Jarl Gare drew his slight body taut. "I need no help now, Waltk. I
used you when I needed you. I don't need you any longer. I will win out
alone. With all your strength, you are weaker than I."
Waltk stared at him. "You do not like me? You have just used what I
have to help yourself?"
"Yes, you big dumb ox," Jarl Gare gloated. "Your weakness is too
obvious. You're strong, but the Venusians have tests for such strength,
and even your mighty body will fail."
"And you have no weakness?" Waltk asked. "Suppose they give you the
test of strength?"
"The Chameleon men don't do it that way. They read your mind, almost,
and figure out a test that should not be impossible, if you are
uniformly strong in body, mind and courage. The test is for all three,
and you must have the brains to go with strength."
"I see," Waltk said, and when he looked at Jarl Gare, there was almost
a sense of pity in the glance.
* * * * *
At last they came to the pool. Out of the fog-shrouded lake came the
Chameleon men, their bodies dripping, their webbed hands carrying the
great shells.
The band of Chameleon men leading the Jovian and the Earthman
halted. Two of them dived into the pool. After long minutes the pair
reappeared, lugging between them a gigantic clam.
They set it down before Waltk. They stared at Waltk. Finally, Waltk
grinned and nodded. With their metal spears, four of the Chameleon men
pried open the bi-valve, and held it open by standing on the shell
edges.
Waltk flexed his great muscles and clamped a huge hand on each shell
edge.
Jarl Gare's yellow eyes widened. Waltk's test was to hold open the
clam, a prodigious feat. For how long? One of the Chameleon men glanced
at Jarl Gare and he saw a picture of darkness descending on the pool.
Why, that must be six hours.
The four Venusians stepped off the shell. The clam's writhing muscles
and the great writhing muscles of the Jovian's back tensed together.
The Chameleon men stared blankly at the striving pair. Jarl Gare
watched passively. If the dumb ox couldn't figure out that all he
had to do was to shove the clam open still further instead of bracing
against closure, he would lose the test.
The moments dripped by, became minutes marked by the jumping back and
shoulder muscles of the Jovian.
An hour passed sluggishly.... Waltk's usually white face became
suffused with red. His chest was laboring.
At the end of two hours, Waltk glanced appealingly over his shoulder at
Jarl Gare. The Earthman laughed. With a convulsive effort, Waltk pushed
back the shells six inches either way.
If he had done that at first, he could have won, Jarl Gare thought, but
not now. Waltk's strength had been drained too greatly.
The great shells quivered, moving back. Waltk strained, but the
Jovian's great muscles could hold no longer. The Jovian's huge body
quivered, the skin grew almost black with his great effort.
The clam had the leverage now. Its white muscles pulsed. The Jovian
grunted with pain. There was a deep _thucking_ sound. Waltk whimpered.
Then the Jovian stood up. He stared at the blood pulsing from the
stumps of his wrists. The clam had sheared off his hands.
"Sorry," Jarl Gare said. And laughed.
The Jovian's face convulsed with fury. Then he relaxed. His moon face
was smiling as he looked at Jarl Gare.
"Your turn now," he said.
The Venusians gathered around Waltk. One of them took a pouch from
beneath his breech clout. His webbed fingers dug in and came out with
a salve that he smeared on the spurting wrist stumps. The blood ceased
spurting.
Then the Venusians turned to Jarl Gare.
They circled him, but broke the circle a little to let a wizened
Venusian through. He was carrying a Venusian pearl. Jarl Gare gasped
at the size of the pearl. He reached out for it, but the old wizened
Venusian drew back and a picture grew in Gare's mind.
"You're going to hide it in an oyster shell, and throw that shell in
with a pile of others?"
The conical wrinkled head bowed. The wizened oldster reached into a
pouch inside his breech clout and pulled out a handful of gray powder.
The Venusians moved toward the pool, forcing Jarl Gare to move along
with them.
At the pool's edge, the old Venusian dipped in a wrinkled hand and drew
out a handful of water. He mixed the water with the powder until it
became the consistency of paste. Jarl Gare watched as the old Venusian
smeared the oyster shell one of the other Chameleon men handed him with
the grayish paste.
Then Jarl Gare saw the great, gray pearl handed to the old man. He
placed the pearl in the shell. Then the other Venusians turned Jarl
Gare away from the oldster, one of them placing his cold webbed fingers
across the Earthman's eyes.
Jarl Gare heard the rattle of the old shells, other rustling motions
behind him as he waited. What test was this the Chameleon men were
planning?
Finally, the hands dropped from his eyes. He turned around. The oldster
was pointing at a huge pile of the oyster shells.
* * * * *
A picture was in Jarl Gare's mind again. So they wanted him to find the
shell? That was a fine test! All the shells were gray, and the pile to
which the elder pointed was approximately twenty feet high. How could
he find one gray shell among so many other gray ones?
He looked up and saw Waltk grinning at him, the stumps of his arms
folded.
"How can I find it?" he asked Waltk. "One gray one among so many
others?"
"Gray?" asked Waltk. "It is not gray. It sticks out of that pile like a
torch. The shell is smeared with red."
"Red?" asked Jarl Gare curiously. "Red? I see no red."
"That's right," Waltk said, and there was laughter in his voice.
"You're color-blind, Earthman. I knew it when you first told me the
vegetation was gray--that the pearls were gray. The Chameleon men knew
it, too. You said they almost could read your mind."
Waltk threw back his head and roared with laughter.
Jarl Gare spun his eyes to the Chameleon men who were watching. A
picture grew in his mind. He had until sunset to find the shell--the
_red_ shell.
And he was color-blind....