Smith paid no attention to what was going on. He just sat humped there on the hobby, crooning to himself like a half-wit baby.
“Let’s get on,” I said. I had been ready to call a halt so we could rest and have a bite to eat, but for some reason this didn’t seem to be the place for it. Although maybe that wasn’t it at all-maybe I wanted to get going so that the sound of the hobbies’ rockers would drown out that sound of crooning.
I expected Sara might protest that I was driving everyone too hard, that it was time to take a rest, but she fell into step beside me and we went on down the street without a word from her.
The tree that stood at the end of the street kept getting bigger all the time, or seemed to be getting bigger. It was only, of course, that as we drew closer to it, we began to get a better perspective of it. Finally we could see that it stood a little distance beyond where the street came to an end and that it seemed to be twice as tall, perhaps more than twice as tall, as the buildings that stood on either side of the street. And that meant twice as tall as any of the buildings in the city, for the buildings here were as tall as any we’d seen in the center of the city.
The sun was slanting toward the west when we finally reached the end of the street, and it really was the end. The city stopped, just like that, and open country lay beyond, a red and yellow land, not exactly desert, but very close to it, a land with buttes and the far-off blue of mountain ranges and here and there the trees. There was other vegetation, little scrubby stuff, but the only thing that reached any height were those monstrous trees. Only the one of them was close, perhaps three miles or so away, although it was hard, admittedly, to judge its distance.
The street ended and a trail went on as a continuation of it-not a road, but a trail that over many years had been worn down a couple of feet or so into the very soil. It went winding out, twisting and turning, into that red and yellow land. A mile or so beyond the city stood a single building, not as massive as the buildings that made up the city, but still good-sized. It was not like the buildings of the city, not just one huge rectangular mass. Rather, it was a frothy sort of thing, but solid and without any foolishness about its frothiness. It was built of some kind of red material and that alone was enough to set it out from the whiteness of the buildings in the city. It had spires and towers and what seemed to be windows, high up, and a huge ramp sprang up to three mighty doors that stood open on its front.
“Captain Ross,” said Sara, “perhaps we should call a halt. It’s been a long, hard day.”
Maybe she expected that I would argue with her, but I didn’t. It had been a long, hard day and it was time to call a halt. I should have done it sooner, perhaps, but I had felt an itch to get out of the city, if that were possible. We’d been marching steadily for eight hours or more and the sun still was only a little better than halfway down the western sky. There still would be several hours of light, but we’d done enough for one day. The days must run long here, I told myself.
“Over by the building,” I suggested. “After we set up camp, we can have a look at it.”
She nodded and we started out again. Smith still was crooning, but you could only hear the crooning in between the creaking sounds made by the rockers of the hobbies. If he kept it up once we set up camp, I’d be hard put to keep from belting him into at least a semblance of silence. To let him keep on with that silly sound was more than a man should have to stand.
Inside the city we had been shielded from the sun, but now the sun was warm-not hot, but warm, with that welcome, heartening warmness one associates with spring. It felt good just to be walking in the sunlight. The air was clean and had a sharpness to it and it carried in it a redolent scent of vegetation, a resinous, spicy scent that tingled in the nostrils.
Ahead of us the red building stood stark against the cloudless sky, its towers and spires seeming to reach up to pierce that very sky. It was good to get out of the city, to be where we could see the sky again, and it gave me the feeling that we were finally on our way, wherever we were going.
I wondered once again just how crazy one could get. If we followed this snaking trail we just might find the centaur people who had bought Roscoe’s brain and if they still happened to have it they might sell it back to us, and if we could get it somehow we could pop it back into Roscoe’s body and just possibly he might be able to tell us what the whole thing was about.
In my time I’d been on wild-goose chases of my own, but to whomp up a honey, I told myself, it took a female big game hunter and a dreaming blind man and a sneaky little religico with dirty fingernails. There might be better combinations, but until a better one came along, those three would stand as tops.
We were about halfway to the building when behind me startled, frightened screams burst out and as I turned I saw the hobbies charging down upon us. Hardly thinking of what I was doing, I dived sidewise off the trail and as I dived caught Sara around the waist and carried her along with me. Together we rolled out to one side of the path and the hobbies went rushing past us, their rockers moving so fast they seemed to be a blur. Both Smith and Tuck where hanging on to the saddles desperately and Tuck’s brown robe was flowing out behind him, snapping in the wind. The hobbies were pounding as hard as they could go straight for the ramp that led into the building, screaming as they went-screams that sent cold shivers running up my spine.
I was halfway to my feet when something exploded just above my head, not a loud explosion, but rather a muffled thump, and dark red pellets went whizzing through the air and bouncing on the ground.
I didn’t know what was going on, but it was quite apparent that this was not a place to stay. The hobbies might know what was happening and they had headed for the ramp and I was more than willing to do my best to follow. I jerked Sara to her feet and we started running for the ramp.
Off to the right was another thump and more of the dark-red pellets went skittering across the ground, raising little puffs of dust as they bounced along.
“It’s the tree!” cried Sara, gasping for breath. “The tree is throwing things at us!”
I jerked up my head and saw that a number of dark balls were flying through the air above us and they certainly did seem to be coming from the tree.
“Look out!” I yelled at Sara and gave her a push that sent her staggering to the ground, falling there myself. Above us the dark balls were going thump! thump! thump! and the air seemed to be filled with the pellets, whizzing wickedly. One caught me in the ribs and it felt as if a mule had kicked me and another clipped me on the cheek.
“Now!” I yelled at Sara and jerked her to her feet She broke free of my clutching hand and beat me to the ramp. All around us the dull thumps were exploding and the floor of the ramp danced with the bouncing pellets, but ‘we made it up the ramp without being hit and stumbled through the door.
The others all were there, the hobbies huddled in a frightened group and Hoot scurrying up and down in front of them, like a worried sheepdog. Tuck was slumped in his saddle and Smith had quit his crooning, but instead of slumping, he was sitting straight or as straight as his tubbiness would let him, and his face was glowing with a silly sort of happiness that was downright frightening.
Outside the door the dark balls still were plunging in and exploding with their muffled crumps, throwing out sprays of the whizzing pellets that struck and bounced in dancing frenzy all along the ramp.