ncient world, a prisoner of weird
machine-monsters! Intended victim of a grotesque sacrificial ceremony!

Could he find her, in the vastness of an unfamiliar world? And having
found her, would there be a chance to rescue her from her hideous
captors? The project seemed insane. But Larry felt a queer, unfamiliar
urge, which, he knew, would drive him on until he had discovered and
saved her--or until he was dead.

* * * * *

At last, when it seemed to Larry nearly three hours since he had begun
this amazing flight, the crawling ebon needle reached the mark, "Pygmy
Planet Normal."

He flew out of the wall of violet flame toward the planet's surface.
Before, the distance between the planet and the ray's edge had seemed
only the fraction of an inch. Now it appeared to be many miles.

Abruptly the Pygmy Planet, which had seemed to be _beside_ him,
appeared to swing about, so that it was _beneath_ him. He knew that it
was a change merely in his sensations. He was feeling the gravitation
of the new world. It was pulling him toward it!

He cut the throttle, and settled the plane into a long glide, a glide
that was to end upon the surface of a new planet!

In what seemed half an hour more, Larry had made a safe landing upon
the Pygmy Planet. He had come down upon a stretch of fairly smooth,
red, sandy desert, which seemed to stretch illimitably toward the
rising sun, which direction Larry instinctively termed "east."

To the "west" was a line of dull green--evidently the vegetation along
a stream. The ocher desert was scattered with sparse clumps of
reddish, spiky scrub. Larry taxied the plane into one of those
thickets. Finding canvas and rope in the cabin, he staked down the
machine, and muffled the motor.

Then, selecting a rifle and a heavy automatic from the weapons in the
cabin, and filling his pockets with extra ammunition, he left the
plane and set out with brisk steps toward the green line of
vegetation.

"I'll follow along the river," he reasoned. "It may lead me somewhere
and it will show the way back to the plane. I may come across
something in the way of a clue. Can't go exploring by air, or I'll
burn up all the gas and be stranded here!"

* * * * *

To his surprise, the water course proved to be an ancient canal,
walled with crumbling masonry. Its channel was choked with mud and
thorny, thick-leaved desert shrubs of unfamiliar variety; but