THE GREEN FOREST

"HERE!" said Marenson.

He put the point of his pencil down in the center of a splotch of green. His eyes focused on the wiry man opposite him.

"Right here, Mr. Clugy," he said, "is where the camp will be built."

Clugy leaned forward and glanced at the spot. Then he looked up; and Marenson was aware of the spaceman's slate-gray eyes studying him. Clugy drew slowly back into his chair, and said in a monotone:

"Why that particular spot?"

"Oh," said Marenson, "I have a feeling we'll get more juice from there."

"A feeling!" The words came explosively. Clugy swallowed hard, and said quietly: "Mr. Marenson, that's dangerous jungle country." He stood up, and bent over the map of the Mira sun planet. "Now, here," he said briskly, "in this mountain country it's bad enough, but the animal and plant life can be fought off, and the climate is bearable."

Marenson shook his head, and put his pencil back to the green splotch. "Here," he said with finality.

Clugy went back to his chair and sat down. He was a lean man with the tan of many suns on his face. Marenson was aware of the spaceman's hard eyes studying him. The other seemed to be tensing himself for a violent verbal battle. Abruptly, he must have decided against a head-on clash with his superior.

"But why?" he said in a perplexed tone. "After all, the problem is very simple. A big ship is being built, and we need the organic juice from the progeny of these Mira beasts."

"Exactly," said Marenson, "so we locate our camp in the forest which is their main habitat."

"Why not," Clugy persisted, "leave the job of selecting the camp site to the field men--the hunters?"

Marenson put his pencil down deliberately. He was accustomed to dealing with people who opposed his plans. He thought of himself as a calm man whose patience was exhausted.

There were times when he gave detailed reasons for his actions, and there were times when he didn't. This was one of the times when he didn't; under the rulings, actually, he couldn't. A glance at the wall clock showed that it was ten to four. Tomorrow at this hour he would be clearing his desk preliminary to leaving on a month's vacation with Janet. Between now and then he had a score of vital things to do. It was time to break off the interview. He said in a formal voice:

"I take full responsibility for my decision. And now, Mr. Clugy--"

He stopped, conscious that he had said the wrong thing. It was not often that there were scenes in this sumptuous office with its hundred-story view of the capital of the galaxy. Usually the deep space men who came in here were properly impressed by Ancil Marenson and his resonant baritone voice. But he took one look now at Clugy's face, and realized he had handled the other in a wrong fashion.

Clugy hunched himself forward angrily. And it was the stupendousness of the emotional jump he made then that startled Marenson--from mildness, without any gradations, to unqualified anger.

"Easy talk," he said now in a harsh, steely voice, "from a man in the penguin division of the service."

Marenson blinked. He parted his lips to speak, then closed them tight. He started to smile, but changed his mind. He had such a long space career behind him that he had never thought of himself as being in the armchair brigade. He cleared his throat.

"Mr. Clugy," he said mildly, "I'm surprised that you introduce personalities into this purely governmental affair."

Clugy's stare was unflinching. "Mr. Marenson," he said with chilling politeness, "a man who sends others into dangerous situations on a mere whim has already introduced the personal element. You're making a life-and-death decision involving several thousand brave men. What you don't seem to understand is that the Mira planet forest is a green hell. There's nothing else like it in the universe we know--unless the Yevd have something similar in their section of the galaxy. The year round it swarms with the progeny of the lymph beast. What puzzles me is why don't I get up and punch you one right in that handsome face of yours?"

It was the reference to the Yevd that gave Marenson the opening he'd been looking for. "If you don't mind," he said coldly, "I'm going to have you tested for light illusion. I'm having endless trouble on all our supply lines from Yevd interference. There's something funny about a man who's fighting as hard as you are to prevent lymph juice from being delivered to the navy."

Clugy smiled, showing his teeth. "That's right," he said. "Attack is the best defense, isn't it? So now I'm a Yevd using my mastery of light and illusion to make you believe I'm a human being."

He stood up. Before he could continue, Marenson said in a savage voice: "It's a good thing that there are men like me in the background. Field people have a tendency to slack on the job, and take all the easy ways. My job is to deliver lymph juice to The Yards. Deliver it, understand. No excuses. No explaining that the hunters find it more convenient to commute from the mountains. I have to get the juice to the factories, or resign in favor of someone who can. Mr. Clugy, I make a hundred thousand a year because I know what decisions to make."

Clugy said: "We'll get the juice."

"You haven't been."

"We're just starting." He leaned over the desk. His gray eyes were steely. "My penguin friend," he said softly, "you've got yourself into a little neurotic corner, fancying the hard decision is always the right one. Well, I don't give a care about your job conditioning. I'm telling you this: When the order comes to me, it had better read, 'Mountain camp', or you'll know the reason why."

