The Halfling and Other Stories

by Leigh Brackett

  He came out on the steps and spoke to them. “They’ve taken my daughter,” he said. “They came and took her from the house.”

  They looked at his face in the glare of the yard light and after their first outraged cry they were silent. Presently one said, “I called my kid but I couldn’t find him.”

  There was more than one father then who remembered that he had not seen his child at home. And now they were all afraid but not for themselves. Sherwin went down the steps. “Let’s go.”

  He was halfway across the little bridge when Allerton came running, crying Sherwin’s name. “They took Richard,” he said. “My boy is gone.”

  The men poured out across the meadow, going like an army on the march, running in the long grass—running to where the cloudy moon was lost beneath the branches of the trees.

  “Head toward the knoll,” cried Sherwin. He told them the direction. “I think that’s where They are. And be careful of the swamp.”

  They went in among the close-set trees, laboring through the undergrowth, the beams of their flashlights leaping in the utter dark. Sherwin knew the woods. He rushed on ahead and Allerton clung close behind him. Neither man spoke. Lightning still danced faintly on the horizon and now and again there was a growl of thunder. The mists were rising from the marsh.

  Abruptly Sherwin stopped. From behind him came a yell and then the crash and roar of a falling tree. There was silence then and he shouted and a distant voice answered.

  “Tree struck by lightning, right in front of us. No one hurt!”

  He could hear them thrashing around as they circled the fallen tree. And then there was a second crash, and another, and still another.

  Sherwin said, “It’s Them. They’re trying to block the way.”

  Muffled voices swore. The men were trying to scramble out of the trap that had been made for them. Sherwin hurried on, Allerton panting at his side. He could not wait for the men. He could not wait now for anything.

  A swoop and a flash of light, an ominous cracking—and ahead a giant maple toppled to the earth, bearing down the younger trees, creating an impassable barrier.

  “All right,” said Sherwin to an unseen presence. “I know another way.”

  He turned aside toward the river. In a minute or two he was ankle deep in mud and water, splashing heavily along an arm of the swamp. Reeds and saplings grew thick but there were no trees here to be thrown down against them.

  The men went fast, careless of how they trod, and all at once Allerton cried out and fell. He floundered in the muck, trying to rise. Sherwin lifted him up and he would have gone on but he went to his hands and knees again, half fainting.

  “I’ve hurt my ankle. A loose stone—it turned!”

  He had lost his rifle. Sherwin got an arm around him and held him up. He was a big man and heavy. It was hard going after that and very slow. Sherwin would have left him but he was afraid that Allerton might faint and drown in the inches of sour water.

  The ridge loomed up before them, the tall pines black against a brooding sky. The men staggered out onto hard ground and Sherwin let his burden drop.

  “Wait here, Sam. I’m going on alone.”

  Allerton caught at him. “Look!”

  Cloudy wings soared above them, swift as streaming fire and one by one the tall pines went lordly down, struck by the lightning They carried in Their hands.

  The ridge was blocked.

  When the night was still again, and empty, Allerton said, “I guess that does it, Hugh. We’re licked.”

  Sherwin did not answer. He remained motionless, standing like an old man, his shoulders bent, his head sunk forward on his breast.

  The earth began to vibrate underneath his feet. A sound, more felt than heard, went out across the woods—deep, powerful throbbing that entered Sherwin’s heart and shook it and brought his head up sharply.

  “You hear that, Sam?”

  “What is it? Thunder?”

  “It’s machinery,” Sherwin whispered. “Motors, starting up.”

  Unfamiliar motors, so strong and mighty that they could shake the ground and still be silent. Their motors. Their ship!

  “They’re getting ready, Sam. They’re going to leave. But what about the kids? Sam—what about Janie and the kids?”

  He turned and fled back into the swamp, along the ridge and around it, and faced a wide expanse of stinking mud and mist. He started out across it.

  The marsh quaked beneath him. Going slowly and by day he would have been afraid, wary of the bog-holes and the sucking sands. He did not think of them now. He could not think of anything but that vast and evil thrumming that filled the air, of what it meant to his child—his child, that might have died already, or might be…

  He did not know. That was the worst of it. He did not know.

