silently rousing them. Kueelo and V'Narik, both Martians, joined him; as well as Smith and Blakely and Wilkinson, Earthmen. These five, together with McGowan, had formed a special little cliche among themselves, and almost daily went off for a secret meeting somewhere during our sleep period. Innumerable times I had seen them do that, but I didn't much care, feeling that whatever they might be planning would be futile in the end.

Now I rolled over in my bunk, turned my face to the stone wall and tried to get back to sleep; I needed much sleep in preparation for the morrow, because lately the radite emanations had been fast sapping my strength. Then, to my amazement, I felt a light hand on my shoulder and I knew it was McGowan. I heard his voice in my ear, scarcely a whisper:

"Reed! You awake? Come on and go with us; we need you!"

They needed me! Wondering and doubting, I rose silently up and followed the six of them toward the dead end of the tunnel. Blakely carried an electric lantern, carefully shaded. A quarter of a mile further we came to the tunnel's end. There in the dim light I gazed around me at the worked-out rock. The radite vein here, I knew, had been exhausted years ago, even before I had come.

As I stood apart, watching, the six of them seized upon a protruding rock and pushed with a certain unison that could only have come with long practice. The rock rolled smoothly away and revealed a ragged little ravine leading up and into the tunnel wall. We entered, and they pulled the huge rock back into place. We began to climb. The ravine was scarcely shoulder-width. A few minutes later, however, it widened out into a large, natural cave!

Blakely placed the light in the center, and we sat in a circle around it. We could only see each other's faces dimly. The two Martians' were dark and leathery, with thick-lidded expressionless eyes. The three Earthmen appeared a little anxious as they glanced at McGowan. I knew what they were thinking, wondering; I was wondering myself.

As though reading our thoughts McGowan said: "Yes, it—it was pretty terrible." But by the look in his eyes alone, dim as it was, we knew that was a masterpiece of understatement. "But that's beside the point," he went on. "Whatever I went through up there, it was worth it. And it had to be done. For your information, Reed"—he turned his head to look at me—"we're going to escape from these tunnels. Then we're going to kill Marnick. When that's accomplished, we'll think about escaping from this planet."

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