"Then I'll know the reason why."

"Is that final?"

"That's final."

Without a word, Clugy turned and headed for the door. It closed behind him with a crash.

Marenson hesitated, then called his wife. She came on the visiplate in her jaunty fashion, a slim, healthy young woman of thirty-five. She smiled when she saw who it was. Marenson explained what had happened, finished:

"So you see I've got to stay down here and figure out ways and means to prevent him from getting back at me. I'll be late, I expect."

"All right. "Bye."

Marenson worked fast. In the early, friendly part of his conversation with Clugy he had mentioned his vacation. Now, he called Government Messenger Service, and sent the spaceship tickets for the trip to the Paradise Planet offices for validation. While he waited for the messenger to return, he checked on Clugy.

The man was registered with his son in a suite at the Spacemen's Club. Son? Marenson's eyes narrowed. If Clugy got rough, the boy might be the best method of striking back at him.

During the next hour, he discovered that Clugy had important "connections" in high government circles, that he had killed four men, juris ultima thule--beyond the law of the uttermost limit--and that he was known as a man who liked to do a job his own way.

The tickets were returned as he reached that point. He grinned down at the union stamp of "validation" on them. If the spacemen's organization repudiated that, they would be open to a court suit for triple damages.

Round one, accordingly, was his.

His grin faded. It was a minor victory against a man who had killed four times.

"The important thing," Marenson decided, "is to stay out of trouble until Janet and I are aboard the Paradise liner tomorrow. That will give me a month."

He realized he was perspiring. He shook his head sadly. "I'm not the man I used to be." He looked down at his long, strong body. "I'm getting soft. I couldn't take a really bad beating up, even with hypnotic anesthesia." He felt better for the admission. "Now, I'm getting down to realities."

The phone rang, Marenson jumped, then answered it. The man whose face came on the video said: "Mr. Clugy is just leaving the Spacemen's Club. He was in his room for about fifteen minutes."

"Do you know where he's going?"

"He is now entering a taxigyro. There goes his destination up on the meter. Just a moment, I can hardly see it ... Y--A ... I got it. The Yards."

Marenson nodded gloomily. Clugy returning to The Yards could, of course, mean many things. They were long and had many points of interest.

"Shall we beat him up, sir?"

Marenson hesitated. Ten years ago he would have said yes. Beat your opponent to the punch. That was the first principle of war between two spacemen. But he wasn't a spaceman any more. He couldn't define it, but it had something to do with prestige. If he was hurt, it was news. In that sense Clugy had an advantage over him. Because if he was caught doing anything against the man, the powerful spacemen's union would ruin him. Whereas if Clugy took action against him, his union would probably defend him on the grounds that he was acting for the best interests of his men.

Marenson's hesitation ended. "Follow him," he ordered, "and report to me."

He recognized the action of a half measure. But, then, a man couldn't risk his career on the basis of one incident. He closed his desk, and headed for home.

He found Janet still packing. She listened to his account of what he had done, a faraway expression in her eyes, and finally said: "You surely don't expect to win that way."

There was a tone in her voice that stung. Marenson defended himself, finishing: "So you see, I just can't take the risks I used to take."

"It's not a matter of risks," she said. "It's a matter of thoroughness." She frowned. "My father used to say that no man today could afford to let down his standards."

Marenson was silent. Her father had been a fleet admiral in his day, and she regarded him as a final authority in most matters. On this occasion he was half inclined to agree with her, and yet there was another factor.

"The important thing," he said, "is that we get away tomorrow evening on the Paradise liner. If I do anything directly against Clugy, I might have an injunction slapped on me, or a union official may order me to appear before an investigating committee--the whole setup is dangerous."

"Is that really the best way to get lymph juice--the way you ordered it?"

Marenson nodded vigorously. "Yes, it is. The records go back just over three hundred years. There have been five major periods of big ship building during that time. And on each occasion the men who actually had to do the hunting have kicked up a row. Every method was tried, and the statistics show the method of living in the forest to be a full seventy-five per cent more effective than any other system."

"Did you tell that to Clugy?"

"No." Marenson shook his head grimly.

"Why not?"

"Two generations ago, a union lawyer got a smart decision rendered against the government. The Supreme Court ruled that new techniques of hunting could nullify all past experience. No basically new methods of hunting had or have been developed, you understand. But, having made that statement, they then went on to draw their conclusion as if the new methods actually existed. They held that, since new techniques could nullify past experience, therefore to mention the past was to engage in unfair tactics. The government, they said, meaning the navy, was the stronger party in the dispute, and there was always danger accordingly that the interests of the men would be ignored. Therefore, the past cannot be considered. Therefore, mention of the past must be regarded as an unfair tactic. Such a tactic would automatically mean that the navy would lose the dispute."

