Short stories; United States -- Social life and customs -- 20th century -- Fiction
At home I found a note from Paul, asking me to come up immediately, and
it was high noon when I came spinning up the driveway on my wheel. Paul
called me from the tennis court, and I dismounted and went over. But the
court was empty. As I stood there, gaping open-mouthed, a tennis ball
struck me on the arm, and as I turned about, another whizzed past my
ear. For aught I could see of my assailant, they came whirling at me
from out of space, and right well was I peppered with them. But when
the balls already flung at me began to come back for a second whack, I
realized the situation. Seizing a racquet and keeping my eyes open, I
quickly saw a rainbow flash appearing and disappearing and darting over
the ground. I took out after it, and when I laid the racquet upon it for
a half-dozen stout blows, Paul’s voice rang out:
“Enough! Enough! Oh! Ouch! Stop! You’re landing on my naked skin, you
know! Ow! O-w-w! I’ll be good! I’ll be good! I only wanted you to see
my metamorphosis,” he said ruefully, and I imagined he was rubbing his
hurts.
A few minutes later we were playing tennis—a handicap on my part, for I
could have no knowledge of his position save when all the angles between
himself, the sun, and me, were in proper conjunction. Then he
flashed, and only then. But the flashes were more brilliant than the
rainbow—purest blue, most delicate violet, brightest yellow, and all
the intermediary shades, with the scintillant brilliancy of the diamond,
dazzling, blinding, iridescent.
But in the midst of our play I felt a sudden cold chill, reminding me
of deep mines and gloomy crypts, such a chill as I had experienced that
very morning. The next moment, close to the net, I saw a ball rebound in
mid-air and empty space, and at the same instant, a score of feet away,
Paul Tichlorne emitted a rainbow flash. It could not be he from whom
the ball had rebounded, and with sickening dread I realized that Lloyd
Inwood had come upon the scene. To make sure, I looked for his shadow,
and there it was, a shapeless blotch the girth of his body, (the sun was
overhead), moving along the ground. I remembered his threat, and felt
sure that all the long years of rivalry were about to culminate in
uncanny battle.
I cried a warning to Paul, and heard a snarl as of a wild beast, and an
answering snarl. I saw the dark blotch move swiftly across the court,
and a brilliant burst of vari-colored light moving with equal swiftness
to meet it; and then shadow and flash came together and there was the
sound of unseen blows. The net went down before my frightened eyes. I
sprang toward the fighters, crying:
“For God’s sake!”
But their locked bodies smote against my knees, and I was overthrown.
“You keep out of this, old man!” I heard the voice of Lloyd Inwood from
out of the emptiness. And then Paul’s voice crying, “Yes, we’ve had
enough of peacemaking!”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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