fled from the village.
“Come back!” Rodriguez screamed after him. “Come back!”
Then Rodriguez turned back to the village. A Pon looked up at him, and blinked.
Then Rodriguez returned to the hut. He had one bottle of Heimat left. His hand shook when he poured it.
“Ten years ago,” he said to himself, “I would not have missed.”
Then he threw out the Heimat on the floor of the hut, and, on one of the stones of the fire pit, at the center of the hut, broke the bottle.
Chapter 23
Brenner looked wildly about.
He cursed a world with no moon. The forest loomed about him, lit by the dim glow of the dangling lantern fruit.
The snapping of a twig is a tiny sound, but he had heard it. He had heard, too, from time to time, movements amongst dried leaves, which might have been their stirring in the wind, but might, too, have been the soft, quick tread of paws.
Brenner sobbed and peered into the darkness.
He jerked off the knapsack and held it by the straps. It would be a poor weapon, flung on its straps. It would be an ineffectual shield. Yet it was something to strike out with, or something to insert between himself and the forest.
A stick, a club, would be better.
Brenner stood in the tiny clearing and listened, as carefully, as intently, as keenly, as he could. He could hear only his own breathing.
There is nothing there, he told himself. I am alone.
He saw another of the white stones. He ran toward it. It was late at night, how late he did not know. He fell on his knees and picked up the whitish stone, and clutched it to him, weeping, and then put it down.
He must now search out another.
How fortunate that the Pons were so stupid, and had so little sense of direction, or knowledge of woodcraft, that they needed a trail of stones to find their way between Company Station and the village. With such an aid Rodriguez’ compass and map, which had been lost in the journey to the village, were not even necessary.
Brenner stood up.
Anything might have caused a twig to snap, if it really had. If it were small enough, and dry enough, and properly positioned, even the foot of a git might break it. Perhaps he had not even heard the sound. It was late at night. It was dark. His imagination might have played tricks on him.
Brenner looked about for another stone. He saw it, several yards away.
He hurried toward it.
* * *
Brenner looked behind him, and to the side.
He stumbled toward another whitish stone.
I have gone miles, he said to himself. The knapsack was now again on his back. In one hand was grasped a stout branch. It would help him to keep his feet in the darkness. There is nothing to be afraid of, he told himself.
Then he cried out with alarm and flung up the stick, and was nearly buffeted by a fleet body which bounded past him, crossing diagonally before him, from his right to his left, one of the tiny, small-horned ungulates of the forest.
He remained very still.
Overhead he heard the calls of a night bird.
Then he went to the next stone.
* * *
After an hour or so, Brenner stopped to drink at a shallow stream, one of many which flowed through the well-watered forest. Then, at the edge of the stream, he sat down. He was tired and hungry. He removed the knapsack and put the stick beside him. He leaned back against a tree.
He sat up, quickly, when two of the small-horned ungulates, one larger and one smaller, crossed the stream some yards below him, splashing, and trotted into the darkness. Their heads bobbed as they moved. Had Rodriguez been with him Rodriguez might have remarked on the oddity of the movements of such creatures at night, as they were day-feeders and normally quiescent at night.
Brenner partook of some bemat cakes and dried fruit.
Then, rested and fed, and feeling much better than before, he rose up.
He had, of course, before resting, located the next stone.
* * *
Brenner was not clear, at first, that that there was anything out there. It is very difficult to interpret the shadows in the uncertain light of stars, in the dim glow of lantern fruit.
It was his unusually fine hearing that at last convinced him that he was not, as he had hitherto assumed, alone in the forest.
At first it was the soft flaking, and crushing, of dried leaves, closer now,