“Okay,” Barry snapped. “Lead on.”
He grabbed two of the bird-girls weapons from the floor and taking Linda by the arm strode after the professor and McGregor . . .
BARRY broke the trail through the jungle, using the curved sword as a jungle knife to hack a path through the thick rope-thick trailers and underbrush. Linda followed him, then the professor and Allerton, who had come around shortly after they left the arena, with McGregor bringing up the rear.
It was a tense silent party. Two hours in the black brooding jungle was enough to try the toughest nerves, but their desperate anxiety was not the prowling carnivora, but the two-legged beasts who trailed them.
Suddenly Barry stopped and swung around.
“Don’t make a sound,” he whispered.
For a moment the jungle silence enveloped them, oppressive and evil.
Then, far to their rear, they heard the sudden shrill shriek of a frightened bird.
“They’re still following,” McGregor muttered.
“They’ll follow until they get us,” Barry said grimly. “They’re gaining steadily. They’re following our trail which makes it easier for them.”
He turned to Linda and the professor.
“I told you once I’d expect obedience on this trip. I want you two to go on ahead. McGregor and I will drop back and fight a rear guard, delaying action. It’s the only chance of any of us getting through this thing.”
“But, Barry,” Linda protested, “You—”
“No arguments,” he said quietly. “You’ll have to do as you’re told.”
“What about me?” Allerton said uneasily.
Barry’s jaw hardened fleetingly. Then he shrugged.
“You go on with Linda and her father. They’ll need protection.”
McGregor snorted disdainfully.
“Fine lot of protection he’d—”
“Mac!” Barry snapped. “That’s all of that. No more talk now.”
Linda looked at him for an instant, tears in her eyes, then she turned and followed Allerton and her father. Soon the jungle swallowed all but the faint noise of their passage.
“Swell spot for us,” McGregor grumbled.
Barry grinned. “I know you better than that, Mac,” he said. “You love this and don’t try and deny it.”
“Well, what’s our program?” McGregor asked.
Barry explained. “I don’t believe there’s a large band following us. Not enough noise. Possibly there are only two or three able to travel. We’ll ambush them as they pass by us. They won’t be expecting a battle and we’ll have the advantage of surprise.”
“Sounds kind of interesting,” the big Scotchman said grimly. “I’m anxious to get a decent crack at these apes.”
Without any more talk they concealed themselves in the dense underbrush that lined the path they had made. Barry’s hands tightened on the handle of the sword he carried. McGregor was similarly armed, but such weapons might be pitifully ineffective against the brute strength and animal cunning of the cave men they were to attack.
They did not have long to wait. Within fifteen minutes the normal noises of the jungle faded away and soon they heard the tramp of feet and the rustle of great bodies against the jungle foliage.
Peering through the screen of underbrush Barry soon saw the figures of three of the Cor-Magnon creatures padding along the trail. In the lead was the giant brute who carried the blazing stone in his club. Barry felt a chill of premonition as he saw this gleaming weapon resting on the shoulder of the massive leader.
In the moonlight he could see the smooth play of mighty muscles and see the rise and fall of cavernous chests, and he could see the expressions of vindictive rage and lust that were stamped on the coarse thick features of the cave men.
His jaw hardened grimly. Linda’s life might depend on what happened in the next few moments.
THEN the moments of cramped waiting were over. The swiftly striding cave men were within six feet of them now and in an instant they would pass between them.
Barry took a death grip on the haft of his sword and then the muscles of his legs uncoiled like powerful steel hurling him at the massive leader.
The advantage of surprise was his, and it was a decisive one. His slashing sword, in one blow, nearly decapitated the massive creature who carried the exploding stone weapon.
Almost without a sound the leader of the small group staggered back, blood pouring from his neck. He pitched to the ground and the weapon he carried exploded with a blinding flash as it struck the hard earth.
