ied a millionfold, that
performed the duties of leaves. Water gurgled and chuckled everywhere,
spread in vast dim ponds and lakes writhing with tormented roots,
up-heaved by unseen, uncatalogued leviathans, rippled by translucent
discs of loathsome, luminescent jelly that quivered from place to
place in pursuit of microscopic prey.

Yet the impression was one of calm and quiet, and the waifs from other
worlds felt a surcease of nervous tension. Unconsciously they relaxed.
Taking their bearings, they changed their course slightly for the
nesting place of the nearest tribe of Inranians where they hoped to
get food and at least partial shelter; for their food tablets had
mysteriously turned to an unpleasant viscous liquid, and their
sleeping bags were alive with giant bacteria easily visible to the
eye.

* * * * *

They were doomed to disappointment. After nearly twelve hours of
desperate struggling through the morass, through gloomy aisles, and
countless narrow escapes from prowling beasts of prey in which only
the speed and tremendous power of their flash pistols saved them from
instant death, they reached a rocky outcropping which led to the
comparatively dry rise of land on which a tribe of Inranians made its
home. Their faces were covered with welts made by the hanging
filaments of blood-sucking trees as fine as spider webs, and their
senses reeled with the oppressive stench of the abysmal jungle. If the
pampered ladies of the Inner Planets only knew where their
thousand-dollar orchids sprang from!

Converging runways showed the opening of one of the underground dens,
almost hidden from view by a bewildering maze of roots, rendered more
formidable by long, sharp stakes made from the iron-hard thigh-bones
of the flying kabo.

Forepaugh cupped his hands over his mouth and gave the call.

"Ouf! Ouf! Ouf! Ouf! Ouf!"

He repeated it over and over, the jungle giving back his voice in a
muffled echo, while Gunga held a spare flash pistol and kept a sharp
lookout for a carnivore intent on getting an unwary Inranian.

There was no answer. These timid creatures, who are often rated the
most intelligent life native to primitive Inra, had sensed disaster
and had fled.

Forepaugh and Gunga slept in one of the foul, poorly ventilated dens,
ate of the hard, woody tubers that had not been worth taking along,
and wished they had a certain stock clerk at that place at that time.
They were awa