Marenson smiled. "Clugy was probably waiting to pounce on me if I used that argument. Of course I may be doing him an injustice. He may not know about the ruling."

"Are these lymph beasts really dangerous?"

He said solemnly: "The progeny are in their own special fashion probably the deadliest creatures ever developed by Nature."

"What are they like?"

Marenson told her. When he had finished, Janet frowned and said: "But why are they so important? Why do we need them?"

Marenson grinned at her. "If I told you that," he said, "the next time I was tested for loyalty I would not only automatically lose my job but at the very least I would be imprisoned for the rest of my life. I might be executed for treason. No, thank you, Mrs. Marenson." There was silence for a while; and Marenson discovered that his words had chilled him just a little. He had an empty feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was so easy, working in an office, to concentrate on the details of a job, and forget the deadlier reasons for that job.

More than two hundred years before, the Yevd had come from the region of the dark obscuring matter in the center of the galaxy. Their ability to control light with the cells of their bodies was not suspected until one day a "man" was blasted while rifling the safe of the Research Council. As the human image dissolved into a rectangular cubelike shape with numerous reticulated legs and arms, human beings had their first inkling of the fantastic danger that threatened.

The fleet was mobilized, armed helicars flew along every street, using radar to silhouette the true shapes of the Yevd. It was afterwards discovered that by a more difficult control of energy, the Yevd could guard themselves against radar. But apparently in their contempt of man's defense systems, they had not bothered to do so. On Earth and on other systems inhabited by men, altogether thirty-seven million of the enemy were killed.

Thereafter, human and Yevd ships fought each other on sight. The intensity of the war waxed and waned, but a few years before, the Yevd had occupied a planetary system near to the solar system. When they refused to leave, the United Governments started the construction of the biggest ship ever planned. Already, though it was only half finished, the great machine towered into the lower heavens.

The Yevd were a carbon-hydrogen-oxygen-fluorine life form, tough of skin and muscle, and almost immune to chemicals and bacteria that affected men. The great compelling problem for man had been to find an organism in his own part of the galaxy that would enable him to experiment for bacteriological warfare.

The progeny of the lymph beast was that organism. And more! The lymph juice, when chemically separated, yielded a high percentage of heavy water.

It was believed that if the Yevd ever discovered how tremendously man was depending on the lymph beasts, they would launch a suicidal attack on the entire Mira system. There were other sources of heavy water, but no other fluorine-metabolism creature that could be used against the Yevd had yet been discovered.

The heavy water was the surface secret. It was hoped that that was what the Yevd would uncover if they ever began to study the problem.

Janet broke the silence with a sigh. "Life has certainly become complicated." She made no further comment. As soon as dinner was over, she retired to her bedroom to finish her packing. When Marenson glanced in later, her light was out and she was in bed. He closed the door softly.

At ten o'clock there was still no call from Detective Jerred. Marenson went to bed, and he must have slept, because he woke with a start to the sound of his visiphone buzzing. A glance at the night clock showed that it was a few minutes after midnight, and a glance at the plate, when he had turned it on, that it was the detective calling him at last.

"I'm back at the club," said Jerred. "Here's what's been happening."

On his arrival at The Yards, Clugy had gone directly to union headquarters, and a union court sat immediately on his appeal for a reversal of the decision. His petition was refused within three hours, on the grounds that the problem involved was supervisory, and did not concern the union.

Apparently, Clugy accepted the decision. For he did not request a full dress trial, which would have required the presence of Marenson as a witness. Instead, he returned to his club where he and his son had dinner in their room. Clugy went to a show by himself, and returned about half an hour ago. He was scheduled to have breakfast at the club, and then at eleven board the freighter that would drop him off at Mira 92, a few days later.

Jerred ended: "Looks as if he made the appeal to satisfy any protests the men might make, then let it go."

Marenson could see how that might be. He had run up against opposition before, and for the most part it was a simple matter of legal procedure. This seemed now to be in the same category.

Clugy would have to act fast if he hoped to change the camp order before his ship departed for Mira.

Marenson said: "Keep somebody watching him till he leaves."

He slept well, and he must have relaxed his vigilance. As he headed for his gyro on the roof after breakfast, he was only vaguely aware of the two men who came toward him.

"Mr. Marenson?" one asked.

Marenson looked up. They were well-dressed, young, strong looking. "Why, yes," he said, "What--"

A gas gun exploded in his face.

Marenson woke up mad. He could feel that fury tensing his body as he came slowly up out of the darkness. And just as he was about to become fully conscious, he recognized the anger for what it was. The anger of fear.

He stayed where he was, eyes closed, body very still, forcing his breath into the slow, deep pattern of a sleeper. He was lying on something that felt like a canvas cot. It sagged in the middle, but it was reasonably comfortable.

