s were torn apart for a space to let through a clear
golden light. The great lantern of Earth was flashing down through space
to light a grassy opening in a jungle of another world, where, stark and
rigid, a girl was walking toward the shadow-world beyond, while before
her went a black shape, huge and powerful, in whose head were eyes like
burning lights, and whose arms were rigidly extended as if to draw the
stricken girl on and on.

The running figure overtook them. Chet saw him checked in mid-spring,
and Harkness, too, stood rigid as if carved from stone, then followed as
did Diane, where the ape-thing led.... From the far side of the
clearing, where Schwartzmann's men had gone, came a great shout of
laughter that jarred Chet from the stupor that bound him.

"The messenger!" he said aloud. "God help them; it's the messenger--and
he's taking them to the pyramid!"

Then the torn clouds closed that the greater darkness might cover those
who vanished in the shadowed fringe of a stormy, wind-whipped jungle....

CHAPTER XX

_On to the Pyramid_

It was like Walt Harkness to rush impetuously after where Diane was
being drawn away; but who, under the same circumstances, would have done
otherwise? Yet it was like Chet, too, to keep a sane and level head, to
check the first wild impulse to dash to their rescue, to realize that he
would be throwing himself away by doing it and helping them not at all.
It was like Chet to stop and think when thinking was desperately needed,
though what it would lead to he could not have told. There were many
factors that entered into his calculations.

Half-consciously he had walked to the barricade that he might stare into
the blackness beyond. The worst of the storm had passed, and the strong
Earth-light forced its way through the thinning clouds in a cold, gray
glow. It served to show the great gateway to the jungle, empty and
black, until Chet saw more of the man-beasts he had called messengers.

A file of them, stolid, woodenly walking--he could not fail to know them
from the ape-men of the tribe. And they moved through the darkness
toward the sounds of shouts and laughter.

Chet saw them when they returned; following them were three others.
Schwartzmann was not one of them; but the pilot, Max, Chet could
distinguish plainly; the other two, he was sure, were the men of
Schwartzmann's crew.

And, for each of them, all laughter and shouted jests had escaped. They
moved like