Spinning quickly he saw that McGregor had had the same success with the creature he had attacked. But the third and surviving member of the horde was already leaping at Barry, face twisted in terrible rage, his massive club swinging in a powerful arc.
Barry sprang back, but a trailing vine caught his heel and slammed him to the ground as the cave man leaped forward.
The club was descending in a mighty circle when McGregor sprang at the savage. The blow, intended for Barry, caught him on the side of the head with a sickening wet crunch.
Barry was on his feet before the snarling cave man could wield the club again. He dodged a devastating swipe, then stepped in swiftly, his sword plunging home with a savage thrust that froze an expression of amazed agony on the bestial features of the massive cave creature.
Before the man sprawled to the ground, Barry was at McGregor’s side, holding his head in his arms. The red of his hair was stained with a deeper red, and his face was pinched with pain.
But he smiled, faintly, weakly, but still a smile.
“I always had the hardest head,” he gasped. “That—blow would have knocked you cold, but—it didn’t hurt me a bit.”
“Sure, sure,” Barry said softly. “You’re okay.”
“No I’m not,” the big Scotchman said painfully. “I wouldn’t lie to you Barry, you know that. I’m done in.”
“Don’t be a fool,” Barry said desperately. “We’re only a mile or so from the professor’s time-ship. He gave me the location. I can get you there in no time.”
McGregor gripped his arm.
“Can’t go to the professor’s ship,” he gasped. “Listen to me Barry. Somethin’ funny there. Meant to tell you before now.”
“Don’t try and talk,” Barry said softly. It was all he could do to keep his voice even, for he knew that the big Scotchman was on his last safari.
“Gotta talk,” McGregor gasped stubbornly. “The professor’s time-ship hasn’t enough entropy juice to make a return trip. Only had enough to get here. Not enough to take it back. Some damn fool drained the tank of return trip fuel. Don’t go there. Head for our ship. It’s the only way you can get back. Sorry I can’t go back with you Barry.”
The big hand on Barry’s arm tightened for an instant, then fell away. Barry looked down into his friend’s peaceful, still smiling face, and a single sob shook his shoulders.
For a long moment he knelt there silently, then he rose to his feet. The gleaming, fiery stone weapon was a bright glow against the darkness of the ground. He picked it up gingerly, careful to handle it by the wooden club end, then he checked his compass and without a backward glance struck off into the jungle. . .
SPEED . . . Speed . . . Speed. The single word seemed burned in his brain as he plowed frantically through the clinging underbrush.
McGregor’s dying revelation acted as a whip lashing him on and on and on.
Not enough entropy juice to take the ship back . . .
Then Linda’s words:
. . . Father left the last check-up to Bruce . . .
It was all so suddenly and terribly clear. Allerton, driven by greed and a desire to dominate completely the company he and the professor had formed, had obviously decided to eliminate the old man by marooning him in time. Entrusted with the job of checking over the professor’s ship, he had deliberately drained an entropy tank, consigning the professor and his companion, to a one way ticket to oblivion. Now, he
was alone with Linda and her father, heading surely for the large ship, which he would know was the only one able to make the return trip. Unsuspecting, the professor and Linda too, were in the gravest danger.
Speed . . . Speed . . . Speed.
The word burned into his brain.
Sobbing for breath, he fought desperately through the dense undergrowth, hacking like a madman at the trailers and vines that entangled him. An eternity passed . . .
It was another hour before he reached the clearing where they had originally landed. With a prayer of thankfulness he saw the slender shimmering shape of the time-ship through the darkness of the night. There still might be time.
Then he heard the shout. It was a thin wavering cry of angry helplessness.
Staggering with weariness he broke into the clearing and by the pale illumination of the moon he saw two figures locked in fierce combat alongside the ship.
Even in that light he recognized Bruce Allerton and Professor Carstairs. The professor was hanging desperately to Allerton, but with an oath, the larger man swung the professor’s slight figure from him and struck him heavily in the face. The professor fell awkwardly to the ground and did not rise.