A faint breeze blew against his cheek, and it brought a thick rancid odor to his nostrils. Jungle, he thought. Rotting vegetation intermingled with the tangy scent of innumerable growing things. The mustiness of the damp earth and something else--an acridness in the air itself, an alien atmosphere that registered on human nostrils with an almost sulphurous sharpness.

He was in a jungle on a planet that was not Earth.

He remembered the two young men who had come out of the stairway entrance as he walked toward his gyro. Marenson groaned inwardly. Gassed, by heaven, he thought. Caught by a simple trick like that. But why? Was it personal--or Yved?

Involuntarily, at that final possibility, Marenson cringed. The anger faded out of him completely, and only a cold fear remained. He lay then for a while simulating deep sleep. But slowly his spirit revived, and his mind began to work again. His thoughts became analytical. He remembered Clugy, but realized he couldn't be sure. As head of the procurement division for the Ship, he had in his time offended many bold and dangerous individuals.

That was one aspect, one possibility.

The other one was that the Yevd enemy of man was using him in one of their intricate games to slow down the construction of the Ship. If the Yevd were responsible, it would be complicated. The masters of light had devious minds, and took it for granted that any simple scheme would be quickly suspected.

Marenson began to breathe more easily. He was still alive, his hands were not tied; and the biggest question was: What would happen when he opened his eyes?

He opened them.

He was staring up through dense foliage at a reddish glowing sky. The sky looked hot, and that gave him a sudden awareness that he was perspiring furiously. And, oddly, now that he knew about it, the heat almost smothered him. He shrank from the flamelike intensity, then slowly climbed to his feet.

It was as if he had given a signal. From his right, beyond a line of bushes, he heard the sounds of a large camp suddenly coming to life.

For the first time, Marenson noticed that he was dressed in a light mesh unit that incased him from head to foot. The material was transparent, and even covered his boots. The clothing shocked him. For it was the kind of hunting outfit used on primitive planets that swarmed with hostile life of every description.

Which planet, and why? He began to think now with more conviction that his predicament was Clugy's doing, and that this was the famous Mira world where the lymph beast lived.

He started off in the direction of the sounds.

The line of brush that had barred his view was, he discovered, about twenty feet thick, and the moment he was through it, he saw that it was not on the outskirts of the camp, but near the center. And now he noticed that the reddish sky was something of an illusion. It was part of a barrier that had been electronically raised around the camp. An energy screen. The red effect was merely the screen's method of reacting to the light of the particular sun that was shining down upon it.

Marenson began to breathe easier. All around were men and machines--men by the hundreds. Even the most cunning group of Yevd wouldn't try to create so massive an illusion. And, besides, their great skill in the use of light was personal to each individual, and not a mass phenomenon.

A clearing was being created out of a tangle of growth. There was so much movement it was hard to know what any individual was doing. Marenson's eye for such things was ten years out of practice, but in a few moments he had oriented himself. The plastic huts were going up to his left. Those at the right were merely waiting their turn to be moved into place. Clugy's office would be in the permanent part of the encampment.

Grimly, Marenson started towards the hut village. Twice "digger" machines harrumphed past him, sowing their insect poison, and he had to step gingerly over the loose earth; in its early stages the poison was as unfriendly to human beings as to anything else. The upturned soil glittered with long, black, shiny worms writhing feebly, with the famous red Mira bugs that shocked their victims with electric currents, and with other things that he did not recognize. He reached the huts, walked on, and came presently to a sign which read:

PRODUCTION SUPERINTENDENT

Ira Clugy

A youth of fifteen or sixteen lolled in an easy-chair behind the counter inside. He looked up with the lazy, insolent eyes of a clerk whose boss is absent. Then he turned his back.

Marenson went through the gate, and reached for the scruff of the kid's neck. There must have been a preliminary warning, for the neck twisted away, and like a cat the boy was on his feet. He came around with a snarl on his face.

Baffled and furious, Marenson retreated into words. "Where's Clugy?"

"I'll have you broken for this!" the boy snapped. "My father--"

Marenson cut him off. "Look, Mr. Big Shot, I'm Marenson from Administration. I'm not the kind that's broken. I break. You'd better start talking, and fast. Is Clugy your father?"

The boy stood stiff, then nodded.

"Where is he?"

"Out in the jungle."

"How long will he be gone?"

The boy hesitated. "Probably be in for lunch--sir."

"I see." Marenson pondered the information. He was surprised that Clugy had chosen to absent himself, and so leave Ancil Marenson temporarily in full control of the camp. But from his own point of view that was all to the good. Even as he made his plans, his mind reached to another thought. He asked: "When's the next ship due?"

"In twenty days."

