They threaded the path they had cut that morning. Travis glanced now and then-at the sky when they crossed small glades. He had half expected to find the blue flyers on the lookout. But none appeared.
Ross took the inner ramp under the dome at a rapid trot. His pace, however, slowed as they wound their way up past five levels, then six, seven, eight, nine and finally ten. There was no sound in the building, nothing to break the echoing emptiness of the fantastically beautiful shell.
They reached the balcony, a narrow walk curving completely around the bulk of the dome, protected by a breast-high parapet of the carved lace. The wind, now rising in intensity, pulled at their hair, sang weirdly through the openwork. Ross took the lead. He hurried to the vantage point from which they could obtain an unrestricted view in the direction they thought Ashe’s captors had headed.
There were other buildings, or the remains of buildings, rising out of the jungle. Some of them were smaller than the dome, three or four—at a greater distance—taller. And the taller ones had a certain similarity of oudine which suggested that they must have had a common architectural origin.
It was one of those which Ross indicated now. “If they were headed for the nearest building across the treetops—that must be it.” He sighted along his pointed finger as he might have along a rifle barrel.
Travis was listing all possible landmarks—though from ground level perhaps three-quarters of them would not be of much use. “To the right of that funnel-shaped capping, and the left of the pile of blocks. It may be several miles from here.”
To cut a trail along the ground was possible—using their blasters. But such action would certainly advertise their coming. If they wanted to located/the enemy—always providing, of course, that the enemy was roosting in the structure Ross had just chosen—the process must entail a longer and more complicated bit of trail craft. And such a scout could not be made at night.
“There’s one way of checking,” Ross said, as if he were thinking aloud. “If we stay here until dark, we’d know.”
“How?”
“Lights. If we see any fights out there—they would be proof.”
“Slim chance. They’d be fools to use lights.”
“Could be trap-setting again,” Ross demurred. “More bait to pull us in.”
“That’s just guessing. How can we tell what makes their minds tick? We don’t even know what they are. You didn’t like the type who first wore this uniform.” Travis plucked at the blue fabric crossing his chest. “If this was their home planet, wouldn’t they be able to play games with us the way they did with you—by mental control?”
“Look out there!” Ross’s sweep of hand included half the landscape, the sea of untroubled jungle, the buildings rising in isolated islands out of it. - “Whatever they had— it’s dead now—long dead. And maybe they’re dead, too—or back at the primitive stage. If they’re primitives, Ashe can handle them to a point; he’s been taught to do just that. I’ve seen him in action. Give me an hour up here past sundown. Then if we see no lights—I’ll go….”
Travis drew his blaster. Dark, or even heavy dusk, here might unleash things to lurk in the shadows along their trail. But he could understand Ross’s point, and they had a well-marked path to the ship.
“All right.”
They walked slowly around the dome waiting for the murk of evening to gather. And so they counted at least fifty more buildings, fantastic, unlike, some even appearing to defy the laws of gravity. Beyond them were those others, tall, thin, of a common mold. Were those the native structures and these others embassies, examples of trans-galactic architecture as Ashe had suggested? If not all of them were stripped, what a wealth of knowledge lay-Travis was jerked out of speculation by a cry from Ross. There was still a reflection of sunlight in the sky at their backs. But—Murdock’s hunch had paid off. A wink of light flashed across the green from the first of the distant tall towers. Flashed on—off—on.
Was it meant to be an enticing signal?
14
They held a council of war in the ship, the outer hatch closed against the night, that simple precaution taught them by the desert world.
“It’ll be difficult to go straight through the tangle in that direction,” Renfry observed. “They’d be waiting for you to try it.”
“Sometimes the fastest way is around, not straight,” Ross agreed. He had a map drawn on a sheet of material from the aliens’ stores, the crosses and squares on it marking the various buildings they had sighted. “See here—they bunch, those tall towers. But here, and here, and here, are other buildings. Suppose we head for this one which looks like an outsized oil can, then beyond that there’s the pile of blocks. The one we want is between them. So—move to the funnel top, then start beyond to the block pile—and cut back. If we can make them believe we’re just searching everything in that direction, it’ll buy us time. Reach a point about here”—his forefinger dug into the surface of the improvised map— “and then do a right-about-face and go at top speed.” He looked up challengingly. “Anybody got a better idea?”
Renfry shrugged. “This is your party, you’ve had the training for this type of thing. But I’ll go along.”
“And let some joker take the ship behind our backs?” Ross wanted to know. “They’ve a line on us—they must have or they wouldn’t have scooped up the chief so neatly. He’s no recruit at this type of fun and games, remember. I’ve seen him in action.”
“Through the treetops,” Travis mused. “If that’s their regular mode of travel, then maybe we have another point in our favor. Once we’re really into the jungle, there’s a lot of cover which will give us protection. They can’t watch us from above all the time.”
“You’re both set on this then?” Renfry still studied the map.
Ross stood up. “I don’t propose to let them nobble the chief and get away with it. And the quicker we are on the move—the better!”
But even Ross had to admit that they must wait until dawn to put their plan to the test. They rummaged the ship for supplies and assembled a small pack apiece. Each wore a belt supporting alien blasters. In addition a coil of the supple cord-rope was wound from shoulder to hip about their bodies, and they had retained the flint knives from their hunter disguise. Brittle though the flint might be, the finely chipped blades could still serve a deadly purpose in close combat. They slung packsacks with food and the froth containers:
Renfry disputed his staying with the ship. But he was forced to admit that there was not way to lock the port behind them and so a guard must remain. However, he insisted upon triggering the armament of the spacer. So when they descended the ladder to the ground in the first dull rose of the early morning, the black mouths of those sinister tubes were thrust from the shell of the globe.
They took turns cutting a path. And, where they could, they pushed through the underbrush, saving the power of the blasters. It was Travis who led when they thrust completely through a fern wall into a green tunnel.
The ground here had been worn into a shallow trough and beaten hard. Travis needed only one look to know that slot for what it was—a game trail, leading either to water or to some favorite grazing ground. It had been well traveled, and for some length of time.
There were tracks here, pads with the pinprick indentations of claws well beyond them, a clover hoof with so deep a cleavage that the hoof must be almost split in two, and some smaller tracings too alien to be identified.
“This goes in the right direction. Do we follow it?” Travis was in two minds about such an action, himself. On one hand they could greatly increase their speed and speed might be important. But a well-used game trail not only provided a road for animals—it was as well a lure for those creatures that preyed upon such travelers.