"There are four," said Drexel. "We figure on mounting the biggest and keeping the rest in storage."
"Are they man-eaters?" asked Henry.
"They're harmless, although I suppose if you went scuba-diving and bothered one, it would defend itself ... Yes, Angela?"
A young woman had come in, through the door at the far end of the hall. "Mr. Drexel, Mrs. Drexel wants you on the telephone. You can use the one in my office."
"Excuse me, Willy," said Drexel. "I'll be right back. You and the kids look at the stuff here. Don't let 'em touch anything."
Angela's heels went click, click as the two marched out the door at the far end. The door slammed shut.
I bent over the tank with the spider crabs. They were tremendous creatures, the biggest with legs four to six feet long and chelae of eight or ten feet. One of those nippers, I thought, could easily take off a human hand or foot.
"What's that stuff? Water?" asked Stephen.
"Formaldehyde, I suppose," I said. "Don't stick your finger in it and then in your mouth to find out."
"Yech!" said Hank. "Putting the stuff those things have been lying dead in, in your mouth!"
"Well, you eat crab out of a can, don't you?" said Stephen. "And it's dead, isn't it?"
"Not me," said Hank. "I don't eat no dead monsters. Say!"
"What?" I asked.
"Did Mister—you know—the old guy—your friend—"
"Mr. Drexel," said Stephen.
"Mr. Drexel—did he say they were dead?"
"Of course he did," I said. He had not, but I was not about to make a point of it.
"Well, they ain't. They're moving."
"You're crazy, Hank," said Stephen.
"Look there!" said Hank. "His legs are wriggling, like he was waking up."
"Just your imag—Hey, Dad, take a look!"
I did. As I looked, all four crabs stirred, gathered their tangled limbs under them, and stood up. They rose from the liquid like Venus from the sea foam, only it would take a more avid seafood lover than I to see any resemblance to Venus. They were a pale, bonelike gray, with bits of olive-green sponge and other marine growths adhering to them.
The boys and I jumped back from the tank. The boys shrieked.
Stepping deliberately, the four crabs climbed dripping out of the tank. Led by the biggest of all, they started towards us, chelae extended and open.
"Run!" I yelled. "This way! Don't let 'em lay a claw on you! They'll take your heads off!"
I started for the Crustacean Hall. The boys dashed past me. Behind us, in single file, came the four spider crabs, their clawed feet going clickety-click on the tiles.
The crabs did not move faster than a brisk walk. Amazed and horrified though I was, I did not, being in good shape for a man past forty, expect any trouble in outrunning them.
When the boys got to the far end of the Crustacean Hall ahead of me, they tried the door. It would not open.
I caught up with them and heaved on the knob. The door was shut on a snap lock, to keep out the unauthorized. It could only be opened with a key, and the key was in Esau Drexel's pocket.
The four crabs came clattering down the Crustacean Hall, along one side of the row of central cases. I yelled and banged the door to no avail.
"Boys!" I said. "They're on one side of the cases. We'll run back on the other and try the other door."
The crabs were now a mere nine feet from us. We dashed back up the hall on the other side of the central cases. The crabs continued their course. They came to the end of the row of central cases, rounded it like Roman racing chariots rounding the end of the spina, and continued their pursuit.
We went back through the Crustacean Hall, through the Mineral Hall, and through the preparation hall. After us came the crabs.
The door at the far end of the preparation hall was also locked. I fruitlessly yelled and banged some more.
As the crabs clicked past the big tank on one side, the boys and I ran the other way on the other side. We made the Crustacean Hall all right. Then, when I looked back, my heart sank. The crabs, or the spirit of Atea, or whatever motivated the monsters, had done the obvious thing. The crabs had split up into two pairs. One pair approached on either side of the row of central cases. Now there was no way to get past them, so we could not continue to play ring-around-the-rosy with them. They had us.
I kicked the door and nearly burst my lungs screaming. I looked around for something to use as a club. Since the crabs were slow and clumsy, I thought I might have a change of bashing in a carapace or two before they got me. At least, I thought, I might save the boys.
When the crabs were over halfway down the hall, I saw something in a corner. It was the fire extinguisher that Drexel had moved out of the way. This was of the big cylindrical type that you turn upside down.
I grabbed that extinguisher, inverted it, and pointed the nozzle on the end of the hose at the nearest crab. I had no time to read the directions and only hoped I was following proper procedure.
The extinguisher made a great fizzing. Liquid shot from the nozzle, spraying all over the crab. The creature halted, waving its chelae in a disorganized way.
I sprayed another, and another, and another, and then back to the first one. I don't know what chemicals were in the extinguisher, but the crabs teetered on their spindly legs. They waved their chelae wildly, banged into the cases, and fell over. One lay on its back with twitching legs. Another collapsed against a case ...
When Esau Drexel came in a few minutes later, he found four motionless crabs and one motionless banker. The last-mentioned leaned breathlessly against a case and held an empty fire extinguisher.
"But—but that's impossible!" said Drexel when he heard the story.
I shrugged. I have had too many funny things happen to me to be very free with the word "impossible."
When the door to the Crustacean Hall was unlocked, others came in. Drexel told a guard to admit only Museum personnel. The boys and I repeated our story.
Doctor Einarson, the assistant curator of Pacific anthropology, spoke up. He talked with a funny little smile, as if hinting that we were not to take him seriously.
"Put a mustache on Atea?" he said. "No wonder. She's a goddess, you know. No mustaches for her!"
The following Monday, when the whole Museum was closed, you would have seen one junior banker and his wife, with a stepladder, a bucket, a sponge, a scrubbing brush, and soap. They were painstakingly erasing the mustache on Atea's tiki.
It must have worked, because nothing more like that has happened to me in the Museum in all the years since.
Far Babylon
Under the lucent moon, a man in a black cowboy hat was squatting by the stream, making a castle of sand.
I had given up trying to sleep. No matter how I squirmed and turned, there was always some stick or stone poking into me through the sleeping bag. At last I crawled out of the bag, pulled on my pants and shoes, and wandered off. Somewhere a coyote howled.
I marveled at the soundness with which Denise and the children managed to sleep. I thought: Wilson Newbury, you were a fool to yield to their pleas to go camping. You are past the age when sleeping out of doors is fun; you should have left such Tarzanism to scoutmasters and camp counsellors. But that's the hell of trying to be a good father.
The stream near which I had parked the station wagon was some obscure affluent of the Pecan. One difficulty with camping in a mixed party in that flat, open country is to find a place where the campers can perform their natural functions with decent privacy. We had finally found this place, where the little dry ravines and the screen of scrubby vegetation bordering the stream provided cover.
The weather was fair, even though, during the afternoon, a couple of distant puff-balls of cumulus cloud built up into thunderheads. The weather down there is deceptive. Because of the clearness of the air and the openness and flatness of the country, you often see little local thunderstorms twenty or thirty miles away and think it is going to rain. Actually, there is only a tiny chance that any rain will reach you.