to help them.
But I'm going. All I ask is to get one crack at whatever it is that is
down in that beastly pit and if I can't do that maybe I can still save
Diane and Walt from tortures you and I can't imagine." He touched his
pistol suggestively.

"Still I say you are a fool," Kreiss insisted. "They are gone--captured;
they will die. That is regrettable, but it is done. Now, besides Herr
Schwartzmann who escaped, only we two remain; the savage, he does not
count. We two!--and a new world!--and science! Science that remains
after these two are gone--after you and I are gone! It is greater than
us all.

"But I, staying, shall contribute to the knowledge of men; I shall make
discoveries that will bear my name always. This world is my laboratory;
I have found deposits such as none has ever seen on Earth.

"Be reasonable, Herr Bullard. The enemy has tracked us down by his
superior cleverness. We will go far away now where he never shall find
us, you and I. Do not be a fool; do not throw your life away."

* * * * *

Chet Bullard, a figure of helpless, hopeless despair, stood unspeaking
while he stared into the black depths of the jungle, and the night wind
whipped his tattered clothing about him.

"A fool!" he said at last, and his voice was dull and heavy. "I guess
you're right--"

Herr Kreiss interrupted: "Of course I am right--right and reasonable and
logical!"

Chet went on as if the other had not spoken:

"If I hadn't been a fool I would have found some way to prevent it; I
would have killed that ape-thing when first I saw it; I would have got
them free."

He turned slowly to face his companion in the darkness.

"But you were wrong, Kreiss; you forgot a couple of things. You said
they found us by their superior cleverness. That's wrong. They found us
because you left a trail they could follow. We threw them off once,
Towahg and I, but the messenger wouldn't be fooled. Then Schwartzmann
and his pack followed the messenger in.

"And you say it is logical that I should quit here, leave Diane and Walt
to take whatever is coming; you say I'm a fool to stay with them till
the end.

"Well,"--he was speaking very quietly, very simply--"if you are right
I'm rather glad that I'm a fool. For you see, Kreiss, they're my
friends, and between friends logic gets knocked all to hell.

"Come on, Towahg!" he called. "Let's see if we can travel this jungle in
the night!" He set off toward t