Not able to fire the gun effectively at such close range, he reversed it and created bloody havoc, using the butt as a club. Two skulls cracked sharply under its impact and as he fought, Mike saw Nicko go down. He couldn't reach him. Several warriors raised the iron-toothed clubs they carried and crashed them down upon Nicko's unprotected body. The result would have been comic under less grim circumstances. The clubs of the warriors caused Nicko's almost indestructible hide to ring like a great bell. The handle of one warrior's lethal bludgeon snapped and the attacker stared at it in amazement. The rest beat down again upon the prone Nicko, their clubs bouncing off and resounding in a sort of anvil chorus. The attention of the warriors bent upon annihilating Mike was diverted by the intriguing spectacle of this strange four-armed creature refusing to be clubbed to death. So Mike was able to get in some telling blows that felled three more of the terrible warriors. He knew however, that the end was already written in the bloody sands around him. He could only fight to the last moment, bringing down as many of the enemy as possible. His heart was sick at what would surely be Doree's fate. He saw her just beyond the perimeter of battle still held by her two captors who were viewing the fight with rapt interest. If he could only reach her. One swing of his gun butt and she would serve no vile purpose in the hands of these raiders. [Illustration: The beastman's intent was all too clear.] Mike mowed a bloody path in her direction. He covered more than half the distance before he knew he would never make it. However, the end of this affair was not written in the sands, but in the skies overhead. Mike realized this when the attackers stopped fighting, all eyes turned heavenward in sudden terror. Mike's eyes followed theirs and he saw the ship. * * * * * It was a craft such as he could never have imagined in dream or reverie. A great rectangular platform, its polished sides inlaid with gold and fist-sized gems. There was a high railing around its edge over which myriad faces peered down. Above it, elevated upon shining cables, were two glowing balls not more than two feet in diameter, and even in his preoccupation with more serious matters, Mike realized the whole craft was suspended from these two balls, that they were its means of buoyancy. Then he was in the midst of a disordered flight as the warriors charged screaming back to the forest. The ship was settling swiftly toward the surface of the river and now a crystalline ray of some sort shot out from the forward deck, cutting down the terrorized warriors in their flight. * * * * *