"Poor devils!" Haller muttered. "But," ... he thought of their savage captors, of Fay, and his face hardened ... "maybe they were lucky! Nineteen-ninety-four! That'd be before Orth's forefathers, before the _Transvalia_! No wonder it's been completely covered by meteors!" Barger, poking about the cabin, suddenly gave a grunt, came up with two L-shaped black objects. "Guns!" he exclaimed. "Old-time lead-throwers! But they'd be better than nothing!" Rather curiously Haller examined the weapons. Scraping dried oil from the mechanism, he thrust one into his belt. "May help," he murmured. "If we ever get out of here. Maybe if there's any fuel left, we may blast our way through to one of the caves." Haller moved to the rear of the ship, studied the rusty engines. The fuel tanks were empty, every drop apparently having been used in a vain effort to break the magnetic grip. "Nothing here," he muttered. "Dead end. Might as well go back and try these lead throwers on our guards when ... and if ... they open the top of that tank. Unless ..." Suddenly Haller broke off, leaning forward, face intent. Very dimly, far away, the sound of hoarse, shouting voices was audible! "Orth and his gang!" Barger muttered. "But it's not coming from the passage we made! Seems to be in that direction!" He motioned toward the rubble behind the ancient ship. "We're near one of their caves!" Haller leaped toward the rear rocket tubes, forced open a massive breech-block. "Come on!" Into the big exhaust tube he dove, crawling through it as though it had been a drain pipe. "Take the rocks as I pass them back," he ordered. Then, chuckling grimly, "Makes you feel like Dante's tunneling under the Chateau D'If. Here comes a big one!" He shoved a chunk of meteor back along the tube. The heap of stones in the old engine room had grown large when Haller saw the light ahead. A pale trickle of illumination, it filtered through the loose rocks. Haller wormed his way nearer, peered through the opening ... and his face went gray. * * * * *