d come back here for more."

The last drop of the precious liquid secured, the vessel moved away,
sluggishly now because of its prodigious load. In their quarters in the
fourth section the three Terrestrials, who had watched with strained
attention the downfall and absorption of the planetoid, stared at each
other with drawn faces. Clio broke the silence.

"Oh, Conway, this is ghastly! It's ... it's just simply perfectly
horrible!" she gasped, then recovered a measure of her customary spirit
as she stared in surprise at Costigan's face. For it was thoughtful, his
eyes were bright and keen--no trace of fear or disorganization was
visible in any line of his hard young face.

"It's not so good," he admitted frankly. "I wish I wasn't such a dumb
cluck--if Lyman Cleveland or Ford Rodebush were here they could help a
lot, but I don't know enough about any of their stuff to flag a
hand-car. I can't even interpret that funny flash--if it really was a
flash--that we saw."

"Why bother about one little flash, after all that really did happen?"
asked Clio, curiously.

"You think Roger launched something? He couldn't have--I didn't see a
thing," Bradley argued.

"I don't know what to think. I've never seen anything material sent out
so fast that I couldn't trace it with an ultra-wave--but on the other
hand, Roger's got a lot of stuff that I never saw anywhere else.
However, I don't see that it has anything to do with the fix we're in
right now--but at that, we might be worse off. We're still breathing
air, you notice, and if they don't blanket my wave I can still talk."

He put both hands in his pockets and spoke.

"Samms? Costigan. Put me on a recorder, quick--I probably haven't got
much time," and for ten minutes he talked, concisely and as rapidly as
he could utter words, reporting clearly and exactly everything that had
transpired. Suddenly he broke off, writhing in agony. Frantically he
tore his shirt open and hurled a tiny object across the room.

"Wow!" he exclaimed. "They may be deaf, but they can certainly detect an
ultra-wave, and the interference they can set up on it is enough to
pulverize your bones. No, I'm not hurt," he reassured the anxious girl,
now at his side, "but it's a good thing I had you out of circuit--it
would have jolted you loose from six or seven of your back teeth."

"Have you any idea where they're taking us?" she asked, soberly.

"No," he answered flatly, looking deep into her steadfast e