He was worried now. For despite his assurances to Jean Palmer, he knew that there were dangers on Venus. In the depths of its oceans, great, foul, nightmarish creatures lived sluggish lives, and if some accident should rouse them to action, they might well wipe out an entire camp in a few moments. Then again, because of the incredible value of the oil, space pirates might have raided the base camp, murdered the men, then escaped with the oil already rendered.

"Damn!" Don Denton said thoughtfully.

He glanced at the sleeping girl, smiled slightly. He felt a sudden protective instinct in his heart that had never been there before, and his hands clenched unconsciously at the thought of what disappointments and heartaches might lie ahead for her.

He shrugged then, grinned wryly into space. Well, there was nothing he could do now but wait. If there was some sort of trouble on Venus, he would have enough trouble then in trying to cope with it; there was no sense in worrying himself stiff about it now. He'd know soon enough.

He clicked on the automatic mechanism of the sleep ray, drifted into dreamless slumber as the purple rays erased all conscious thought from his mind.

II

Venus was no longer a green planet; it loomed ahead like some woolly ball spinning in space. The Comet circled it warily, Don Denton's fingers resting lightly on the control studs of the instrument panel, his lips pursed a bit as he drove the ship closer to the clouds.

"It will probably be several hours before we land," he explained to the wide-eyed Jean at his side, "Trying to find the Lanka camp in that soup down there is quite a job in itself, even after I get the Comet through fifteen miles of cloud banks."

Jean was a trifle pale, but there was a spark of confidence in her eyes. "I think," she said quietly, "I feel like you must have felt the first time you landed here."

Don Denton smiled. "There's no feeling like it," he admitted. "I felt it first on the Earth's Moon, and I knew then that I'd never be able to settle down into some routine job. I suppose I'll end my life still feeling that thrill, still seeking out hidden places in the universe."

He pressed a firing stud, and the Comet flashed down toward Venus. For the first time, there was a sense of movement, as the spinning clouds rushed to meet the ship. Always before, with 

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