Marenson nodded. It seemed to him that he was beginning to understand. Clugy had known he was due to leave on his vacation, and so he had decided to inconvenience him. Instead of pleasure on Paradise Planet, he'd spend his vacation on primitive and dangerous Mira 92. Having no other method of countering his order, Clugy was repaying him with personal discomfort.

Marenson's lips tightened. Then he said: "What's your name?"

"Peter."

"Well, Peter," said Marenson grimly, "I've got some work for you to do. So let's get busy."

For a while, then, it was a case of "Where's that, Peter?" And, "Peter, how about the stamp for this kind of document?" Altogether, in one hour he wrote out five orders. He assigned himself a Model A hut. He authorized himself to make visiradio calls to Earth. He assigned himself to Clugy's food unit. And he requisitioned two blasters, the use of a helicar and a pilot to operate it.

While Peter raced around delivering four of the orders to the proper departments, Marenson wrote out a news item for the editor of the camp newspaper. When that also was delivered, and Peter was back, Marenson felt better. What could be done on the scene was done. And since he'd have to remain for twenty days, the men in the camp might as well believe he was here on an inspection tour. The newspaper account would see to that.

Frowning, but partially satisfied, he started for the radio hut. His requisition was not questioned. He sat down and waited while the long and involved connection was put through.

Outside, men and machines were forcing a malignant stretch of jungle to be temporarily friendly to the hothouse needs of human flesh. Inside, surrounded by embanked instrument boards, Marenson pondered his next move. He had no evidence. His presence here against his will was not transparently the fault of Clugy. He had a lot of obscure back trails to investigate.

"Here's your connection," said the radio man at last. "Booth Three."

"Thank you."

Marenson talked first to his lawyer. "I want a court order," he said after he had described his situation, "authorizing the camp magistrate to question Clugy by means of a lie detector, and authorizing complete amnesia afterwards. That's for my protection during the rest of the time I'll have to spend in the camp with him. Can do?"

"Can," said the lawyer, "by tomorrow."

Next, Marenson connected with Jerred, head of his protective staff. The detective's face lighted as he saw who it was. "Man," he demanded, "where have you been?"

His listened soberly to Marenson's account, then nodded. "The outrage has one favorable aspect," he said, "it puts us into a better legal position. Perhaps now we can find out who the woman was that called Clugy's room at eleven o'clock the night before you were kidnapped. Apparently, his son answered, and must have communicated the message to him.

"Woman?" said Marenson.

Jerred shrugged. "I don't know who it was. My agent didn't report to me till the following morning. He had no opportunity to listen in."

Marenson nodded, and said: "Try to see if there were any eyewitnesses to my kidnapping, then we'll get a court order and find out from Clugy and his son who the woman was."

"You can count on us to do everything possible," said the detective heartily.

"I expect results," said Marenson, and broke the connection.

His next call was to his apartment. The visiplate did not brighten, and after the proper length of time, a recorder sighed at him:

"Mr. and Mrs. Marenson have gone to Paradise Planet until August 26th. Do you wish to leave a message?"

Marenson hung up, shaken, and went quietly out of the hut.

The fear that had come faded before his determination not to be alarmed. There must be a rational explanation for Janet's departure. He couldn't quite see how the Yevd could be involved.

He was annoyed that his mind had leaped instantly to that possibility.

A minute later, wearily, he unlocked the door of the hut. Inside, he removed his boots and sprawled on the bed. But he was too restless to relax. After less than five minutes, he got up with the intention of going to Clugy's office, and waiting there for the man to return. He had a lot of hard things to say to Ira Clugy.

Outside, he stopped short. Climbing up to his hut, he hadn't realized what a vantage point he had. The hill reared up a hundred feet above the jungle and the main part of the camp. It gave him an unsurpassed view of a green splendor, of the endless, shining forest. Clugy had chosen his camp site well. Lacking the higher mountains hundreds of miles to the south, he had nevertheless found in the hilly jungle country a sizeable semimountain that sloped gradually up until it was about eight hundred feet above the main jungle. The hill where Marenson stood was the final peak of the long, jungle-robed slope.

Marenson saw the glint of rivers, the sparkling color of strange trees; and, as he looked, something of his old feeling for this universe of planets beyond Earth stirred within him. He glanced up at the famous and wonderful Mira sun, and the thrill that came ended only when he thought of his situation and his purpose. Grimly, he started down the hill.

Both Clugy and his son were in the office when Marenson entered it a few minutes later. The spaceman stood up. He seemed curious rather than friendly. "Peter was telling me about you being here," he said. "So you thought you'd come and look the territory over personally, eh?"

Marenson ignored the comment. Coldly, he made his accusation. He finished, "You may think you're going to get away with this trick, but I assure you that you aren't."

Clugy gazed at him in astonishment. "What's all this nonsense?" the spaceman demanded.

"Do you deny you had me kidnapped?"

