V
When they were let out of their prison box next morning--nine o'clockFriday, by the chronograph, and they had slept another fifteenhours--there were five of the gigantic beast-creatures waiting for them.Any hopes that Tom Watkins had had of rooting around the big hall for away of escape died with a dejected grunt. There must be well over a tonof enemies there, with their caverned red eyes peering down at thehumans. No chance to explore under those gazes.
The boss of the alien scientists--Watkins recognized it, or him (or wasit her?), by the clothing and by certain differences in facialstructure--came and bent over them. Watkins was smoking a cigarette hehad bummed from Villa, Summersby's having given out the day before. Hetook a hearty drag and blew out the smoke, which unfortunately liftedright into the creature's eyes. It shook its head and made a squawkingsound, "Hwrak!" and flipped its green prodder into his belly. Heabruptly sat down, with the sensation of having stuck his finger into alamp socket. "My God!" he said. Cal helped him up.
Summersby walked off toward a twenty-foot-high door. None of the beingstried to stop him. The boss motioned Watkins to go with it, so he rathershakily followed it across the room.
Before him was a gadget that resembled a five-manual organ console. Thebanks of keys were broad and there was a kind of chair, or stool, fixedon a horizontal bar in front of them. The giant indicated that he was toget onto it.
"Now what?" he said, when he had been stopped directly in front of theapparatus. "Expect me to play this? Look, Buster, I'm tone deaf, Ihaven't had my coffee yet, and I'd just as soon dance a polka as playyou a tune."
The thing pressed down two of the keys--they were of an amethyst color,longer and more tapered than those of an organ--and looked at Watkins.
"Drop dead," he said to it. He was always bitterly antagonistic toeverything and everybody if he didn't have three cups of coffee beforehe got out of bed. "Go on, you big ape, make me play."
It hit him on the head with a couple of its big rubbery fingers. He feltas if a cop had sloshed him with a blackjack, and all the hostility wentout of him. He leaned forward and pushed down half a dozen keys atrandom.
There was no sound, at least none that he could hear, though heremembered the whistle he had at home to call his dog, and wondered ifthe notes of this organ were sub- or supersonic. Certainly there was noreason to suppose this race of creatures was limited to the same rangeof hearing that humans were.
The thing went down the hall some yards and folded itself into a sittingposition before a large white space on the wall. When Watkins didnothing, it gestured angrily with its goad. He pressed more keys. Itjerked its head around and stared at the white space.
Accidentally he discovered that by pressing with his calves on certainpedals below the stool he could maneuver the seat to either side. Thegadget began to intrigue him.
He had never played any musical instrument, but had always had a quietdesire to produce music. He couldn't hear this organ's sounds, but hecould go through the motions with fervor. He did.
The boss scientist gazed raptly at the wall screen; was it concentratingon what he played? Did his random selection of keys indicate somethingto it, something about his mental powers or emotions or--what?
Or was it possible that the playing produced images or colors on theblank space? He craned his neck, but could distinguish nothing. Poundingon, he called over his shoulder, "Come here, somebody!"
No one answered. Pushing keys at random, he turned to look for them.Each of them was doing something under the supervision of a twelve-footbeast, except for Summersby, who was still examining the door. "Hey,High-pockets!" he yelled, knowing the big man hated the nickname, butnot giving a damn. "Summersby! Come here!"
"What is it?" said Summersby in a moment, standing below his seat.
"Take a squint at that screen the old boy's gaping at. I want to knowwhat the devil I'm doing."
Summersby walked over and stood beside the scientist.
"What's happening?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing at all?"
"Well, the screen's mottled gray and white, and the pattern's swirlingslowly; but that's all."
"Is it particularly beautiful?" asked Watkins.
"No. It's hardly distinguishable."
* * * * *
Sliding right and left on the bar, striking first one and then anotherof the manuals, Watkins said to Summersby, "What do you figure thesescientists are, anyway?"
"Mammals," said the big man.
"I suppose so--"
"They have navels. They weren't hatched."
"Oh." Watkins hadn't noticed that. "Where are we, then?"
"I don't know."
Another scientist wandered over and sat down beside the first. Shortlythey seemed to get in each other's way, and there was a lot of shovingand squawking. At last one of them hit the other in the face with anopen hand. Then they were rolling on the floor, snatching at oneanother's hair and pummeling the big bodies and heads with thosegargantuan fists. It sounded like a brawl between elephants. Watkinsswiveled round to watch. Mrs. Full said to someone--Watkins heard herdistinctly in a lull in the ruckus--"If these are scientists, what arethe common people like?" For the first time that day he grinned. He hadstopped playing the organ. The other scientists had gathered around thefight and were uttering strange cries, like wild geese honking. Cheeringthem on? he wondered.
Adam came over. "Mr. Watkins," he said, "could we have been wrong aboutthem? Do you think a scientist would act like that?"
