The Creature Walks Among Us

Sherwood illustrates his point with a night voyage into the Everglades, inky blackness pervades the image.

Day exteriors give the grand view of Florida skies.

The action is transferred to a ranch in Sausalito, whither Vagabondia III carries the critically burned Gill Man (he has lungs, like an African lungfish). Dr. Barton, who owns the pleasure yacht and the seaside ranch, responds to a geneticist’s speech (from Things to Come) about “the stars or the jungle”, the insanely jealous surgeon tells his beautiful wife, “I want to catch a star!”

“A basic mutation, a major change” is in the offing for the creature. No longer alive in his pool of ink (the writer miraculously adapted to the work) but kept in a pen at the ranch with sheep. He kills a mountain lion come after them. He kills Dr. Barton, who has beaten a crewman to death for flirting with his disaffected wife.

Gills useless, the creature stares at the sea, where he must drown.