His guide suddenly swung him round a big tree with a crack-the-whip effect and stood facing him.

  "Oh," she said, "here is the very door of my place. Will you not stay and rest for a few moments?" And as Barber groped for a formula of reluctance that would allow him to change his mind and accept with the least urging, she added: "If not for your own sake, at least for mine. I'm suddenly so tired."

  An alarm bell rang in his head. That was a lie. She was not in the least tired. But Fred Barber was utterly lost now in this immense wood, and if she was lying to him, it was also likely that she had taken him far from his direction. He could only string along and find out.

  "Why, I don't know—" he said, "I really must be making progress."

  "Ah, I understand." Her head lowered and she let his hand fall. "I'm but a poor woods thing, and you used to great courts ..." The fluting voice trailed off with an accent of the edge of tears.

  "Oh, no; I was just going to say that I must be making progress, but I've already made about enough for tonight, so I can stop for a few minutes."

  She took his hand again and led for half a dozen steps. A deeper black that would be a bank loomed out of the dimness ahead; his guide stooped and pulled aside a curtain of leaves. Warm fingers of yellow light reached from a short tunnel at whose far end Barber could see a room. He ducked through the door and followed her. At the far end she turned, laughing, and took both his hands in hers.

  Neither buckteeth nor piano legs, but a good if somewhat well-developed figure, clad in a sheer dress splotched batik-wise in red, yellow, green, with a massive jeweled belt clasped round the waist. A blond head, cheeks cosmetic-red, though he could swear not from cosmetics, and eyes of a pronounced and startling green. Nice features, full lips; Barber smiled approval.

  Her eyes widened in response, a little smile played across her lips as she drew his hands round till they met at her back. Her fingers slid up his biceps till they reached his shoulders, where they clung with a tingling pressure and her head tipped back ... "We in the wood are so lonely—so lonely," she sighed into his lips after the first contact. "Oh ... you're strong. I didn't know a mortal could be so strong." Her eyelids fluttered against his throat; the perfume of her hair was intoxicating.

  Was there something a trifle too rapid in this approach? The girl sighed and pulled his head down to meet her lips again. "Loose my girdle," she whispered.

  His fingers fumbled with the clasp, and he undid it with pounding pulses. She slid from his arms a moment and tossed the belt clanking into the corner.

  Fred Barber said: "I really ought to know your name."

  She put up her arms again: "I have no name, my love."

  The alarm bell rang again, loud and clear this time. She was lying. But why? And what did it matter, with this fascinating vision pirouetting slowly between him and the light? Barber remembered that there had been occasions when he threw a shoe at the alarm clock. Unfortunately, he also remembered there were usually consequences when he did it, and briefly cursed a temperament that could not take the moment without question as she slid into his arms again.

  "No, really, what do people call you?"

  "You may call me Malacea. Ah, love—"

  Another bell jangled with a different timbre, far back in memory. The name ought to mean something, he could not think what. He talked desperately between long kisses. "How do you live? I mean, do you stay here always?"

  "You will see. You'll stay with me ... We can be so happy, we two alone."

  She's lying.

  "Are you all by yourself?"

  "Until you came." That's a lie. "But now we'll be together—forever." That's another. She tilted her head back. Again it came between him and the light, a curious light that flowed without visible source from a little bowl of bark, and Barber noted with a nervous shock that his hostess was ever so slightly transparent. There was something wrong—very wrong. He pulled away suddenly and sat down on the bed, which was of moss and let him sink into it. Think fast, Barber!

  "Listen sweetheart," he said, reaching for her hand and holding it tight, "let's do this right. They warned me that all sorts of terrible things would happen to me if I didn't hurry up this mission I'm on, and I believe them. Can't you come with me as far as the Kobold Hills? It won't take long, and then we can both come back here ... I like your woods."

  Her eyes twitched and around her mouth little lines sprang into being that left her expression not half so attractive. "Oh, stay," she said, with a throaty sob in her voice. But Barber noted that the fingers of her other hand, resting against the wooden door pillar, were tap-tapping an irregular telegraphic beat, and her head cocked as though to hear an expected sound. ^

  "How can I? You wouldn't want me to—turn into a frog in your arms?"

  Tap-tap ... and then, a duller sound, something approaching the cave with slow, heavy tread.

  Malacea wrenched her hand free, snatched up Barber's wand, and raced down the tunnel.

  He sprang to his feet and after, plunging through the leaf curtain with a rustle. For a moment he hung there, utterly blinded by a change from lighted room to tree shadow where only a few drops of moonlight filtered through, and out of that dark came the girl's voice:

  "No—no. Please! You have the wand—that's all you need—ooh!"

  The girl, just visible ahead of him, stumbled and fell as though strongly pushed. Between them moved a shadow, whose opposite side was outlined by a shaft of moon to the likeness of a leafless branch, shaped like a huge, gnarled hand. It was coming toward him.

