Hale could not crush back the cry that issued from his throat.
“Where is Sir Basil?” he gasped.
“There!” cried the Indian, pointing to the kicking rat, which was fast gaining strength.
Hale staggered back. “No! You don’t mean it, do you?”
Unani Assu turned the rat over with a contemptuous toe. “Yes, I mean it. Behold Aimu, the man who thought himself creator and destroyer—the man who said that a human being was no higher than a rat! Perhaps he was right, for see this thing that was once a man!”
Hale buried his face in his hands. “Kill it, Unani Assu! Kill it!”
Unani Assu’s low laugh was metallic. “You kill it.”
Hale uncovered his face. “Open the disintegrator.” Gingerly he reached for the rat’s tail.
But his hand never touched the animal. The hairless face turned for a second, and the little, beady eyes blinked up at Hale with an expression that his fevered imagination thought almost human. Then, like a dark shadow, the rat dashed away. Once around the room it scampered, hunting 309 for an exit. Hale started in pursuit. He was almost upon the animal again, when, leaping up from his grasp, it landed on a low shelf where chemicals were stored. Several bottles fell, filling the room with fumes.