Page:Amazing Stories Volume 15 Number 10.djvu/58

58 masqueraded. They emerged as thin, small creatures whose bodies seemed unsubstantial, and when they touched, there was no contact but a seeming merging of the bodies. They were wraithlike even in their movements, hovering over the ground without limbs, moving like smoke in the empty hall.

Now the six shadowy creatures flitted out of the hall and came into the gloomy out-of-doors. There was not a sound nor was there anything to be seen. It seemed as though a curse hovered in the moist and fetid air.

"Nevertheless, you are wrong," said Lito. "They understood us, and they took our vial. Our story was too convincing, and the element of religion was too powerful for them to fight. They will empty the vial into the sea, and their storehouses will be ours."

Murra sneered again.

"Our mighty science," he laughed thinly. "We should have spent our time conquering the plague that overcame our meat animals. Maybe we could have done something that way."

"No," said Kora-san. "Even in the day of Tallu, our meat animals were dying. There was no way; we had to break through to another world, and our plan was great. We are too shaken by the things we have seen. Our loved ones have starved all around us, and death has clouded our minds. We are the last, but we will survive."

It was dusk. The dark sun was fast falling behind the horizon, and the hot wind that blew from the swamps that were on all sides was scattering the frail bodies of the Quennians.

"Perhaps," said Kora-san, "we should pray. Let us not be ashamed to pray. It comforted the ancients."

"To whom shall we pray?" said Pyteles, angrily.

"To our unknown ancestor," said Kora-san. "He who, in the dark ages past, was the first meat-eater."

The six creatures were silent. At length, Murra said,

"No. If we are to pray, let our prayer be to Tallu. It was he who knew of this other world, and who left us the plan to conquer it. And perhaps we will conquer it, and all its billions of people will form the larder for a new world of Quenna." He paused a moment, then said, "There is nothing to do now but wait. Soon the vial will work, and we will cross the divider to our new world. We must wait."

"Yes," said he who had acted as the High Priest. "Let us wait—"