Danny Dunn and the Swamp Monster

by Raymond Abrashkin

  “I have an idea, Professor,” Irene said. “We could make a—well—a kind of burglar alarm.”

  “First he’s a TV star and now he’s a burglar,” said Joe. “No wonder nobody knows what the lau looks like.”

  “I mean,” said Irene, “we could string a cord all around this place and tie the ends of it to a couple of cooking pots. When the lau comes ashore, he’ll pull the cord and down will come the pots.”

  “We’d be kind of far away to hear the noise, wouldn’t we?” Danny objected. “Why don’t we all camp here and wait?”

  “Great!” Joe said. “Why don’t you all camp here and I all go back to the Nuer camp and see what’s for lunch?”

  “Well, we could do both,” said Irene. “I mean, camp here and also put up the alarm signal so we’d be warned.”

  “Now, now, just a minute,” Professor Bullfinch interrupted. “I am certainly not going to allow you three to wait here for the lau. If anything happened—”

  “But Professor!” said Danny. “You’ve always told me that a scientist should always let his curiosity be greater than his fear. Haven’t you?”

  The Professor fiddled with his pipe. “I can’t deny it. But on the other hand—well, let’s see what Ben has to say.”

  He looked around. “Ben?”

  There was no trace of the zoologist.

  “What’s happened to him?” said the Professor.

  Danny peered at the ground. “Here’s a footprint,” he said. “He must have wandered off deeper into the swamp.”

  “Perhaps—” the Professor was beginning.

  Without waiting to hear the rest of it, Dan said impetuously, “Don’t worry. I’ll go find him.”

  He dashed off into the high reeds, for he had seen another footprint in the black earth. He thought he saw, too, where the papyrus stalks had been pushed aside and broken. He hastened in that direction. The ground was firm and there were no more footprints, but he pressed on. After a time, the reeds thinned. He came out abruptly on the edge of a small pool where tall grass grew around still, brown water.

  He could hear the distant voices of his friends, calling. But where he was, all was very quiet.

  The stems of the reeds rose about him. They were three times his height—a thin, whispering, feathery forest. They were the same in every direction. Above, the sun pulsed in a brilliant sky, sending down burning waves of heat. A small bird with a long tail and a bright scarlet breast darted close, hovered for a moment over the pool, and shot away again.

  Danny opened his mouth to shout, “Dr. Fenster!” but his voice trailed away after the first sound. There was something menacing about the sameness of the reeds and the hot silence of the air.

  Again, he heard someone calling faintly. It sounded very far away.

  “I’d better get back,” he thought. It wasn’t that he was really scared, he told himself, but only that it was silly to get separated from the others.

  Now, where was it he had come from? He saw a place where some of the reeds had been broken and started off that way. But after a moment, there was no further sign of a trail. “I’ll go back to the pool,” he thought, “and start again.” He retraced his steps, trying to find his own tracks, but mistaking other marks in the soil for footprints and getting mixed up when he found breaks in the reeds in several different places.

  He stopped. He could no longer, hear his friends. He couldn’t find the pool. Every place looked like every other place here, and there were no landmarks.

  “Oh, gosh,” he groaned. “What a dope! Headstrong, always acting without thinking. Now what?”

  He stiffened. In the quiet, he could distinctly hear a soft rustling among the reeds. Then he could see the shadow of some large thing moving. It was hard to make it out because of the shifting light among the reed-stems.

  He was poised, ready to run like mad, when a voice said, “Yabi, yabi”

  “Cuol!” Danny exploded in relief.

  The tall man parted the last few stalks and grinned out at him.

  “Oh, man! Am I glad to see you,” Danny said.

  “And I am glad to see you, Brother Redhead,” said Cuol. “Come. Follow me.”

  He led the way through the reeds. Danny said, “How’d you happen to be here?”

  “Some of my kinsmen told me that the man, Canigou, is planning to come with spearmen and make his camp near your camp. I came to warn your people. They told me you were in the swamp.”