  Barber ducked, dodged behind a tree and looked up. Above him towered a figure, human in form, barklike in texture, twice his own size, semi transparent where it got between him and the moon. Its eyes held a dead fire of hate and cruelty, and the scraggy arms were reaching for him.

  He turned and ran as he had never run in his life, dodging like a deer among the moon-splotched trunks. A root tripped him; he took three sprawling steps, recovered and went on; almost lost his footing over a small depression. Behind him, getting no nearer but certainly not receding, he heard the swish and crackle of the ogre's pursuit.

  He slipped round one tree and was caught across the head by a low-hung branch, hard enough to bring a blinding flash across his vision. He kept on, feeling rather than seeing his way till sight cleared.

  Another staggering trip must have cost him yards of the small lead he held over the monster, and a trick of position threw the shadow of that clutching hand across a broad slash of moonlight before him. He could feel the wing-stumps quiver with instinct on his back; useless—and his second wind was going.

  Racing on, he risked a sidelong glance. One of the huge hands was almost abreast, its fingers spread. Before him the forest suddenly opened into brilliant light and there was a stream, with flashing rapids right and left. A dark pool loomed before. Fred Barber put his last ounce of strength into a soaring broad jump.

  He lost a shoe at the water's edge, and fell forward. In a last burst of vitality, he heaved himself to a knee and groped for something with which to defend himself.

  The ogre towered from the other bank, looking down with those lidless eyes, its mouth working. It was partly transparent; the flooding moonlight on the thing cast only the thinnest of shadows through its shapeless carcass. For a few ticks of the watch, man and spook stared at each other across the rippling water. One of Barber's hands found the stone he sought.

  The ogre turned and moved off among the trees, thump-thump on the leaf mold. If His Transparency wanted to call the matter quits, Fred Barber was certainly in no mood to pursue the matter further. It was not till the monster had disappeared from sight and sound that he remembered Oberon's words—"brooks ... plagued ungainly obstacles to us of the pure blood, who must seek round by their sources or fly high above." That was why the pursuit had been given up. Or perhaps it had not; perhaps the ogre was on his way now to circle the stream at its headwaters.

  Barber staggered dizzily forward. His forehead was growing an imposing bump and ached dreadfully. He had not taken more than a dozen steps when the pinwheels before his eyes ran together and he collapsed into a faint. The last thing he remembered before going out was Malacca's perfume. It was apple blossoms.

  -

  CHAPTER VII

  Exhausted nerves and muscles must have turned his faint into normal sleep. He came to himself on his back, staring straight up. The incredible moon was already losing some of its light to a paling sky. He felt hungry, sore and abused. The ground, oozy-damp beneath, had left a trail of discomfort along his spine, and his head ached vilely, but he felt better.

  The fact was, Barber told himself, lying there staring at the intaglioed surface of the earth's sister-star, and not caring to move lest it make the headache twinges worse—the fact was that being hunted through the woods by a translucent ogre out of a nightmare was a useful experience. It restored one's confidence in the reality of objective existence. Also in the ability of the corporeal senses to bear true witness of that existence, however their testimony might disaccord with preconceived notions of what it ought to be. His experience held no precedent for that wild chase through the forest, but lack of precedent was no reason for rejecting the memory—or his thoroughly physical bruises—as spurious. There had been no precedent for his first seasickness, either, but he had escaped from that when the ship reached dock. There didn't seem to be any docks on the shores of the sea of incertitude on which he was now launched.

  No, it was real enough, and he did not doubt that if the ogre's woody fingers had closed about him they would have been real enough, too. So was the pressure of Malacca's breasts, round against him as he kissed her, though she was semitransparent. Well, the forest hag warned him against the apple—though how could he have known? The little bitch! ... The thing to do was to learn the rationale of this system of existence into which he had somehow been projected, as one learned the new diplomatic code or the proper form of address for a first First Equerry. He—

  At this point his meditations were interrupted by the unmistakable voice of the little bitch, her accent low and urgent:

  "Let him wake. Oh, let him wake before the dawn."

  Barber sat up and reached for the ache spot on his head. Malacea was facing him across the stream. She leaped to her feet: "Oh, my mortal lover!" she cried. "Come back; I know a spell to cure your pain."

  "Yeah?" said Barber with hostility. "I know how you'd do it, too—turn me over to that Dracula boy friend of yours and have him fix me up so I wouldn't have to worry about any pains any more."

  The light, whether of moon or coming day, was bright enough to show two big tears coming out on her cheek. "Ah, never, I swear it. My heart rose when you escaped the clutches of that demon Plum."

  "That demon what?"

  "Plum. I dare not but do as he asks. All the plums are hard and evil, but this one worst. His heart has dried and he wants a mortal blood transfusion."

  "And you help him get it. Is that the idea?" Barber's voice was implacable.

  "Oh ..." Her fingers twisted against each other. "How can I make myself clean before you? How could I know that among the mortals that come to this wood would be my own dear love? Oh, come back, and help me repent; I'll make it good to you."

