Alien Earth and Other Stories Read online

  Then the goldsmith rubbed some more brown leaf into the pipe, right on top of the coals of the other pipeful.

  "The girl is claimin' you as a slave," he says.

  "Who is the girl?" I asked him.

  "Kk-Kk," he says, an' I didn't know whether he was givin' me a name or warning' me to keep quiet.

  Well, I figured I'd rather be a slave than a meal, so I kept quiet.

  Then the monkey-man in the tree began to jabber.

  They didn't look up at him, but I could see they were listenin'. When he got done the girl squeaked some more words.

  Then the monkey-man made some more talk, and the girl talked. The fellow with the pipe smoked an' blew the smoke out of his nose. His eyes were weary an' puckered. He was an odd fellow.

  Finally the old man that had grunted an' made 'em squat, gave another grunt. They all stood up.

  This is the show-down, I says to myself. It's either bein' a white slave or bein' a meat loaf.

  The old man looked at me an' blinked. Then he sucked his lips into his mouth until his face was all puckered into wrinkles. He blinked his lidless eyes some more an' then grunted twice. Then all the men marched off. I could hear their feet boomin' along the hard ground in the jungle, on a path that had been beaten down hard by millions of bare feet. I found out afterward that same path had been used for over a hundred years, an' the king made a law it had to be traveled every day. That was the only way they could keep the ground hard.

  I guess I'm a meal, I thought to myself. I figgered the goldsmith would have told me if I had been goin' to be a slave. But he'd moved off with the rest, an' he hadn't said a word.

  The monkey-man kept talkin' to the bunch. He didn't walk along the path, but he moved through the trees, keepin' up in the branches, right over the heads of the others, an' talkin' all the time, an' his words didn't seem happy words. I sort of felt he was scoldin' like a monkey that's watchin' yuh eat a coconut

  But the old man grunted at him, an' he shut up like a clam. He was mad, though. I could tell that because he set off through the trees, tearin' after a couple of monkeys. An' he pretty nearly caught 'em. They sounded like a whirlwind, tearin' through the branches. Then the sounds got fainter, an' finally eveiything was still.

  I looked around. There was nobody in sight I was there, on the fringe of beach, right near the edge of the jungle, and everything was still an' silent

  Then there came a rustiin' of the jungle stuff an' she came out.

  She had on a skirt of grass stuff, an' her eyes were funny, a liquid expression. Her eyes were like that.

  "I'm Kk-Kk the daughter of Yik-Yik, and the keeper of the gold ledge," she said. "I have learned to speak the language of the goldsmith. You, too, speak the same language. You are my slave."

  "Thank God I ain't a meal," I said. That was before the doctor guys discovered these here calories in food; but right then I didn't feel like a half a good-sized calory, much less a fit meal for a native warrior.

  "You will be my slave," she said, "but if you pay skins to my father you can buy your freedom, and then you will be a warrior."

  "I ain't never been a slave to a woman," I told her, me bein' one of the kind that had always kept from being led to the altar, "but I'd rather be a slave to you than to that old man on the boat out yonder."

  There was something half shy about her, and yet something proud and dignified.

  "I have promised my father my share of the next hunt in order to purchase you from the tribe," she went on.

  "Thanks," I told her, knowin' it was up to me to say somethin', but sort of wonderin' whether a free, white man should thank a woman who had made a slave outa him.

  "Come," she said, an' turned away.

  I had more of a chance to study her back. She was lithe, graceful, and she was a well-turned lass. There was a set to her head, a funny little twist of her shoulders when she walked that showed she was royalty and knowed it. Funny how people get that little touch of class no matter where they are or what stock. Just as soon as they get royal blood in 'em they get it. I've seen 'em everywhere.

  I followed her into the jungle, down under the branches where there wasn't sunlight any more; but the day was just filled with green light.

  Finally we came through the jungle an' into a big clearin'. There were huts around the clearin' an' a big fire. The people of the tribe were here, goin' about their business in knots of two an' three just like nothin' had happened. I was a member of the tribe now, the slave of Kk-Kk.

