It seemed that his very life was bound up with the torch that now smoked and struggled to burn. If its feeble flame went out, that meant extinction, black and final.

Then he became aware that Carver was no longer beside him. He whirled. Ten yards behind, the other was bending down, scrabbling frantically in the dust.

"I dropped it!" he shouted. "I can't find it!"

Jerry tried to reach him, but the other thing was quicker. A whirlpool of blackness engulfed Carver, blotted him out. Then Jerry was confronted by an unbelievable sight—a great, savage head, towering over him, its eyes glowing redly and foam creaming over gigantic, open jaws.

Desperately, he shoved his cross straight at it. The thing spat and roared deafeningly. The thud of its paws shook the ground. It lashed out with monstrous claws that sliced his skin. Half-stunned, Jerry kept lunging toward it, till finally his cross touched its coarse hide. There was a crackle of blue flame, a shriek that split the night, and the thing disintegrated in roiling clouds of bitter smoke.

Jerry swayed. The hand that held the cross was numb and tingling. Like an automaton, he turned, went back, and knelt beside the crumpled shape that had been Mike Carver. Then he rose, still carrying the feebly flickering torch, and plodded on....

They met him as he was coming back—Watson, Henderson, Caruso, Miller, Hammond and the rest. They had flashlights and guns and tear gas, and their faces were grim and desperate.

"We found your car," they said. "We could see the flames from Wide Bend. What in hell has been going on?"

Jerry stared at them. He dropped the dead torch. One hand tried to put the cross back into his pocket. His face was black, his hair singed, his side wet with blood.

"It's all over," he croaked. "They're gone. Dark Valley is free again."

Big Joe Merklos was the first of them. He appeared at the Rocky Mountain Trust Company one day, cash in hand. The charm of him, his flashing smile, the easy strength in his big body, were persuasive recommendations. But the Company's appraisal scarcely got that far. Wasn't he the first buyer they had ever had for that suburban real-estate fiasco, Hidden Acres...?

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