Finally it was over. Dawes lay crumpled on the ground, shielding his face. Noonan stood over him, and a strange expression of guilt was beginning to cross his features. His lower lip was swelling.
Sitting up, Dawes put his hands to his ribs; nothing was broken. He said hoarsely to Noonan. 'Okay. You were spoiling to kick me around again, and now you did it. You got it all out of your system. I hope you did, anyway.'
Noonan looked completely drained of fight. He didn't speak. Dawes mopped a trickle of blood away from his lips and went on.
'Noonan, you're a strong man, and in some ways you're a clever man. But you couldn't figure a way out of here, and you were damned if you'd let me have a go at it without beating me up first. Okay, I got beat up.'
'Listen—' Noonan began unsteadily.
Dawes cut him off. Despite the pain of the beating, he felt a kind of exhilaration. 'You listen to me. We can get out of here, if we only cooperate. All four of us.
'I don't know what kind of things those aliens are but they aren't as primitive as they look. We've been writing them off as ugly ape-things, but they're a lot subtler and smarter than that. I think they grabbed us out of the colony and stuck us up here so they could listen in on our emotions, soak them up, feed on them. They took four of us. Four people who hardly knew one another.
They threw us here and left us alone. They knew damned well what would happen. They knew we'd start hating each other, that we'd fight and quarrel and build walls around ourselves. That's what they wanted us to do. It would be a sort of circus for them - a purge, maybe. A kind of entertainment. Okay. They were right. We put on a good show for them. And I'll bet they've been out there drinking up every bit of friction and hate and fighting that's gone on in this cave since we got here.'
Dawes paused. The words were flowing smoothly, now that he had been granted the floor, but he wanted to allow time for his ideas to sink into the other three minds.
'Go on,' Noonan said quietly. 'Finish telling us what you have to say.'
'We don't have to hate each other, that's what I'm trying to get across. Sure, we get on each others' nerves. Four saints in a cage like this would drive each other batty.
But we can turn the hate outward. Hate them. And the best way we can show our hate for them is by loving each other instead of fighting. We're playing into their hands by bickering and brawling. Let's work together and try to understand each other. I'll admit up to now I've been as selfish as any of you. We're all equally to blame. But if we start cooperating now - hell, we'll be of no more use to them than fighting cocks without any fight. And we can build that rope ladder and they'll let us go.'
No one spoke when Dawes had finished. He let them think it over, and finally Cherry said, They're like parasites, then. Getting their kicks from our hate?'
'You've got the idea.' Dawes looked at the big man.
'Noonan, what do you say? You think what I said is worth anything?'
Slowly, Noonan began to smile despite the swollen lip. 'Yeah. Maybe you've got something. I guess we could try it.'
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
At Dawes' suggestion they relaxed for an hour or so, talking the situation out quietly, before starting to build the rope ladder. Sweating despite the chill, Dawes took charge of the discussion, showing the others as tactfully as he could that there was no real reason for discord in the cave.
Gradually he even began to convince himself. The aliens had made Noonan stare at Carol, had brought on all the humiliation and loss of privacy. And Noonan hadn't really meant to take away Carol last night. He had just been acting out of pique, out of the senseless non-motivation that their confinement provided.
Dawes began to regard the other three as just people.
He didn't hate Noonan any more, or scatterheaded Carol, or cynical Cherry. They were only people. Earth people, frail and imperfect, and they each carried around their own private unhappinesses. In the cave, four sets of desires and weaknesses and selfishnesses had impinged, causing conflict. But now, if each only gave ground a little, harmony could prevail.
And the others began to understand, as Dawes made it plain for them. Slowly, because they were not quickthinking people, they were starting to grasp the essential truth of their situation. And the tension and distrust and hatred was washing out and draining away.
When they were all smiling, Dawes gently steered the discussion toward the matter of escaping.
He said, 'Noonan, you say we can get out of here if we build a rope ladder of some kind. Will you show us how to build this ladder of yours?'
'We'll build it out of clothes,' Noonan said. 'Obviously.
That's the only kind of fabric we have. Let's all start undressing.'
He peeled off his shirt and trousers and tied them together, leg to sleeve, with an elaborate knot. He reinforced it with a sock.
Carol was wearing a skirt. She unfastened it, stepped out of it, and handed it over.
Dawes donated his pants. The line was growing quickly. At Noonan's command Dawes and Cherry roamed the cave collecting the animal hides that the aliens had used to wrap the daily food bundles in. There were four of them. Noonan slashed them into long strips with the obsidian-like knife and added them to the line.
'Okay,' Noonan said at last. 'Maybe this'll do. Let's test it. Dawes, get yourself on the other end of this thing and pull hard.'
Dawes took a double grip on the rope and pulled, as hard as he could, digging his feet into the sand to keep from being dragged toward Noonan. The line held.
'Good,' Noonan grunted. 'She's tight.'
He anchored the end of the line to a jutting rock near the mouth of the cave, hurled the free end out, and let it dangle. Noonan said, 'I'm going to climb down to the ledge. Carol and Cherry will follow me. And then you, Dawes. All clear?'
Noonan grasped the line, tugged it to make sure it was fast, and lowered himself over the edge. Just before he disappeared below the floor level of the cave he grinned, and Dawes grinned back.
'Good luck, Noonan.'
'Thanks. I'll probably need it.'
Dawes watched tensely as Noonan descended, hand under hand, swaying in the wind. He dangled at the very end of the line, his hands grasping the rope only an inch or two from its end, and still his feet scrabbled for purchase, his arms flailed wildly to balance him, and then he stood solid, looking up at them and smiling.
'Okay,' Noonan called. 'Carol. You come down next.
Keep your feet clamped to the rope and hold on tight.'
Pale, frightened beyond the point of feeling fear, Carol took hold of the rope. She paused for an instant.
'Go on.' Dawes said softly. 'It's safe. Just hold on and let yourself down hand by hand.'
The girl grasped the rope with her small hands, wrapped her legs round it, and started to descend. Dawes held his breath. The rope seemed tremendously long. Was she going to make it all the way? Or would she fatigue and topple off, still eighty feet above the ground?
She made it. She dangled in mid-air a few feet above Noonan; he stretched out his arms for her, urged her to let go, and finally she did. He caught her and put her safely down on the ledge.
Cherry was next. She showed no outward sign of fear, and she negotiated the descent quickly and skillfully.
Dawes waited until she stood by Carol's side on the ledge.
Then, taking a last look at the cave, he grabbed hold of the rope himself.
He had done plenty of rope-climbing in high school, in an ultimately fruitless attempt to put some muscle on his skinny body. But those had been fifteen or twenty-foot ropes. This one dangled for a hundred feet, and no protective mat waited beneath it.
Positioning one hand beneath the other, he let himself down, feeling the savage bite of the wind against his skin. He knew the others were waiting for him, watching him, maybe praying. Once, he glanced down, and saw he still had nearly half the distance to go. His muscles were quivering and his arms felt as if they were about to part company with their sockets. But he made it.