McFeen's eyes followed the gesture. For an unbeatable moment he looked squarely at the thing in the corner of the cage. His heart gave a horrible lurch, like a horse trying to unseat the rider on its back. "It's nothing," he said desperately. "Nothing, nothing! Just a shadow. The bulkhead's casting it."
"Was the shadow here when you were in the hold before?"
"I don't know. Yes, of course it was. It must have been."
Alice stood quite motionless for an instant. Her elbows were pressed to her sides, her hands against her chest, in the feminine posture of resistance and defense. "Turn the floodlights on, Mac," she said.
The lights snapped on. The hold was illuminated from all sides. It was an illumination as shadowless as that of an operating theater, as bright as the noon of a terrestrial day. The shadow in the corner of the Hyra cage was quite unaffected by it.
Alice drew a long, quavering sigh. She put both her hands on McFeen's forearm; he could feel her trembling. "Mac, honey," she said very softly, "you know such a lot, you're so smart. Won't you tell me where the shadow's coming from? Won't you please tell me what's making it?"
McFeen looked at her. His eyes were wild. "I don't know!" he said in a high, breaking voice. "I tell you, I don't know! Stop asking me questions! Stop badgering me! I'm getting out of here!" He pulled against her for a moment. Then he tore loose and ran.
"Mac, honey," Alice said when they were back in the cabin once more with the hold sealed behind them, "I think I know what that thing in the cage is." She spoke with surprising calmness. Though she was trembling a good deal she had, all things considered, come out of the hold in better condition than McFeen had.
"There's nothing in the cage," McFeen answered, shuddering. He uncapped a phlomis bottle and drank from it. Drops of the liquor were running down his chin. "There's nothing in the cage."