"And that will be no short time," said the taciturn Brady. "Shall we start?"
Correy raged. I had expected that, and I was in complete sympathy with him. Routine patrol was better than being earth-fast on this barren and uninteresting ball of mud.
"Have I your permission, sir," asked Correy on the fourth day, "to make a little tour of inspection and exploration? We might run into some fresh meat."
"I'm not sure that would be wise. These spider creatures—"
"Pardon me, sir," interrupted Correy eagerly, "but we could take a small landing force, armed with pistols and grenades. Even a field ray tube. Certainly we could handle anything which might turn up, then."
"And, you rather hope that something will turn up, Mr. Correy?"
Correy grinned and shrugged his shoulders.
"It would break the monotony, wouldn't it, sir? And, too, if anything should happen to them"—and he glanced up the river, in the direction taken by the three scientists—"we'd know something about what we had to contend with, wouldn't we?"
I'm not sure whether it was Correy's argument or my own venturesome disposition which swayed me, but immediately after lunch Correy and I, with a picked crew of men, started out from the ship.