It was a partly-grown praying mantis, not too long hatched. It stood rigid, waiting benignly for the boy to come closer or try to flee. If he had fled, it would fling itself after him with a ferocity beside which the fury of a tiger would be kittenish. If he approached, its fanged arms would flash down, pierce his body, and hold him terribly fast by the needle-sharp hooks that were so much worse than trap-claws. And of course it would not wait for him to die before it began its meal.
All the small party of humans stood frozen. It may be questioned whether they were filled with horror for the boy, or cast into a deeper abyss of despair by the sight of a half-grown mantis. Only Burl, so far, had any notion of actually leaving the valley. To the rest, the discovery of one partly mature praying mantis meant that there would be hundreds of others. It would be impossible to evade the tiny, slavering demons which were the brood of the great spider. It would be impossibility multiplied to live where a horde of small--yet vastly larger--fiends lived, raising their arms in a semblance of blessing before they did murder.
Only Burl was capable of thought, and this was because vanity filled him. He had commanded and had been obeyed. Now obedience was forgotten because there was this young mantis. If the men had dreamed of fighting it, it could have destroyed any number of them by sheer ferocity and its arsenal of knives and daggers. But Burl was at once furious and experienced. He had encountered such a middle-sized monster, when alone, and deliberately had experimented with it. In consequence he could dare to rage. He ran toward the mantis. He swung the small corpse of an ant--killed by Tet only minutes since--and hurled it past the terror-fascinated boy. He had hurled it at the mantis.
It struck. And insects simply do not think. Something hurtled at the ghastly young creature. Its arms struck ferociously to defend itself. The ant was heavy. Poised upright in its spectral attitude, the mantis was literally flung backward. But it rolled over, fighting the dead ant with that frenzy which is not so much ferocity as mania.
The small boy fled, hysterically, once the insect's attention was diverted.