awson let her go. She seemed hardly looking where she went; her eyes were downcast. She moved slowly around the sheltering rock and on toward the level ground and the rushing winds of the shaft.
His own thoughts were in a whirl, too confused with emotion for clear thinking. "A symbol of love!" And back there in that cave world she had pressed her lips to his hand. Then they had come here, and he had been transformed to a god, a being who could never have more than an impersonal affection for one as humble as she.
The rising flood of happiness within him was abruptly frozen, changed to something which filled his veins with ice. For, from beyond the crystal barrier that hid Loah from his view, her voice had come in one single cry of terror. Then, "Dean!" she called. "Dean San!" But by then, Rawson was throwing himself madly around the barricade of rocks.
Like a sensitized plate when the camera's shutter is opened a merest fraction of a second, Rawson's brain took the imprint of every detail that was there. The black mouth of the shaft, and, on the rock beside it, something metallic, brilliantly gleaming—a flame-thrower! Beyond the pit was Loah, half crouching, her slim body tense as if checked in mid-flight. She had been running toward him, coming to warn him. And between her and the shaft, his back turned squarely toward Rawson, was the hideous figure of a mole-man, one of the Reds! His grotesque, pointed head was bent forward toward the girl; his arms were reaching, the long fingers like talons.
awson did not know when he called the girl's name. But he knew the instant that he had done it and he knew it was a mistake. He should have crept quietly, seized the weapon—and now his feet tore madly on the white rock floor as he raced toward the shining implement of death. From beyond, the red figure, whirling at his call, leaped wildly for the same prize.
The taloned hands were on the flame-thrower first. Rawson saw the red body straighten, saw the weapon swing, glistening in air, swinging over and down. From its tip green fire made a straight line of light.