Page:Amazing Stories Volume 15 Number 12.djvu/32

32 reached us. The gas was insurance against that possibility."

The dining hall was on the roof, a sort of summer-house completely enclosed by glass and heated by bowls of red crystals set about on stands. No flames or smoke came from the crystals, but they gave off plenty of warmth.

The Ionians stood up as they approached. Dane was introduced to twenty people who occupied chairs about the table. Half of the men possessed translucent skin like Kris', and Dane wondered still more about it. Only two of the men impressed him deeply at that first meeting.

Nile Vanz, warlord of Io, was a brawny, deep-chested man who wore a military man's stripes and a hero's scars. His jaw was square and undershot; his cheeckbones high; his small, black eyes deep-set. A puckered white scar crossed his chin at a 45-degree angle. Yet, that weird translucency gave him a look of softness that Dane knew was not there. He had one question to ask Dane when they were introduced:

"What kind of fighters are these Americans?"

"Excellent," Dane told him. "Perfect physical specimens, intelligent, bred to savagery."

"But their battle manners?"

"The best. They're trained from childhood. Every man is a tactician. He'd sooner die than break a rule in the book. But since they are completely devoid of initiative, this is taken for granted."

Nile Vanz' right eye twitched.

"Fine!" he rumbled the word in a bass voice that came from the bottom of his chest. "Then we'll defeat them easily! Our attack will be so different from anything they've ever seen that their own tactics will cause their downfall."

HE other man Dane especially noticed was Tolek Serj. Serj was Margo's father. "Guardian of the Intensifier," was his title; the Intensifier, Dane found out, was the bronze bowl. He found out, too, that the title was purely honorary, and that all Serj really understood was Ionian wines. He was a pouter-pigeon of a man, weighed down by medals and dressed to kill. No one took him seriously except Tolek Serj. But Dane read genuine value in his character, and instinctively liked the little man.

Midway in the meal there was a commotion down in the street. The whole party rushed to the balustrade and looked down. Dane's eyes went wide at what he saw. A mob of at least fifty was attempting to storm the door of the rulers' house!

Guards' kept them at bay with short rifles. Their Ionian shouts rang unfamiliarly on Dane's ears. The crowd surged restlessly, on the point of rushing the police. Then Margo threw the window open and her voice rang out over them.

Not a word of what was said was intelligible to Dane. A member of the mob shouted back at her, and Margo replied curtly. Dane got a chilling insight into the trouble when his father muttered:

"Third time in a week! We can't put them off much longer!"

"What does it mean?" Dane demanded.

"Unless we can show them some action mighty soon—it means revolution!" jerked the elderly Earthman.

Margo turned abruptly from the window. Her delicate features, nipped by the cold, were flushed. To Sam Cabot she said hurriedly:

"They promise a revolution unless we leave for Earth tomorrow! Another section has been buried by falling rocks.