* *

Its attacker was a smaller thing of a brilliant green hue, striped and
mottled with blue and yellow. While our captor was almost formless, the
newcomer had a very definite shape. It resembled a cross between a bird
and a lizard, its shape resembling a bird, as did tiny rudimentary wings
and a long beak, while the scaly covering and the fact that it had four
legs instead of two bore out the idea that it might be a lizard. Its
huge birdlike beak was armed with three rows of long sharp teeth with
which it was tearing at our captor. The purple amoeba was holding its
assailant with a dozen of its thrown out feelers which were wrapped
about the body and legs of the green horror. The whole battle was
conducted in absolute silence.

"Now's our chance, Jim!" I cried. "Get away from here while that dragon
has the amoeba busy!"

He jumped to the control levers of the flyer and pulled the starting
switch well forward. The shock of the sudden start hurled me to the
floor, but from where I fell I was able to watch the battle on the
plain below us. It raged with uninterrupted fury and I felt certain of
our escape when, with a shock which hurled both Jim and me to the
ceiling, the flyer stopped. We fell back to the floor and I reflected
that it was well for us that the interior of the flyer was so well
padded. Had it not been, our bones would have been broken a dozen times
by the shocks to which we had been subjected.

"What now?" I asked as I painfully struggled to my feet.

"Another of those purple amoebas," replied Jim from the vantage point of
a window. "He's looking us over as if he were trying to decide whether
we are edible or not."

* * * * *

I joined him at the window. The thing which had us was a replica of the
monster we had left below us engaged in battle with the green dragon
which had attacked it. The same indefinite and ever changing outline was
evident, as well as the four huge eyes. The thing regarded us for a
moment and slowly moved us up against its bulk until we touched it.
Deeper and deeper into the mass of the body we penetrated until we were
in a deep cavern with the light coming to us only from the entrance. I
watched the entrance and horror possessed my soul.

"The hole's closing. Jim!" I gasped. "The thing is swallowing us!"

"I expected that," he replied grimly. "The amoeba has no mouth, you
know. Nourishment is passed into the body through the skin, which