"What difference does it make?" Maota cried, suddenly angry. "You want
to close up all these things in boxes for a posterity who may have no
slightest feeling or appreciation. I want to leave the city as it is,
for spirits whose existence I cannot prove."
The old man's eyes were furious now, deadly. The gun came down directly
in line with the Earthman's chest. The gnarled finger moved.
Michaelson, using the power of the cylinder behind his ear, jumped
behind the old webfoot. To Maota it seemed that he had flicked out of
existence like a match blown out. The next instant Michaelson spun
him around and hit him. It was an inexpert fist, belonging to an
archeologist, not a fighter. But Maota was an old man.
He dropped in the sand, momentarily stunned. Michaelson bent over to
pick up the gun and the old man, feeling it slip from his fingers,
hung on and was pulled to his feet.
They struggled for possession of the gun, silently, gasping, kicking
sand. Faces grew red. Lips drew back over Michaelson's white teeth,
over Maota's pink, toothless gums. The dead city's fragile spires threw
impersonal shadows down where they fought.
Then quite suddenly a finger or hand--neither knew whose finger or
hand--touched the firing stud.
There was a hollow, whooshing sound. Both stopped still, realizing the
total destruction they might have caused.
"It only hit the ground," Michaelson said.
A black, charred hole, two feet in diameter and--they could not see how
deep--stared at them.
Maota let go and sprawled in the sand. "The book!" he cried. "The book
is gone!"
"No! We probably covered it with sand while we fought."
* * * * *
Both men began scooping sand in their cupped hands, digging frantically
for the book. Saliva dripped from Maota's mouth, but he didn't know or
care.
Finally they stopped, exhausted. They had covered a substantial area
around the hole. They had covered the complete area where they had been.
"We killed it," the old man moaned.
"It was just a book. Not alive, you know."
"How do you know?" The old man's pale eyes were filled with tears. "It
talked and it sang. In a way, it had a soul. Sometimes on long nights I
used to imagine it loved me, for taking care of it."
"There are other books. We'll get another."