Half a block further along, the facade of the New Dyckman held a dim blue glimmer. It slid off the helmets of the two sentries who paced before the entrance, up and down, up and down. I saw Regelin turn past them, casually flipping an answer to their salute. Darkness masked his face as he disappeared inside. I slouched on down Hennepin till I came to the alley tunneling in toward the parking lot at the rear of the hotel. There would be guards here, too. I walked into the courtyard.

  “Halt!” The command rapped out in an indescribable accent. Turning, I saw the two sentries approach me with rifles at the slant. They weren’t very suspicious—what could one wanderer mean? I moved toward them until they stood almost against me, tall black shadows casqued in metal. I made my voice thick, and swayed on my feet.

  “Yeh? Wha’ya wan’? I gotta zheneral’s car. Zheneral tol’ me get ’is car, ’e did—”

  “Go,” said the nearest. It must have been one of his few English words. He took my arm and tried to steer me back out of the alley. “Go.”

  I hit him, then, the edge of my hand full into his larynx. It is a brutal blow when you know how to deliver it. He went down with a sob, clattering to the hard ground. My foot was already behind the ankles of the other, I pushed him and he fell, and my boot crashed against the temples of both. I hope I didn’t kill them.

  Then I had to run. With Martian hearing what it is, there’d be somebody to investigate in seconds—but the two guards would be in no condition to say where I’d gone. It would be assumed a purposeless act of resentment—I hoped!

  Weaving between the cars, I made a jump, caught the fire escape, and swung myself up. I seem to be getting addicted to fire escapes, I thought in a moment of fleeting gallows humor. But I couldn’t run up it, that would have been a public announcement. I had to flow.

  By the time I’d reached the seventh story, there was turmoil underneath me. I waited, fighting the need to gasp air into starved lungs. Soldiers were yelling and flashing lights around. One beam swept me where I lay, and for an instant I awaited the shock of bullets. But I was wearing dark clothes and not moving at all.

  We couldn’t time this. Regelin would almost certainly be in 1847 before I—and what then? I was to be the second wave of the attack, in case one was needed. I lay clawing myself fast to the iron, it was wet with dew under me, and thinking that this was nonsense. If Regelin could get to the door at all, we had succeeded. Alandzu would never suspect a Martian voice calling him, saying it was an urgent message; he’d open the door and find himself looking down a gun barrel— Of course, we might have to fight later on, if help didn’t come in time. I’d be needed then.

  It was forever before the commotion down there began to even out. I crawled up the stairway on hands and knees, hoping that what racket still went on would cover my noise. Eight, nine, ten— Was it ten? Had I lost count? Inside myself, I cursed.

  Seventeen, eighteen. My knees were rubbed raw. I opened the door and stepped into the corridor’s dim length. The room beside me was 1823. So I’d gotten it right after all.

  I padded down the empty hall, letting the numbers slide by. This way, around this corner—yes, a thin sliver of light streaming under the threshold, that must be our door. Regelin was sure to be there now, covering the aliens, maybe wondering what was holding me up.

  I paused. All right, my nerves were drawn nearly to snapping, I was plagued with nightmare fancies, there was no time to lose in melodramatics. Only—why take chances?

  I went on past the door as quietly as I could, turned a couple of corners, and found a fire escape on the east side. It fronted on another blank wall, just across an alley. And there was a ledge running around the hotel building, below the windows: for the washing machines, I supposed. Sticking the gun in my belt, I edged out on the strip, spread-eagling myself, and began working my way along. Oddly, the acrobatics soothed me, I was alone in clean darkness with nothing to fear but my own awkwardness. And a spaceman is necessarily a good tumbler.

  Rounding the corner, I saw the window I was after, shining into night. I shuffled closer until I was against the edge of it; then, craning my neck, I peered briefly in.

  I swear I had only thought Regelin might not have arrived yet. He had to be the one to enter first; they’d be too suspicious of a human voice. But I saw him standing with raised hands, disarmed, four guns aimed at his midriff.

  Four Martians watched him.

  No—four aliens. They must be!

