Clifford Simak - Out of Their Minds

Behind the crowd came two men riding horses, but as I watched the procession, I saw after a little time that the one who rode behind the other rode a donkey, not a horse, with his feet almost dragging on the ground. But it was the man who rode in front who attracted my attention and very well he might. He loomed tall and gaunt and was dressed in armor, with a shield upon one arm and a long «. lance carried on one shoulder. The horse was as gaunt as he was and it walked with a stumbling gait and with its head held low. As the procession approached closer I saw, in the light cast by the torches, that the horse was little better than a bag of bones.

The procession halted and the people parted as the " horse carrying the tall scarecrow in armor stumbled through the crowd and to the front. Having walked clear of the crowd, it halted and stood with hanging head and I would not have been surprised if, at any moment, it had fallen in a heap.

Man and horse held motionless and the crowd as well and watching them warily, I wondered rather vaguely what might happen next. In a place like this, I knew, it could be anything. The whole thing was ridiculous, of course—but that was no consolation, for it was a judgment based On the manners and the mores of the human twentieth century and it was not valid here.

The horse slowly raised his head. The crowd shuffled expectantly, with the torches bobbing. And the knight; with what seemed a conscious effort, straightened and stiffened himself in the saddle and brought down the lance. I stood there, in the innyard, an interested spectator and just a bit befuddled as to what it might be all about.

Suddenly the knight was shouting and, although his voice rang out loud and clear in the silence of the night, it took an instant for me to sort out what he said. The lance, braced against his thigh had leveled, and the horse had launched itself into a gallop before I realized the intent of his words.

"Catiff," he had shouted, "wretch, dirty infidel, make ready to defend thyself!"

And it must have been me he meant, I gathered, because the horse was thundering toward me and the lance was pointed at me and, God knows, I had no time at all to prepare for my defense.

If there had been time, I'd have taken to my heels, for I knew I was outclassed. But I didn't have the time to do anything at all and I was, in fact, half frozen by the craziness of it and in the few intervening seconds that somehow seemed like hours I stood and watched in fascination as the glittering lance point came bearing down upon me. The horse was no great shakes, but he was good for a sudden burst of speed and he was thundering along like an asthmatic locomotive.

The lance point was only a few feet away and about to spit me when I came alive enough to move. I jumped backward. The point went past me, but as it did the knight seemed to lose control of it, or the horse might have shied or stumbled—I don't know which it was—but, in any case, the lance swung sharply toward me and, reaching out my hands, I batted at it blindly to shove it away from me.

I hit it and deflected it downward and the point plunged into the ground. Suddenly the lance, its point plunged into the ground. Suddenly the lance, its point deeply buried, became a catapult so that its butt, catching in the armpit of the knight, hoisted him off the saddle and high into the air. The horse dug in its feet and skidded to a halt, with the stirrups swinging wildly, while the bowed lance straightened and hurled the hapless knight like a rock fired from a slingshot. He arched through the air and landed, face downward and spread-eagled, at the far end of the yard and when he hit the ground there was a clangor such as one might make if he hit an empty steel drum a resounding lick with a heavy hammer.

Up the road the people who had formed the procession for the knight were convulsed with glee. Some of them were doubled over, laughing, with their arms wrapped about their middles, while others of them were rolling on the ground, helpless with their guffaws.

Shambling down the road came the lop-eared little donkey, still carrying the tattered man whose feet almost dragged upon the ground—poor, patient Sancho Panza coming once again to the relief of his master, Don Quixote de la Mancha.

And those others rolling in the road, I knew, had merely come along for the fun of it, willingly bearing torches to light the way for this scarecrow knight, knowing very well that one of his never-ending misadventures would sometime in the not-too-distant future provide amusement for them.

I turned away, back toward the inn—and there wasn't any inn.

"Kathy!" I shouted. "Kathy!"

There was no answer. Up the road the amusement-seeking company still was howling out its laughter. At the far end of what had been the inn yard Sancho had dismounted from the donkey and was trying manfully, but with small success, to roll Don Quixote over on his back. But the inn was gone and there was no sign of either Kathy or the witch.

From somewhere in the woods and down the slope came the shrill cackling of the witch. I waited and the cackle came again and this time I pinpointed the direction and went plunging gown the slope. I crossed the few feet of cleared space that had served as the inn yard and ran into the woods. Roots clutched at my toes, seeking to trip me up, and branches raked my face. But I kept on running, with my arms outstretched to protect me against running into a tree headfirst arid beating out what little brains I had. Ahead of me the insane cackling still went on.

If I could only catch her, I promised myself, I'd wring her scrawny neck until she took me to Kathy or told me where she was, and after that the temptation, I knew, would be great to continue with the wringing. But I knew even then, I think, how little chance I had of catching her. I banged into a boulder and fell across it and felt my way around it and went on running down the slope, while ahead of me, leading me on, never any farther off, never any closer, the crazy laughter still went on. I ran into a tree, but my outstretched hands found it first and saved me from a cracked skull, although I thought for a moment that both the wrists were fractured. And, finally, one of the roots on the forest floor managed to trip me up and I went cartwheeling through the air, but I landed soft—in the edge of a woodland swamp. I landed on my back and my head went under and I sat up coughing and retching, for I had swallowed some of the foul swamp water.

I sat there, without stirring, knowing I was licked. I could chase that cackle through the woods for a million years and not lay hands upon the witch. For this was a world, I knew, with which neither I, nor any other human, could cope. A human would be dealing with the fantasies he'd hatched and all his worlds of logic would not come up with any answers.

I sat in the mud and water to my waist and above my head the cattails swayed and off to my left something—I suppose a frog—went jumping through the muck. Dimly I became aware of a light glowing faintly off to the right of me and, I got up slowly. Mud fell off my trousers with little, sodden plops as it hit the water. But, even standing, I could not see the light well, for I sank close to my knees in muck and the cattail growth came up around my head.

With some difficulty, I began to make my way toward the light. It was not easy going. The muck was deep and sticky and the cattails, mixed with water-loving bushes, helped to impede my progress. I plodded forward slowly, forcing my way through the heavy growth.

The mud and water became shallower and the cattail growth began thinning out. I saw that the light was shining from a point somewhere above my head and I wondered where that light might be, but a moment later, when I came to a sloping bank, I knew the light was atop the bank. I started to climb the bank, but it was slippery. Partway up, I started skidding back and as I did, a great brawny hand came out of nowhere and I grabbed at it and felt the fingers of it close hard around my wrist.