set low between. As he advanced, Migul moved aside.

"Master, I have done well. There is no reason to punish."

"Of course not, Migul. Well you have done, indeed. But I do not like
your ideas of mastery, and so I came just to make sure that you are
still very loyal to me. You have done well, indeed. Who is in this
other cage which follows us?"

"Master, Harl was in it. And the Princess Tina."

"Ah!"

"And a stranger. A man--"

"From 1935? Did they stop there?"

"Master, yes. But they stopped again, I think, in that same night of
1777, where I did your bidding. Master, the man Major Atwood is--"

"That is very good, Migul," Tugh said hastily. Mary and I standing
gazing at him, did not know then that Mary's father had been murdered.
And Tugh did not wish us to know it. "Very good, Migul." He regarded
us as though about to speak, but turned again to the Robot.

"And so Tina's cage follows us--as you hoped?"

"Yes, Master. But now there is only Harl in it. He approached us very
close a while in the past. He is alone."

"So?" Tugh glanced at the Time-dials. "Stop us where we planned. You
remember--in one of those years when this space was the big forest
glade."

* * * * *

He fronted Mary and me. "You are patient, young sir. You do not
speak."

His glittering black eyes held me. They were red-rimmed eyes, like
those of a beast. He had a strangely repulsive face. His lips were
cruel, and so thin they made his wide mouth like a gash. But there was
an intellectuality stamped upon his features.

He held the black cloak closely around his thick, misshapen form. "You
do not speak," he repeated.

I moistened my dry lips. Tugh was smiling now, and suddenly I saw the
full inhuman quality of his face--the great high-bridged nose, and
high cheek-bones; a face Satanic when he smiled.

I managed, "Should I speak, and demand the meaning of this? I do. And
if you will return this girl from whence she came--"

"It will oblige you greatly," he finished ironically. "An amusing
fellow. What is your name?"

"George Rankin."

"Migul took you from 1935?"

"Yes."

"Well, as you doubtless know, you are most unwelcome.... You are
watching the dials, Migul?"

"Yes, Master."

"You can return me," I said. I was standing with my arm around Mary. I
could feel her shuddering. I was trying to be calm, but across the
background of my consciousness thoughts were whirling. We must escape.
This