Singularly enough, although we stood full in the light, they had not yet seen us.
Suddenly the girl, moved by what impulse I know not, turned her face in our direction. Her eyes fell upon us. She paused abruptly in her playing, and her instrument dropped to the floor. Then she uttered a cry, and with extended arms ran toward us.
But when she was near she stopped abruptly, the glad look fading from her face, and started back with terror-stricken eyes, as if, after all, she had found us not what she expected.
Then for an instant she looked more intently at us, her countenance cleared once more, and, overcome by some strange emotion, her eyes filled with tears, and, drawing a little nearer, she stretched forth her hands to us appealingly.
Meanwhile the Martians had started to their feet. They looked down upon us in astonishment. We were like pygmies to them; like little gnomes which had sprung out of the ground at their feet.
One of the giants seized some kind of a weapon and started forward with a threatening gesture.
The girl sprang to my side and grasped my arm with a cry of fear.
This seemed to throw the Martian into a sudden frenzy, and he raised his arms to strike.
But the disintegrator was in my hand.
My rage was equal to his.