"Evelyn and I can't stay around here, Smithers. The Ragged Men may come back, and it'll be weeks before you and the professor can get another Tube through. I'm going to make for the Golden City and work on them there to cut off the Death Mist." There was an inarticulate sound from Smithers. "Tell the professor. If he can find Jacaro's Tube, he'll work out some way to communicate through it. We've got to stop that Death Mist somehow. And we don't know what else they may try." Smithers tried to speak, and could not. He merely made grief-stricken noises. He worshiped Evelyn and she was isolated in a hostile world which was vastly more unreachable than could be measured by millions or trillions of miles. But at last he said unsteadily: "We'll be comin', Mr. Reames. We'll come, if we have t' blow half the world apart!" Tommy said grimly: "Then hunt up the Golden City and bring extra ammunition. Mostly explosive bullets. Good-by." * * * * * He untwisted the wires from the shattered phone units and thrust them in his pocket. Evelyn was picking up stray small objects from the ground. "I've found some cartridges, Tommy," she said constrainedly, "and a pistol I think will work." "Then listen for visitors," commanded Tommy, "while I look for more." For half in hour he scoured the area around the shattered Tube. He found where some clumsy-wheeled thing had been pushed to a spot near the Tube--undoubtedly the machine which had sprayed the flaming stuff upon it. He found two pockets full of shells. He found an extra magazine, for the sub-machine gun. It was nearly full and only a little bent. That was all. "Now," he said briskly, "we'll start. I've got a hunch the jungle thins out over that way. We'll find a clearing, try to locate the Golden City either by seeing it or by watching for aircraft flying to it, and then make for it. They're making war on Earth there. They don't understand. We've got to make them understand. O. K.?" Evelyn nodded. She put out her hand suddenly, a brave slender figure amid the incredible growths about her. "I'm glad, Tommy," she said slowly, "that if--if anything happens, it will be the--the two of us. Funny, isn't it?" Tommy kissed the twisted little smile from her face. "And now that that's over," he observed, ashamed of his own emotion, "let's go!" * * * * *