Allerton wheeled then, as if warned by a sixth sense, and faced Barry. The wheat colored hair hung in his blazing eyes and his chest rose and fell heavily with every gasp.
“You!” he snarled. There was a black hate and bitterness in the way he ground out the word. “You won’t stop me. No one will!”
With an inarticulate bellow he sprang at Barry.
Barry’s exhausted body rose to meet this final test. He lifted the brilliantly gleaming stone weapon he was still holding and swung it at Allerton’s charging figure. But he overestimated his strength.
The club slipped futilely from his nerveless, limp fingers and dropped to the ground. Oddly, the handle jammed in a crevice in the earth, and the club head of flashing stone did not touch the ground.
Allerton slewed to a stop, a gloating smile on his face.
“Thanks for the weapon,” he said mockingly.
He bent swiftly and grabbed the hammer by the head.
It was the last thing he ever did. The roaring explosion lifted him off his feet and hurled him backwards a dozen feet through the air. When his eyes cleared after the blinding detonation, and the acrid smoke settled, Barry stumbled to the professor’s prone figure. With the last of his waning strength he lifted him in his arms and carried him into the time-ship.
Linda was stretched out on a cot and there was a small bruise above her temple, but she was breathing evenly.
The professor opened his eyes as Barry eased him into a chair.
“Your arrival was most opportune,” he said heavily. “That fiend planned to leave us here and take Linda back with him. My boy, you have more than saved my life. You have saved everything in life that is dear to me.”
Barry looked at Linda’s pale lovely features and smiled.
“Maybe I had a selfish motive,” he said.
The professor regarded him for an instant and there was a hint of the customary twinkle in his keen blue eyes. He nodded his head slowly. “I see,” he said, “I see.”
Linda stirred slightly then and Barry dropped to his knees beside the cot. When she opened her eyes he was smiling. “Everything is all right,” he whispered. “Don’t try to speak now.”
The professor set the controls and mechanism for the return trip, but before he made the final adjustment, Barry swung around to him. “Aren’t you forgetting something?” he asked. The professor looked at him blankly. “No. Why?”
“What about your mission here?”
“Oh!” the professor nodded, “You refer to my search for the hammer of Thor—the hammer weapon of the cave people is the legendary hammer.”
“Well,” Barry said, “aren’t you going to take it back with you?”
“Oh that won’t be necessary,” the professor was absorbedly tinkering with the intricate mechanism of the ship. “You see, there was no problem of synthetic energy in the action of the explosive hammer. It was simply a highly magnetized rock which released an electrical charge when grounded. That ended my interest in the matter. I have another problem facing me now. It has to do with the entropy zone movement of time travel. I must get back and get to work on it.”
A frown settled over his forehead as he leaned nearer the control board of the ship. It was obvious that he had forgotten everything else.
Linda squeezed Barry’s hand.
“Do you think,” she said, “that you can stand a research scientist for a father-in-law?”
Barry looked down at her solemnly. “It’s a lot to ask,” he said, “but you almost balance things up. Notice I say ‘almost’.”
He slipped his arm about her shoulders as the professor engaged the master switch. “We’re on our way,” he said quietly.
“Together,” she whispered.
DUNCAN’S DREADFUL DOLL
First published in the July 1942 issue of Fantastic Adventures.
Duncan Digit found it was extremely necessary to see that no harm came to the doll, because what happened to it happened to him. Then he lost it—and things happened!
DUNCAN DIGIT was a tall, amiable young man with an immense capacity for Scotch whisky and an equally immense capacity for making a fool of himself on any and all occasions.
Perhaps he had other qualifications but no one had ever noticed their existence. If such qualities did exist they were dwarfed by his two more prominent characteristics.
At the present moment he was displaying these two major idiosyncrasies to the crowd that thronged about his night club table.
With a wide smile, that had a fixed frozen quality, he raised his glass in an unsteady gesture.