  They soon emerged to join the others. “You’ve got him, I see,” Professor Bullfinch said. He looked rather pale in spite of his sunburn.

  He shook his head at Danny. “My boy, you really must learn to restrain yourself.”

  “I’m sorry, Professor,” Danny said earnestly. “I won’t ever do anything like that again. But where’s Dr. Fenster?”

  “He still hasn’t returned.”

  Cuol said, “I will go now and find him.”

  But before he could move, there was a loud splashing in the river.

  Cuol froze. Professor Bullfinch began to say something, but the Nuer raised a hand commandingly for silence.

  They all stood, waiting. Another splash, and then the ground beneath their feet trembled.

  They glanced at each other. Shivers ran up and down Danny’s spine. Looking at the faces of his friends, he could see in them the same sudden terror he was feeling.

  The reeds swayed wildly and then were flattened. Irene screamed. A gigantic shape, like something out of a nightmare, heaved itself into view.

  They had a glimpse of an enormous round head, gray-black and shining, of waving tentacles as long as a man’s body, of a stiff crest rising behind them.

  For a moment that seemed to stretch on forever, the monster remained motionless. The five people stood as if paralyzed. Then Cuol bravely raised his long staff and took a step forward.

  “You others—run!” he said.

  Rashly, Danny drew his hunting knife. All he could think of was Cuol’s courage. He ran to the Nuer’s side, determined to help him.

  Someone bellowed, “Stop!”

  Dr. Fenster burst out of the reeds behind the group.

  “Get back!” he roared. “Quick! If you so much as touch that thing, you’re done for!”

  CHAPTER 12

  “You Have One Hour”

  His shouts broke the spell. The monster’s head reared up again, and it began to move.

  The group burst apart and fled. Danny had a glimpse of Dr. Fenster pointing the heavy air pistol he called Little Sandy. He heard a snorting and rumbling, and then he tripped and fell headlong. He lay struggling to catch his breath, and at last rolled over.

  Dr. Fenster stood there calmly, pistol in hand. “It’s all right,” he said.

  Dizzily, Dan sat up. The others were coming out of various hiding places among the reeds. Dr. Fenster slipped his pistol back into the holster.

  “Two darts, well placed,” he remarked. “I think the lau will nap for a while.”

  He glanced at Cuol. The Nuer had not run with the others but had only moved back a few paces.

  “You’re the bravest man I know, Cuol,” Dr. Fenster said. “But thank heavens you didn’t touch that thing.”

  He turned and walked up to the beast. Professor Bullfinch and Cuol followed. Dan scrambled to his feet, his curiosity getting the better of his fright.

  The lau’s thick, snaky body was longer than a two-ton truck. Its skin was smooth and glistening. It had no limbs, but two fins grew from behind its great round head, and it had used these as forelegs. Another fin, which they had taken for a crest, ran down its back almost to the flat rounded tail. Its mouth split the bottom of its head from side to side—a mouth large enough to gulp down a man. What they had thought were tentacles were actually long spiny whiskers that grew from around its lips and now lay limp on each s
ide of the body.

  “It looks like—” Danny began. “I can’t believe it, but it looks like—”

  “A catfish!” Joe exclaimed. “It looks like an overgrown version of one of those little bullheads we used to catch in Moffat’s Pond.”

  He reached out to touch the dark wet skin. Dr. Fenster snapped, “No!”

  Joe jumped. “I was just going to see what it felt like,” he said.

  “It would be the last thing you ever felt,” said Dr. Fenster.

  Professor Bullfinch pushed his glasses farther up on his nose. “You don’t mean—” he said in surprise. “A Malapterurus!”

  “A related species. I’m sure of it.”

  “I can’t believe it.”

  “Nevertheless, there it is,” Dr. Fenster said with satisfaction. “A twenty-foot-long electric catfish!”

  “Electric?” cried Danny.

