found his feet under him, as Phee-e-al dragged him
clear of the chest, Rawson brought the breech of the gun crashing down
upon the pointed skull.

He felt the talons release their hold. The priests were rushing upon
him. Phee-e-al, too, had been only momentarily stunned--he was
springing. Then Rawson whipped the rifle down in line, and the
clamoring shrieks that filled the room with tumult were drowned under
another roar.

He saw Phee-e-al fall. Even then, through all the pandemonium within
his own mind, he thrilled with satisfaction at sight of a little dot
and a spreading stain above Phee-e-al's heart, where only bare skin
had been before.

The next shot took the foremost of the priests. The others paused,
hesitant for a moment, ranged out in an irregular line. Past them,
beyond the golden barrier, Rawson caught a confused glimpse of a sea
of red faces. Green flames were stabbing upward from their ready
weapons. The priests were between him and them, and there came to
Rawson in that instant, through all the chaos of fighting and
half-formed plans, the knowledge that these priests were a living
barrier that held off the flames.

He fired once more to check them, then sprang for the wide entrance
of the tunnel. He fired again back of him, shooting wildly as he ran,
then saw Loah as she came from her hiding place with the flame-thrower
ready in her hand.

"Quick!" he gasped. "Get back!" Then, with her, he was running
stumblingly through the dark.

* * * * *

There could be no escape; even while they fled he knew it. And yet
they almost made it--though the end, when it came, was one that
neither could possibly have foreseen.

They were following a wide passage, one of the countless thoroughfares
of the Reds. It was deserted. Loah flashed her light freely. Ahead of
them the passage turned. Just short of that bend was a rift in the
rocks.

"There!" Loah gasped. "Turn there. It will take us back to the
_jana_." But the words were followed by a flash of green from dead
ahead.

The flames that made it came quickly after and a dozen of the red
warriors were before them, the light of their weapons slanting just
above Rawson's head. His rifle was half raised--they would at least
fight to the last. Then he realized that the green death was not
swinging downward.

From behind them, in the corridor through which they had raced, came a
chorus of whistling shouts. Rawson whirled to find