_Let's go back again. Don't hurry. We've all the time in the world. Go back to the footsteps you heard behind you._ Almost heard. And then I black and cold. Heavy. Flat. Face heavy against helmet, cold. Lying down. Must get up, must get up, danger. Far away. Can't. MacDonald is screaming. Let the lift alone, what are you doing, Hyrst? Hyrst! Shut up, you greedy little man, and listen. You're not Hyrst--who are you? That doesn't matter. I know, you're from Bellaver. Bellaver sent you to steal the Titanite. Well, you won't get it. It's where nobody will ever get it unless I show them how. Good. That's good, MacDonald. That's what I wanted to know. You see, _we_ don't need the Titanite. MacDonald screams again and the lift goes down with a roar and a rattle of severed chain. Heavy footsteps, shaking the floor by my head. Someone turns me over, speaks to me, bending close. Light is gray and strange. I try to rouse. I can't. The man is satisfied. He drops me and goes away, but I have seen his face inside his helmet. I hear him working on some metal thing with a tool. He is whistling a little under his breath. MacDonald is not screaming now. From time to time he whimpers. But I have seen the killer's face. I have seen his face. I have seen-- _Take it easy, Hyrst. Take your time._ Elena is dead, and this is Christina bending over me. I have seen the killer's face. It is the face of Vernon. CHAPTER VII There was Christina, and there was Shearing, and there were two more he did not know, leaning over him. The drug was wearing off a little, and Hyrst could see them more clearly, see the bitter disappointment in their eyes. "Is that all?" Christina said. "Are you sure? Go back again--" They took him back again, and it was the same. "That's all MacDonald said? Then we're no closer to the Titanite than we were before." Hyrst was not interested in the Titanite. "Vernon," he said. Something red and wild rose up in him, and he tried to tear away the straps that held him. "Vernon. I'll get him--" "Later, Hyrst," said Shearing, and sighed. "Lie still a bit. He's on Bellaver's yacht, remember? Quite out of reach. Now think. MacDonald said, You won't get it, it's where nobody will ever get it--" "What's the use?" said Christina, turning away. "It was a faint hope anyway. Dying men don't draw obliging maps for you." She sat down on the edge of a bunk and put her head in her hands. "We might as well give up. You know that." One of the two Lazarites who had done the latent probe on Hyrst said with hollow hopefulness, "Perhaps if we let him rest a while and then go over it again--" "Let me up out of here," said Hyrst, still groggy with the drug. "I want Vernon." "I'll help you get him," said Shearing, "if you'll tell me what MacDonald meant when he said _nobody will ever get it unless I show them how_." "How the devil do I know?" Hyrst tugged at the straps, raging. "Let me up."