  Most of the women stared, an' the kids scampered away when they seen me look toward 'em; but that was all. The men took me for granted.

  Chapter 3—Guardians Of Gold

  The girl took me to a hut. In one corner was a frame of wood with animal skins stretched over it. There were all kinds of skins. Some of 'em I knew, more of 'em I didn't.

  She squeaked out some words an' then there was some more jabberin' in a quaverin' voice, an' an old woman came an' brought me fruits.

  I squatted down on my heels the way the natives did, an' tried to eat the fruit. My stomach was still pretty full of salt water an' sand, but the fruit tasted good. Then they gave me a half a coconut shell filled with some sort of creamy liquid that had bubbles comin' up in it. It tasted sort of sour, but it had a lot of authority. Ten minutes after I drank it I felt my neck snap back. It was the delayed kick, an' it was like the hind leg of a mule.

  "Come," says the jane, an' led the way again out into the openin'.

  I followed her, across the openin' into the jungle, along a path, past the shore of a lagoon, and up into a little canon. Here the trees were thicker than ever except on the walls of the canon itself. There'd been a few dirt slides in that canon, an' in one or two places the rock had been stripped bare. After a ways it was all rock.

  An' then we came to somethin' that made my eyes stick out. There was a ledge o' rock an' a vein o' quartz in it. The vein was just shot with gold, an' in the center it was almost pure gold. The quartz was crumbly, an' there were pieces of it scattered around on the ground. The foliage had been cleared away, an' the ground was hard. There was a fire goin' near the ledge an' some clay crucibles were there. Then there was a great bellows affair made out of thick, oiled leather. It was a big thing, but all the air came out of a little piece of hollow wood in the front.

  I picked up one of the pieces of quartz. The rock could be crumbled between the fingers, an' it left the gold in my hand. The gold was just like it showed in the rock, spreadin' out to form sort of a tree. There must have been fifty dollars' worth in the piece o' rock that I crumbled up in my fingers.

  I moved my hands around fast an' managed to slip the gold in my torn shirt. The girl was watchin' me with those funny, liquid eyes of hers, but she didn't say a word.

  There was a great big pile of small sticks between me an' the ledge of gold. I figured it was kindlin' wood that they kept for the fire. But finally my eyes got loose from the ledge of gold an' what should I see but the sticks movin'. I looked again, an' then I saw somethin' else.

  It was a big ant heap made outa sticks an' sawdust. Some of those sticks were eight or ten inches long and half an inch around. And the whole place was swarming with ants. They had their heads stickin' out of the little holes between the sticks.

  They must be big ants, I thought; but I was interested in that gold ledge. There must have been millions of dollars in it. I took a couple of steps toward it, an' then the ant heap just swarmed with life.

  They were big ants covered with sort of a white wool and they came out of there like somebody had given 'em an order.

  The girl shrieked somethin' in a high-pitched voice, but I didn't know whether it was at me or the ants.

  The ants swarmed into two columns of maybe eight or ten abreast in each column, an' they started for me, swingin' out in a big circle as though one was goin' to come on one side, an' one on the other.

  An' then they stopped. The girl ran forward an' put her arms on my shoulders an' starte
d caressin' me, pattin' my hair, cooin' soft noises in my ears.

  I thought maybe she'd gone cuckoo, an' I looked into her eyes, but they weren't lookin' at me, they were lookin' at the ants, an' they were wide with fear.

  An' the ants were lookin' at her. I could see their big eyes gazin' steadylike at her. Then somethin' else must have been said to 'em, although I did not hear anything. But all at once, just like an army presentin' arms in response to an order, they threw up their long feelers an' waved 'em gently back an' forth. Then the girl took me by the arm an' moved me away.

  "I should have told you," she said, "never to go past the line of that path. The ants guard the yellow metal, and when one comes nearer than that they attack. There is no escape from those ants. I took you to them so now you can help me feed them."

  That all sounded sorta cuckoo to me, but the whole business was cuckoo anyway.

  "Look here," I tells this jane. "I'm willin' to be the slave of a chiefs daughter—for awhile. But I ain't goin' to be slave to no ant hill."

