solutely
right. Coming back we would have a cordon of interplanetary police
aboard.

Sir Arthur broke the awkward silence. "Magnificent sight, the moon, from
so close a viewpoint--though I was too much afraid of pressure-sickness
to be up to see it."

* * * * *

I had nearly finished my hasty meal when another incident shocked me.
The two other passengers at our table came in and took their seats. A
Martian girl and man. The girl had the seat at my left, with the man
beside her. All Martians are tall. This girl was about my own
height--that is, six feet, two inches. The man was seven feet or more.
Both wore the Martian outer robe. The girl flung hers back. Her limbs
were encased in pseudo-mail. She looked, as all Martians like to look, a
very warlike Amazon. But she was a pretty girl. She smiled at me with a
keen-eyed, direct gaze.

"Mr. Dean said at breakfast that you were big and handsome. You are."

They were brother and sister, these Martians. Snap introduced them as
Set Miko and Setta Moa.[5]

This Miko was, from our Earth standards, a tremendous, brawny giant. Not
spindly, like most Martians, this fellow, for all his seven feet of
height, was almost heavy-set. He wore a plaited leather jerkin beneath
his robe, and knee pants of leather out of which his lower legs showed
as gray, hairy pillars of strength. He had come into the salon with a
swagger, his sword-ornament clanking.

"A pleasant voyage so far," he said to me as he started his meal. His
voice had the heavy, throaty rasp characteristic of the Martian. He
spoke perfect English--both Martians and Venus people are by heritage
extraordinary linguists. Miko and his sister Moa had a touch of Martian
accent, worn almost away by living for some years in Great-New York.

The shock to me came within a few minutes. Miko, absorbed in attacking
his meal, inadvertently pushed back his robe to bare his forearm. An
instant only, then it dropped again to his wrist. But in that instant I
had seen, upon the gray flesh, a thin sear turned red. A very recent
burn--as though a pencil-ray of heat had caught his arm.

My mind flung back. Only last night in the City Corridor, Snap and I had
been followed by a Martian. I had shot at him with the heat-ray; I
thought I had hit him on the arm. Was this the mysterious Martian who
had followed us from Halsey's office?

CHAPTER V

_Venza the Venus Girl_

It was shortly after that mid-day m