"Why, certainly, I deny it." Clugy was indignant. "I wouldn't pull a fool stunt like that in these days of authorized lie detector tests. Besides, I don't work that way."

He sounded so sincere that for a moment Marenson was taken aback. He recovered swiftly. "If you're so positive," he said, "how about coming down right now to the camp magistrate's office, and taking an immediate test."

Clugy frowned at him. He seemed puzzled. "I'll do just that," he said. He spoke quietly. "And you'd better be prepared to take such a test yourself. There's something funny about this whole business."

"Come along!" Marenson said.

Clugy paused at the door. "Peter, keep an eye on the office till I get back."

"Sure, Pop."

The man's swift acceptance of the challenge was in itself convincing, Marenson thought as he walked along at Clugy's side. It seemed to prove that he actually had accepted the ruling of his union. His part in this affair must have ended the very night of their argument.

But then, who had seized on the situation? Who was trying to take advantage of the quarrel? Yevd? There was no indication of it. But then who?

The two tests required slightly less than an hour and a half. And Clugy was telling the truth. And Marenson was telling the truth. Convinced, the two men gazed at each other in baffled amazement. It was Marenson who broke the silence.

"What about the woman who called up your son the night before you left Earth?"

"What woman?"

Marenson groaned. "You mean to tell me you don't know anything about that either?" He broke off with a frown. "Just a minute," he said, "how come Peter didn't tell you?"

His mind leaped to a fantastic possibility. He said in a hushed voice: "I think we'd better surround your hut."

But the superintendent's office, when they finally closed in on it, was empty. Nor was Peter discoverable at any of his usual haunts.

"Obviously," said Clugy, his face the color of lead, "when he heard me agree to a lie detector test, he realized the game was up."

"We've got to trace this whole thing back," Marenson said slowly. "Somewhere along the line a Yevd was substituted for your son. He came with you to Solar City, and took no chances on being caught by one of the several traps we have around The Yards to catch Yevd spies. I mean by that, he stayed in his room, and apparently communicated with other Yevd agents by visiradio. That woman who called the Yevd who was impersonating your son was probably another Yevd, and there's still another one of them impersonating me--"

He stopped. Because that other one was with Janet. Marenson started hastily for the radio hut. I've got to contact Earth," he called over his shoulder to Clugy.

The radio hut was a shambles. On the floor, with his head blown off, was a man--Marenson couldn't be sure it was the operator. There was blood splattered on dozens of instruments, and the whole intricate machinery of an interstellar radio system had been burned by innumerable crisscrosses of energy from a powerful blaster.

Marenson did not linger in the radio hut. Back in Clugy's office, he paused only long enough to find out from that distracted man that the nearest radio station was in a settlement some nine hundred miles to the south.

"It's all right," he said to Clugy's offer of a requisition for a helicar and pilot. "I signed one myself this morning."

A few minutes later he was in the air.

The speed of the machine gradually soothed Marenson. The tenseness went out of his muscles, and his mind began to work smoothly again. He stared out over the green world of the jungle, and thought: The purpose of the Yevd is to slow down procurement of lymph juice. That's the important thing to remember. They must have struck first at the source of the juice, and did an easy imitation of a boy. That was their usual tactic of interference at the production level. Then a new factor came into the situation. They discovered that Ancil Marenson, head of the procurement department, could be fitted into an enlarged version of their sabotage plan. Accordingly, two Yevd who looked like human beings gassed him and put him aboard the Mira freighter.

At the same time, a Yevd image of Marenson must have continued on to the office, and later that day the duplicate and Janet had probably departed together for Paradise Planet.

But why did they let me live? Marenson wondered. Why not get me completely out of the way?

There was only one reasonable explanation. They wanted to make further use of him. First of all, he must establish his presence, and his authority, and then--and not till then--he would be killed. And another Marenson image would order Clugy to transfer his camp to the distant mountain. In that fashion they would convince the willing Clugy that Marenson, having come to see for himself, had recognized the justice of Clugy's arguments.

Marenson felt himself change color--because that stage had arrived. All they needed from him was his signature on the order to Clugy. And even that could possibly be dispensed with, if they had managed to obtain some copy of his signature in the time available to them. But how would the attempt on him be made?

Uneasily, Marenson gazed out of the small helicar. He felt unprotected. He had been hasty in leaving the camp. In his anxiety to secure the safety of Janet he had exposed himself in a small ship which could be destroyed all too easily. I'd better go back, he decided.

He called to the pilot, "Turn back!"

"Back?" said the man. He sounded surprised.

Marenson waved and pointed. The man seemed to hesitate, and then--he turned the machine upside down. With a crash, Marenson was flung to the ceiling of the craft. As he scrambled and fought for balance, the machine was spun once again. This time he had hold of a crossbar, and he came down more easily. He struggled to pull out a blaster.

