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mulus instead of his will. Sheer anguish twisted him. And the room filled with a hearty bellow of laughter. The monstrous whiskered man had turned about and was shaking with merriment. He picked up a pocket-gun from beside him and turned off a switch at his elbow. Thorn's muscles were freed. "Go back, my friendt," boomed the same voice that had come from a speaker the night before. "Go to der couch. You amuse me and you haff already been useful, but I shall haff no hesitation in killing you. You are Thorn Hardt. My name is Kreynborg. How do you do?" "Where's my friend?" demanded Thorn savagely. "Where is she?" "Der lady friendt? There!" The whiskered man pointed negligently with the pocket-gun. "I gafe her a bunk to slumber in." * * * * * There was a niche in the wall, which Thorn had not seen. Sylva was there, sleeping the same heavy, dreamless sleep from which Thorn himself had just awakened. He went to her swiftly. She was breathing naturally, though tears from the irritating gas still streaked her face and her skin seemed to be pinkened a little from the same cause. Thorn swung around. His weapons were gone, of course. The huge man snapped on the induction-screen switch again and put down his weapon. With that screen separating the room into two halves, no living thing could cross it without either such muscular paralysis as Thorn had just experienced, or death. Coils in the floor induced alternating currents in the flesh itself, very like those currents used for supposed medical effects in "medical batteries," and "shockers." "Be calm!" said Kreynborg, chuckling. "I am pleased to haff company. This is der loneliest spot in der Rockies. It was chosen for that reason. But I shall be here for maybe months, and now I shall not be lonely. We of der Com-Pubs haff scientific resources such as your fools haff nefer dreamed of, but there is no scientific substitute for a pretty woman." He turned again to the writing device. It clicked half a dozen times more, and he stopped. A strip of paper came out of it. He inserted it into the slot of another mechanism and switched on a standard G.C. phone as the paper began to feed. In seconds the room was filled with unearthly hoots and wails and whistles. They came from the device into which the paper was feeding, and they poured into the G.C. transmitter. They went on for nearly a minute, and ceased. Kreynborg shut off the transmitte
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