  Somehow they’d gotten the drop on him. Warned? How? I clung there with a thin breeze whimpering under my feet, digging my fingers into the wall. What to do, what to do?

  If I burst in like the U. N. Marines to the rescue and yelled “Hands up!” they’d have time to shoot him and me both; I couldn’t get all of them that fast. For a sick instant I thought of returning to Kit and running with her, running away forever.

  No, the hunt would never stop till we were dead, and that wouldn’t take long. I set my teeth. Drawing the gun, I clicked it to automatic fire. I leaned over, catching the window sill with my left hand, and shot through the pane.

  The noise was like doomsday. I saw them fall, marionettes scythed down without warning, a spurting of ruined flesh and bone. Almost with the same movement, I went through the shattered window myself and sprawled on the floor.

  “Good man!” said Regelin grimly. “They were expecting me when I came in. I never had a chance. Of all the incredibly bad luck— David, Gellert is an alien!”

  There was no time to think of it then, no time to see Kit and Alice alone in the room, with a monster. We had to get away. Regelin must have planned this out while he stood guarded, schemed in the pale hope that I could save him. He flung open the door of the suite’s adjoining room and pointed me to the bed. I dove under it. He himself stood rigid against my side of the door.

  It was only moments before the main entrance was being smashed in. I lay there hearing boots crash on the floor and a howl of Martian voices.

  It was a crowd that jammed inside, an excited crowd. Regelin took a long chance, but the only one. He stepped out again into the larger room, mingling with the swarm. “No one in there,” I think he shouted. “The killer must have gone out the window.” He began to give orders—you three go have all the fire escapes watched, you go call the military police, you pass the word to the main office. The rest of you get out, you’re messing up the trail, I’ll stand guard here.

  Incredibly, it worked. Or maybe not so incredibly. Martians are not that different from us: a murder had been done, the crowd was too feverish to think, and he was a high-ranking officer who seemed to know what he was about. In a couple of minutes, we were alone.

  I crawled from under the bed to find Regelin going through the pockets of Alandzu’s batman. “Here,” he said. “The keys to his car. It ought to be down there in the parking lot.”

  We went out the window and fumbled our way recklessly fast along the ledge until we came to the fire escape above the courtyard. Regelin clattered briskly down it, with me creeping well behind him. A pair of guards at its base challenged him. “No one on this stair,” he must have said. “Here, help me down…Now quick, which is Yoakh Alandzu’s car? He wants me to follow a trail for him.”

  They didn’t realize who had been killed. Time crept past, second by thundering second, while Regelin opened the car and got in and started it. He ordered the guards to watch in the alley mouth and they snapped to it, vanishing into the shadows. He slid the car near the staircase. I dropped down, landing on my toes, and bounced into the front seat and huddled on the floor. The car got smoothly into motion.

  “And now for Kit,” he said tightly. “If she is still in that room.”

  If she is still alive.

  -8-

  It was a wild and desperate chance to take, but we had little to lose. Our minds were reasoning mostly on the subconscious level now, throwing their conclusions into the taut-drawn awareness, and we couldn’t stop to follow out that logic. We had to escape.

  The car slid down the few blocks to the Rocket Haven, past it, around the corner. Its facade was dark, empty. No one in sight, no one had been summoned, unless they waited in ambush. Regelin rounded the block and stopped in front of the hotel. I got out and dashed inside. The lobby was deserted, only vaguely fit, even the clerk had gone to bed. Shadows flowed monstrously around me as I went up the stairs.

  It made sense, I thought somewhere in the thrumming that was my mind. Suppose Gellert was an alien, one who in human form was doing some job for his race—perhaps spying on mankind, or worming his way into our councils, or merely observing. He wouldn’t want to reveal his true nature to the Martians, either. He’d acted coolly and boldly—remaining a helpless prisoner till he learned our plans. Then he must have broken loose, overwhelmed Kit, and phoned Alandzu with a warning. But he’d stay alone with her and the child until members of his own race could arrive to hustle them off. He’d assume that Alandzu and the others, prepared for Regelin and me, could handle us. As they damn near had done!