  “Exactly,” said Dr. Fenster. “If you touched it, you’d be electrocuted. It’s difficult for me to say without tests, but I should guess from its size that the thing can discharge a thousand volts or more.”

  Joe’s mouth had dropped open. “An electric fish?” he gasped. “I never heard of such a thing.”

  “I have,” said Irene. “There’s an electric eel, too, isn’t there, Dr. Fenster? I think it’s found in South America.”

  “There are electric fish in many parts of the world,” replied the zoologist. “Some live in fresh water and some, like the electric ray, live in the ocean.”

  “But how is it possible?” Joe asked.

  “All nervous and muscular tissues generate tiny electric currents,” said Professor Bullfinch. “Your brain, for instance, puts out as much as one ten-thousandths of a volt. In some fish there are special cells called electroplaques, which are hooked up in series and can build up quite a respectable voltage.”

  “But this thing comes out on land,” Danny said, looking up at the giant form which lay quietly before them. It somehow no longer looked quite so threatening now that they knew what it was. “Is it really a fish?”

  “Don’t you remember the fish Professor Ismail showed you?” said Dr. Fenster. “There are several varieties of the catfish family that have air sacs which allow them to live for a time on dry land. I’m not surprised that this specimen has them. What surprises me is that it took me so long to realize what the lau was.”

  He shook his head. “I should have guessed. It shows you how easy it is to have all the information you need before your eyes and yet not see what it means. The Nuer were right—the size and color and snaky body are all there, and even the long ‘tentacles’ which aren’t tentacles at all but feelers that every catfish has around its mouth.”

  “And even the part about ‘If the lau sees you first, you die!’” said Irene with a shiver.

  “That’s right. Not just a quaint legend, you see, but a very real possibility. It explains why there are no crocodiles in this region. The catfish’s electricity can act as a defense or as a way of killing its prey. The electric organs are all over the fish’s body, just under the skin.

  “I knew there were electric catfish in Africa,” Dr. Fenster continued. “They are found in many parts of the upper Nile, and in rivers right across the continent. The natives call them ‘thunderfish.’ However, they’re generally less than a foot long, although one or two specimens have been found running to as much as four feet. I just never connected them with the lau. But Joe was right, you see.”

  “Me?” Joe said. “What’d I say?”

  “You said that maybe the lau knocked down the camera. And when Euclid said something about ‘struck by lightning’ that started me thinking. Something might have come ashore, tangled with the superconductor, and accidentally pulled down the camera, tearing off the balloon in the process. The next logical step, of course, was that it might have been something capable of sending an electric charge back to our generator. And if there had been a fault in the insulation of the generator, it would have blown.”

  They all looked with respect at the lau’s motionless body.

  Irene said, “But if it’s asleep, can it still hurt us?”

  “Oh, yes. Its discharge is an automatic reflex and would respond to a touch, or a poke.”

  Cuol had been listening carefully to everything that was said. Now he put in, “So that is the lau. I have heard of it all my life, but I never thought I would see one. And you have not killed it but only put it to sleep?”

  “That’s right,” said Dr. Fenster.

  “Then you are a fool. Why don’t you kill it? When it wakes, it will kill you.”

  “No,” said Dr. Fenster. “It won’t harm you if you don’t touch it. And I want to study it.” He took off his broad-brimmed hat and scratched his head. “I’m afraid I didn’t prepare for this, though. We certainly can’t take the lau away with us. We’ll measure it, photograph it.”

  “We’ve got a portable voltage meter with us,” Danny said. “We ought to find out how much of a charge it puts out.”

  “Exactly, my boy,” said Dr. Fenster approvingly.

  Professor Bullfinch had been walking around the giant creature. Now he said, “Were going to have a bit of a problem keeping it, Ben. We can’t build a cage that will hold it.”

  Joe said, “We’re going to have another problem, Professor. Maybe even more serious.”

  “What is it, Joe?”

  “Visitors,” said Joe with a jerk of his head. Jean Canigou’s boat was approaching. They had all been so interested in the lau that they hadn’t noticed the sound of the motor.

