and less mistakable than formerly. It was mostly on his right, and behind him.
A little later Brenner stopped, suddenly, and, to be sure, there was the sound again, but then it stopped, as he had stopped.
He removed the knapsack uneasily from his back. He clutched the stick more firmly.
Then he heard the sound, or a similar sound, from his left.
Brenner hurried to the next stone. It was fortunate that there were such stones. Without them he would have been lost, utterly confused, disoriented, in the forest. Even with a map and compass it would have required skill to find Company Station. Without them, trying, say, to find one’s way by marks of weathering, by the growth of moss, by stars, and such, there would have been but small prospect of success. Company Station was no more than a dot in the trackless forests of the northern hemisphere of Abydos. In searching for it, one might pass within a mile of it and never know it. But, felicitously, there were the stones! They would be his guideposts. They comforted him, providing him with assurances of Company Station, with its fence and gate.
“Go back!” screamed Brenner. “Get away!”
This was his first clear visual contact with what was out there. It was a dark shape to his left, as he had turned. It was not like the thing which had seized Archimedes. It was quite different. It was not nearly as large. It sat back on its haunches. It seemed almost, facing him, as though it had no head, until Brenner realized that what he had taken for the shoulders was actually a gigantic knot of muscle, humplike, below which, there emergent from the shoulders, was the head.
“Get away!” screamed Brenner.
When the beast turned its head to the side, Brenner could detect that it had an odd silhouette. There was something running the length of its skull. Brenner spun about. There was another noise there. Brenner was extremely quiet.
He now heard, clearly, from at least two quarters, quick, breaths, those which might be expected of animals with heavy coats, which might have become overheated in movement. Such creatures perspire primarily through their mouth, and the pads of their feet.
Then, from the darkness, there emerged another such beast. Its eyes flashed, suddenly, reflecting the light of one of the dangling fruits.
“Stay away I” said Brenner.
Then it had backed away, and was crouching down, watching him.
On its skull, running the length of it, beginning above and between the eyes, visible in the dim light of the lantern fruit, seemingly yellowish in its light, was a hairless, serrated bony plate, or ridge.
Brenner then detected two more of the creatures, farther back.
The muzzles of these creatures were very broad, and powerful. Brenner could see teeth, they, too, in the light of the lantern fruit, appearing yellowish.
“Go back!” said Brenner.
Suddenly one of the ungulates, the fourth he had seen, emerged from the darkness and darted, with odd bounds, through the beasts, and disappeared amongst the trees.
That is it, said Brenner to himself. They do not want me. They are pursuing that. That is what they want. That is what they are after.
Another pair of animals appeared.
They appeared, silently, from the direction from which the ungulate had come, fleeing.
“Get back!” said Brenner.
Brenner backed away, and the nearest animal, crouching down, inched forward.
Brenner could now detect several of these beasts about him. There were, though he could not be sure of it, given the darkness, seven of them.
“Get back!” said Brenner.
Another animal came a little closer. They expected Brenner to run.
Brenner, holding to a strap, flung the knapsack out at the closest animal. It struck it across the face, and it drew back. Then it bared its teeth. Another animal, crouching, head up, teeth bared, approached. Brenner struck out again with the knapsack. Then again, at another animal, he struck out. Then the sack was torn from his grip and he saw the knapsack attacked by two other animals. Three fought for it. Brenner saw the great knots of muscle in the necks bulge, the wide, powerful jaws closed like clamps on the object. Then it was being fiercely shaken by one or another animal, the others, too, rolling, snarling, in the dirt, not relinquishing their grip. Then each had a portion of the heavy leather and canvas object, the contents scattered for yards about, on the leaves, amongst the trees. The great mass of muscles in the back of the neck, of course, a feature in this life form,