"They sure seem to be a quarrelsome race, Adam," he said, "they're notnoticing what we do. Suppose you go look for a way out."
"We want to get away as soon as we can," nodded the boy. "Dangerousaround here!" He ran down the hall.
The giants arose and straightened their clothing. They had patched uptheir argument in the midst of fighting over it. The leader walkedtoward a tall device of pipes and boards and steps, motioning Mrs. Fullto follow.
Apparently Watkins had been forgotten. He took his briefcase off hislap, where he had held it all the time he played, and dropped it to thefloor. Then he hung by his hands and let go. He picked up the case andwent to investigate the room.
Before he had done more than glimpse the enormous door, he was picked upkitten-fashion by a scientist, who carried him off, dangling andswearing, to another infernal machine.
For a couple of hours they were put through paces, all of them;sometimes one man would be working a gadget while all the scientists andhumans watched him, at other periods they would each be hard at workdoing something the result of which they had no conception of.
* * * * *
Several of the machines could be figured: the pink maze, one or twoothers; and Watkins had at least a theory on the organ. The sleekmodernistic machinery which directed the airship was plain enough. Therewere certain designs and arrangements to follow that flew it up and downthe room. They were hard to memorize but Mrs. Full and the somberranger, Summersby, became adept at them.
Then there were the others....
There was a remote control device that played "music," weird hauntingall-but-harmonies that sounded worst when the creatures appeared mostpleased, and earned the punishment stool or a brutal cuffing for theoperator when he did manage to produce something resembling a tune.Evidently bearing a relation to this was the sharp slap Adam got when hestarted to sing "The Whiffenpoof Song" while idling around a pile ofoutsize blocks like a child's building bricks. What the human earrelished, the giant ear flinched from.
There was a sort of vertical maze that verged on the four-dimensional,for when they thought they were finding a way out the top they wouldcome abruptly to the side, or even the bottom, and have to begin anew.This one was obviously impossible to figure out, thought Watkins. Itmust be one of the ways in which the scientists induced neuroses intheir experimental subjects. He had a quick mind for puzzles andintricacies of any kind, but this one stumped him col
d.
"You think it's calculated to drive you crazy?" he asked Cal.
The New Englander considered for a minute. Then he nodded. "Possibly,"he said.
"You think it might work?"
This time Cal pondered longer. At last he said, "Not if we don't letit."
"I could develop a first-class neurosis," said Watkins to Mrs. Full, "ifI let myself really go."
"We must all keep our heads, Mr. Watkins," she told him. "Those of uswho have not given up--" She glanced at Summersby with a frown--"musthold a tight rein on ourselves."
"That's right, ma'am," he said. They all called her "ma'am" or "Mrs.Full." Nobody knew her first name. He wondered if she'd be insulted ifhe asked her, and decided that she would.
Capriciously, then, on the heels of a series of punishments, the headscientist went out of the room and came back with food for them. Itflung the food--three chickens--on the floor. Villa snatched one of themup with a happy shout, but at once his dark face soured. "Raw? How canwe cook them?" His hand with the fowl dropped limply to his side.
"We can make a fire," said Calvin. Watkins was a little surprised thatit was Cal who made the suggestion first, but the Vermont man added,"I've made enough campfires to know something about it."
"Mr. Full is an enthusiastic hunter," said his wife.
"A fire of what?" asked Villa, managing to look starved, helpless, andwistful, all at once.
Summersby said, "There are plates of plastic over there, and plenty ofshort rods. I don't know what these beasts use them for, but if they'refireproof, we can construct a grill with them." He went without furthertalk to a stack of the multicolored slabs and dowels, which lay beside aneat array of what looked like conduit pipes, electromagnets, and coiledcable. He picked up an armload. One of the giants put a hand down beforehim. He pushed it aside and strode back to the group. Gutty, thoughtWatkins, or just hungry? Or is it his sense of kismet?
"I'll cut some kindling from the trees in our room," said Calvin. "Whohas a knife?"
Summersby handed him a large pocket knife, and set about making a grillover two of the plastic slabs. It was a workmanlike job when he hadfinished. He held his lighter under one of the rods, which wasapparently impervious to fire. He nodded to himself. Looks more human,thought Watkins, than he has yet.
Villa was plucking one of the chickens, humming to himself. Mrs. Fullwas working on another, Adam on the third. Watkins felt useless, and satdown, running his fingers along the smooth side of his briefcase.
Cal made a heap of chips and pieces of wood and bark under the grill.Summersby lit it. The giants, who were grouped around them at a fewyards' distance, mumbled among themselves as the shavings took flame.The plucked and drawn fowls were laid on the grill. Watkins' mouth beganto water.
"Now if we only had some coffee," he said to Adam. "One lousy pot ofgreasy-spoon coffee!"