Mike flung himself at the Chief, literally snarling. His small fist hit
the Chief's face--and Mike was small but he was not puny. The "crack" of
the impact was loud in the car. Haney grabbed. There was a moment's
frenzied struggling. Then Mike was helplessly wrapped in Haney's arms,
incoherent with fury and shame.
"Crazy fool!" grunted the Chief, feeling his jaw. "What's the matter
with you? Don't you feel good?"
He was angry, but he was more concerned. Mike was white and raging.
"You tell that," he panted shrilly, "and so help me----"
"What's got into you?" demanded Haney anxiously. "I'd be bragging, I
would, if I'd got a brainstorm like you did! That guy Sanford woulda
wiped us all out----"
The Chief said angrily, between unease and puzzlement:
"I never knew you to go off your nut like this before! What's got into
you, anyway?"
Mike gulped suddenly. Haney still held him firmly, but both Haney and
the Chief were looking at him with worried eyes. And Mike said
desperately: "You were going to tell Sally----"
The Chief snorted.
"Huh! You fool little runt! No! I was going to tell her about you
opening up that airlock when Sanford locked us out! Sure I kidded you
about what you're talking about! Sure! I'm going to do it again! But
that's amongst us! I don't tell that outside!"
Haney made an inarticulate exclamation. He understood, and he was
relieved. But he looked disgusted. He released Mike abruptly, rumbling
to himself. He stared out the window. And Mike stood upright, an absurd
small figure. His face worked a little.
"Okay," said Mike, with a little difficulty. "I was dumb. Only, Chief,
you owe me a sock on the jaw when you feel like it. I'll take it."
He swallowed. Sally was watching wide-eyed.
"Sally," said Mike bitterly, "I'm a bigger fool than I look. I thought
the Chief was going to tell you what happened when I landed. I--I
floated down in a village over there in India, and those crazy savages'd
never seen a parachute, and they began to yell and make gestures, and
first thing I knew they had a sort of litter and were piling me in it,
and throwing flowers all over me, and there was a procession----"
Sally listened blankly. Mike told the tale of his shame with the very
quintessence of bitter resentment. When he got to his installation in a
red-painted mud temple, and the reverent and forcible removal of his
clothes so he could be greased with butter, Sally's lips began to
twitch. At the picture of Mike in a red loincloth, squirming furiously
while brown-skinned admirers zestfully sang his praises, howling his
rage while they celebrated some sort of pious festival in honor of his
arrival, Sally broke down and laughed helplessly.
Mike stared at her, aghast. He felt that he'd hated the Chief when he
thought the Chief was going to tell the tale on him as a joke. He'd told
it on himself as a penance, in the place of the blow he'd given the
Chief and which the Chief wouldn't return. To Mike it was still tragedy.
It was still an outrage to his dignity. But Sally was laughing. She
rocked back and forth next to Joe, helpless with mirth.
"Oh, Mike!" she gasped. "It's beautiful! They must have been saying such
lovely, respectful things, while you were calling them names and wanting
to kill them! They'd have been bragging to each other about how you
were--visiting them because they'd been such good people, and--this was
the reward of well-spent lives, and you--you----"
She leaned against Joe and shook. The car went on. The Chief chuckled.
Haney grinned. Joe watched Mike as this new aspect of his disgrace got
into his consciousness. It hadn't occurred to Mike, before, that anybody
but himself had been ridiculous. It hadn't occurred to him, until he
lost his temper, that Haney and the Chief would ride him mercilessly
among themselves, but would not dream of letting anybody outside the
gang do so.
Presently Mike managed to grin a little. It was a twisty grin, and not
altogether mirthful.
"Yeah," he said wrily. "I see it. They were crazy too. I should've had
more sense than to get mad." Then his grin grew a trifle twistier. "I
didn't tell you that the thing that made me maddest was when they wanted
to put earrings on me. I grabbed a club then and--uh--persuaded them I
didn't like the idea."
Sally chortled. The picture of the small, truculent Mike in frenzied
revolt with a club against the idea of being decked with jewelry....
Mike turned to the two big men and shoved at them imperiously.
"Move over!" he growled. "If you two big lummoxes had dropped in on
those crazy goofs instead of me, they'd've thought you were elephants
and set you to work hauling logs!"
He squirmed to a seat between them. He still looked ashamed, but it was
shame of a different sort. Now he looked as if he wished he hadn't
mistrusted his friends for even a moment. And he included Sally.
"Anyhow," he said suddenly in a different tone, "maybe it did do some
good for me to get all worked up! I got kind of frantic. I figured
somebody'd made a fool of me, and I was going to put something over on
you."
"Mike!" said Sally reproachfully.
"Not like you think, Sally," said Mike, grinning a little. "I made up my
mind to beat these lummoxes at their own game. I asked Joe about my
brainstorm in the plane. He didn't know what I was driving at, but he
said what I hoped was so. So I'm telling you--and," he added fiercely,
"if it's any good everybody gets credit for it, because all of us
four--even two big apes who try kidding--are responsible for it!"