Page:Weird Tales Volume 11 Number 06 (1928-06).djvu/119

 against the knuckles of his left hand, then clapped the reptile to his neck. It lay stunned, unmoving, its mouth tight against Turtlelove's throat.

Once more Turtlelove stretched out on his back. He closed his eyes to slits, held his breath, watched the hillman come to the cave entrance, pass through and stand within four feet of him. The hillman leaned over to see better. His hands were held out ahead of him. Then suddenly his mouth flew open, his eyes dilated. The shadows of his hands lay unmoving on the floor. In this pose he appeared to freeze.

Fighting the growing impulse to breathe, and by sheer will overcoming the tendency of his muscles to twitch, Turtlelove felt seconds grow into eternity. It seemed to him that he had been looking into horror-struck eyes and a froth-flecked mouth for ages, that he and the hillman were growing old like sculpture under a hard, white moon.

Suddenly, as if to bring the agony of suspense to a close, the lizard stirred. Turtlelove could feel its flight across his body, see the flash of its leap to the hillman's foot and its race for a cranny in the wall. The hillman's body broke up. With a cry which seemed tuned to a vision of something worse than death the hillman threw out his arms as if for support, spun around and crashed to earth.

Rising to his elbows, breathing heavily, beads of sweat covering his forehead, Turtlelove shivered and stared at the hillman's face, horror-frozen by death, and the silent, open mouth flecked with froth.