They had paralleled the stream for some time when suddenly Madsen shouted in exultation.
"Look!"
They were standing at a point of land at a juncture of the river and an evil looking backwater some twenty feet wide. It was bridged by one fallen trunk, and on the other side were several more, where a falling giant had brought down his neighbors in his collapse.
Madsen hastily started across the trunk which bridged the slough, ignoring Morley's admonition to take it easy. Halfway across, a rotten piece of bark crumbled under his tread. He caught at the stub of a limb, preventing a full length fall by a narrow margin, and wound up standing in semi-liquid, knee deep mud. He had placed his hands on the fallen trunk, preparatory to climbing back on it, when, with hardly a warning ripple, something flipped from the muddy surface and clamped around his wrist. Another slapped across his neck, and clung.
Madsen tore at them in vain, waves of revulsion flooding him. The things were inch-thick ribbons, a foot and a half long, and about six inches wide, a mottled green in color. There was an unspeakable repulsion about their touch, and they were coldly, clammily strong. Now the surface of the slough was churning as the hideous swarm converged, and Madsen felt his strength fading as a light dims when an electrician turns a rheostat. He tried to keep fighting, but his muscles refused to answer his will. Immobile, but fully conscious, with his insides a ball of cold horror, he waited.
Meanwhile, Morley, on solid ground, was clawing the contents from his knapsack, scattering jerky on all sides.