I did not press it. I was wondering if the shell of this huge globe would let me through. Could I clutch Bee and will myself away into the void? Could I not thus escape Brutar.... My thoughts must have reached him. He said sharply, "If you regard the welfare of your mind, Rob, you will not attempt to wander." His tone changed to a menacing contempt. "I can strike that sickly mind of yours from your body in an instant. Have a care!" I fancied I caught a warning glance from Eo. Bee gave a low half-suppressed cry of fear. I smiled at Brutar. "You are too suspicious," I said. "If we are to be friends you go about it badly." He did not answer that, and I added, "You said you would tell us how you discovered our Earth-realm. It must have seemed an extraordinary discovery." His vanity was easily touched. He smiled again. "Yes, I will tell you. And show you. It is no secret--that leader Thone of the Big-City knows it.... So I do not mind showing you." CHAPTER XIII THE LOLOS FLOWER We stepped back from the wall. Brutar led us onward through the twilight. We passed globes translucent with light from within; heard the hum and hiss of work going on--but Brutar would not let us enter. We passed a dark bowl of enormous size, like a great globe cut in half. We encircled its rim. I stared down into darkness; grey shapes of inert things were ranged there--things which had been manufactured of the thought-substance, I surmised. But Brutar would not say. We skirted the misty lake. It seemed a blanket of fog lying there. Within me, at the sight, a vague pang stirred. A desire--unpleasant in its suggestion of a needed gratification; and with it a premonition of coming pleasure. I was puzzled. There was no instinct to guide me; or if there was, my puzzled reason subverted it. I described my feeling to Eo. "It seems physical," I said. "I had forgotten my body--but there seems a pang there." "Thirst," he said readily. The word he used, gave me the thought of thirst. And this was water, or its equivalent. I knelt beside the white layers of mist. Did I inhale it, or drink it? I have no means of knowing; but I know that the pang left me, and that the experience was vaguely pleasant.