ainly illumined them. Polter's arm was
around Babs. I had not realized how small they were until I saw Polter
lift the rope of the little four-inch fence, and he and Babs stooped and
walked under it. The fragment of quartz lay a foot from them in the
center of the white surface. They walked unsteadily toward it. But soon
they were running.

My horrified senses whirled. Then abruptly I felt something touch my
face! Alan and I were lying in shadow. No one had noticed my writhing
movements, and Alan was still in drugged unconsciousness. Something tiny
and light and soundless as a butterfly wing brushed my face! I jerked my
head aside. On the floor, within six inches of my eyes, I saw the tiny
figure of a girl an inch high! She stood, with a warning gesture to her
lips--a human girl in a filmy flowing robe. Long, pale golden tresses
lay on her white shoulders; her face, small as my little fingernail,
colorful as a miniature painted on ivory, was so close to my eyes that I
could see her expression--warning me not to move.

There was a faint glow of light on the floor where she stood, but in a
moment she moved out of it. Then I felt her brush against the back of my
head. My ear was near the ground. A tiny warm hand touched my ear lobe;
clung to it. A tiny voice sounded in my ear.

"Please do not move your head. You might kill me!"

There was a pause. I held myself rigid. Then the tiny voice came again.

"I am Glora, a friend. I have the drug! I will help you!"

CHAPTER III

It seemed that Alan was stirring. I felt the tiny hand leave my ear. I
thought that I could hear faint little footfalls as the girl scampered
away, fearful that a sudden movement by Alan would crush her. I turned
cautiously after a moment and saw Alan's eyes upon me. He too had seen,
with a blurred returning consciousness, the dwindling figures of Babs
and Polter. I followed his gaze. The while slab with the golden quartz
under the microscope seemed empty. The several men in this huge circular
dome-room were dispersing to their affairs; three of them sat whispering
by what I now saw was a pile of gold ingots stacked crosswise. But the
fellow at the microscope held his place, his eyes glued to its aperture
as he watched the vanishing figures of Polter and Babs on the
rock-fragment.

Alan was trying to convey something to me. He could only gaze and jerk
his head. I saw behind his head the figures of the tiny girl on the
floor behind him. She