onder at anything that might happen here.
Disappointed that Naida's story had been interrupted, wondering what was
wrong, he obeyed Naida's order to keep clear.

As he fell back and stood motionless, there came from behind a dense
screen of shrubs which would have resembled aloe and prickly pear
bushes, save that they were as big as oak trees, a ghastly howling. The
next second, hopped and hurtled across the beach toward the girls, a
group of hair-covered, shaggy creatures which were neither apes nor men.
The faces, contorted with lust, were hideously leathery and brown, the
foreheads small and beetling, and the mouths enormous, with immense
yellow teeth.

Helpless, Kirby realized that Naida and all the others had clapped over
their faces curious masks which seemed to be made of some crystalline
substance, and that now others had armed themselves with the tennis
balls. And that was the last observation he made before the battle
opened furiously.

With a cry muffled behind her mask, Naida leaped out in front of her
squadron and cut loose her queer vegetable ball with whizzing aim and
force.

Full into the snarling face of one of the ape-men the thing smashed,
filling the air all about the creature with a yellow, mistlike powder.
Kirby was half deafened by the yells of rage and terror which went up
from the entire attacking band. The creature who had been hit fell to
his knees the while he made agonized tearing movements at his face and
uttered shrill, jabbering yelps.

Other balls flashed instantly from Naida's ranks, and each brought about
the same ghastly result as the first. But then Kirby saw that the whole
jungle seethed with the hairy, awful men.

"Keep back!" Naida shrieked at him through her mask. "We have no mask
for you. If the powder from our fungi touches you, it will be the end!"

* * * * *

With gaps in the advancing line filled as soon as each screeching ape
went down, the attackers leaped on until Kirby knew they would be upon
the girls in a matter of seconds. A sweat broke out on his neck.

But then an idea gripped him, and suddenly, without even a last glance
at Naida, he leaped away even as she had commanded.

A great boulder lay on the shore fifty yards away. Toward it Kirby
streaked as though he had become coward. But he had not turned coward.

By the time he reached the shelter which would protect him from the
fungus mist, a turning point had come in the b