farm? If so, why had there been no harvest?
It wounded his pride to think that his race, his species, his world was being defeated with such apparent ease. What was worse, what he could not endure was the suspicion that it all meant nothing, that the process of their annihilation was something quite mechanical: that mankind’s destroyers were not, in other words, fighting a war but merely spraying the garden.
The opening to the cave was discovered inadvertently—Denny Stromberg fell through it. Without that happy chance, they might well have gone the whole night without finding it, for everyone in their party had passed it by.
The cave went farther back than the lamplight would reach from the entrance, but before the full depth was explored, everyone was inside. All the adults except Anderson, Buddy, and Maryann (all three under five feet six) had to bend over double or even crawl to keep from hitting their heads against the crumbling ceiling. Anderson declared that the moment for silent prayer was at hand, for which Orville was grateful. Huddled next to each other for warmth, their backs against the sloping wall of the cave, they tried to recover their sense of identity, of purpose, of touch—whatever senses they had lost in the hours-long stampede through the snow. The lamp was left burning, since Anderson judged that matches were more precious than oil.
After five minutes given over to prayers, Anderson, Buddy, Neil and Orville (though not of the family hierarchy, he
had
been the one to think of the cave—and of more things besides than Anderson cared to reckon) explored the back of the cave. It was big but not so big as they’d hoped, extending some twenty feet to the rear, narrowing continually. At its far end, there was a small el filled with bones.
“Wolves!” Neil declared.
Closer inspection confirmed this with some definiteness, for the skeletons of the wolves themselves were discovered, stripped as clean as the others, topmost on the pile.
“Rats,” Neil decided. “Just rats.”
To reach the far depth of the cave they had had to squeeze past the gigantic root of a Plant that had broken through the cave wall. Returning from the pile of bones the men examined this, the only other exceptional feature of the cave, with some care. The Plant’s root at this level was very little distinguishable from its trunk. To judge from the curvature of the portion exposed in the cave, it was, like the bole of the Plant, some fourteen or fifteen feet in diameter. Near the floor of the cave, the smooth surface of the root was abraded, just as the smooth green trunks were often chewed by hungry rabbits. Here, however, there appeared to be more than a nibble taken out.
Orville stooped to examine it. “Rabbits didn’t do this. It’s gone right to the heart of the wood.” He reached his hand into the dark hole. The outermost layer of wood extended no more than a foot, beyond which his fingers encountered what seemed a tangle of vines—and beyond this (his whole shoulder pressing against the hole), nothing; emptiness; air. “This thing is hollow!”
“Nonsense,” Anderson said. He got down beside Orville and thrust his own arm into the hole. “It can’t be,” he said, feeling that it could be and was.
“Rabbits certainly didn’t make
that
hole,” Orville insisted.
“Rats,” Neil repeated, more than ever confirmed in his judgment. But, as usual, no one paid him any attention.
“It
grows
that way. Like the stem of a dandelion—it’s hollow.”
“It’s dead. Termites must have gotten to it.”
“The only dead Plants I’ve seen, Mr. Anderson, are the ones we’ve killed. If you don’t object, I’d like to see what’s down there.”
“I don’t see what good that could do. You have an unhealthy curiosity about these Plants, young man. I sometimes have the impression that you’re more on their side than on ours.”
“The good it could do,” Orville said, half-truthfully (for he dared not
It wounded his pride to think that his race, his species, his world was being defeated with such apparent ease. What was worse, what he could not endure was the suspicion that it all meant nothing, that the process of their annihilation was something quite mechanical: that mankind’s destroyers were not, in other words, fighting a war but merely spraying the garden.
The opening to the cave was discovered inadvertently—Denny Stromberg fell through it. Without that happy chance, they might well have gone the whole night without finding it, for everyone in their party had passed it by.
The cave went farther back than the lamplight would reach from the entrance, but before the full depth was explored, everyone was inside. All the adults except Anderson, Buddy, and Maryann (all three under five feet six) had to bend over double or even crawl to keep from hitting their heads against the crumbling ceiling. Anderson declared that the moment for silent prayer was at hand, for which Orville was grateful. Huddled next to each other for warmth, their backs against the sloping wall of the cave, they tried to recover their sense of identity, of purpose, of touch—whatever senses they had lost in the hours-long stampede through the snow. The lamp was left burning, since Anderson judged that matches were more precious than oil.
After five minutes given over to prayers, Anderson, Buddy, Neil and Orville (though not of the family hierarchy, he
had
been the one to think of the cave—and of more things besides than Anderson cared to reckon) explored the back of the cave. It was big but not so big as they’d hoped, extending some twenty feet to the rear, narrowing continually. At its far end, there was a small el filled with bones.
“Wolves!” Neil declared.
Closer inspection confirmed this with some definiteness, for the skeletons of the wolves themselves were discovered, stripped as clean as the others, topmost on the pile.
“Rats,” Neil decided. “Just rats.”
To reach the far depth of the cave they had had to squeeze past the gigantic root of a Plant that had broken through the cave wall. Returning from the pile of bones the men examined this, the only other exceptional feature of the cave, with some care. The Plant’s root at this level was very little distinguishable from its trunk. To judge from the curvature of the portion exposed in the cave, it was, like the bole of the Plant, some fourteen or fifteen feet in diameter. Near the floor of the cave, the smooth surface of the root was abraded, just as the smooth green trunks were often chewed by hungry rabbits. Here, however, there appeared to be more than a nibble taken out.
Orville stooped to examine it. “Rabbits didn’t do this. It’s gone right to the heart of the wood.” He reached his hand into the dark hole. The outermost layer of wood extended no more than a foot, beyond which his fingers encountered what seemed a tangle of vines—and beyond this (his whole shoulder pressing against the hole), nothing; emptiness; air. “This thing is hollow!”
“Nonsense,” Anderson said. He got down beside Orville and thrust his own arm into the hole. “It can’t be,” he said, feeling that it could be and was.
“Rabbits certainly didn’t make
that
hole,” Orville insisted.
“Rats,” Neil repeated, more than ever confirmed in his judgment. But, as usual, no one paid him any attention.
“It
grows
that way. Like the stem of a dandelion—it’s hollow.”
“It’s dead. Termites must have gotten to it.”
“The only dead Plants I’ve seen, Mr. Anderson, are the ones we’ve killed. If you don’t object, I’d like to see what’s down there.”
“I don’t see what good that could do. You have an unhealthy curiosity about these Plants, young man. I sometimes have the impression that you’re more on their side than on ours.”
“The good it could do,” Orville said, half-truthfully (for he dared not
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