"We now find this to be an unworthy situation. We have decided to once again become a prolific race--but in so doing we are going to breed in such a way that our children will retain our keen intellects and the perfect bodies of men from the past. After some thought on the matter, and with an enticing example to help solve the question--" Here he fastened a greedily appreciative eye on Sandra, "--we have decided that we shall draw the mothers of our new race from _your_ period!" Sandra gasped. "But--but you can't do that! They won't want to leave their own age, mate with strangers--" "What," demanded Harg icily, "are the petty desires of barbarians to the Masters of Earth? Yes, my charming aborigine, soon you will have companionship with many women from your own Time. It will be pleasant company for you, I know." He paused. Then, in an expectant tone, "You may express your thanks, if you wish." Sandra was speechless. But the words made a sort of sense to Larry; the kind of sense he did not care for. In a grating voice he demanded, "Thanks? Thanks for what?" The little scientist smiled serenely, arching his brows. "Because now," he answered, "she will not become a subject for the dissecting table. Her life will be spared. Yet an even greater glory is in store for her. She will not be mated to one of the lesser Masters. She will become the first and favored mate of myself, the great Harg-Ofortu!" * * * * * For a moment, a vast and terrible rage shook Larry Wilson. Then it evaporated, dissipated before another emotion. His fists unclenched, the frown that had sprung to his brow disappeared in a network of crinkles, and laughter bellowed from his throat, shook him, exhausted him, doubled him. Sandra laughed, too, hysterically at first, then as completely giving way to amusement as Larry. Harg looked at first one, then the other. He was alternately surprised and startled; then, as the full import of their laughter burst upon him, he became a diminutive phial of wrath. His goitrous eyes flamed with bitterness, his tiny body stiffened, and his hands jerked toward the studs on his harness. His thought, a maelstrom of vitriolic hatred, became a seething hell that stifled the young couple's mirth. "You are amused? That is interesting. Perhaps you will be the less so when you lie upon the table beneath the scalpel, screaming, pleading for the boon of death I can give or withhold!" Harg's mouth was twisting with venom. "When that moment comes, O fool, remember that as your life ebbs new life will spring within this woman--Well, what is it?" He turned and shot the final query to the pair of guards who had appeared in the doorway. The foremost stepped forward, dragging into view a pair of manacled Underlings. "We found these two rebels skulking about the laboratory, Master. We brought them that you might put them to the question."