“Not just her sister,” interrupted Geo, “but the Goddess Argo Incarnate.”
“Be patient,” said Iimmi. “Only if she wished to make permanent her temporary condition, you thought, could she set such an impossible task. There may be some truth in what you say. But she herself would not bring the jewel to the shores of Aptor, though it was for her own protection. Thanks to you, all three jewels are now in Aptor, and if any part of her story is true, Leptar is now in more danger than it has been in five hundred years. You have the jewels, two of them, and you cannot use them. Where is your friend Snake who can? Both Snake and Jordde could easily be spies and the enmity between them feigned, so that while you focused on one, you could be misled by the other. You say he can move into men’s minds? Perhaps he clouded yours.”
They sat silent for the lapsing of a minute.
“Argo may be torn by many things,” continued Iimmi. “But you, in watching some, may have been deluded by others.”
Light from the river quivered on the undersides of leaves. Urson spoke now. “I think his story is better than yours, Geo.”
“Then what shall we do now?” asked Geo, softly.
“Do what the Goddess requests as best we can,” said Iimmi. “Find the Temple of Hama, secure the stone, rescue the young Goddess, and die before we let the jewels fall into hands of Aptor.”
“From the way you describe this place,” muttered Urson, “that may not be far off.”
“Still,” mused Geo, “there are things that don’t mesh. Like why were you saved too, Iimmi? Why were we brought here at all? And why did Jordde want to kill you and the other sailor?”
“Perhaps,” said Iimmi, “the god Hama has a strange sense of humor and we shall be allowed to carry the jewels up to the temple door before we are slaughtered, dropping them at his feet.” He smiled. “Then again, perhaps your theory is the correct one, Geo, and I am the spy, sent to sway your reason.”
Urson and Geo glanced at each other.
“There are an infinite number of theories for every set of facts,” said the Negro. “Rule number one: assume the simplest; that includes all the known conditions to be true until more conditions arise for which your theory no longer holds. Rule number two: then, and not until, change it.”
“Then we go on into the jungle,” Geo said.
“I guess we do,” said Urson.
“Since we’ve got this job, we’ve got to trust ourselves and do it right. Let’s see if we can put one more of those things around your neck before we’re through.” He pointed to the two jewels hanging at Geo’s chest. Then he laughed. “One more and you’ll be all the way up to me,” and he rattled his own triple necklace.
V
Light lowered in the sky as they walked beside the river, keeping close to the rocky edge and brushing away vines that strung into the water from hanging limbs. Urson broke down a branch as thick as his wrist and as tall as himself and smote the water with it, playfully. “That should put a welt on anyone’s head who wants to bother us.” He raised the stick from the water and drops ran along the bark, moving sparks at the ends of dark lines.
“We’ll have to turn into the woods for food soon,” said Iimmi, “unless we wait for animals who come down to drink.”
Urson tugged at another branch, and it twisted loose from fibrous white pulp. “Here,” he handed it to Iimmi. “I’ll have one for you in a moment, Geo.”
“And maybe we could explore a little, before it gets dark,” Geo suggested.
Urson handed him the third staff. “There’s not much here I want to see,” he muttered.
“Well, we can’t sleep on the bank. We’ve got to find a place hidden in the trees.”
“Can you see what that is through there?” Iimmi asked.
“Where?” asked Geo. “Huh … ?” Through the thick growth was a rising shadow. “A rock or a cliff?” he suggested.
“Maybe,” mused Urson, “but it’s awfully regular.”
Geo started off into the underbrush, and the others followed. Their goal was further and larger than it had looked from the river. Once they passed across a section of ten or twelve stones, rectangular and side by side, like paving. Small trees had pushed up between some of them, but for thirty feet, before the edge sank beneath the soft jungle floor it was easier going. Suddenly the growth became thin again and they were at the edge of a relatively clear area. Before them loomed the ruins of a great building. Six girders cleared the highest wall, implying an original height of eighteen or twenty stories. One wall was completely sheared away and fragments of it chunked the ground. The revealed dark caves of broken rooms and cubicles suggested an injured granite hive. They approached slowly.
To one side a great metal cylinder lay askew a heap of rubbish. A flat blade of metal transversed it, one side twisting into the ground where skeletal girders shown beneath ripped plating. A row of windows like dark eyes lined the body, and a door gaped in an idiotic oval halfway along its length.
Fascinated, they turned toward the injured wreck. As they neared, a sound came from inside the door. They stopped, and their staves leapt a protective inch from the ground. In the shadow of the door, ten feet from the ground, another shadow moved, resolving itself into an animal head, long, muzzled, gray. Then they could see the forelegs. It looked like an immense dog, and it was carrying a smaller animal, obviously dead, in its mouth. It saw them, watched them, was still.
“Dinner,” Urson said softly. “Come on.” They moved forward again. Then they stopped.
Suddenly the beast sprang from the doorway. Shadow and distance had made them completely underestimate its size. Along the
