"You confuse bravery with selfishness. He insists on the first
shot--won't trust another member of a hunting party to hold his fire.
He always stalks out ahead like this," Annellica explained tensely.
I had noticed that the niece carried no weapon. Which brought up
another question. "Does he always mix his pleasures?" I asked.
She was in the act of withdrawing a long telescopic sight which she
must have had bound to the inside of her thigh. As she mounted it to
her rifle with feverish haste she answered, "He is not mixing his
pleasures. _Suchane is bait._"
Before this could sink in completely a shrill, feminine scream tore
faintly into the gusty wind and found us. I leaped to my feet. Half way
to the edge of the jungle, some hundred yards from us, I watched Daphne
pushing the olive-skinned girl ahead of him with rough shoves. A deeper
color spread from her neck and swathed one shoulder and her side.
He stopped and raised the rifle threateningly. She turned and fled
toward the jungle.
"What in God's name--" I shouted.
"You can't help her," Annellica said hopelessly. "He's cut her jugular.
If there's an animal in there the blood scent will bring it out in
seconds. If there isn't--Suchane is gone, anyway."
I stared down at my companion in horror. She had warned me about the
"Fate of Daffy's nieces," but I couldn't have visualized anything this
bestial.
She looked up at me. "She will faint soon. There are worse ways to die.
You will see." She arose to stand beside me.
* * * * *
I threw my rifle to my shoulder, fully intending to fire the whole clip
into Daphne's back, but three things happened at once. Suchane sank out
of sight in the grass, an orange splotch ripped into the open, and the
Major, too, sank down and levelled his rifle.
The animal, even at this distance, was undoubtedly one of the Major's
wampus varieties. It was stilt-legged, but not clumsy like a giraffe.
The long, thick neck swung left and right tracing the scent of warm
blood, and its cat-like body arched so high a man could have walked
under it.
The wind was directly at our back, and as the several human scents
touched the animal's nostrils it jerked the long-fanged mouth. Its
belly touched the high grass in a quick crouch, then it sprang in one,
deadly accurate leap that carried it forty yards to the prostrate
Suchane. Even in the light gravity, the orange blur did not rise in a
high trajectory, and the Major had time for only one shot while it was
in the air.
The sound startled the beast as it settled on its prey, and it raised
its ugly head high while Daphne slammed the rest of his ammunition at
it with no effect.
Annellica stood calmly as her husband dropped his rifle unbelievingly.
The heavy caliber bullets had failed to cause a quiver in the beast,
but the shocking noise had made him nervous.
At the moment when it seemed he would turn and run for the jungle,
Annellica raised her rifle. Daphne saw her sight through the
telescope. "It's no use," he yelled. "We need higher power charges. Got
a hide on him like a--"
She pulled the trigger.
The great animal pirouetted, bit at its own side, then wheeled facing
us. Even as it sprang, Daphne, who was only twenty yards from us,
screamed, "You gut-shot it! You clumsy--"
His wife dropped her rifle instantly after the shot and drew the little
nuclear pistol. I got off one shot as the beast reached the apex of its
leap, but I think I missed.
I kept waiting for Annellica's deadly handweapon to speak, but she
followed the arc of the raking talons all the way to the ground where
they churned briefly. Daphne only screamed once.
At last the pistol spat, just as the furry belly touched the grass in
its third crouch. The leap came, but it was almost straight up. The
slender pellet had entered the chest and cooked half the spine. The
aimless floundering was reflexive spasm.
Annellica grabbed my rifle and fired three quick shots at the
impervious hull of the ship. It brought the captain and two crew
members to help us with the remains. Before they reached us, however,
she was quick to secure Daphne's rifle and examine the chamber.
Even with an eye-witness and three other witnesses after the fact, she
insisted that we hack the head and claws from the monster carnivore. We
packed them, together with her husband's shredded corpse in the game
freezer.
When a financial personage of Daphne's stature dies on a strange planet
the investigation is most thorough. It wasn't necessary to take such
pains with Suchane's pitiful remains. We buried her on Tigursh II where
investigators could exhume her ripped body if they chose. The jugular
slash was indistinguishable in the general lacerations.
It was a nasty mess. It cured me from any slight pleasure in hunting
and cost me the quickest billion dollars I ever had a chance at.
Naturally, the deal was off without the Major to verify the verbal
agreement. Anyway, with characteristic selfishness, he died intestate
which threw all his holdings into the courts.
But the greatest change the incident made in my life concerned the loss
of my bachelorhood. A man can get his belly full of anything, even
promiscuity, and Daphne's little hunting party did me that favor.
I'm still stuck with Tigursh II and its mile-under-mud thorium deposit
and orange-colored wampuses but I have prospects. If the courts clear
up the Daphne estate my wife will own more planets than I have golf
balls.
So, if you ever go big game hunting again don't forget the Major's
advice. I pass it on to you for what it's worth, although you may
never aim at anything but a lion. Never gut-shoot a wampus. It's better
even if you're only shooting blanks!
And I don't feel a damn bit bad about the way Annellica loaded the
major's gun....