Fatty wasn't listening. He was standing on his toes and staring around eagerly.

"We're seeing what no man has ever seen before us," he said softly. "We're on Mars, do you understand, Paul? The sun—notice how much smaller it looks than on Earth? What wouldn't Professor Fronac give to be in our shoes!"

"He can have mine any time he shows up. And I'll throw in a new pair of soles and heels. Looking at a red desert isn't my idea of a really big time, if you know what I mean. Fails to give me a bang. And where are the Martians?"

"They'll show, Paul, they'll show. They didn't send us forty million miles just to decorate their desert. Hold your horses, feller."

But I didn't have to hold them long. Off at the edge of the horizon, two specks appeared, one in the air and coming fast, and one mooching along the ground.

The speck in the air grew into a green and bulbous mass about the size of the one in Cassowary Cove. It didn't have any wings or jets or any other way of pushing itself along that I could see. It just happened to be flying.

When it reached us, the one on the ground was still far away.

Our new buddy had eyes, too—if that's what they were. Only they weren't black dots floating inside it; they were dark knob-like affairs stuck on the outside. But they felt just the same as the other when it paused on top of our bubble—as if they could undress our minds.

Just a second of this. Then it moved to the box, fiddled with it a moment and the music stopped. The silence sounded wonderful.

When it slid round to the bottom, going down through the sand as if the desert was made of mirage, Fatty handed me a couple of the knives we'd saved and picked out three for himself.

"Stand by," he whispered. "It may come off any minute now."

I didn't make any sarcastic crack about the usefulness of such weapons because I was having trouble breathing. Besides, the knives gave me a little confidence. I couldn't see where we might go if we happened to have a battle with these things and won, but it was nice holding something that could conceivably do damage.

By this time, the guy on the ground had arrived. He was in a one-wheeled car that was filled with wires and gadgets and crackly stuff. We didn't get a good glimpse of him until he stepped out of the car and stood stiffly 

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