as almost knocked to the ground by the thud of a frantic
tentacle against the vine. His movement had been seen. Again the
tentacle struck with crushing force. The great vine swayed. He managed
to reach the shelf again in the very nick of time.

"HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM!"

A bolt of lightning struck a giant fern some distance away. The crash
of thunder was hardly noticeable. Forepaugh wondered if his tree would
be struck. Perhaps it might even start a fire, giving him a flaming
brand with which to torment his tormentor. Vain hope! The wood was
saturated with moisture. Even the fire pellets could not make it burn.

"HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM!"

The six-shooter! He had forgotten it. He jerked it from its holster
and pointed it at the red throat, emptied all the chambers. He saw the
flash of yellow flame, felt the recoil, but the sound of the
discharges was drowned in the Brobdignagian tumult. He drew back his
arm to throw the useless toy from him. But again that unexplainable,
senseless "hunch" restrained him. He reloaded the gun and returned it
to its holster.

"HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM! HOOM!"

A thought had been struggling to reach his consciousness against the
pressure of the unbearable noise. The fire pellets! Couldn't they be
used in some way? These small chemical spheres, no larger than the end
of his little finger, had long ago supplanted actual fire along the
frontiers, where electricity was not available for cooking. In contact
with moisture they emitted terrific heat, a radiant heat which
penetrated meat, bone, and even metal. One such pellet would cook a
meal in ten minutes, with no sign of scorching or burning. And they
had several hundred in one of the standard moisture-proof containers.

* * * * *

As fast as his fingers could work the trigger of the dispenser
Forepaugh dropped the potent little pellets down the bellowing throat.
He managed to release about thirty before the bellowing stopped. A
veritable tornado of energy broke loose at the foot of the tree. The
giant maw was closed, and the shocking silence was broken only by the
thrashing of a giant body in its death agonies. The radiant heat,
penetrating through and through the beast's body, withered nearby
vegetation and could be easily felt on the perch up the tree.

Gunga was slowly recovering. His iron constitution helped him to rally
from the powerful blow he had received, and by the t