  I stopped in front of the door. Empty hall, empty house, silence thick around me; but there was light inside the room. The revolver was heavy in my right hand as my left slid the key into the lock. I turned it as softly as I could, threw the door open, and burst in.

  The monster turned and met me with a whistling curse. I barely glimpsed the weapon which one hand swung around. My left closed on that wrist, while my right brought the heavy barrel of my own gun down on the animal snout. The blow shocked back into my muscles and I saw blood. Gellert grunted in pain, shaking that unhuman head, and tried to wrench the alien weapon loose. This time my gun barrel smashed down on the wrist, and at the same time I kneed the creature in the belly. I tore the weapon loose as Gellert lurched back, and brought up my boot, a football kick to the jaw. Gellert fell heavily, twitching and moaning.

  Kit was in my arms, then, sobbing uncontrollably. “He grew thin,” she gasped. “He made himself thin.”

  I looked at the strips with which our prisoner had been bound. Yes—that plastic flesh could almost ooze out of such lashings, hurl itself forward to overwhelm unarmed Kit— Alice was clinging to my legs, weeping. “Daddy, daddy!” I picked her up, kissing the wet terrified little face—what a sight it had been for a child!—and gave her back to her mother.

  A glance at the door— No one stirred out there. Gellert and I had been equally anxious to keep the fight silent. Whatever Martians had heard it must have decided it was none of their business and gone back to sleep. And I— God, I had my alien!

  I kicked the heaving flanks. “Get up,” I said. “Get up or I’ll shoot you here and now.”

  Gellert staggered erect. She—yes, she, in the torn and now ill-fitting pajamas—grabbed at the wall for support. I stuck her own—gun?—in my belt, and gestured with mine. “Let’s go.”

  She moved slowly forward. She was as squat and powerfully built and rubbery-limbed as the male I’d once seen; the wig had fallen off the crested head, and the little pigment-spots which had given her jaws a man’s blueness were absorbed again by the colorless skin, but brows and lashes and body hair, fastened on with infinite skill, still clung. She shambled before me, wiping her bloody muzzle with one seven-fingered hand.

  “Reggy’s got a car outside,” I whispered to Kit. “We’ll get this thing to Yueth like we planned, at his home. After that, he’ll protect us till an inquiry can be made.”

  We went down the stairs again, and out onto the sidewalk—just as a police car drew near. Its probing searchlight dazzled my eyes, wobbled, and held firm. I heard the Martian oath loud in the night. “Kevran yantsu!”

  “Into the car!” I gave Kit a shove that sent her spinning forward with Alice in her arms. Gellert chose that moment to fight, whirling on me and grabbing my gun hand and punching savagely for my face. I launched myself against her, throwing the whole weight of me at her solidity, dropping my gun so I could wrestle.

  A pistol cracked, and another and another. A siren began to shriek. I slugged Gellert toward the car. Kit, in the front seat, opened the back door. I got my hands on Gellert’s throat and lunged. Both of us toppled into the back seat. Regelin got going. I heard a tommy gun start its yammer.

  We fought there in the car, kicking and punching and gouging, while Regelin shot up Seventh. The police beam held us like a long gleaming finger, they roared behind us and their gunner was shooting. I slugged Gellert, hard jolting blows into the rubbery face. A hand was on my throat, clamping shut. I got my teeth on its wrist and bit like a dog.

  Kit knelt in the front seat, reaching over and fumbling at us where we struggled in darkness. Her hands closed on the fleshy crest of the alien and she pulled. Gellert snarled in pain, her head yanked upward. My fist slammed into her throat. She had grown claws and begun raking me.

  We turned the corner on a wheel and a half and roared up Lyndale. Houses were a blur, fleeing past at 200 miles an hour. The car lurched wildly to avoid a collision, jumped up on a lawn, and bounced down into the street again. The police held steady, fifty yards behind. The ether must be crackling with their calls for help.

  One more blow, two, three. Gellert slumped, all at once. I lay there beside her, gasping, darkness whirling in my head.

  Consciousness returned. I crawled into the back seat and sat with my feet on Gellert’s body, my head in my hands. “I’ve got the thing covered,” said Kit. She was holding Regelin’s sidearm, pointing it at the monster.