“Eat, drink and be merry,” he chirruped gaily, “for tomorrow I die.”
The blonde at his right hiccoughed apprehensively but Duncan regarded her solemnly.
“Ish truth,” he assured her mournfully. Over the din provided by the exceedingly brassy band, he repeated sadly, “tomorrow I die. My dear aunt ish arriving tomorrow to cut me out of her will. Like that!”
With an emphatic gesture, he brought the edge of his palm down on the table. A glass toppled and spilled. Scotch dribbled to the floor. Duncan watched this waste sadly.
“Ish shame,” he muttered. “Tomorrow I die.”
In spite of Duncan’s state of mind, everyone else at the small, crowded night club seemed to be in high spirits. Liquor flowed merrily and the babel of voices was frenziedly gay.
The only other person who seemed to share Duncan’s melancholy was a wrinkled, ragged Gypsy who stood in one corner of the room and moodily observed the festivities. On her fat brown arms a dozen charm bracelets clinked together as she moved, and a red and white bandana was draped over her dark greasy hair.
Madam Pilar had every right to be unhappy. She had to spend six nights a week in the hot, airless, smoke-filled club, and that was enough to make anyone unhappy.
SHE worked at the club as a fortune teller and seer, and since the fortunes of the crowd were invariably not worth telling, the job was very dull.
Disconsolately she moved about the room and finally stopped before Duncan’s table.
He looked up and blinked drowsily. Then he shook his head and took another gulp from his drink.
“Ish better than pink elephants,” he muttered philosophically. Looking again, he was pleased to discover that the apparition had not vanished. Maybe it wasn’t an apparition.
“Have a drink?” he asked warily. “Tomorrow I die,” he added in the way of further inducement.
Thank you,” Madam Pilar said in a toneless voice. She sat down. “Why do you die tomorrow?”
“I got enemies,” Duncan said vaguely.
“Who . . . are they?” the Gypsy demanded.
Duncan burped sleepily. “Too many to count.”
The Gypsy leaned forward and regarded him steadily.
“I
have charms to protect you,” she whispered.
Duncan brightened. “Thas’ good. Need lotsa charms.”
The Gypsy brought forth a small ragged doll from the voluminous folds of her dress. It was about ten inches high. The face of the doll was completely blank.
“Do you notice the resemblance?” the Gypsy whispered impressively.
“Spitting image,” Duncan said, nodding vigorously.
“This will protect your body from physical harm,” said the Gypsy. “Never leave it out of your possession.”
Duncan stared blearily at the doll. “Ish cute,” he said fondly.
The Gypsy dug into her dress again and brought out a small scissors. With a quick gesture she snipped a lock of hair from Duncan’s head.
Duncan nodded approvingly.
“Just a trim, though,” he said, wagging a finger.
The Gypsy took his hands in hers then and rapidly snipped the nails from his index and middle fingers. She wrapped the lock of hair about the nail parings and stuffed the tiny ball into an opening in the doll’s chest.
“The voodoo spell of the doll will protect you always,” the Gypsy said solemnly. “Keep it always with you and you will be safe. Never, never, leave it out of your possession. Do you understand?”
Duncan looked into the eyes of the Gypsy. They burned strangely at him, piercing through his alcoholic stupor.
He reached out and took the doll in his arms.
“I understand,” he said, hiccoughing jerkily. “The li’l guy stays with me from now on. Jush like to see somebody take him away.” He smiled blissfully down into the doll’s blank face. “We’re pals, thatsh what we are!”
When he looked up again the Gypsy was gone.
DUNCAN awoke the next morning in his own apartment. The events of the previous night were vague and cloudy, but he was agreeably surprised to discover that his head felt normal.
He lay in bed for a few moments staring at the ceiling, and then he became aware that he seemed to be bouncing slightly on the mattress.
The sensation was not unpleasant, but it was definitely disturbing. He sat up straight, but he continued to bounce up and down.
Collected Fiction (1940-1963) Page 116
