re butchered by flying insects with jaws extended for
that sole purpose of slaughter. Less luckier ones live on as hosts for
mounds of greedy larvae.

Bertrand stirred himself from his covering. Having climbed into a low
lying cavity of limestone shelves, he was able to elude his pursuers.
His thoughts wander again to Alex. Had Alex heeded local caution
concerning the sand pit in his panic stricken flight? Unlikely, as Alex
was unclear of the exact presence of the quarry and could not be
expected to realize its many treacheries if terror stricken.

Like the starling young, Alex had been sluggish, refusing to be stirred
until prodded by a stronger outside stimulus. And, as with the
nestlings, Alex had succumbed to laws red in fang and claw, cause and
effect relationships.

Emptying the last stone from his knapsack, Bertrand imagines the huzzah
of battle to have cleared this forest glade. He perceives the clenched
stone to be the stream smoothed missile David used in overpowering
Goliath-the last silver thimble fired at Goliad[1].

With a cry, he implores Alex to come forth and stand his
ground--sensation and imagery roam lawlessly in his brain as mop up
operations are set to begin.

[1] Site of a second Texan massacre in the war of independence with
Mexico.

THE WAGER

"We think by feeling. What else is there to know." Theodore Roethke

"I can live an adventuresome life vicariously through my characters.
It's inexpensive and a dandy form of ready made self-expression. The
perfect sort of sublimation exists after all. For years I wore myself
out trying to amass enough experience to commence serious writing. You
know the having to see all and do all syndrome. I realize the pursuit
of that plateaus sheer idiocy as it remains ever distant as one grows
older."

Wenceslaus at that point placed his pen down and turned to open a
glossy picture print of a ship under full sail, a clipper mail packet
on the China run over a century ago.

"Shakespeare never experienced the myriad situations he subjected his
characters to--how could he--except perhaps subliminally. Jules Verne
must have employed a similar type of wish fulfillment with his
prophetic writings that splashed a hundred years into the present. What
I propose doing is to animate my earliest atavistic yearnings in a like
fashion. I hope to give scenarios embedded in the innermost recesses of
my psyche time to materialize, to exude from the substance of dynamic