he fringe of great trees, then let Towahg
go ahead to find a trail.

* * * * *

Travel at night through the tangle of creepers was not humanly possible.
Even Towahg, after an hour's work, grunted his disgust and curled
himself up for the night. And Chet, though he found his mind filled with
vain imaginings, was so drained by the day's demands on his nervous
energy that he slept through to the rising of the sun.

Then they circled wide of the trail they had taken before; no risk would
Chet take of a chance meeting with one of the pyramid apes. And he
plagued his brain with vain questions of what he should do when he
reached the arena and the pyramid and the unknown something that waited
within, until he told himself in desperation: "You're going down, you're
going into that damned place; that's all you know for sure."

Whereupon his questioning ceased, and his mind was clear enough to think
of giant creepers that barred his way, of streams to be crossed, and to
wonder, at the last, when the valley of the pyramid was in sight and
whether the others had reached there before him.

Another day's sun was beating straight down into the arena when again it
opened before Chet's eyes. And the bleak horror of this place of black
and white that had seemed so incredibly unreal under Earth-lit skies was
doubly so in the glare of noon.

They entered through the jagged crack that had been their means of
escape. An earthquake, one time, had split the stone, and Chet was more
than satisfied to avoid the broad entrance where the rocks made a
gateway and where hostile eyes might be watching.

* * * * *

He stood for long minutes in the cleft in the rocks where the hard earth
of the arena made a floor before him, where the huge steps of ribboned
white and black swung out on either hand, and where, directly ahead, in
the same hard, contrasting strata, a pyramid lifted itself to finish in
a projecting capstone. And now that he faced it he found himself
curiously cool.

He motioned Towahg to his side, and the black came cowering and
trembling. He had tried before to ask Towahg about the mystery of the
pyramid, but Towahg had never understood, or, as Chet believed, he had
pretended not to understand. But now he could no longer feign ignorance
of Chet's queries.

Chet pointed to the pyramid with a commanding hand. "What is there?" he
demanded. "Towahg afraid! What is Towah