Each of them had two of the bouncing gas grenades, the last of their supply. Doc said, 'Let's go,' and he seemed to the others to have dissolved into the forest. Pauncho said, 'Don't foul things up in your usual slap-happy manner, Barney. Try to keep from falling over your own feet.'
'You low-browed hairy monstrosity!' Barney said. 'I hope you can keep from swinging from the trees; they must really be tempting you! Keep your mind on our business and don't shoot me by accident!'
Pauncho grinned and said, 'It wouldn't be any accident.'
They saluted each other with fingers to noses and, still grinning, slipped into the woods. Barney went east, below the house, and cut across the path. Though he was not the equal of Caliban in moving swiftly and quietly through a forest, he was superior to most men. His rapier form moved past naked-branched bushes and over twigs with not a sound. Pauncho, even though he went much more slowly, made more noise. He cut to the west on the back side of the ridge and far enough below the house to make sure he wasn't seen. Then he worked his way up to the south end.
There was a silence for a long time. Only the faint cries of ravens and the screech of a hawk disturbed the air. The sun reached the zenith and began to slide down the blue steps. The storm that had been in the west showed no signs of coming closer; it seemed to have run into a wall.
Doc waited. He studied the windows for signs of life, but the thick curtains and the lack of light inside the house hid any faces looking from under the blinds. He was sure that armed men waited there. They had probably called for help; helicopters might appear at any time. The machines that had been used in the attack against Iwaldi could not be too far away. He could not wait until night or until they got so tense that they sent men out to poke around.
Doc cupped his hands close to his mouth and gave the cry of the lark native to these mountains. A few seconds later, the call was answered. Perhaps the men inside the house were fooled, but Doc knew that Barney was returning his signal.
He wormed between the little fir plank outhouse and a small log house from which came the odour of birds of prey.
The piles of lumber and firewood there made for good cover. That would have occurred to the men in the house, too, and they would be keeping a bright eye on the piles.
A third cry of the lark came. This was even less convincing than Barney's.
Doc wormed along the ground until he came behind the outhouse, and he stood up. He could see the lime-stone chimney on the north easily enough. He stepped back, estimated the distance and the wind again, and tossed the gas grenade underhanded. It flew up in a high arc and came down almost in its target, the square hole on top of the chimney.
It struck the edge, however, bounced up and down onto the sloping roof, bounded along and leaped from the roof's edge and fell onto the ground just below a window. Doc had stepped behind the outhouse by then and put his fingers on his ears. The blast was still get-ting echoes from the mountain behind him and across the valley when he tossed his second grenade. This disappeared down the chimney and exploded before it reached the bottom. At least, it should have done so. He had sent it higher than the first so that the six-second interval between pulling the pin and the mingling of gases would result in a blast halfway down the stone shaft.
There was the chance that Cobbs and Villiers might get hurt, but they would certainly be hurt if their captors got clean away with them. They would have to take chances, too. They were adults who knew very well what the consequences of this game might be if they lost.
The echoes of the second explosion had just died when a third, Barney's, blew up just outside the front porch - if Barney had thrown accurately. Doc charged toward the house just as Pauncho's grenade, thrown from the south, blew up the side porch.
Doc was hoping that the rapid succession of blasts would stun the defenders and yet would not kill the prisoners. He ran with the bundle of dynamite sticks held by a cord in one hand. He threw it ahead of him so it landed on the roof, leaped up, grabbed the edge, and swung himself up with the agility of a leopard. An automatic rifle began firing immediately afterwards, and the muzzle, stuck from the window, tried to follow him up. But it was too late.
Somebody began to shoot through the roof. The bullets did penetrate the three- inch thick planks, but he had moved on to a station just beside the chimney. When the firing ceased, he yelled down the shaft.
'Come on out with your hands behind your necks! Or I'll drop this dynamite down the chimney!'
'If you do, you'll kill Cobbs and the girl!' a man shouted.
Doc said, 'So what?'
There was a pause. He resisted the temptation to put his head over the mouth of the chimney to hear what they were saying. Somebody might be down there waiting to shoot his face off.
'O.K.!' the same voice shouted. 'We know when we're licked! We'll come out with our hands up!'
'Send the prisoners out first!'
There was another pause. Then the man said, 'Here they come!'
A banging as of the front door being violently opened announced the exit of somebody. He could not see who it was, but Barney suddenly stuck his head out from behind a tree and signalled. Cobbs and Villiers were being released. A few seconds later, he saw them walking toward Barney, who was waving an arm at them. They looked dishevelled, dusty, and a little bloody. Their hands were tied behind them.
Two men came out of the back, three through the front door, and two through the hole blown in the south side of the house by Barney's grenade. They came out shooting wildly. Cobbs and Villiers threw themselves on the ground, but von
Zarndirl's men did not care to waste bullets on them. They wanted to get Doc and his men first.
Doc, knowing that some of them would turn and shoot at him, tossed the bundle of dynamite toward the rear door to panic them. Then he leaped past the chimney and down to the ground, landing on both feet but going forward to the ground and rolling. His massive muscles and thick bones enabled him to take the shock without injury. He came up onto his feet, his gasgun spewing at the men in the front, two of whom had run to the north so they could get him in their line of fire. His little bullets ran across their chests, sending up gouts of flesh and blood.
Barney's FN had cut the third man almost in half.
The men in the back had taken off when the dynamite fell near them. They did not know that it had no fuse. They kept on running and so were caught in Pauncho's gasgun fire.
The two men who had gone out through the hole in the south side had been wounded in the legs by Pauncho's first few bullets. One got to his elbows and started to shoot, and Pauncho had to kill him. The other man put up his hands, though he was unable to stand up when Pauncho ordered him to.
Barney had untied the hands of Cobbs and the red-head. She did not look so beautiful now what with the dust and the blood and the greyish skin. But, seeing Doc, she smiled, and at that moment, dishevelled and shocked or not, she was beautiful.
Pauncho came around from the side of the house dragging a man along behind him, by the jacket collar. He dropped him before Doc, and said, 'We're in luck! Von Zarndirl, if those scars mean anything!'
Caliban gathered together the metal box and the weapons, and Pauncho dragged von Zarndirl into the house. It was necessary to give him three of the blood-building pills. There was food in the house, and the German ate after the initial effects of the pills had energised and deshocked him. Doc put Barney on guard outside with orders to watch especially for helicopters. There was a transceiver by which they could have called for help. It had been on a table near the fire-place, and it and the operator lay in two heaps on the floor. Doc's grenade had blown out the upper part of the fireplace, and the stone fragments had shattered the radio and driven a sharp piece into the operator's neck.