A NIGHT OF HORROR

THE NEWSCASTER'S VOICE came blaring from the sound-grid: "And we have upon good authority the information that the Bolton Flying Cube is almost ready for another trial flight. Dr. Norton Grenfell, when interviewed yesterday, was evasive regarding his plans. But from other sources we learn that at the next Inferior Conjunction of Mercury and Earthwhich occurs in about two weeks now, at which time the two planets will again be at their closest points to each otherwe are informed that this new concept in interplanetary travelthe Flying Cube, will endeavor to reach Mercury"

"Well!" exclaimed Rowena. "They think they know a lot, don't they?"

"Hear him out," I said.

The voice went on: "There is undoubtedly no further menace from Mercury. The marauders from last fall will not come again. Jack Dean and his wife, Rowena Palisse, will of course be upon the Flying Cube when it makes its adventurous flight. Dean and his wife and Guy Palisse and the strange girl named Tama, and her brother Toh, who came last fall from Mercury, are still in seclusion. We have as yet been unable-"

"To locate us," Guy said with a grin. "This fellow has a lordly manner, hasn't he?" I am the Jack Dean whom the newscaster mentioned. This was in March; in August of the previous year the world was startled by an attack of Mercurian invaders upon a girls' summer camp in Maine. Some of the girls were abducted vanished in the night. I met Rowena Palisse then.

She's a very tall girl, with the regal aspect of a Nordic queen. I myself am several inches over six feet. I think our abnormal statures first attracted us to each other.

Rowena's brother, Guy, had tried to get to the Moon ten years ago, an abortive attempt in a moon rocket. He left the Earth, and was not heard from again. It was to Mercury the rocket carried him. He lived there all those ten yearsand last August he came back, a captive with the Mercurian invaders.