ched to their shoulders. They were
shorter and more heavily built than Earthmen, perhaps, but there was a
grace to them that denied the greater gravity of their planet. The
murals portrayed a world of warm sunlight, green plants, and tall trees
waving in a breeze--a breeze of air that now lay frozen on the stone
floors of their buildings.

Scene after scene they saw--then they came to a great hall. Here they
saw hundreds of bodies; people wrapped in heavy cloth blankets. And over
the floor of the room lay little crystals of green.

Wade looked at the little crystals for a long time, and then at the
people who lay there, perfectly preserved by the utter cold. They seemed
only sleeping--men, women, and children, sleeping under a blanket of
soft snow that evaporated and disappeared as the energy of the lights
fell on it. There was one little group the men looked at before they
left the room of death. There were three in it--a young man, a fair,
blonde young woman who seemed scarcely more than a girl, and between
them, a little child. They were sleeping, arms about each other, warm in
the arms of Death, the kindly Reliever of Pain.

Arcot turned and rose, flying swiftly down the long corridor toward the
door.

"That was not meant for us," he said. "Let's leave."

The others followed.

"But let's see what records they left," he went on. "It may be that they
wanted us to know their tragic story. Let's see what sort of
civilization they had."

"Their chemistry was good, at least," said Wade. "Did you notice those
green crystals? A quick, painless poison gas to relieve them of the
struggle against the cold."

They went down to the first floor level, where there was a single great
court. There were no pillars, only a vast, smooth floor.

"They had good architecture," said Morey. "No pillars under all the vast
load of that building."

"And the load is even greater under this gravity," remarked Arcot.

In the center of the room was a great, golden bronze globe resting on a
platform of marble. It must have been new when this world froze, for
there was no sign of corrosion or oxidation. The men flew over to it and
stood beside it, looking at the great sphere, nearly fifteen feet in
diameter.

"A globe of their world," said Fuller, looking at it with interest.

"Yes," agreed Arcot, "and it was set up after they were sure the cold
would come, from the looks of it. Let's take a look at it." He flew up
to the top of it