"It's the freighter Dekorus," he shouted. "They're two days ahead of the others. Were on their way to Callisto when they got our distress helio from the Tellus. Couldn't reply. Their sender was out of order. They'll be here any time." "For God's sake, stop that ship!" Norman screamed. "They'll get here just as that stuff blows...." "I'm trying. They don't acknowledge my signals." Like a racing moon, the wreck of the Tellus shot below the horizon. It seemed much closer than before. "_Calling Dekorus. Why don't you answer, Dekorus? Calling Dekorus...._" Two hours later, a solitary figure stumbled into the group around the helio. The instrument was silent. Men sat or crouched in stolid hopelessness. They had just pronounced sentence of death on themselves. "We got through," Norman told Harald. "They aren't coming. Where's Merrill?" Harald staggered and would have fallen, but Norman gripped him roughly. "Merrill's dead," he said. A glaze of horror went over his face. "We found the ship. It was the one all right--his father's--the charting expedition. There was nothing in it--no bodies, nothing. We looked around. There was a hole there, a sort of shaft. It led down at a steep angle. A rough sort of ladder had been hacked into the rock, niches and pegs. We had a time getting down, but Merrill thought we might find something. He said he wanted to know before he died. "We went down and down. And at the bottom was a door. It was a wooden door, of some wood I don't know, black and shiny with pinpoints of color here and there. And it was _carved_. "While we stood there, it began to swing open. Slowly open. I was scared, frankly and honestly scared, but not Merrill. He strode up to it, shoved it open the rest of the way and went inside. I tried to follow, but my feet refused to move. I was rooted to the spot. I couldn't go in and I couldn't leave. It seemed hours. Then he came out. He came out running. "I caught up with him and tried to hold him, but he struck at me and tried to kill me. When I looked in his eyes, I saw why. He was mad. Stark, raving mad. He broke away and ran to the foot of the stairs. But he didn't try to climb. He just kept banging his helmet face-plate on one of those rock pegs till it smashed. Have you ever seen a man smash his face plate in space? The horror of eyes squeezed out, flesh bursting to bloody pulp from the pressure of liquid blood inside, then in a second frozen steel-hard from the cold. It makes you all sick inside and you dream about it the rest of your life. But that wasn't the worst. "I got curious about what he'd seen back there. I went back to have a look at it myself. The door was closed, but I pushed on it and it opened.... "One look was enough for me. I wish I could tell you what it was, but there aren't any words. Have you ever seen anything that made you want to die? I did. I took my look, then I got back here as fast as I could."