  Barber, hunting among the long grasses for his dropped shoe, cocked an inward ear toward the alarm bell of his instinct for lies. Not a tinkle. She really meant it; or perhaps that new sixth sense merely did not work on emotional matters. "Thanks," he said, "but I'll stay over here out of reach of your friend. What happened to my wand?"

  "You need not fear him. Listen, I'll prove my faith by giving you his secret. Wait for the sun; when daylight's abroad he cannot stir from his tree. You have only to eat of his fruit, then he can never harm you after. A hundred and fifty paces upstream will bring you to where the tree can be seen; it has a broken top."

  "Unh." Barber found the shoe and put it on. It was wet. "Good. I'll wait till daylight and then try it."

  "But come to me now. Oh hurry 1" She looked up at the sky, now fully rose-colored along the horizon. "It's growing daybreak and I must go back to my own tree."

  "What became of my wand?" repeated Barber.

  "I don't know."

  "You're lying."

  She was weeping openly now. Barber, who had seen enough of both night-club life and diplomacy to develop some cynicism about feminine tears, flicked dried mud off his clothes without looking at her. Malacea stamped her foot: "The plum took it; where, I do not know. So you have my full confession; won't you—"

  "No, I won't," said Barber. It seemed to him that his new sense of truth or no-truth was confused. Possibly Malacea suspected but did not definitely know where the wand was. He found a fallen trunk, tested it for solidity, and sitting down, opened the provision bag. Everything all right there, so far. Between bites, he said: "If you really want to impress me, you might tell me how to get to the Kobold Hills."

  "Go straight on. Beyond the wood, you will reach a plain; walk through it for an hour or two, and when you see the hills blue on the horizon, you are near. But there be devils and strange things in that plain; I can see to guide you only so far."

  Barber frowned, but there was no indication of anything but truth in her words. Watching him narrowly from beyond the stream, she suddenly became all gaiety.

  "Oh, you'll return; I see it now. I am your fate and you mine. We are all, all avatars, though you are mortal and I only a tree sprite who can be seen through when the light is strong. Farewell then, for a little time."

  "Good-by." He was beginning to relent a little; after all, she had been decent as far as she knew how.

  "No, not good-by. We'll meet again and strangely." The tinkling laugh that had accompanied her first words when they met ran three notes up a scale and two down. "And you, mortal, will live weirdly before you lose yourself in finding yourself."

  She took three steps among the crowding trees and was hidden, but behind her for a moment there floated the words of a song:

  -

  "... fairies turn to men;

  When he touches the three—"

  -

  It was cut off abruptly and the wood went utterly silent as the first level ray of sunlight struck across the rapids in the stream.

  Barber, dawdling over the remains of his breakfast, reflected that the downright approach of this child of nature was perhaps more appropriate to certain phases of international relations than to personal ones. There was something peculiar about the personal relations of Fairyland anyway, now that he came to think of it. The winged girl in Oberon's palace and, now, this one had practically thrown themselves at him. He could not honestly flatter himself into believing it was because of any innate attractiveness of his own. Of course, his mortal appearance might be attractive to fairy girls ... No—the Queen's attendant had described him as preternaturally ugly, if he remembered right.

  There was also Jib and Cyril, both busy, who had been willing enough to drop their concerns and help him when he asked in the right way. It was as though Fairyland psychological reaction worked like a slot machine; you dropped in a penny, and unless it was counterfeit, got a stick of gum. No, not quite. There seemed to be some choice of reaction. He remembered Titania catching herself midway in a reply to one of Oberon's taunts, and the latter's abrupt shift to meet her mood—Malacca's lightning change from tears to happiness. It was more like a game of chess; you played pawn to king four on the board of personal relations and your opposite number, though not compelled to imitate you exactly, had to make one of a series of standard moves or find himself compromised.

  If this held true as a general rule—Hold the boat, Malacea had just offered him a chance to give check to the king. Eat some of the dryhearted plum's fruit, and then be damned to him. He would need any such protections he could get after having lost Titania's wand, for he did not in the least doubt that queenly lady's word about his coming to "misadventured piteous overthrow" as a result. Action!

  The plum tree was there, all right, standing pretty much by itself, as though none of the neighboring foliage cared to approach the monster. It was a very seedy old tree indeed, with pink blotches of fungus on its straggling leaves.

  Barber waded the stream and approached it cautiously, ready to bolt. It took some inspection to reveal any fruit at all on it, but he finally located a couple-flat, wrinkly things, but plums. There was no sign of the wand. He wondered if the plum were hollow and the wand inside. It would be interesting to investigate; for that matter, it would be interesting to chop down the tree itself. That ought to settle Mr. Plum-spook's hash. But he had no ax^ not even a knife; no matches to experiment with burning the thing down, and was not enough of a Boy Scout to start a fire by rubbing sticks.