The outlaw's face, lined with years of dunging inhalation, broke into a lunatic smile. Since Graff wasn't looking at him, he deduced Graff hadn't seen him. Pubina's henchman took larger steps. Graff backed. He counted as he retreated. He counted slowly, taking steps that were uniform and even, looking off to the side of the outlaw, trying to keep his tortured body from making a deadly mis-step. There! He breathed gustily as he saw he'd passed the white line. The outlaw crept forward, crouching, trying to get close enough for a certain blast. He too noticed the trigger-vine, and stepped daintily across it. Graff whirled to face him then, electroblast at the ready. The man jumped--and one boot dug into the creeper! He barely had time to scream. A haze of white tendrils whipped around him, each armed with thousands of microscopic suckers. A moment later the bloodless husk that had been a human was being dropped from the sucking ivy's clutches, rattling like so much paper. The scream had been heard. Graff's jungle-trained ears caught the whispers of the other two men on his left as they conferred worriedly. If only he had a decent weapon. Anything besides the stiletto! He could take such dryhorns with an old-fashioned pistol! But he didn't have a pistol. All he had was twenty-seven years' experience on Venus as a native-born citizen. So he began to run. He stopped after a moment and listened. The crashes behind him indicated he was being pursued. If he was afraid, the outlaws had evidently decided, he was weak enough to chase. Graff ran toward the Tuscany. By the time he reached the river, he was weaving from side to side and sobbing. The exertion magnified his pain a thousandfold. His pursuers were getting closer. Desperately, he trotted downstream. They were quite close now. He heard them chuckling and calling to each other triumphantly--but there was the Gridnik nest! He waited just a moment, poised on the bank of the river, until they broke into the clear, almost within electroblast range. Then, as they caught sight of him and increased their speed, he hurled his useless weapon into the striped little dome--and jumped. * * * * * When he came threshing out of the water, twenty feet further down the bank, the hideous swarm of insects were still gorging themselves. Graff crept away, nauseated. He rubbed his eyes against the darkness welling within them. "MacDuff!" he called, his voice crackling with agony. "MacDuff!" The terry swept down to his side. "Listen, pal, I haven't got much time left, so we'll have to hurry. No more fancy stuff. Think you can fly in the rear windows or something, by way of diversion? It'll give me time to cross the sandy stretch." Without a word, the lizard-bird went away. Graff came to the edge of the arid soil surrounding the pre-fab and waited.