  The car shook to the bursting of machine-gun explosives on its armor. We couldn’t hold out long, sooner or later one of them would find a vital part. Or a jet would come overhead and strafe us. I forced full awareness back into my spinning brain.

  “If we surrender now—” Regelin’s voice was dim under the roaring of cloven air. “We’ve got the alien here for proof.”

  I felt the writhing under my feet. The searchlight glare, probing in through our canopy, showed the face of Fred Gellert. The wig was gone, yes—but what Martian had ever paid attention to one little man, enough to remember his appearance?

  Kit’s voice was thin and savage. “Change back,” she said. “Change back, damn you, or you get a bullet in the stomach.”

  A hoarse defiance: “Do you think that matters to me?”

  The car drummed and rattled with the slugs.

  I felt the strange gun hard against my belly. “We may have a chance,” I said slowly. “I don’t know what this thing does, but we can try. We’ve got no other weapons that’ll stop that car.”

  Regelin nodded bleakly. “Get ready to shoot, then,” he said. “I’ll let them pull alongside.”

  He slowed our hurtling pace. The police car drew up, long and lean and black. I rolled down the window. The gun was cold and heavy, awkward in my five-fingered hand, but there seemed to be a firing stud. Gellert cursed, trying to sit up. “Don’t,” said Kit.

  They weren’t shooting now, but tommy barrels must be firm on us. I aimed the new gun and pushed the stud.

  There was no noise, no recoil. But suddenly the other car disintegrated. I saw a flash of smoke and steam and fire, the air was full of flying steel. There was only a heap of fragments and burning fuel between the front and rear ends as Regelin got into full speed again.

  We heard the whistling overhead. Looking up, I saw the jet diving. I leaned out the open window, into the ripping wind, and shot again. The jet hailed down on us.

  “Okay.” Kit’s tone was hard. “Let’s go.”

  We had no chance to turn back and try to find Yueth. There was a hornet’s nest behind us by now.

  We had to run. Already we were out in open country. Regelin turned off on the first side road and sent us bulletlike over dirt and gravel, bearing north.

  “I’ll cover our friend, Kit,” I said wearily. Strength had drained from me with our escape. It seemed a thousand years since I had eaten or slept, a million since I had known unfrightened peace. “Give me the revolver.”

  We made Gellert crouch on the floor, in the far corner from me. Kit crawled into the back seat and wiped my face and slashed body, crying. I held her close with one arm while we fled.

  It was dawn by this time. Clouds had piled up, and sunrise was hidden by a veil of rain. That was helpful, and we badly needed help just then. It was an hour or so later that we spotted the abandoned farm.

  There are a lot of them in this north country—weed-grown yards, fields where a thin growth of forest is creeping back, a decayed shack and outbuildings. This one had a fairly good barn, though. We drove in through the sagging doors, stopped, and got out. My legs wobbled under me.

  “Kit, you and Alice may as well sleep in the car,” said Regelin. His tones were dull with exhaustion. “We shall stay here till nightfall.”

  Alice whimpered and huddled against her mother. She was shivering, and Kit brought my hand over to feel her forehead. Hot, and the pulse was high. Kit’s eyes looked at me out of caverns of shadow.

  “Fever,” she said. “What shall we do?”

  “Wait,” I told her. “There’s nothing else for us.”

  “No food, no medicine, no—” She slumped and turned away, carrying the girl in her arms. My face twisted.

  The barn was cold and damp, it smelled moldy. Outside, the rain fell strong and steady, veiling the spruce woods, turning the road into mud. Regelin coughed, more miserable even than I.

  We sat down. Gellert squatted a few feet away, facing us with a blank expression. I held the revolver loose, ready to shoot if need be.

  “Well” said Regelin, “what do we do now?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I just don’t know.”

  The rain drummed loud on the roof. Water dripped in through the holes and runneled along the dirt floor.

  After a while Regelin smiled. “For a cup of zardak, I think I would trade my ancestry,” he said. “If I were also allowed a dish of ruzan, they could have my right arm.”

  “Bacon and eggs, toast and coffee,” I answered.