THE LEAF

                          By ROBERT F. YOUNG

                     Illustrated by RICHARD KLUGA

             Even his present desperate situation couldn't
            spoil his memories of other days in the woods:
        like the lovely, lazy day he shot eleven squirrels....

           [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
                         Infinity March 1958.
         Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
         the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]


He could remember the afternoon as if it were yesterday. It wasn't, of
course--actually it had been several years back. It had been around the
middle of autumn, about the time when the last incarnadine leaves were
making their fluttering journeys earthward. He had taken his .22 and
gone into the woods where the hickory trees were, and he had settled
himself comfortably against the shaggy trunk of one of the hickories,
the .22 balanced across his sprawled knees. Then he had waited.

The first red squirrel had come out on one of the high limbs and posed
there. That was the word all right--posed. It had sat there on its
haunches with utter immobility almost as if it had been painted on
canvas against a background of leafless naked branches and milk-blue
sky.

He had raised the .22 lazily and sighted along the slender barrel.
There was no hurry. There was all the time in the world. He didn't
squeeze the trigger until he had a perfect right-between-the-eyes bead,
then he squeezed it ever so lightly. There was the sharp sound of the
report, and then the small body falling swiftly, bouncing and glancing
off limbs, tumbling over and over, making a rustling thump in the dry
leaves at the tree's base.

He hadn't even bothered to go over and examine it. He knew he'd got it
right where he'd aimed. They didn't die instantly like that unless you
got them in a vital spot. They thrashed and kicked around after they
hit the ground and sometimes you had to waste another shell on them if
the noise bothered you. Of course if the noise didn't bother you, you
could save the shell for the next one, but it was better in the long
run to get them right between the eyes because that way the others
wouldn't be frightened away by the thrashing sound, and you didn't have
to get up.

That had been the first one.

The second one had been coming down the trunk of the same tree,
spiraling the trunk, the way squirrels do, stopping at frequent
intervals and studying their surroundings with their bright beebees of
eyes, looking right at you sometimes but never seeing you unless you
moved. This one had stopped, head down, and was looking off to one side
when he got it. The force of the bullet, striking just below the ear,
where he'd aimed, tore the small red body right off the trunk, spun it
around several times, and dropped it into a wild blackberry thicket.

He hadn't bothered to look at that one either. He had lit a cigarette
and leaned back more comfortably against the hickory. It was a pleasant
afternoon, mild for November--a time for wandering in woods, a time
to take it a little easy, a time to knock off some of the scavengers
and pests you'd neglected during the first days of pheasant and rabbit
season, a time to get your eyes down to hair-line fineness for the
first ecstatic day of deer. Red squirrels were easy, of course, a
little beneath the dignity of a true hunter, but when you tried to bore
them in vital spots you got some pretty good practice out of it.

He yawned. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught a red wisp
of movement high in the tree to his right. He brought the .22 over
casually. He hardly needed to turn his body at all. The stock fitted
his shoulder snugly, lay cool against his cheek. There was no recoil,
only the sharp ripping sound, and then the dark red body falling,
hitting limbs, caroming, dropping, dropping, making the familiar
thrilling rustling sound in the dead leaves.

That had been the third.

The fourth and the fifth had been about the same.

After the fifth, he had become a little bored. He decided to vary the
game a little. He drew his knees together and rested the barrel of the
.22 in the niche between them, then sat there quietly for a long time.

Presently the sixth squirrel left the security of the trees and made
a few quick jumps into the small clearing. Then it stopped and stood
poised, a statuette except for its alive bright eyes. It was a perfect
target, but he was in no hurry. He was enjoying himself immensely.

After about half a minute the squirrel moved again--several yards
closer, almost in an exact line with the dark little eye of the .22. It
sat up on its haunches then, its tail an arched question mark behind
it. It put its tiny forepaws together and sat there not moving, almost
as though it were praying. (That was the part he remembered most
vividly.)

He'd hardly needed to move the .22 at all. The slightest shift had
aligned the sights with the imaginary mark between the little eyes. He
had squeezed the trigger nonchalantly, and the part of the head just
above the eyes had come right off and the small red body had completed
a perfect somersault before dropping into the dead leaves of the
clearing.

After that he hadn't bothered with the trees. It was so much more fun
in the clearing, waiting for them to come right up to you and pose. Of
course it wasn't such good practice, but it was fine entertainment--an
ideal way to spend a lazy afternoon in fall when the wood was all cut
for winter, the crops in, the barn roof repaired and Pa off to town
where he couldn't be finding annoying little things for you to do.

He had got eleven of them altogether, he hadn't missed a one, and he
had felt pretty proud taking them home to show to Ma before feeding
them to the dogs.

       *       *       *       *       *

He shifted his cramped legs and peered down through the interstices of
the foliage at the gray shape of the hunter. Some of his initial terror
had left him when he'd finally realized that they couldn't see through
leaves any more than he could; that They, as well as he, needed an open
target in order to make a kill.

So he was relatively safe in the tree--for a while, at least. Perhaps
he could find safety in trees for the rest of his life. Trees might be
the answer.

He felt a little better. A portion of the fear that had followed the
meteor shower was still with him, however. The fear that had detonated
in his mind the morning after the shower when Pa had come running to
the barn, shouting: "The cities! All the cities have been blowed up!
They ain't no more cities in the whole world. Radio just said so 'fore
it went dead. We're bein' invaded!"

_Invaded?_ Invaded by whom? He hadn't been able to grasp it at first.
At first he'd thought Russia, and then he'd thought, no, it couldn't
be Russia. Pa had said _all_ the cities. All the cities in the whole
wide world.

And then he'd begun to see the people on the road. The terrified
people, the walking, running, stumbling people heading for the
hills--the hills and the forests, the hiding places that ships couldn't
see, that bombs couldn't find.

But that hunters could.

Hunters hunting with incredible silver guns, skimming along the roads
to the hills and the forests in fantastic vehicles, alighting by
roadsides and lumbering across fields to timber stands; routing out
the people from elms and oaks and maples and locusts and even sumac,
flushing them out like rabbits and shooting them down in cold blood
with blinding shards of bullets.

He had run when he'd seen the first vehicle. He'd run wildly for the
woods. He'd forgotten Pa and Ma. He'd even forgotten his gun. He'd been
scared. Crazy-scared.

What did They want to kill people for? What was wrong with people?

He shivered on the limb, in the chill morning wind that had sprung
up after the first frost of the season. Martians, he'd bet. Martians
landing on Earth and wanting everything for Themselves, afraid to let
people live for fear _they'd_ get some. Greedy Martians, trying to hog
the whole world!

The gray shape below him moved slightly and his terror broke out
afresh. The hunter appeared to be reclining against the trunk of a
nearby tree, its gleaming weapon resting on its huge tentacular legs.
Waiting. For an irrational moment he considered climbing down and
approaching it, getting down on his knees and begging it for mercy.

But he'd only be wasting his time. He realized that right away. He knew
he'd see no pity in those cold inhuman eyes. He knew he'd see nothing
but death.

The trees were the only answer. The trees with their friendly screens
of foliage, their lofty leafy hiding places. By living in the trees
a shrewd man might be able to elude the hunters forever. If he was
careful. If he never let himself be seen.

He peered cautiously down at the hunter again. He looked at the gray
patches of the gargantuan body that showed through the interstices of
the foliage.

As he watched, the first frost-nipped leaf fluttered down past his
face, hovering for a moment before his eyes so that he could not miss
its new autumnal coloring.