The Compleat Bolo

Mick hung back. "You mean them things is ru

"What I tole old Marshal," Henry confirmed. "Come on. Ain't far. Seen the sucker sneaking through the brush jest west o' Jed Lightner's store yonder. In that patch o' brush, by the fault. Just seen the one and skedaddled. Must be more of 'em. Let's find out what them suckers is up to."

"What do they look like, sir?" Dub asked timidly.

"Oh, kinda like reglar spodders, boy," Henry explained as he led the way along the narrow alley toward the street. "Got four ski

"Never seen a ghoti," Dub said, following the old man.

"No, used to be a lot of 'em hereabouts," Henry acceded. "Never bothered the crops, o' course; can't eat Terry plants. But they trampled the corn to get at the yelloweed used to grow good where the ground was cultivated, between rows-like. So they been extink now for some years. Like I said, 'bout so high. A spodder's got brains, got them fancy guns, can blow a hole right through a feller, but don't worry. We won't let 'em see us."

The boys looked doubtfully at each other, but as Henry scuttled away toward the street, they followed.

"Pa finds out, I'll catch it," Dub said solemnly. "You, too," he added.

"Not if we come back and report to Marshal what they're up to and all," Mick rejoined.

Although Main Street was deserted except for two men disputing, with gestures, in front of the pictonews office, and a few women moving aimlessly in the market at the south end of the street, Henry went furtively along, close to the building-fronts, and the boys followed. The old man cut across to the west side of the avenue and disappeared into the narrow alley beside the opera house-cum-cathedral. His two followers hurried after him, emerging on the unused alleyway which ran behind the buildings, thence east-west across dry clods toward a stand of tall Terran-import Australian pines and squat scrub oak, mixed with native yim trees even taller and more feathery than the alien conifers. There, in a shallow fold, Henry paused, and after cautioning the boys to silence told them: "Got to go easy now. Seen him about fifty yard yonder." He pointed to the deepest shadows ahead.

"Way I figger, critter had to get here someways: got to be a vessel o' some sort the suckers soft-landed in the night, prolly over north o' town in the hills. We gotta be careful not to get between the spodder and his base. Come on."

Mick forged ahead, pushing into a clump of dry yelloweed.

"Slow down, boy," Henry warned. "Don't want to spook the sucker."

"What were you doing out here, anyway?" Mick demanded, falling back.

"Hadda pump ship," the old fellow replied shortly. "Thought I seen something, and come on over and checked." He set out toward the trees.

"How much further we going?" Mick asked.

"Not far," Henry grunted. "Hold it, boys. Duck."

Obeying his own command, he dropped into a crouch. The boys followed suit, looking around eagerly.

"Lower," Henry said, motioning before he went flat. Dub promptly obeyed, while Mick took his time. A moment later, he hissed. "Looky yonder!"

"He seen you, boy, dammit!" Henry charged. "Keep your knot-head down and freeze. The suckers can see like a yit-bug."

Hugging the powder-surfaced, hard-rutted, weed-thick ground, Mick peered through the screen of dry stalks, probing the dark recesses of the clump of trees twenty feet from him. Something stirred in the darkness, and sunlight glinted for an instant on something which moved. Then a harsh voice croaked something unintelligible. Off to Mick's left, Henry came to his feet with a yell; a pale beam lanced from the thicket and the old fellow stumbled and went down hard.

"Run, boys!" he called in a strangled yell.

Dub saw something small, ovoid and dark-glittering burst from the thicket, darting on twinkling spike-like legs. It dashed directly to where Mick hugged the ground, caught the boy by the collar as he tried to rise, threw him down and did something swiftly elaborate, then darted to where Henry was struggling to get to his feet. Mick lay where the alien had left him. With a deft motion, the creature felled Henry again and spun to pursue Dub, now halfway to the shelter of the nearest outbuildings behind the street-front structures. When the boy reached the shelter of a shed behind the barber shop, the Deng broke off its pursuit and returned to take up a spot close to its prisoners.

Emerging from his office in the former theatre now serving as public school, Doug Crawford nearly collided with Dub who, sobbing, had been at the point of knocking on the principal's door.

"Terrence!" Crawford exclaimed, grabbing the little fellow's arm. "Whatever are you doing in the street during class? I assure you your absence was duly noted-" He broke off as the import of the gasping child's words penetrated his ritual indignation.

"-got Mick. Got old Henry, too. Spodders! I seen 'em."

"You saw them, Terrence," Crawford rebuked, then knelt and pulled the lad's hands away from his tear-wet face. "It's all right, Dub," he said soothingly. "Spiders won't hurt anyone; they're harmless arachnids. And just where is Gerald?"

Dub twisted in Crawford's comforting grip to point across the street, apparently indicating a faded store-front.

"Yonder," Dub wailed. "I run. Old Henry told me to, and I was awful scared, too, but now we got to do something! It's got Mick!"

"You mean in Lightner's store?" Crawford queried, puzzled. He rose while holding the sobbing boy's wet fist in a firm grip.

"No-out back-over by the woods," Dub wailed. "Got to hurry up, before that spodder does something terrible to Henry… and Mick."

"Some of the spiders that we have here on our world can give mild stings, rarely poisonous," Crawford attempted to reason with the lad. "I don't understand all this excitement about a little old spider. Most are completely harmless; descended from fruit-eaters inadvertently brought in by the early settlers. Buck up, Dub! What's this all about?"

"Not spiders," Dub tried frantically to explain. "Real spodders; them big ones, like in the war. I saw one. Right over there!" He wilted in tears of frustration.

"You're saying you saw a Deng trooper here?" Craw-ford echoed, his tone incredulous. "You mean a dead one, a corpse, just bones, perhaps, a casualty, possibly, who hid in the fault and died there, two hundred and ten years ago. Well, if so, I can understand your being upset. But it can't hurt you-or anyone. Now, come along, show me." He urged the boy toward the street.

"Got to get a gun, Mr. Crawford," Dub protested. "It's got one. Shot old Henry, but he ain't dead, just kinda can't move good, is all. You got to get some more men, Mr. Crawford! Hurry!" Dub pulled away and ran into the adjacent alley. Crawford took a step after him, then let him go.

The school teacher looked around as the town marshal and the mayor hailed him, coming up puffing as from a brisk run.

"Doug, boy, we missed you at the Council," Marlowe blurted.

"You didn't miss nothing," the other contributed. "Lotta talk, no ideas."

"I didn't hear about it, Mr. Mayor," Crawford replied, puzzled. "Special meeting, eh? What's the occasion?" He looked after Dub, already a hundred yards distant and ru