A few moments, and fromen sources came the details. Professor Vanderstuyft had arrived from Xenephrene! With his daughter, and Daniel Cain, Frederick Smith--and a young man, a Xenephrene friendly to earth--named Kean. They had weapons with them with which to fight this invader! They were no more than fifty miles from Miami, and were being rushed to the conference by a government Arctic A. * * * * * We were crouching over the floor of our hovering globe, gazing down at the shadowy outlines of the Florida coast. The twilight of August 7 deepened into night. No searchlight beam showed. We waited. We did not see father's globe come down: I did not know anything about it until afterward. The hours passed. "They will yield," said Graff confidently. "They postpone now the humiliating hour. But before the dawn we will see their searchlight beam. It will waver, tremble--jus' as in their own hearts they are wavering and trembling." And Zetta and I thought so, too. The short night passed; the twilight of dawn began showing. And then the white beam from down there sprang up. It stood vertical. Motionless! For a moment we stared at it, almost unbelieving. Moisture clouded my sight of it; my brave world, firmly shining its defiance! Graff sprang to his feet. "Why! Incredible! They have not yielded?" Anger contorted his face--chagrin was in his voice. I think he felt the chagrin more strongly from Zetta's presence. "So they will not yield? The worse for them! You shall see now the Red Control, Peter!" "No!" burst out Zetta. "You mus' not do that, Graff!" His laugh was grim. "You shall see! The Red Control--I will loose it now upon them!" CHAPTER XIX RED MADNESS STALKING THE EARTH Days of grim activity in Graff's camp followed. I think Graff had no intimation of the reason for the earth's defiance; he seemed to feel that our governments were fool-hardy, stupid--stubborn beyond the point of human reason. He had been in a towering rage, but that passed. He moved about his tasks now with a cool, careful efficiency. But I could see a certain almost awed grimness about him for the diabolical nature of this thing he was doing. His mood was reflected in all his men. And they changed toward me. Never more than contemptuously tolerant, they were now openly hostile. Gibing at me, the earthman. I was passing one morning down the line of flimsy houses which was the main street of the camp. A woman leaped from a doorway and struck me in the face. My guard was at hand. Graff never let me move anywhere without an armed man to watch me. He said to protect me, especially from the giant insects which lurked about the camp, and which, in truth, I always feared; but I knew Graff's motive was to watch that I did not try to escape. The woman struck and reviled me until my guard pulled her away.