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acid onto the varmint. It didn't notice. "So, small moist pests, you would try to outdo Me!"
Abercrombie and Ginny lifted their wands and shouted the few brief words of transformation.
Crouched back into my corner, peering through a sulfurous reek of fumes, I saw Ginny lurch and
then jump for safety. She must have sensed the backlash. There came a shattering explosion and the air
was full of flying glass.
My body shielded Griswold, and the spell didn't do more to me than turn me lupe me. Ginny was on
her hands and knees behind a bench, half-unconscious...but unhurt, unhurt, praise the good Powers
for-ever. Svartalf-a Pekingese dog yapped on the shelf. Abercrombie was gone, but a chimpanzee in
baggy tweeds stuttered wailing toward the door.
A fire-blast rushed before the ape. He whirled, screamed, and shinnied up a steam pipe. The
salamander arched its back and howled with laughter.
"You would use your tricks on Me? Almighty Me, terrible Me, beautiful Me? Ha, they bounce off
like water from a hot skillet! And I, I, I am the skillet which is going to fry you!"
Somehow, the low-grade melodrama of its speech was not in the least ridiculous. For this was the
child-ish, vainglorious, senselessly consuming thing which was loose on earth to make ashes of men and
the homes of men.
Under the Polaroids, I switched back to human and rose to my feet behind a bench. Griswold turned
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on a water faucet and squirted a jet with his finger. The salamander hissed in annoyance-yes, water still
hurt, but we had too little liquid here to quench it, you'd need a whole lake by this time -- It swung its
head, gape-mouthed, aimed at Griswold, and drew a long breath.
All is vanity...
I reeled over to the Bunsen burner that was heating a futile beaker of water. Ginny looked at me
through scorched bangs. The room roiled with heat, sweat rivered off me. I didn't have any flash of
genius, I acted on raw instinct and tumbled memories.
"Kill us," I croaked. "Kill us if you dare. Our ser-vant is more powerful than you. He'll hound you to
the ends of creation."
"Your servant?" Flame wreathed the words.
"Yeah...I mean yes...our servant, that Fire which fears not water!"
The salamander stepped back a pace, snarling. It was not yet so strong that the very name of water
didn't make it flinch. "Show me!" it chattered. "Show me! I dare you!"
"Our servant...small, but powerful," I rasped. "Brighter and more beautiful than you, and above harm
from the Wet Element." I staggered to the jars of metal samples and grabbed a pair of tongs.
"Have you the courage to look on him?"
The salamander bristled. "Have I the courage? Ask rather, does it dare confront Me?"
I flicked a glance from the corner of my eye. Ginny had risen and was gripping her wand. She
scarcely breathed, but her eyes were narrowed.
There was a silence. It hung like a world's weight in that room, smothering what noises remained: the
crackle of fire, Abercrombie's simian gibber, Svartalf s indig-nant yapping. I took a strip of magnesium in
the tongs and held it to the burner flame.
It burst into a blue-white actinic radiance from which I turned dazzled eyes. The salamander was less
viciously brilliant. I saw the brute accomplish the feat of simultaneously puffing itself up and shrinking
back.
"Behold!" I lifted the burning strip. Behind me, Ginny's rapid mutter came: "O Indra, Abaddon,
Lucifer --
The child mind, incapable of considering more than one thing at a time...but for how long a time? I
had to hold its full attention for the hundred and twenty seconds required.
"Fire," said the salamander feverishly. "Only another fire, one tiny piece of that Force from which I
came."
"Can you do this, buster?"
I plunged the strip into the beaker. Steam puffed from the water, it boiled and bubbled-and the metal
went on burning!
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" -- abire ex orbis terrestris -- "
"Mg plus H20 yields Mg0 plus H2," whispered Griswold reverently.
"It's a trick!" screamed the salamander. "It's impos-sible! If even I cannot -- No!"
"Stay where you are!" I barked in my best Army manner. "Do you doubt that my servant can follow
you wherever you may flee?"
"I'll kill that little monster!"
"Go right ahead, chum," I agreed. "Want to fight the duel under the ocean?"
Whistles skirled above our racket. The police had seen through these windows.
"I'll show you, I will!" The roar was almost a sob. I ducked behind the bench, pulling Griswold with
me. A geyser of flame rushed were I had been.
"Nyaah, nyaah, nyaah," I called. "You can't catch me! Scaredy-cat!"
Svartalf gave me a hard look.
The floor trembled as the elemental came toward me, not going around the benches but burning its
way through them. Heat clawed at my throat. I spun down toward darkness.
And it was gone. Ginny cried her triumphant "Amen!" and displaced air cracked like thunder.
I lurched to my feet. Ginny fell into my arms. The police entered the lab and Griswold hollered
some-thing about calling the fire department before his whole building whiffed off in smoke. Abercrombie
scampered out a window and Svartalf jumped down from the shelf. He forgot that a Pekingese isn't as
agile as a cat, and his popeyes bubbled with righteous wrath.
"Keek-eek-eek!" said Abercrombie. "Yip-yip-yip!" said Svartalf
XIII
OUTSIDE, THE MALL was cool and still. We sat on dewed grass and looked at the moon and
thought what a great and simple wonder it is to be alive.
The geas held us apart, but tenderness lay on Ginny's lips. We scarcely noticed when somebody ran
past, us shouting that the salamander was gone, nor when church bells began pealing the news to men an
Heaven.
Svartalf finally roused us with his barking. Gin chuckled. "Poor fellow. I'll change you back as soon I
can, but now I've more urgent business. Come on Steve."
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Griswold, assured that his priceless hall was safe followed us at a tactful distance. Svartalf merely
where he was...too shocked to move, I guess, at idea that there could be more important affairs than
turning him back into a cat.
Dr. Malzius met us halfway, under one of the campus elms. Moonlight spattered his face and
gleamed in the pince-nez. "My dear Miss Graylock," he began, "is it indeed true that you have overcome
that menace to society? Most noteworthy. Accept my congratulations. The glorious annals of this great
institution of which I have the honor to be president -- "
Ginny faced him, arms akimbo, and nailed him with surely the chilliest gaze he had ever seen. "The
credit belongs to Mr. Matuchek and Dr. Griswold," she said. "I shall so inform the press. Doubtless you'll
see fit to recommend a larger appropriation for Dr. Griswold's outstanding work."
"Oh, really," stammered the scientist. "I didn't -- " [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]