Page:Amazing Stories Volume 15 Number 10.djvu/81

Rh with their iron clubs.

It was a pity about that plucky Earthling. The tiny man was not to be seen. Not even a ripple that might have been made by his swimming figure could the Martian detect in the searchlight glare. The little man must have been struck by a deathray. He had not come up.

The idea that Earthlings might be very inferior swimmers, compared to Martians, did not occur to him.

He swam on, not in the least in a hurry. He found a large log, and swam to it with the idea of sitting astride it and paddling. Vans Holors had swum little more than five miles as yet, but he was lazy.

There were too many power-boats about for him to take the risk of showing himself. The simple-minded giant was annoyed at this. Vans Holors wanted to sit on a log, and he couldn't sit on that log because of a lot of pesky power-boats. He'd show them.

A power-boat was racing toward him. Vans watched from the end of the log. The searchers were not quite so keen-eyed as they had been at the beginning of their search.

Vans waited until the boat was close, then swam with his log. He pulled it right into the path of the racing boat, and dived.

Unable to stop or turn in time, the boat hit the log. Three men shot right out of the boat at the impact. The other four rolled over and over in the bottom of the boat. Vans Holors came tumbling over the stern and four blows of his fists silenced them forever.

He looked over the side. The three in the water took him for one of their own men.

"Help us aboard," they asked.

"Do you want a tow?" he said.

"Yes."

Vans picked up a deathray box. The ray flicked from head to head.

"Take hold of that," he said.

"You ask for a tow," he said, "and when I offer you one you won't take hold of it."

He turned to the bodies in the boat.

"Get up, you lazy devils," he said. "Do your job. Run the boat for me."

Naturally, there was no response.

"All right, if you won't do as I tell you I won't have you in my boat. You can swim home."

Picking them up one in each hand, he threw them overboard.

For a while he toyed with the idea of going back and waging a private war on the other power-boats, but he decided that it would be a waste of time. He headed away.

Presently he came to a deserted, stony shore. He came ashore.

UDDENLY an ape-man sprang down from a big rock and stood before him, waving an iron club threateningly.

"Hrrrumpah!" meaning, "What do you want here?" it growled.

"A fight!" said Vans Holors.

The ape swung the iron club. Vans dodged back, making him miss. The ape, puzzled, swung again. Holors dodged again.

"Tut, tut!" said Vans Holors. "Let me show you how to use that thing."

"Grobah!" said the ape, meaning, "I never did think much of clubs, anyway."

Dropping the club, it charged with teeth and nails.

The wrestling champion knew all there was to know about furious charges. He dropped to his haunches, seized two hairy ankles in his hands and heaved upward. With the force of its own charge and Vans' mighty heave the ape sailed over his head to crash on the rocks beyond, unable to fight.