"Oh, my husband," she cried. "Please, I must. Let me take the drug now and grow small--like them. Then will they see we mean them no harm. And I shall tell them we are their friends--and you, the Master, mean only good----" The Big Business Man started forward. "They'll kill her. God, that's----" But the Chemist held them back. "Not now, Lylda," he said gently. "Not now. Don't you see? There's nothing you can do; it's too late now." He met her gaze unyielding. For a moment she stared; then her figure swayed and with a low sob she dropped in a heap upon the sand. As Lylda fell, the Chemist leaped forward, the other three men at his side. A strident cry came up from the swarming multitude, and in an instant hundreds of them were upon her, climbing over her and thrusting their swords into her body. The Chemist and the Big Business Man picked her up and carried her into the water, brushing off the fighting little figures that still clung to her. There they laid her down, her head supported by Eena, who knelt in the water beside her mistress. The multitude on the sand crowded up to the water's edge; hundreds, forced forward by the pressure of those behind, plunged in, swam about, or sank and were rolled back by the surf, lifeless upon the shore. The beach crawled with their struggling forms, only the spot where Lylda had fallen was black and still. "She's all right," said the Doctor after a moment, bending over Lylda. A cry from Oteo made him straighten up quickly. Out over the horizon, towards Orlog, there appeared the dim shape of a gigantic human form, and behind it others, faint and blurred against the stars! CHAPTER XXXIII THE RESCUE OF LOTO The Very Young Man heard the clang of the closing door with sinking heart. The two newcomers, passing close to him and Aura as they stood shrinking up against the wall, joined their friends at the table. The Very Young Man turned to Aura with a solemn face. "Are there any other doors?" he asked. The girl pointed. "One other, there--but see, it, too, is closed." Far across the room the Very Young Man could make out a heavy metal door similar to that through which they had entered. It was closed--he could see that plainly. And to open it--so huge a door that its great golden handle hung nearly a hundred feet above them--was an utter impossibility. The Very Young Man looked at the windows. There were four of them, all on one side of the room--enormous curtained apertures, two hundred feet in length and half as broad--but none came even within fifty feet of the floor. The Very Young Man realized with dismay that there was apparently no way of escape out of the room. "We can't get out, Aura," he said, and in spite of him his voice trembled. "There's no way."