We heard her small voice.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Stand quiet. Now I put my hand for you."
His monstrous hand bristled with a thatch of heavy black hair. He slid it carefully along the cushion. Babs was barely the length of one of its finger joints. She climbed upon its palm.
"That iss right, Babs. Now I bring you--hold tight to my finger. Here, I crook the little one. Fling your arms around it."
With a swoop his hand took her aloft and away. Then we saw her, twenty feet or so in the air, still on his hand as he held it near his face.
"Now we haf a little talk, Babs. When we get to the island, I put you back in your cage."
I had a sudden flash of realization. There was something I could do. I know now my judgment was bad. I recall it struck me that Alan would want to do it also. And, perhaps, even Glora. But that wouldn"t work. My chances, however desperate, were better alone. Glora and Alan--in our present size--could doubtless disembark safely. Glora knew the layout of the island. And she could follow Polter.
Alan and Glora were standing beside me peering over that billowing cushion spread toward the distant giant palm with Babs standing upon it.
I gripped Alan"s shoulder.
"See here, Alan," I whispered vehemently: "What ever happens, we must follow Polter. Glora knows the way. Some opportunity will come to get large without being discovered. Then we"ll rush Polter!"
Alan"s white face turned to me. "Yes, that"s what we"re planning. But George, here on this boat--"
"Of course not. Can"t do it here. Tell Glora, to be sure to follow Polter. Whatever happens, you"ll think of nothing else: you won"t will you?"
"George, what--"
"We"ve got to make some opportunity." I was trembling inside, fearful that Alan would be suspicious of me. Yet I had to make sure that he and Glora would stay as close to Polter as possible.
"All right," Alan agreed. "Listen to them."
Polter was talking to Babs. But I didn"t hear the words I moved a trifle away. Rash decision! I hardly decided anything. There was only the vision of Babs before me and my love for her. My desperate need of doing something; getting to her, seeing her, being with her. I wanted her near my own size again as though the blessed normality of that would rationalize and lessen her danger. If only I had been less rash! If only back there in that tunnel I had stopped to see what it was my foot kicked against!
I slid away. Alan and Glora did not notice it; they were whispering together and gazing over the cushion at Babs. In the shadow of the cushion I moved some ten feet. On the undulating top of the cushion the little golden cage stood with its lattice door open. It was a few feet from my face.
I fumbled at my belt for the diminishing vial. I found one pellet left.
Well, that would be enough. I was hurried. Alan might discover me.
Polter might put Babs back in the cage and close its door. We might be near the island already, and the confusion, the activity of disembarking would defeat me. A thousand things might happen.
I touched the pellet to my tongue. In a few seconds the drug action had come and pa.s.sed. The cushion top loomed well over my head. The side was a ridged, indescribably unnatural vista of cliff wall. The fabric was coa.r.s.e with hairy strands, dented into little ravines and crevices. I climbed and I came panting to the pillow surface. The golden cage was six or eight feet away and was now two feet high.
Again I touched the drug to my tongue; held it an instant. The cage drew away; grew to a normal six-foot height; then larger, until in a moment it stopped. I stood peering at it, trying to gauge its size in relation to me. I wanted so intensely now to appear normal in Babs" eyes. The cage seemed about ten feet high. A little less, possibly. I barely tasted the pellet, and replaced it carefully in the vial. I could only hope its efficacy would be preserved.
I had to chance that I wouldn"t be seen while crossing this billowy expanse. I ran. The rope strands of the fabric now had s.p.a.ces between their curving surfaces. The cage was a shining golden house, set on this wide rolling area. Far in the distance there was a blur--Polter"s reclining body.
I reached the cage. It was a room about ten feet square and equally as high. Walled solid, top and bottom, and on three sides. The front was a lattice of bars, with a narrow six-foot doorway, standing open now.
I dashed in. The interior was not wholly bare. There was a metal-wrought couch fastened to the wall, with a railing around it and handles. It suggested a ship"s bunk. There was a railing at convenient height all around the wall.
I sought a hiding place. I saw just one--under the couch. It was secluded enough. There was a grillelike lattice extending down from the seat to the floor. I squeezed under one end, and lay wedged behind the grille.
How much time pa.s.sed I don"t know. My thoughts were racing. Babs would be coming.
I heard the distant approaching rumble of Polter"s voice. Through the grille I could see across the floor of the ten foot cage to the front lattice bars. Outside, there appeared a huge, pink-white, mottled blob--Polter"s hand, a ridged and pitted surface with great, bristling black stalks of hair.
The figure of Babs came through the cage doorway. Blessed normality! The same slim little Babs who always stood, since we were both matured, with her head about level with my shoulders.
The latticed door swung shut with a reverberating metallic clank. Babs stood tense, clinging to the wall railing. I heard the blurred rumble of Polter"s voice.
"Hold tightly, my little Babs!"
The room lurched; went upward and sidewise with a wild dizzying swoop.
Babs clung to the rail and I was wedged p.r.o.ne under the couch. Then the movement stopped; there was a jolting, rocking, and outside I heard the clank of metal. Polter was fastening the chains of the cage to his chest.
A white glow now came through the bars. It was starlight reflecting from Polter"s shirt bosom. An abyss of distance was outside. I could see nothing but the white glow.
Momentarily there was very little movement in the room. Only the rhythmic sway of Polter"s breathing and an occasional jolt as he shifted his position. The floor was tilted at a sharp angle. Babs came toward the couch, pulling herself along the wall railing.
I called softly, "Babs!"
She stopped. I called again, "Babs! Don"t cry out! It"s George!
Here--stand still!"
She gave a little cry. "George--where are you? I don"t--"
I slid out from my concealment and stood up, holding to the railing.
Blessed normality of size! She cried again, "George! You! How did you get here?"
She edged along the railing, a step or two down the tilting floor, then released her hold and flung herself into my waiting arms.
"I think we are landing. Hold on to the railing, George. When the room moves it goes with a rush."
Babs laughed softly. It must have seemed to her, after being alone in here, that now our plight was far less desperate. She had told me how she was captured. A man accosted her on the Terrace, saying he wanted to speak to her about Alan. Then a weapon threatened her. Amid all those people she was held up in old-fashioned style, hurried to a taxicar and whirled away.
She was saying now, "When Polter moves, it is dizzying. You"ll see."
"I have already, Babs. Heavens, what a swoop!"
The room was more level now. We carefully drew ourselves to the front lattice. Polter was standing, and we had the white sheen from his shirt front. A sheer drop was outside the bars, but looking down I could see the outlines of his body with the huge spread of the boat"s c.o.c.kpit underneath us.
A confusion of rumbling voices sounded. Blurred giant shapes were outside. The room jolted and swayed as the boat landed and Polter disembarked.
Babs stood clinging to me. We, at least, were normal in this metal barred room, Babs and I. But outside was the abnormality of largeness. I think that in relation to us, the men were of over two hundred-foot stature, and the hunched Polter a trifle less. It seemed as he walked that we were lurching at least a hundred and fifty feet above ground.
"You had better hide," Babs urged. "He might stop and speak to someone.
If anyone looked in here you would be seen; no chance then, even to get across the room."
It was true. But for a few moments I lingered. I could distinguish vegetation on their flat roof-tops, as though flower gardens were laid there.