  Canigou stood in the bow. There were five other men with him, one of them steering the boat. They were dressed in ragged clothing and wore dirty turbans or skullcaps. They were armed with spears and clubs.

  “They are bad men,” said Cuol. “They are from a village farther up the Nile.”

  The boat coasted to a stop and Canigou sprang ashore. His eyes widened as he saw the lau. He walked up to the explorers and stopped.

  “I see you have had some luck,” he said. “That is a fine catch. What is it?”

  “That’s none of your business,” Dr. Fenster answered sharply.

  “But it is business, good business,” said Canigou with a thin smile. “Much money, if such a strange big fish can be sold to the right person.”

  “It’s not going to be sold,” said Dr. Fenster. “Suppose you get back in your boat and leave us alone.”

  Canigou scowled. “Suppose you think about this,” he said. “We are six men with weapons. You are two men and three children. I don’t count him—” he motioned to Cuol. “He has nothing to do with this. I don’t want trouble, but I am going to take that thing, whatever it is. I will go now. I will wait downstream. You can have an hour to think about it. You think carefully. Maybe you don’t want those youngsters hurt, eh?”

  He stepped into the boat. As it moved away, he called over the noise of the motor, “One hour. Then I come back and take it.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Danny Finds an Answer

  Joe broke the long silence. “He didn’t even say please,” he muttered.

  The others couldn’t help smiling, in spite of the tension.

  “But it’s no laughing matter,” said Professor Bullfinch. He took out his pipe and slowly began to fill it. “That man’s dangerous.”

  “We can’t risk the lives of these three,” Dr. Fenster said, nodding at the young people.

  “Oh, you are so right,” said Joe quickly.

  Danny said indignantly, “You’re not going to let Canigou get away with it, are you?”

  “If you want a simple answer,” said Joe, “yes.”

  “Professor! Dr. Fenster!” Danny cried. “We can’t! We discovered the lau. And now he’ll just take it—”

  “Why don’t we let him?” said Irene thoughtfully. “I m
ean, let him come and try to move it. He doesn’t know it’s electric.”

  “I see what you mean,” Dr. Fenster said. “He’d be in for a shock.”

  “We can’t allow that,” Professor Bullfinch said gravely. “Someone might be killed. We would have to warn him. Well, wouldn’t we?”

  They nodded.

  “No, that’s not the answer,” he went on. “I think Danny’s got a real point. We just shouldn’t let Canigou get away with this. But I don’t see how we can stop him.”

  Irene said, “Maybe Cuol would help?”

  “That’s right!” Danny turned to the tall Nuer. “Would you, Cuol? Couldn’t you get some of your people and help us stop Canigou?”

  Cuol slowly shook his head.

  “It has nothing to do with us,” he said. “The lau is deadly. Why should we care who has it?”

  Dr. Fenster sighed. “That’s it, then. I don’t see that we have any choice. I can’t think of a way of preventing that fellow from doing what he wishes. How much time have we left, Euclid?”

  Professor Bullfinch drew back his sleeve and glanced at his watch. Before he could answer, Dan gave a screech that made everyone jump.

  “Watch!”

  “Watch what?” said Professor Bullfinch.

  “Watch where?” Dr. Fenster said, looking around.

  “Not where. Watch!” spluttered Danny. “Which watch. I’m sorry, I mean wrist watch. That’s it. That’s the answer.”

  “Poor lad,” said Dr. Fenster in an undertone to the Professor. “He’s frightened out of his wits. He doesn’t know what he’s saying. We’d better get him out of here, and the sooner the better.”

  Danny was dancing about in a frenzy of excitement. He seized the Professor’s arm.

  “I’m not frightened out of my which—I mean, wits,” he cried. “Listen! Don’t you remember when you discovered the superconductor? You couldn’t get your hand past the magnetic field because your watch was caught and held. Why can’t we set up the same kind of field and stop Canigou?”