He cut the charge of the lance down to a minimum. It would be sure to burn through the wood, but enough of the searing energy might be reflected. It was one of the peculiarities of the flame lance beam that it could be reflected from a wooden surface at a low angle of incidence.
The door panel slowly swung the image of Sebours into Roal's line of sight. He raised the lance. But the image was so distorted in the surface that the figure of Alayna mingled and flowed with that of her father. If the warped door forced the deadly energy a fraction of a degree away from its target Alayna would receive the full reflected blast instead of Sebours.
Roal waited. The door moved, then paused. It was not quite far enough—but it was moving back now in the wrong direction. In another instant it would be too late.
Roal jammed himself against the wall to get the best angle of reflection. The images wobbled and flowed on the uneven surface, but there was no time to wait for a better reflection.
He pressed the trigger.
A fury of flame leaped out towards the door and burst against it in a bloom of crimson fire. The charred wood that remained refused to tell Roal of the success or failure of his shot.
There was no sound from the laboratory to tell if the shot had hit or missed—or found the wrong target. Only a sudden great silence.
And in that silence Roal plunged out. He could not endure the waiting in ambush longer. He plunged out upon a scene of disaster—for his enemies. Closely following, Shorty came out blasting with his lance.
But the Martians were too dumb-stricken to fight back. They seemed to have lost all their nerve and some had even dropped their guns to the floor. They all faced the table where disaster had befallen them.
Roal saw at once that his daring shot had been successful. Sebours had fallen across Alayna and now he slumped slowly to the floor. The reflected fire of the lance had not been sufficient to burn through him, but rather had enveloped him in horrible consuming fire. His death had not been pretty and he had died over the bound form of his daughter.