waitresses, was at their side....

* * * * *

Hiah-Leugh was having his eyeballs massaged. It was a delicate and
tedious operation for the one doing the massaging; not every Goman was
possessed of eight eyeballs. But Hiah-Leugh was not an ordinary Goman.
Not he! He was chief of all the Gomans, which meant he was head of all
the bug-eyed monsters on the whole of the planet of XYZ268PDQ.

The four-headed slave, one of the giants Hiah-Leugh's tribe had
captured on one of their forays into the terrible forest of Evil
Contractions, scratched himself with one of his six arms. He was quite
bored with this peaceful, though tedious pursuit the tribe of
Hiah-Leugh had given to him as his duties. Especially the massaging of
eyeballs. Of course it helped to have six arms. Ooh! His four heads
ranged themselves in a single line.

The slave had committed a sin.

There were three cardinal sins on the planet of XYZ268PDQ. Two of them
were unmentionable and the third was forgetting to massage all of the
eight eyeballs of Hiah-Leugh at one and the same time. If it were not
for the massage the giants of the planet would all live in peace. But
it took a man with six arms to do the job. In fact it was to the
regret of Hiah-Leugh that the giants did not have eight arms.

Now one of the eyelids was closing. In a second or two it would be
closed completely and once a single of the eight eyes closed the
others automatically followed suit. There was but a single thing to do
in this case. The giant did it.

He poked his finger into the drooping lid.

Hiah-Leugh awoke with a suddenness of shock and startled surprise. He
howled in pain then leaped from the chair, scuttling about the
room-of-massage on his twelve pairs of crablike legs at a great pace.

"Heavens to Betsy!" Hiah-Leugh screamed. "You _are_ the clumsiest
giant.... But what can a B. E. M. expect? Oh, well! You're excused. Go
and see if there are any children to frighten...."

There were four different expressions on the four heads. One showed
pleasure, and another, surprise and a third, gloom and the fourth was
blank completely. This head was the dumb one. It had but one
expression, blankness. The four heads bent and the great body bowed
low, and slowly, with great effort and with many bumpings into various
pieces of furniture, the giant bowed himself out of the massage
parlor.

Hiah-Leugh was left alone.

But not for long. Suddenly a whole s