  He took a straight line toward the knoll, slipping, floundering, falling now and again and scrambling up, wet to the skin and foul with ooze, but going on, always going on, and at last there was solid ground under his feet and only a belt of trees between him and the clearing.

  They were not looking for him now. They thought he was trapped and helpless, back on the ridge. At least They did not try to stop him. He forced himself to go quietly.

  This time he could see the clearing. It crossed his mind that whatever trick They had used before to bend and twist the lightrays around that space so that it could not be seen had depended on some mechanism in the ship, that now They could not spare the power for it.

  A dark and monstrous bulk filled more than half the opening. The moon had broken clear, and by its light he could see the metal sheathing of the ship, scored and pitted and worn by unimaginable voyages. The mighty throb of its motors gave it an illusion of life, as though it were anxious to be away again. Sherwin remembered the crystal and the glimpse of streaming Suns and he shuddered, thinking of where this ship had been.

  They were hovering around an open hatch in the belly of the ship and the children were there also—Janie, Richard, a half dozen more, grouped beside the doorway.

  And Jane was climbing in.

  Sherwin screamed. He screamed her name and ran out across the clearing. He dropped his gun. He could not use it anyway for fear of harming the children and this had gone beyond such things as guns. The child turned and looked at him and then They came.

  They did not harm him. They held him fast and even now, with Their solid strength binding him, he could see Them only as misty shapes with wings of cloudy fire spread against his struggles.

  Perhaps the light was different on Their world. Perhaps in the glow of those twin suns They would be as real as he was. But here They were like ghosts, alien phantoms that made him cold with horror.

  “Jane!” he cried, “come back! Come back!”

  Reluctantly she came toward him. “They won’t hurt you, Daddy. Don’t be scared. Daddy, I want to go with Them. Just for a little while! They’ll bring us back. They promised. And I want to go with them—out there.”

  She pointed to where the stars burned clear in the valleys between the clouds.

  “I didn’t mean to sneak away, Daddy, but I knew you wouldn’t let me go and I have to—oh, I have to! They came and got me, so I could.”

  “No,” he said. “Oh, no!” They were not words so much as a groan of agony. “Listen, Janie, please listen. I’ll give you anything you want. I’ll buy you a pony, I’ll take you clear around the world, I’ll do anything.”

  “But I don’t want any of those things, not now.”

  “Jane,” he said, “don’t you care anything about your mother and me at all? Do you want to kill us both?”

  “I don’t see why everybody has to die just because I want to go somewhere!” But she began to cry a little and he shouted to the other children, pleading with them, telling them how their parents felt, trying to make them understand the danger, the enormity of the thing that they were about to do.

  Richard looked stubbornly at the ground and said, “We’ll never ha
ve a chance again. We’ll never see those other places out there if we don’t go now. I don’t care what my father says. I’m going.”

  One of the little girls said doubtfully, “I’m scared. I think I want to go home.”

  Some of them began to waver, thinking of the things Sherwin had said. And then Sherwin heard a silent voice speaking within his mind.

  He knew that the children could hear it far more clearly than he. Their minds were young and plastic, open wide to all things. But he could hear it well enough.

  What are you afraid of? it said. Come on! There are all sorts of worlds beside this one. We’ll show them to you. We’ll show you how the stars look, out beyond your sky. We’ll teach you how to run the ship. Think of the fun we can have together, all across the galaxy!

  Other voices joined in, telling of colored Suns and bright strange planets, of toys and pets and treasures, of adventures unthinkable. Child’s talk, couched in the language of children—cunningly wrought to lure them on with promises that set their heads whirling with wonder and delight.

  Suppose you do get punished when we bring you back? Are you going to miss it all just because you’re afraid of a little punishment?

  “That’s right,” said Janie, turning to the others. “Think what They’re going to catch when They get home and They’re not afraid. They didn’t let Their parents stop them!”

  “No sir!” said Richard. “They weren’t scared.”

  Slowly, very slowly, Sherwin said, “Their parents? Jane, did you say ‘Their parents’?”

