and in it we intended to take them to the sea, where we would meet the
girls, who would then fly with them to the Twilight Country. But we could
not figure out how to capture them without alarming the city. We were sure
they were unarmed; they had been carefully searched by the authorities
when they entered the country. But they were ten to our two.

Mercer voiced the problem most emphatically.

"Ten men in a house," he declared. "Maybe we can catch them all asleep.
But even if they are, how are we going to get them out? There'd be a row,
and we don't want any noise. Besides, there's always this confounded
daylight here. If we tied them up somebody might see us when we got
outside. How do we get them out of that house without any rumpus, and down
to that boat? That's what I don't see."

"I--do--that," said Anina suddenly.

She had spoken in English, and we looked at her in amazement. She lisped
the words in her soft, sweet voice, haltingly, like a little child. Then
she turned to Miela and poured out a torrent of her native language.
Mercer stared at her in undisguised admiration.

As Miela explained it, Anina proposed that she go into Tao's house alone,
and decoy his men down to the boat where we could capture them.

"But how will she get them there?" I exclaimed. "What will she tell them?"

"She says she can make them think she is one of those few of our women who
sympathize with their cause," Miela explained. "And she will say that the
earth-man who escaped from them she has seen lurking about their boat;
perhaps he plans to steal it. She will go there with them, and they can
recapture him."

"They might not all go," said Mercer. "We want to get them all."

"It is Anina's thought that they will all go, for they fear this earth-man
much--and all would go to make sure of him."

I could not feel it was right for us to let Anina do so daring a thing,
and Mercer agreed with me heartily. But Anina insisted, with a fire in her
eyes and flushed cheeks that contrasted strangely with her usually gentle
demeanor.

In the end Mercer and I gave in, for we could think of no better plan, and
Miela was confident Anina would not be harmed.

It was about what would correspond with ten o'clock in the evening on
earth when the girls began to arrive. We waited until all fifty of them
had come in. Miela named a place on the shore of the sea known to them
all. They were to take the platform--starting in about two hours, when t