"Alan Dean Foster - Humanx 1 - Midworld" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

5

his scent to whatever was making its ponderous way
downward.

A last loud crunching of parted vegetation, and
the vertical traveler showed himselfтАФa dark brown
cone shape, covered with stubby brown fur. At the
flat end of the cone two long tentacles reached out.
Red-irised eyes tipped them. Evenly spaced around
the cone-shaped body of the grazer were four thickly-
muscled arms, which held it suspended between upper
and lower branches with the aid of the prehensile
tail that extended from the point of the cone.

Nearly two meters of bulk, five times Bora's weight,
the grazer would be difficult to kill. The thick, close-


file:///F|/rah/Alan%20Dean%20Foster/Foster,%2...n%20Dean%20-%20Humanx%2001%20-%20Midworld.txt (4 of 181) [1/16/03 7:03:42 PM]
 file:///F|/rah/Alan%20Dean%20Foster/Foster,%20Alan%20Dean%20-%20Humanx%2001%20-%20Midworld.txt

matted fur would be hard to penetrate, but only a
thin bristle covered (he flat base of the cone. To
strike there Born would have to wait until the creature
turned toward him. The tiny round mouth set in the
center of the base was harmless, lined with four op-
posing sets of flat grinding teeth. But those arms could
reduce the cubble path to splinters. A man would
come apart much more easily.

One arm shifted its grip, grabbed a lower branch.
The tail curved down to grip the same support. Then
the upper and left arm let go and the grazer swung
lower still. Born wished he had prepared a little more
thoroughly, setting out a second tank seed and jacari
thorn. Now it was too late. A single slight movement
from him and the grazer would be gone in a blur
of arms and tail. It could travel up, down, or sideways
through the forest with tremendous speed. It could
also circle behind a man almost before he had time
to turn.

It paused on the liana directly above the cistern.
The tail and double-handed grip rotated it slowly as
it looked in all directions. Once, it seemed to Born
that the weaving eyes stared straight at his hiding
place, but they neither stopped nor hesitated and
swung on past. Apparently satisfied with the state of
the neighborhood, the grazer dropped to the cubble.