Cemetery World by Clifford D. Simak Page B

shapes at first, but as I stared at them, astonished, they began to take on more definite form and feature, although they did not gain in substantiality. They still were nebulous and hazy, but now they were people rather than just shapes, and I saw with horror that they wore the costumes of many different races from far among the stars. There a bewhiskered brigand in the kilt and cape of that distant planet that was called, curiously enough, End of Nothing; there the jolly merchant with his stately toga from the planet Cash, and between them, dancing with abandon in a tattered gown, a rope of gems about her neck, a girl who could have been from nowhere else but the pleasure planet Vegas.
    She didn’t touch me and I didn’t hear her come, but with some sense I did not know I had, I became aware that Cynthia was beside me. I looked down at her and she was staring up at me, with mingled fear and wonder on her face. Her lips moved, but I couldn’t hear her because of the loudness of the music.
    “What did you say?” I asked, but she had no time to answer, for in the instant that I spoke, a concussion slapped me over and I went down on the ground so hard that the breath was knocked out of me. I landed on my side and rolled over on my back and I saw, with some surprise, Bronco flying through the air, with all eight legs spraddled out grotesquely, while all around burning togs and brands were flying and a puff of smoke floated up to dim the brilliance of the moon.
    I tried to breathe and couldn’t and a sudden panic hit me—that I’d never breathe again, that I was done with breathing. Then I did breathe, taking in great gulps of air, and each gulp was so agonizing that I tried to stop, but couldn’t.
    All over the clearing, I saw, people had been thrown to the ground. Some of them were getting up and others were trying to get up and there were many others who were just lying there.
    I struggled to my knees and saw that Cynthia, beside me, was also trying to get up and I put out a hand to help her. Bronco was sprawled out on the ground and as I watched, he finally gained his feet, but two of his legs, both on the same side, dangled, and he stood there unsteadily on the other six.
    A thunder of feet went past me and Elmer was at Bronco’s side, holding him erect, propping him, helping him to move. I got to my feet and pulled Cynthia up beside me. Elmer and Bronco were coming toward us and Elmer yelled at us, “Get out of here! Up across the hill!”
    We turned and ran, coming to the fence on which the old man, Henry, and myself had squatted half the afternoon. And coming to it, I knew that the crippled Bronco could never make his way across it. I grabbed a post with both my hands and tried to pull it loose and force it down. It wiggled back and forth, but I could not topple it.
    “Let me,” said Elmer, close beside me. He lifted a foot and kicked and the boards splintered and came loose. Cynthia had crawled through the fence and was running up the hill. I ran after her.
    I took one quick look behind me as I ran and saw that one of the haystacks close beside the barn was burning, set afire, most likely, by one of the flaming brands sent flying through the air by the explosion that had crippled Bronco. People were running aimlessly in the light of the burning stack.
    Looking back, not watching where I was going, I ran into a cornstack and, toppling it, went down on top of it.
    By the time I disentangled myself and was on my feet again, Elmer and Bronco had gone on past me and were disappearing over the brow of the moonlit hill. I sprinted after them. My face and hands smarted and burned from their forcible contact with the sun-dried corn leaves and when I put my hand up to my face it came away wet and sticky with blood oozing from the cuts the dry, sharp leaves had inflicted on my skin.
    I went plunging down the hill below the brow and far ahead of me saw the whiteness of Cynthia’s jacket, almost at the woods that ran