swim. Then you will feel better.”
“I don’t dare. I can’t cross the village without being seen.”
“Today there is no one in the village,” said Donna. “Everyone has gone to the Festival, three miles down the river.”
“Festival!” Joe perked up. “That’s my chance to present the cup-oh-oh!” He stopped, crestfallen. The Festival of the Horn Folk that would be the occasion those two yeggs were talking about, where Donna would be forced to choose her husband.
“What is the matter, Joe?” She placed a hand on his shoulder.
He turned toward Donna, clutched her bare shoulders with a savage impulse that he thought was jealousy. He wanted to crush her. Then he was kissing her, and for a long moment his head swam with the pleasure of knowing her lips, of finding their answer to his own. She did not draw away from him, and when he looked into her eyes; her pretty face was serious.
“I’m crazy about you, Donna,” he whispered tensely. “I’ve been half mad about you since the first time I saw you. You must have known. That’s why I wouldn’t let you get away from me. That’s why I came here . . . Say something, Donna. Don’t just stare at me that way.”
He was holding her close. As if in answer to his words, she bowed her head slowly against his chest. The three horns of her head brushed gently across his face. She bowed deeper until the sharp points stroked under his chin, to press against his throat.
Was that her answer to his feverish declaration of love?
She moved away from him slowly. She rose to stand like a goddess, her majestic head high, her firm breasts outlined within the close fitting stripes of her brief costume.
“After the Festival is over,” she said softly, “I may be able to take you and Uncle Keller back to your homes. I cannot promise now. It depends.”
It depends Joe breathed hard. So she did not know whom she would marry! Or did she mean that she and her future husband were undecided whether to go to the Earth on their honeymoon?
“I assume,” she added, “that you will want to go back soon?”
He looked at her sharply. Had she already heard of his ill-fated effort to rescue the screaming girl?
She took her leave again, to hurry away to the Festival. He called to Uncle Keller. This time they would not stay and wait. They would follow!
The festival grounds were under tall trees, well spaced, with trimmed trunks. The wide arm of branches formed a high ceiling of lush green foliage.
Joe and Uncle Keller followed a winding ravine to avoid the crowds.
“I never figured you’d dare walk this close to danger,” said Uncle Keller. “What did she say when you told her about the girl and the rope?”
“I never told her,” Joe admitted. “It’s something I want to forget. Do you think it’ll fly back in my face the first time I meet someone?”
“I think Donna would have warned you to skip the country.”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” said Joe, “And I don’t want to miss the Festival. Especially if she chooses.”
“Ugh. I hope you ain’t got any ideas.”
“I just want to see what the bird looks like that can walk off with her.”
The very young boys with half developed horns were chasing around an arena, warming up for this game. Through a thicket Joe and Uncle Keller could see the whole arena.
The judge was there, on an elevated platform built between tree trunks. He and Londeenoko stood glaring at each other, snarling.
The judge had come to run the festival, and Londeenoko challenged his right to do it.
Their quarrel drew a crowd. Everyone in Donna’s village knew that Londeenoko, a thick, crusty sharp mustached old gentleman with seven reddish horns, was bombastic enough to knock the young judge off the stage if he didn’t like the way things went.
But the young judge was a stubborn number. He had the greater advantage. The office of judge carried great esteem.
Molar wore the customary green face paint and a bold-striped judge’s robe.
His judgelike dignity and charm captivated many. Although he was a newcomer among their people, having come from “Up North,” he seemed well on his way to being accepted as their new leader.
The former judge had been Donna’s late father. His administration of justice had won great popularity. Now his surviving brother, Londeenoko, was reluctant to accept this young upstart, Mobar, as a worthy successor.
“Give him a chance,” people kept shouting from the crowd.
Londeenoko was at last forced to bow to pressure. He was the father of nineteen children, the grandfather of an uncounted number of grandchildren. This tribe knew how to band together against the crusty old man’s will. It had become their habit to consider, as a matter of course, that he was in the wrong whenever he got into an argument.
“I concede the power to Mobar,” Londeenoko called out at last. “Never before have we accepted a judge from Up North. But I refuse t
o be accused of being so prejudiced in favor of my brother that I cannot accept another judge. Let us give Mobar a chance.”
The crowd cheered with a weird, half laughing, “Yo-yo-yo-yo!”
Then the two men on the elevated platform gave the sign of friendship. Each in turn bowed to the other, touching his sharp horns against the other’s chest gently, thus proving that all feeling of malice were set aside.
It was Mobar’s turn to speak. Joe, watching from his hiding place, could not read the young judge’s expression. The squares of green paint over that dignitary’s face were a part of his official protection.
“I wish to honor the brother of the late judge.” With his robed arm he made a gracious gesture toward Londeenoko. “I hereby appoint him my assistant, and ask him to take over the active management of this Festival.”
It was a clever stroke, almost sly in its psychological effect. Londeenoko took a deep proud breath and held his head high. His tribal relatives who had just thrown him overboard in favor of this newcomer could see, now, that he was still a big and important man. He would remain on the stage to run the Festival.
“If at any time you need any assistance in making decisions,” the young judge added in his precise Martian tongue, “my judgment is at your service.”
This took a little wind out of Londeenoko’s sails. But he gave a gruff laugh to treat it as a joke.
Then a messenger arrived with a call for the judge to come elsewhere. The judge frowned as the message was whispered to him. He bowed to the crowd and excused himself.
“I shall leave you temporarily,” he said. “A matter beyond the next village requires my attention.”
Joe, watching everything through the thicket, went tense. “Did you hear that, Uncle?”
“I heard, but I didn’t get it. What’s up?”
“I’m not dead certain, but I think they’re on our trail.”
“On account of that girl you didn’t rescue, Uncle Keller grunted. “I dunno what we’ve got ourselves into, but I figure that act of kindness is gonna cost us.”
Donna had joined the crowd, and wherever she went people greeted her and told her they had missed her. They wished her father could still be here, running the show as he used to do. And some of them would say, “I am sure you will make your choice this season.”
