'What?'
'Shh. He told me about it just a while ago. He says there's a little ledge down the side of the cliff a way.
Thinks we could manage to reach it with a rope ladder made out of our clothes. But he won't say anything about it to you because he doesn't want to help you.'
Dawes scowled. 'He's got no right to keep something like that to himself—'
'Noonan never worries about rights. Besides, he doesn't really think his idea could work. We might be able to get down, all right, but then the aliens would just bring us right back up here.'
Dawes had to acknowledge the truth of that. He slumped back, the momentary spark of hope dying. The waiting jailers below would never let them escape so openly, he thought.
Shadows deepened in the cave as the angle of sunlight sharpened. Four days, Dawes thought leadenly. Four days of just Noonan and Carol and Cherry, and the captivity might well go on forever. Forever. Was this why he had been selected and flung out into space, to sit in a cave with three other people, guarded by aliens for some unfathomable alien reason? He thought of all the vast and cumbersome machinery of selection, the computer and the local boards and the blue letter from District Chairman Mulholland, whoever he might be, damn his politicking hide! District Chairman Mulholland, Dawes thought, was probably some boot-licking nonentity who took a sinister delight in packing people off to the other planets. And for what? So they could be captured by apethings and stuffed into a cave?
A few more days with Noonan and Carol and Cherry and he might easily go out of his mind. Dawes remembered a line from some play he had once seen performed at State: Hell is other people.
Whoever wrote that line had been right, he thought.
Carol and Noonan were laughing, there at the back of the cave. Dawes forced himself to sit still. It was hopeless to try to interfere. If Noonan had developed a craving for Carol, there would be no peace in the cave until Noonan had satisfied that craving, and nothing Dawes would do could alter that. He listened numbly to their gay laughter. Carol had never laughed like that in his arms, Dawes thought bitterly.
He knew Cherry was laughing at him, too, inside, laughing because he didn't have the strength to knock Noonan sprawling as he deserved. On the outside, Cherry was pitying him. Inside, laughing.
The sun dropped almost out of sight; no more remained to the day but a few dim red flickers. The eternal wind howled wildly. Dawes looked out into the gathering night, moonless as ever.
'I wonder how the colony's doing,' he said abstractedly.
'Whether they're still there or not. And whether they ever ask themselves what happened to us.'
'You're always thinking,' Cherry said. 'Asking yourself questions. Well, the people in the colony don't have time to wonder about us - if they're alive. They're too busy surviving.'
The light went completely. In the dark, Dawes heard Carol's laugh. It sounded strange, harsh, ugly to him.
Topping it came the deep chuckle of Noonan.
'The light's out,' Noonan said, loud enough to be heard all over the cave. 'Time to go to bed.'
'Yeah,' said Dawes. 'Time to go to bed.'
He hunched into himself, cradling his head on his arms, and clenched his eyes tight. Sleep was a long time in coming, and it seemed to him he had hardly fallen off when the first rays of morning were streaming through the narrow mouth of the cave.
Morning. The fifth day.
And the invisible threads of hatred coiled a little tighter around the four in the cave.
Carol was unaccountably red-eyed and sullen. She bathed alone, early. Dawes watched her, from the distance, without getting up. She was like a little child in so many ways - helpless, frightened, selfish.
When Carol was through washing, Noonan bathed, and after him Dawes made his slow way to the rear of the cavern and plunged into the little stream enjoying the sharp pain of the ice-cold water against his skin.
At noon, the food bundle was hurled into the cave right on schedule. They ate silently, Noonan dividing the food as usual and doing a reasonably fair job of it. Not a word had been spoken in the cave since dawn. Dawes looked out and saw the aliens massed below, in greater numbers than ever before. After the meal, he settled into a corner of the cave. Cherry and Carol and Noonan each took up positions far from each other.
Carol. Noonan. Dawes. Cherry. Scattered over the cave like particles which innately repelled each other. No one spoke.
It was Cherry who split the silence finally. 'How long are we supposed to stay like this?' she asked, her voice hard. 'We sit here staring like mortal enemies at each other 1 Christ, what did we ever do to each other that makes us hate this way?'
'Shut up,' Noonan growled.
Carol chuckled hysterically. 'What did we do? I'll tell you. We were born, that's what we did to each other.
We came into this world and we were picked together and we ended up in this damned cave, making each other miserable.'
'We grate on each other,' Dawes said.
He found himself hating Carol for having gone to Noonan, hating Cherry for her noisy banter, hating Noonan for simply being Noonan. Flimsy reasons, all.
But powerful enough to spark the currents of hate in the cave.
'Why can't we get along with each other?' Cherry demanded of no one particular.
'We don't like each other,' Dawes said. 'You'd almost think the aliens picked us that way, to see what would happen when we were penned together. You'd—'
He stopped, suddenly, pushed himself to his feet, walked to the cave mouth, and looked down. As always the height made him a little dizzy, and he gripped the side of the rock for reassurance.
'Yeah, look at them,' he said. They sit down there as if they know everything that's happening in this cave. As if they're drinking in all the hatred that's rising between us. As if—''
'Stop that crazy babble,' Noonan ordered brusquely.
'You hurt my ears.'
Dawes knelt and peered down the face of the cliff, trying to see Noonan's ridge. Yes, there it was, a narrow, precipitous shelf of rock projecting no more than a few inches from the cliffside. Turning, Dawes said to Noonan, 'I understand you know how to get us out of here. Why the hell haven't you spoken up about it?'
'Who in blazes told you that? It's not true!'
'The ledge down there,' Cherry said. 'Yesterday you told me—'
Noonan slapped her viciously. Glaring at Dawes, he said, 'Okay, so there's a ledge down there. But my idea won't work, anyway. Even if we got out, the aliens would just grab us and put us right back in the cave. Well, won't they?'
'Maybe not,' Dawes said.
'Maybe not I Maybe not!' Norman roared with laughter. 'You can bet your life they will! You think they'll just sit down there and let us traipse past them?'
'Maybe. I know how to beat the aliens,' Dawes said in a level voice.
Suddenly Carol started to laugh - a high, keening, mad shriek of a laugh, repeated over and over. It wasn't hysteria, but the nearest approach to hysteria. Moments later Cherry was giggling, calmly, cynically.
'Keep quiet!' Dawes shouted. 'Let me talk 1'
'We don't want to hear any crazy nonsense out of you,' Noonan snapped. 'Shut your mouth.'
Dawes grinned oddly and took two unhesitant steps forward. There was only one way he could make Noonan listen to him. With careful aim he jabbed the big man sharply in the ribs.
Noonan was astonished by the assault. He glared at Dawes in amazement for an instant, and rumbled into action. His fists shot out blindingly crashing into Dawes' stomach, pounding him under the heart. Dawes fought back grimly. He landed a solid blow on Noonan's lip; then Noonan snarled angrily and cracked him backward with two fast punches in the midsection.
Dawes landed hard, feeling pain lance through his body. He gasped for breath. Noonan stood over him, dispassionately kicked him. Each blow was a new agony.