The helicar was plummeting down towards the jungle now, and the pilot was jerking it violently to and fro. Marenson guessed his purpose and his identity, and felt ill. What a fool he had been to rush so blindly into this trap. The Yevd, knowing that he would try to send a radio message, must have killed the regular pilot--and simply waited for that simpleton Ancil Marenson to do what it expected him to do.

Marenson had a glimpse of trees terribly near. And realized the enemy's plan. A crash landing. The weak human being would be knocked unconscious, or killed. The Yevd, a carbon-hydrogen-oxygen-fluorine life form, would survive.

The next moment, there was a thump that shook his bones. During the seconds that followed, he seemed to be continuously conscious. He was even aware that the branches of strong trees had broken the fall of the ship, and so possibly saved his life. More vaguely, he knew when his blasters were taken from him. The only period of blur occurred when he was dropped to the ground from the helicar.

When his vision cleared again, he was in time to see another helicar come down in a nearby open space among the trees. The image of young Peter Clugy stepped out of it, and joined the image of the pilot. The two Yevd stood looking down at him.

Marenson braced himself. He was as good as dead, but the will to meet death standing up and fighting made him try to climb to his feet. He couldn't. His hands were tied to his legs.

He lay back weakly. He had no memory of having been tied. Which meant that he was wrong in believing that he had not been unconscious. It didn't matter, of course. With sick eyes he gazed up at his captors.

"What happened to the real Peter Clugy?" he asked finally.

The two Yevd merely continued to look at him, bleakly. Not that an answer was needed. Somewhere along the line of their moves to this point, Clugy's son had been murdered. It was possible that these two individuals did not even know the details of the killing.

Marenson changed the subject, and said with a boldness he did not feel: "I see I made a slight personal error. Well, I'll make a bargain with you. You release me, and I'll see to it that you get safely off the planet."

The two images wavered ever so slightly, an indication that the Yevd were talking to each other by means of light waves above the human vision level. Finally, one of them said:

"We're in no danger. We'll get off this planet in our own good time."

Marenson laughed curtly. The laugh sounded unconvincing in his own ears, but the fact that they had answered him at all was encouraging. He said savagely: "The whole game is up. When I called Earth, the merest suspicion that Yevd were involved set in motion a far-flung defense organization. And, actually, my call was not necessary. The discovery that Yevd were involved was made in connection with my wife, Janet."

It was a shot in the dark, but he was desperately anxious to find out if Janet were all right. Once more, there was the faint unsteadiness in the human images, that indicated conversation. Then the Yevd who was imitating Peter Clugy said:

"That's impossible. The person who accompanied your wife to Paradise Planet had instructions to destroy her if she showed the faintest sign of suspicion."

Marenson shrugged. "You'd better believe me," he said.

He was tingling. His own analysis had been confirmed. Janet had gone off on her vacation with someone she thought was her husband. It was a characteristic of Yevd imitating human beings that they liked to be with a real woman or man who would be able to do things for them. There were so many things that a Yevd could do only with great difficulty, so many places where it was dangerous for an individual Yevd to go. Thus the image of Peter Clugy had taken the risk of living with the real Peter's father, and the image of Ancil Marenson had gone along with the real Janet.

The pilot Yevd said: "We don't have to worry too much about any small group of human beings. Long-married couples are not demonstrative with each other. Days go by without kissing. In other words, the person imitating you is protected from discovery by contact for at least a week. Our plan will be accomplished by then."

Marenson said: "Don't be a couple of fools. I can see you're going to be stupid and make us all die. That's where this kind of stuff is so depressing. We three will die. And no one will care. It's not as if we'll be heroes, any of us. You'll be burned, trying to escape, and I--" He broke off. "What's your plan for me?"

"First," said young Clugy's image, "we want you to sign a paper."

He paused; and Marenson sighed. His analysis of the situation had been so completely right--too late.

"And if I don't?" he asked. His voice trembled the faintest bit.

"Your signature," was the reply, "would merely make things easier for us. In doing what we have done, we had to act swiftly, and so none of our people capable of imitating a signature is available on this planet. That can be rectified in a few days, but fortunately for you, we want quicker action. Accordingly, we are in a position to offer you the choice of signing or not signing."

"O.K.," said Marenson ironically. "My choice is--I don't sign."

"If you sign," the Yevd went on in an inexorable tone, "we'll kill you mercifully."

"And if I don't?"

"We leave you here."

Marenson blinked. For an instant it seemed a meaningless threat. And then:

"Yes," said Peter's image with satisfaction, "leave you here for the lymph beast's progeny. I understand they like to burrow into the flesh of anybody they catch--a very weight-reducing experience."