  "That is not expected," she said. "It is an honor to assist in feeding the ants, a sacred right. You only assist me. Never again must you come so near to the ants."

  I did a lot of thinkin'. I wasn't hankerin' to come into an argument with those ants, but I was figurin' to take a closer slant at that gold ledge.

  She took me away into the jungle where there was a pile of fruit dryin' in the sun. It was a funny sort of fruit, an' smelled sweet, like orange blossoms, only there was more of a honey smell to it.

  "Take your arms full," she said.

  Well, it was my first experience bein' a slave, but I couldn't see as it was much different from bein' a sailor, only the work was easier.

  I scooped up both arms full of the stuff. The smell made me a little dizzy at first, but I soon got used to it. The girl picked up some, too, an' she led the way back to the ant pile.

  She had me put my load down an' showed me how to arrange it in a long semicircle. I could see the ants watchin' from out of the holes in the ant pile, but they did not do anything except watch.

  Finally the girl made a queer clicking sound with her tongue an' teeth an' the ants commenced to boil out again. This time they made for the fruit, an' they went in order, just like a bunch of swell passengers on one of the big ocean liners. Some of 'em seemed to hold first meal ticket while the others remained on guard. Then there must have been some signal from the ants, because the girl didn't say a word, but all of the first bunch of ants fell back an' stood guard, an' the second bunch of ants moved forward.

  They repeated that a couple of times. I watched 'em, too fascinated to say a word.

  After awhile I heard steps, an' the old goldsmith came along, puffin' his pipe regular, a puff for every two steps. He reminded me of a freight engine, boilin' along on a down grade, hittin' her up regular.

  He didn't say a word to me, nor to the ants, but the ants heard him comin' an' they all formed into two lanes with their feelers wavin', an' the goldsmith walked down between those lanes an' up to the gold ledge. There he stuck some more wood on the fire, raked away some ashes an' pawed out a bed of coals.

  Then I saw he had a hammer an' a piece of metal that looked like a reddish iron. He pulled a skin away an' I saw lots of lumps an' stringers of pure gold. It was a yellow, frosty lookin' sort of gold, and it was so pure it glistened.

  He picked up some of the pieces an' commenced to hammer 'em into ornaments.

  "What do yuh do with that stuff?" I asked the girl, wavin' my hand careless like so she wouldn't think I was much interested.

  "We trade it to the Fanti tribes," she said. "It is of no use, too soft to make weapons, too heavy for arrow points; but they use it to wear around their fingers and ankles. They give us many skins for it, and sometimes they try to capture our territory and take the entire ledge. If I had my way we would stop making the ornaments. Our people do not like the metal, and never use it. Having it here just makes trouble for us, and the Fantis are fierce people. They are killing off our entire tribe."

  I nodded as wise as a dozen owls on a limb.

  "Yeah," I told her, "the stuff always makes trouble. Seems to me it'd be better to get rid of it."

  The old goldsmith raised his head, twisted his pipe in his mouth and screwed his rheumy eyes at me. For a minute or two he acted like he was goin' to say somethin', an' then he went back to his work.

  It was a close call. Right then I knew I'd been goin' too fast. But I had my eye on that ledge o' gold.

  I guess it was a Fanti that saved my life; if it hadn't been for seein' him, the ants would have got me sure. Those ants looked pretty fierce when I saw 'em boilin' out in military formation, but by the time it came dark they didn't seem so much.

  I got to thinkin' things over. Bein' a slave wasn't near so bad as it might me, an' one of these days I was goin' to get away in the jungle an' work down to a port. All I needed was to have about ninety pounds o' pure gold on my back when I went out an' I wouldn't be workin' as a sailor no more.

  Sittin' there in the warm night, while the other folks had all rolled into their huts, I got to thinkin' things over. As a slave, I wasn't given a hut. I could sleep out. If the animals got bad I could either build up the fire or climb a tree. But there was fifty or sixty other slaves, mosdy captured warriors of other tribes, an' it wasn't so bad.

  There was a place in the jungle where the hills formed a bottle neck, an' there the tribe kept sentries so the Fantis couldn't get in, an' so the slaves couldn't get out. Gettin' through the jungle where there wasn't a trail was plain impossible.

