st.
"Wake me up a good fifteen minutes before."

He lay upon the berth. I sat thinking. I came to myself with a
guilty start. I had completely lost myself in my deep preoccupation.
What time was it? I looked at my watch and jumped to the port-hole. It
was full moonlight; the orb had been up for fully half an hour. I
strode over to Throckmartin and shook him by the shoulder.

"Up, quick, man!" I cried. He rose sleepily. His shirt fell open at
the neck and I looked, in amazement, at the white band around his
chest. Even under the electric light it shone softly, as though little
flecks of light were in it.

Throckmartin seemed only half-awake. He looked down at his breast,
saw the glowing cincture, and smiled.

"Yes," he said drowsily, "it's coming--to take me back to Edith!
Well, I'm glad."

"Throckmartin!" I cried. "Wake up! Fight!"

"Fight!" he said. "No use; come after us!"

He went to the port and sleepily drew aside the curtain. The moon
traced a broad path of light straight to the ship. Under its rays the
band around his chest gleamed brighter and brighter; shot forth little
rays; seemed to writhe.

The lights went out in the cabin; evidently also throughout the ship,
for I heard shoutings above.

Throckmartin still stood at the open port. Over his shoulder I saw a
gleaming pillar racing along the moon path toward us. Through the
window cascaded a blinding radiance. It gathered Throckmartin to it,
clothed him in a robe of living opalescence. Light pulsed through and
from him. The cabin filled with murmurings--

A wave of weakness swept over me, buried me in blackness. When
consciousness came back, the lights were again burning brightly.

But of Throckmartin there was no trace!

CHAPTER VI

"The Shining Devil Took Them!"

My colleagues of the Association, and you others who may read this my
narrative, for what I did and did not when full realization returned I
must offer here, briefly as I can, an explanation; a defense--if you
will.

My first act was to spring to the open port. The coma had lasted
hours, for the moon was now low in the west! I ran to the door to
sound the alarm. It resisted under my frantic hands; would not open.
Something fell tinkling to the floor. It was the key and I remembered
then that Throckmartin had turned it before we began our vigil. With
memory a hope died that I had not known was in me, the hope that he
had escaped from the cabin, found refuge elsewhe