Page:Weird Tales volume 11 number 02.pdf/89

232 "Martt! Don't"

A sense of shame struck at Martt; he dropped the rock. "Zee, can you talk to him—try if he understands your language."

She spoke, and the young giant answered. He was trying to smile, grateful for the words. Zee stooped and splashed water on his wounded forehead.

"Martt, he says his name is Degg—he has seen Leela and Frannie —a man and woman took them into the river mouth."

The fellow did not seem greatly hurt. He was frightened, watchful, but docile enough. Martt took the drugs from him. "Ask him the way up to his world—it will help us"

It was the one thing that would help them! Martt realized it.

Degg, outwardly at least, seemed friendly enough. When Zee promised that they would not hurt him—would take him to his own world, the only way he would ever get there, since he had no drugs—he agreed readily to lead them.

"But we must be careful," said Martt. "Never let him get larger than ourselves. And watch him, always."

At Degg's direction, first they diminished their stature until, compared to the buildings of Reaf, they were about fifty feet tall. Degg said, in Zee's language, "We wade now into the black river. Rokk likes to swim—but wading is easier."

They were ready to start. Soon they would be beyond this world—up into largeness unfathomable. Martt said, "We must leave some message for Brett. Let him know what became of us."

There was no way to leave a written message. Conspicuously on a rock near the shore, Martt left the broad belt of his jacket. As he turned away, Degg was calling softly, "Ae! Eeff! Eeff, come here!" The green-white, headless thing was lurking among the rocks. "Eeff, come here!"

It advanced, whimpering. Compared to Martt's fifty-foot stature it seemed now no bigger than a rat. Martt conquered his aversion and stood waiting while it approached. In the starlight it glowed unreal; its eye on the stalk pointed distrustfully at Martt. It stood at Degg's feet; whimpering—and mumbling words.

Degg said to Zee, "It is afraid of your man. I tell it you will do no harm. It wants to come with us." He stooped over. "Eeff, you come with us?"

It understood, partly the words spoken in Zee's language, and partly the gesture. It said mouthingly, "Yes. Eeff come—with you."

Uncanny! Horrible! Martt shuddered. Degg was saying, "It is a very good friend to me. May we take it?"

"All right," said Martt shortly, when Zee translated. But it worried him. He resolved more than ever to watch Degg carefully, and to watch this headless thing Degg called a friend.

They fed a small morsel of the drug to Eeff, until it had grown to a size normal to them. Then they started. The black mouth of the river, to them in this size, seemed a passageway ten or twelve feet high and twice as broad. The river swirled about their legs; hot, with steam rising. Soon they were in darkness, following the river around a bend. But only for a moment. Martt and Zee were hand in hand. Degg was in advance; Martt could just distinguish Degg's figure with the shining blob of Eeff in the water beside him.

Darkness. But Martt's eyes were growing accustomed to it. And now the rocks of the caverns seemed to be giving light—a dim phosphorescence. The cavern expanded. They waded across a broad, shallow lake where the