called for ships from other points, they get so close and then their power gives out."

"But, gee," put in Dead-Eye, "this car's running. How come?"

"Don't know why, Dead-Eye," Packer added. "These, of course, don't have the new cyc motors; still run on the old combustion principle. The force field probably neutralizes the cycs, but doesn't faze the firing gas in the cars."

"The space guns didn't help, I suppose?" Wing asked.

"No," Packer said, twisted his face ruefully. "The shadows thrived on it and threw our bolts back ten times as hard. It wasn't nice to see."

Sometimes," he said, wistfully, "I wish we were back in your beef-striker--sorry, Dead-Eye--cow-puncher days. It was man to man then, and you knew that it wasn't the weapon but the wielder." He ran his hands through his tousled blond hair.

"Yep," said Dead-Eye. "Elizabeth and me'd fix 'em if we could see 'em."

The bucketing car began to have smoother going; the darkness outside was lifting, and the beat of the rain seemed to decelerate.

In the comparative quiet and peace, Curt Wing's dulled mind, clarified by the stimulating drug, was beginning to work again; his spirit numbed and beaten down by pain and inability to solve the enigma of the shadows and their weapons was lifting itself, shaking itself from its lethargy, as something stirred within.

Just that buoyant spirit of man which refused to admit defeat? Wing was wondering. Or was despair so deep that I couldn't go any deeper so I have to come up toward hope again?

The rocket car suddenly sloughed to a stop.

"Sorry," Pat said softly, and laughed. There was a note of hysteria in that laugh. "But we're surrounded." The three men peered out through the plastic windshield. The shadow-things were ahead, moving toward them.

But no destruction was spitting from those ghostly figures. For the first time, Curt Wing had a chance to observe closely.

They seemed about the height of a man--but distorted like a man's shadow falling before him as he trudged up a hill with the sun behind. Yet not so distinct. They wavered, too, within themselves, although the outline remained constant.

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