is left arm and shoulder go numb as he was crushed
for a fleeting instant against the wood partition. Broken, he thought
dimly. The collar-bone. But still he kept moving on.

* * * * *

He moved in a haze of pain and weakness. He did not see that he had
passed clear of the menacing hulk--that his slow crawling had been
multiplied in results by the fact that the termite guard had finally,
stopped trying to turn in the narrow passage and had rushed ahead into
the Queen's chamber, to turn there and come dashing back. He did not see
that Jim was finally disarmed and completely helpless, with his spear
buried beyond recovery in the bulk of the maddened guard. He hardly felt
Jim's supporting arm as it was thrust under him, to half drag and half
lead him along the tunnel away from the horde behind.

He only knew that they were moving forward, with the din behind them--as
the grim cohorts of the Queen fought to all crowd ahead in the narrow
passage at once--keeping pace with them in spite of all they could do to
make haste. And he only knew that finally Jim gave a great shout, and
that suddenly they were standing under a rent in a tunnel roof through
which sunlight was pouring.

Several worker termites were laboring to close up the chink and cut off
the sunlight; but these, not being of the band outraged by the
destruction of the egg in the Queen's chamber, moved swiftly away as the
two men advanced.

Jim reached up and tore with frantic hands at the crumbling edges of the
rotten wood overhead. Ignoring his gashed and bleeding fingers, he
widened the breach till he, could pull himself up through it. Then he
reached down, caught Denny's sound arm, and raised him by main strength.

They were in the clear air of the outer world once more, on a terrace in
the mound low down near its base.

Jim and Dennis half slid, half fell down the near terrace slope to the
jungle of grass stalks beneath. And there Denny bit his lip sharply,
struggled against the weakness overcoming him--and fainted.

* * * * *

Jim caught him up over his shoulder, and staggered forward through the
jungle. Behind, the termites poured out through the broken wall in an
enraged flood, braving even the sunlight and outer air in their chase of
the invaders that had, profaned the Queen's chamber.

"Matt!" shouted Jim with all the strength of his lungs, forgetting that
his voice could not be heard