years old and that he has at
least two thousand more ahead of him. That Lodore must be a queer
world," he commented, shaking his grizzly head.

"It is not so queer when you take everything into consideration," said
Steinholt. "It seems quite natural when Teuxical explains it. Lodore it
seems, is something like a hundred thousand times as big as this
miniature world we live on. It took Lodore infinitely longer to solidify
from a gaseous state than it took this world, and its entire evolution
has been relatively slower than ours. Therefore, according to Teuxical,
the people up there live longer and, incidentally, know infinitely more
than we do."

* * * * *

"What time is it now?" asked Dirk, after a moment of thought.

"It is just about twelve o'clock at night," Steinholt informed him.

"Have these Lodorians made any demands yet?" Dirk asked. "Does anybody
know what they are going to do or what they want?"

"They are liable to do almost anything," said Lazarre, "and it looks as
though they will be able to get anything that they want. Teuxical, as I
understand it, just gave you a slight shock with his death-ray device.
If he had pulled the trigger all the way you would have become just a
little pile of dust that the first breeze would have blown away."

"Our own death-rays are somewhat similar," said Steinholt, "but they are
not a hundredth as powerful. And they won't work on the Lodorians,
either," he added, "because those metal sheaths that they wear make them
immune to all kinds of destructive rays."

* * * * *

"It appears," remarked Lazarre morosely, "as if this little world of
ours is going to be taken for a ride. And it's too bad, considering that
it's the only world we've got. There has been no formal presentation of
demands yet, but it seems to be sort of understood that the earth is
going to become a tributary of Lodore. It is a good thing," he added,
"that Teuxical, and not Zitlan, is the boss of that outfit. I don't like
the looks of that young fellow. He's only twelve hundred years old and
he is sort of hot-blooded, I guess."

"I was talking with Anteucan," said Steinholt, "and he told me that the
Lodorians usually make heavy levies on worlds which they discover and
dominate. As soon as Teuxical returns to Lodore and announces a new
discovery a fleet of those damned monsters is sent out to mop up the new
planet. That Malfero, who is the