barrier which must be part of the
electrical fortifications of the palace. A human guard was sitting
there at a tiny gate-way, a hood-light above him, illumining his black
and white garbed figure.

Tina called softly. "All well, Alent? Tugh has not passed back?"

"No, Princess," he answered, standing erect. The voices echoed through
the confined space with a muffled blur.

"Let no one pass but humans, Alent."

"That is my order," he said. He had not noticed Larry, whom Tina had
pushed into a shadow against the wall. The Princess waved at the guard
and turned away, whispering to Larry:

"Come!"

There were rooms opening off this corridor--decrepit dungeons, most of
them seemed to Larry. He had tried to keep his sense of direction, and
figured they were now under the palace garden. Tina stopped abruptly.
There were no lights here, only the glow from one at a distance. To
Larry it was an eery business.

"What is it?" he whispered.

"Wait! I thought I heard something."

In the dead, heavy silence Larry found that there was much to hear.

Voices very dim from the palace overhead; infinitely faint music; the
clammy sodden drip of moisture from the tunnel roof. And, permeating
everything, the faint hum of machinery.

Tina touched him in the gloom. "It's nothing, I guess. Though I
thought I heard a man's voice."

"Overhead?"

"No; down here."

* * * * *

There was a dark, arched door near at hand. Tina entered it and
fumbled for a switch, and in the soft light that came Larry saw an
unoccupied apartment very similar to the one he had had upstairs, save
that this was much smaller.

"Harl's room," said Tina. She prowled along the wall where audible
book-cylinders[4] stood in racks, searching for a title. Presently she
found a hidden switch, pressed it, and a small section of the case
swung out, revealing a concealed compartment. Larry saw her fingers
trembling as she drew out a small brass cylinder.

[Footnote 4: Cylinder records of books which by machinery gave audible
rendition, in similar fashion to the radio-phonograph.]

"This must be it, Larry," she said.

They took it to a table which held a shaded light. Within the cylinder
was a scroll of writing. Tina unrolled it and held it under the light,
while Larry stood breathless, watching her.

"Is it what you wanted?" Larry murmured.

"Yes. Poor Harl!"

She read aloud to Larry the gist of it in the few closing paragra