  “Yes, Daddy. They ran away and They’ve had all kinds of fun and haven’t got hurt a bit and They weren’t any older than we are. And if They can do it, so can we!”

  Parents!

  They ran away, and They aren’t any older than we…

  Sherwin said nothing for a long moment.

  At last he whispered, “Do you mean that They are children, too?”

  “Why, of course,” she answered. “I thought you knew.”

  Sherwin began to laugh. It was not healthy laughter and he made himself stop it at once.

  Children!

  The fright, the anguish, the pain of the past two days and nights—a whole village in arms, terrified parents combing the woods for the missing, the awful dread of the unknown that had beset him and Allerton!

  Children. Children had done all this!

  He looked at Them and he could not believe it. “It’s a lie,” he said. “It’s a lie They’ve told you to lead you on.”

  Jane said impatiently, “Don’t be silly, Daddy. Why would They want to play with us if They were grown up?”

  He remembered the winged creatures, large and small, going between the diamond towers of the city he had glimpsed on the world of a distant star.

  Large and small, old and young…

  Why not?

  A race that could build such ships to ply between the Suns, a race that could put thought into crystals and make themselves unseen, that could cause whole buildings to vanish and topple trees at will—would not their young be children still in spite of a vaster knowledge?

  He heard Them laugh, soundless gleeful laughter, as though They had played an excellent trick upon him to frighten him so, and he knew that it was true.

  Children—these unhuman creatures with all their unholy powers. Truant children, like his own!

  A queer sort of anger came to Sherwin then and with it a faint and desperate hope. He straightened up and turned to face the two that held him. He told Them sternly, “Let me go!”

  They relaxed their grasp but the others had come closer now and were around him, mingled with the children of Earth.

  Sherwin was thinking, The species doesn’t matter, even a lion cub will obey. Maybe—Maybe!

  He spoke to Them. “You’re telling our children not to be afraid of punishment. What are your own elders going to say to you when you get back?”

  They rustled Their wings and did not answer. “You’re being very brave, aren’t you? You’re just going to go on having fun. Well, I know kids, and I know different. You’re afraid. You’re afraid to go home!”

  Their voices reached him in defiant chorus.

  No! We are not afraid!

  “Oh, yes you are. You’re scared stiff. You’ve stolen a ship and run away and there’ll be the devil to pay about it and you know it.”

  He stepped toward Them, forcing himself to be stem and assured, the single adult among a group of children, the angry adult asserting his authority. He hoped They could not read the fear that threatened to choke the words in his throat.

  “If I were you,” he told Them, “I’d get home and face the music before you make things any worse. The longer you stay away, the harder it’ll be for you. And you might as well know right now, nobody’s going with you!”

  He turned to his own. “Come here to me, Jane. The rest of you, get home as fast as you can make it. Your fathers are coming and you know what you’ll get if they catch you here!”

  He waited. There was nothing more to do but wait. For a moment no one moved nor spoke. The children hung then-heads and looked at each other sidelong and it seemed to Sherwin that the wings of the strangers drooped a little.

  Imperceptibly the two groups began to draw apart.

  The little girl who had spoken before ran suddenly into the woods, crying. And They commenced to mutter among Themselves.

  They were speaking only to each other now and Sherwin could not hear Their thoughts but it seemed that They were quarreling, some hanging back, others arguing with flashing motions of Their wings.

  Jane came slowly and stood beside Sherwin. Her eyes were on the earth. She did not raise them.

  They began to drift toward the ship. They were not talking now.

  They stopped beside the hatchway and looked back. Most of the human children had already melted into the darkness between the trees. Sherwin took Jane’s hand and held it. They must have called to her, for she said good-bye and They went slowly and gloomily into the ship. The hatchway closed.

  Sherwin took his daughter into his arms and carried her away.

  Behind him the heavy throbbing deepened and then seemed to rise and fade. Looking upward through a rift in the branches he saw a dark shape sweep out across the stars and vanish, bearing those other children to their homeplace far across the sky.

  Janie was crying, her head pressed hard against his shoulder.

  A little later he met the other men.

  “Whoever was in the woods has gone away,” he said. “Everything’s all right now and the truants—all of them—are going home.”