He laughed. It was a human laugh, a remarkable reproduction considering that it was done by light wave activation of a sound box it carried in its abdomen.

Marenson did not answer immediately. Until this instant, he had taken it for granted that the Yevd knew as much about the habits of those deadly dangerous creatures as did men. Apparently, their information was vague, accurate as far as it went, but--

"Of course," said Peter Clugy's image, "we won't really go away. We'll just go over to the ship and watch. And when you've had enough, we'll get your signature. Does that meet with your approval?"

Marenson had caught a movement out of the corner of one eye. It seemed a little more than a series of shadows very close to the ground, more like a quiver in the soil than anything substantial. But the perspiration broke out on his forehead. Dark forest of Mira, he thought, alive with the young of the lymph beast--He held himself very still, looking neither to the right nor to the left, neither at the Yevd nor at the shadow things.

"Well"--it was the Yevd image of the pilot--"we'll stick around and have a look at some of these creatures we've been hearing so much about."

They were moving away as the speaker reached that point. But Marenson did not turn, did not look. He heard a jerky movement, and then bright flashes lit up the dark corridor under the trees. But Marenson did not even roll his eyes. He lay still as death, silent as a log. A thing slithered across his chest, paused while he grew half-paralyzed with fright and then moved on with a gliding movement.

The lights flashed more brilliantly now, and more erratically. And there were thumping sounds as if heavy bodies were frantically flinging themselves around. Marenson didn't have to look to realize that the enemy pair were in their death throes.

Two more Yevd were discovering the hard way that human beings were interested in the brainless lymph things because they were as dangerous to man's cunning opponent as to man himself.

For Marenson, the effort to remain quiet was a special agony, but he held himself there until the light was as spasmodic as a guttering candle, and as dim. When the glow had completely died, and when there had been silence for more than a minute, Marenson permitted himself the exquisite luxury of turning his head slightly.

Only one of the Yevd was in his line of vision. It lay on the ground, a long, almost black, rectangular shape, with a whole series of reticulated arms and legs. Except for the appendages, it looked more like a contorted bar of metal than a thing of flesh. Here and there over its surface, the body glittered with a black, glassy sheen, evidence that some of the light-controlling cells were still alive.

In that one look, Marenson saw no less than seven discolored gashes in the part of the Yevd body that he could see--which meant that at least seven of the young lymph beasts had crawled inside. Being mindless, they would be quite unaware that they had killed anything or that there had been a struggle.

They lived to eat, and they attacked any object that moved. If it ceased moving before they reached it, they forgot about it instantly. Utterly indiscriminate, they attacked leaves drifting in the wind, the waving branch of a tree, even moving water. Millions of the tiny snake-like things died every month making insensate attacks on inanimate objects that had moved for one reason or another. Only a very small percentage survived the first two months of their existence, and changed into their final form.

In the development of the lymph beast, Nature had achieved one of her most fantastic balancing acts. The ultimate shape of the lymph beast was a hard-shelled beehivelike construction that could not move. It was difficult to go far into the Mira jungle without stumbling across one of these structures. They were everywhere, on the ground and in trees, on hillsides and in valleys--wherever the young monster happened to be at the moment of the change, there the "adult" settled. The final stage was short but prolific. The "hive" lived entirely on the food it had stored up as a youngster. Being bisexual, it spent its brief existence in a sustained ecstasy of procreation. The young, however, were not discharged from the body. They incubated inside it, and when the shell died ate what was left of the parent. They also ate each other, but there were thousands of them, and the process of birth was so rapid that a fairly large proportion simply ate themselves to comparative safety outside.

On rare occasions, the outer shell failed to soften quickly enough for the progeny to escape their own savage appetites. At such times, the total "born" was greatly reduced.

Marenson had no trouble. As soon as he had carefully examined his surroundings, he climbed to his feet--and stood silent and cautious while he made another prolonged investigation. In that fashion, step by step, he moved toward the helicar that stood in the little open space just beyond where the first machine had crashed.

He reached it and a few minutes later was back at the camp. Clugy warned, and the entire camp finally on the alert, he took another pilot-guide--this time after both he and the pilot were tested for humanness--and flew to the distant pleasure town. News awaited him there.

The Yevd gang was caught. Janet had become suspicious of the Marenson image, and had skillfully aided in its capture. That put the security police on the trail, and it was a simple matter of following the back track of the persons involved.

It took another hour before Marenson was able to contact Janet on Paradise Planet. He sighed with relief when her face came onto the visiplate. "I was sure worried," he said, "when the Yevd here told me that my image was counting on the habits of old married couples. They evidently didn't realize why we were taking the trip."

Janet was anxious. "A police ship will be calling at Mira tomorrow," she said, "be sure to get on it, and come here as fast as you can."

She finished, "I want to spend at least part of my second honeymoon with my husband."