triangle's hypotenuse.

"They understand the Pythagorean theorem, sir!" exclaimed Von Frisch.

"Good! They undoubtedly know some astronomy, then. Go on."

Von Frisch hesitated a moment, then erased the triangle. He drew a small circle with rays from it, for the sun. He drew four larger concentric circles around it, with small circles for planets on the rim of each one. He pointed to the third planet, then at himself, then at his companions, one by one. Then he pointed at the fourth planet and at the Martians, one by one. To complete the matter, he pointed at the sky.

"We are Earthmen," he said. "You are Martians."

The trouble was that the Earthmen didn't realize the things the Martians had were weapons until they used them. They didn't realize it then, as a matter of fact, because the Earthmen were dead, all three of them.

"The Martian hunting party came back from the desert with word of the strange creatures who came, apparently, from another world."

"Whether they have weapons, we do not know," said the leader of the hunting party. "But they wished to harm our people, so we killed them all."

"That is desperate action," said the patriarch of the village. "In what way were they dangerous to us?"

"Foolishly they disclosed their intention to us," replied the leader of the hunting party. "They informed us they planned to take over our world and to drive our people farther from the sun, to the great planet Jupiter."

"Then you did right," said the patriarch, blinking his big eyes.

Biggs and Golden were working near the G-boat. Their helmet radios were set to a different channel from that used by the exploring party, so they were unable to hear Captain Powers shouting frantically into his microphone and getting no answer. It was just after sunset, and Biggs was looking into the west.

"We ought to see it now, but it ain't there," commented Biggs.

"What ain't there?" demanded Golden.

"Mercury," said Biggs, who prided himself on being an amateur astronomer. "I reckon you can't see it from Mars without a telescope. Too close to the sun."

He chuckled.

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