The Andre Norton Megapack - 15 Classic Novels and Short Stories

flaying the spaceman, but they came near to that in places as they worried a choice selection of tree thorns out of his arm and shoulder. The captain had been unfortunate enough to trip and fall into the embrace of a very unfriendly bush.
    Dane inspected a fallen tree for evidence of inimical wild life, and then rested his blanket between him and it as a protecting cushion before he sat down. These trees were not the towering giants of the true forests, but rather oversized bushes which had been made into walls by twined vines. Brilliant bursts of flowers were splotches of vivid color, and the attendant insect life was altogether too abundant. Dane tried to tally his immunity shots and hoped for the best. At the moment he wondered why anyone would want to visit Khatka, let alone pay some astronomical sum for the privilege. Though he could also guess that the plush safari arranged for a paying client might be run on quite different lines from their own present trek.
    How could a tracker find his way through this? With the compasses playing crazy tricks into the bargain! Jellico knew that the compasses were off, yet the captain had followed Asaki’s lead without question, so he must trust the Ranger’s forest craft. But Dane wished they were clear on the mountain side again.
    Time had little meaning in that green gloom. But when they worked through to meet rock walls again, the sun said it was well into the after part of the day. They sheltered for a breather under the drooping limbs of one of the last trees.
    “Amazing!” Jellico, his torn arm in a sling across his chest, came down-slope from the higher point where he had been using the distance lenses. “We struck straight across and cut off about ten miles by that jungle jog. Now I believe all that I’ve heard of your people’s ability to cross wilderness and not lose their built in ‘riding beams,’ sir. With the compasses out, I’ll admit I’ve been nourishing a healthy set of doubts.”
    Asaki laughed. “Captain, I do not question your ability to flit from world to world, or how you have learned to set up trade with strange humans and non-humans alike. To each his own mystery. On Khatka every boy before he becomes a man must learn to navigate the jungle, and with no instruments to help him, only what lies in here.” He touched his thumb to his forehead. “So through generations we have developed our homing instincts. Those who did not, also did not live to father others who might have had the same lack. We are hounds who can run on a scent, and we are migrators who have better than a compass within our own bodies.”
    “Now we take to climbing again?” Tau surveyed the way before them critically.
    “Not at this hour. That sun on the upward slopes can cook a man’s skin were he to touch any rock. We wait.…”
    Waiting for the Khatkans was a chance to sleep. They curled up on their light blankets. But the three spacemen were restless. Dane would have liked to have taken off his boots, but feared he could not replace them; and he could tell from the way the captain shifted his position that Jellico was in pain too. Tau sat quietly, staring at nothing Dane could see, unless it was a tall rock thrust out of the slope like a finger pointing skyward.
    “What color is that rock?”
    Surprised, Dane gave the stony finger closer attention. To him it was the same color as most of the other rocks, a weathered black which in certain lights appeared to carry a brownish film.
    “Black, or maybe dark brown?”
    Tau looked past him to Jellico. The captain nodded.
    “I’d agree with that.”
    Tau cupped his hands over his eyes for a moment and his lips moved as if he were counting. Then he took his hands away and stared up-slope. Dane watched the medic’s eyelids blink slowly. “Nothing but black or brown?” Tau pressed.
    “No.” Jellico supported his injured arm upon his knees, leaning forward, as intent upon the designated rock as if he expected it to assume some far more startling appearance.
    “Queer,” Tau said to himself, and then added briskly, “You’re right, of course. That sun can play tricks with one’s eyes.”
    Dane continued to watch the finger rock. Maybe strong sunlight could play tricks, but he could see nothing odd about that rough lump. And since the captain asked no questions of Tau, he did not quite want to either.
    It was perhaps a half-hour later, and the medic and Jellico had both succumbed to the quiet, the heat, and