he felt a grim
exaltation in the knowledge that he had enough fortitude to let nothing
stop him from doing his job.

Hell! What was a little wind? This thought came to him and he smiled
grimly. He'd show Halliday! He'd show 'em all! Nothing was going to stop
him!

There was a peculiar crackling sound in the air about him, as if bolts
of unseen lightning were slashing through the turbulent atmosphere, but
he forged ahead. He knew there was little danger of an electric bolt
striking him as long as he was out in the open.

The distance to the goal was not a matter of a dozen yards or so, but it
took him fully five minutes to cover the stretch. He had trouble
breathing; each breath was snatched from his open mouth by the fury of
the wind. And his eyes were rimmed with dust and streaming from the
stinging bite of the flaky soil.

When he reached the wall of the building he was sobbing for breath and
blind from the whiplash of the wind. He sagged against the comfortable
bulk of the squat, solid structure and wiped at his eyes with a
handkerchief, but the wind soon tore the flimsy cloth from his fingers.

There was nothing to do but find the door of the building as quickly as
possible. Using his hands as groping feelers he staggered around two
corners of the buildings until his fingers closed about a door knob.

The gale was increasing in intensity; the roaring lash of the wind was
wild and explosive, as if the floodgates of Nature had swung open to
unleash this maelstrom of fury and destruction.

The sputtering crackle of electric energy he had noticed seemed to be
swelling in volume, rising steadily in pitch and fury. And then a new
sound was added to the hideous cacophony. Ward heard it faintly at first
and it failed to register on his consciousness.

The new sound was an unearthly rasping noise that roared about his head
and crashed against his ear drums with terrifying impact. The sound
seemed everywhere; it seemed to emanate from the unleashed forces of the
storm itself; its marrow-chilling, rasping moan was a demoniacal cry,
screaming a weird defiance into the teeth of the mighty monsoon.

* * * * *

Ward, hugging the building, heard the rasping sound, and he remembered
what Halliday had told him. Crouched against the side of the structure,
listening to that weird, desolate wail of unnamable horror, he felt his
heart thudding with sudden fear against his ribs.

The door of th