  I picked up a lot of this from the girl, an' a lot from usin' my eyes.

  Night time the ants didn't seem so much, an' the gold seemed a lot more. I wondered how I could work it, an' then a scheme hit me. I'd go out an' make a quick run for the ledge, chop off a few chunks o' quartz an' then beat it back quick. I'd be in an' out before the ants could come boilin' out of their thirty-foot ant hill. It seemed a cinch.

  I sneaked away an' managed to find my way down the trail to the gold ledge. It was dark in the jungle. The stars were all misty, an' a squall was workin' somewheres out to sea. I could hear the thunder of the surf an' smell the smells of the jungle. There wasn't any noise outside of the poundin' surf.

  I'd taken my shoes off when I dropped onto the raft, an' they'd got lost while I was rollin' around in the water, so I was barefoot. The ground had been beaten hard by millions of bare feet, an' so I made no noise. The hard part was tellin' just when I got to the gold ledge, because I didn't want to steer a wrong course an' fetch up against the ant heap.

  I needn't have worried. I smelled the faint smell o' smoke, an' then a pile o' coals gleamed red against the black of the jungle night. It was the coals of the goldsmith's fire. I chuckled to myself. What a simple bunch o' people this tribe was!

  An' then, all of a sudden, I knew someone else was there in the jungle. It was that funny feelin' that a man can't describe. It wasn't a sound, because there wasn't any sound. It wasn't anything I could see, because it was as dark as the inside of a pocket. But it was somethin' that just made my hair bristle.

  I slipped back from the path and into the dark of the jungle. Six feet from the trail an' I was hidden as well as though I'd been buried

  I got my eye up against a crack in the leaves an' watched the coals of the camp fire, tryin' to see if anything moved.

  All of a sudden those coals just blotted out. I thought maybe a leaf or a vine had got in front of my eyes, but there wasn't. It was just somethin' movin' between me an' the fire. An' then it stepped to one side, an' I saw it, a black man, naked, rushin' into the cliff of gold. He worked fast, that boy. The light from the coals showed me just a blur of black motion as he chipped rocks from the ledge.

  Then he turned and sprinted out.

  I chuckled to myself. The boy had got my system. It was a cinch, nothin' to it.

  An' then there came a yell of pain. The black man began to do a devil's
dance, wavin' his hands and legs. He'd got right in front of me, within ten feet he was, an' I could just make him out when he moved.

  From the ground there came a faint whisperin' noise, an' then I could sense things crawlin'. I felt my blood turn to lukewarm water as I thought of the danger I was in. If those ants found me there—

  I was afraid to move, an' I was afraid to stand still.

  But the black boy solved the problem for me. He made for a tree, climbin' up a creeper like a monkey. Up in the tree, I could hear his hands goin' as he tried to brush the ants off. And he kept up a low, moanin' noise, sort of a chatter of agony.

  I couldn't tell whether the ants were leavin' him alone or whether they were watchin' the bottom of the tree, waitin' for him.

  But the creeper that he'd climbed up stretched against the starlit sky almost in front of my nose. I could see it faintly outlined against the stars. And then I noticed that it was rip-plin' an' swayin'. For a minute I couldn't make it out. Then I saw that those ants were swarmin' up the tree.

  That was the end. The moanin' became a yellin', an' then things began to thud to the ground. That must be the gold rock the fellow had packed away with him, probably in a skin bag slung over his shoulder.

  Then the sounds quit. Everything was silent. But I sensed the jungle was full of activity, a horrid activity that made me want to vomit. I could smell somethin' that must have been blood, an' there was a drip-drip from the tree branches.

  Then the coals flickered up an' I could see a little more. The ground was black, swarmin'. The ants were goin' back and forth, up an' down the creepers, up into the tree.

  Finally somethin' fell to the ground. It couldn't have been a man, because it was too small, hardly bigger than a hunk o' deer meat; but the firelight flickered on it, an' I could see that the heap was all of a quiver. An' it kept gettin' smaller an' smaller. Then I knew. The ants were finishin' their work.