Vagabonds of Gor

33 Night

Marcus and I moved very slowly, our faces darkened, on our bellies, through the grass, approaching the fellow's position from opposite sides. We had, the previous night, reconnoitered this area. There were five such positions, and a hut a few hundred yards to the back, where the bounty hunters kept their grisly trophies. Two nights ago, wading, we had reconnoitered the edge of the swamp. There, in the rence, near the delta's edge, we had found two bodies, half afloat, partly rotted, partly eaten, presumably by small fish and tharlarion. The bounty hunters would apparently discard the bodies in the swamp, after they had removed the heads, these to be presented for bounty fees. One of the bodies we had found had been that of a Cosian. Bounty hunters are not always particular about the heads they collect, and their paymasters usually, of course, have no way of telling the head of a fellow of Ar from that, say, of a Cosian or rencer.

In the darkness, when one is alert, tense, and such, it is difficult not to react to even small noises.

Marcus would now be in position, I assumed. Certainly, now, I was. I was no more than a yard from the fellow. I could see the outline of his head against the darkness.

I then heard the tiny noise made by Marcus, almost inaudible, a tiny clicking noise, not unlike one of the phonetic tongue clicks used in some of languages spoken east of Schendi, in the interior. Instantly the fellow responded to this tiny sound, turning toward its source. I then approached him from the other side and cut his throat.

Marcus joined me in the fellow's position, dug in the grass.

"That should be the last one," I said, "except for the fellow, or fellows, in the hut."

"Here," said Marcus, bitterly, lifting up an object, "is his sack."

"I have an idea," I said.