given by the odd blend of colors. Almost escaping notice because of their unusual position and their dull brown hue were the stomach fangs, in neat rows which could be extended and retracted like those of a snake.

He noticed that Louise had shuddered again, and said, in the manner of a man making conversation, "Interesting, aren't they? They're rock breathers, you know. They need very little oxygen, and they extract that from the silicates and other oxygen-containing compounds of the rock."

"Don't talk about them."

"All right, if you don't want me to. But about us—you see, my dear, no one expected us to be lost. And even if the Lighthouse Service has started to look for us, it'll take a long time to find us."

"We have food, water, air. If not for those beasts, we'd last until a rescue ship appeared."

"But even a rescue ship wouldn't be able to reach us unless we kept the beam going. So far, we've been lucky. It's really functioned remarkably well. But sooner or later it'll go out of order, and then I'll have to go out and fix it. You agree to that, don't you, Louise, dear?"

She nodded. She said quietly, "The beam must be kept in order."

"That's when the creatures will get me," he said, almost with satisfaction. "I may kill one or two of them, although the way I feel toward everything, I hate to kill anything at all. But you know, sweetheart, that there are more than a dozen of them altogether, and it's clumsy shooting in a spacesuit at beasts which move as swiftly as they do."

"And if you don't succeed in fixing what's wrong, if they get you—" She broke down suddenly and began to cry.

He looked at her with compassion, and smoothed her hair. And yet, under the influence of the drug, he enjoyed even her crying. It was, as he never tired of repeating to himself and to her a wonderful drug. Under its spell, a man—or a woman—could really enjoy life.

Tonight she would begin to enjoy life along with him.

Their chronometer functioned perfectly, and they still regulated their living habits by it, using Greenwich Earth time. At seven in the evening they sat down to a fine meal. Knowing that tomorrow they might die, Louise had decided that tonight they would eat and drink as well as they could, and she had selected a Christmas special. She had 

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