d comic
as ever, but terrifyingly destructive; jaguars like trucks and trailers;
centipedes with stingers over their backs that would reach a man in a
third-story window; wasps and bees like buzzards. The army was lashing
at these things with machine guns, flame throwers, tanks and rockets.
Jeeps careened across the landscape with loads of ammo. It was a
madhouse on a vast scale, and being fought to the death. They waited for
the beasts to come out of the jungle, then they jumped them--or were
jumped. Nobody was allowed to fly into the hinterland to see where they
were coming from. And when I tried to get officials to consider it, they
absolutely refused. Up there, it was hinted, were secret government
projects--besides they were too far away--and radio said there was no
sign of anything unusual there. It was worth even a general's job to
poke his nose in near those projects. And how could I tell these people
traitorous men of their own government were the culprits? It just wasn't
possible--and because I had to stay on the scene, I never even hinted
it. I merely waited my chance to produce proof. I knew I'd get it,
sooner or later. Something would come out of that jungle I'd be able to
use to convey the real menace to the knowledge of a puzzled world.

[Illustration: _Only the fire-power of cannon could stop the monster._]

I wrote carefully, reporting the weird war with the animal world--and I
kept inserting paragraphs hinting about Stegner and his growth field,
adding "rumors" that maybe his work had been taken over by a power-mad
clique and it was they who were loosing this horror.

My boss liked the stuff I was putting in, because it sold papers, and I
was careful to keep my facts separate, and label my theories. Nobody--at
least so it seemed--believed the theories, but they made good reading. I
got a raise in salary.

Other reporters were knocking out stories as good as mine, but without
the insight into the facts that I had. So their stories went too far
afield. Mine became popular, and were in demand as reprints all over the
world. But officially, nobody paid any attention to me, so the important
papers nestled in the bottom of my trunk. I didn't want them confiscated
until the time came when I could publish them with proof. My boss would
back me up when that proof came. I was sure of that.

I got my chance the day the giantess came crashing out of the smoke and
dust of the circle of horror across which the b