Both Scotty and Randall watched him half-fearful, half in admiration as he strode away from the cruiser. The luminous, iridescent sphere hovering over the rocks, whirled faster and faster as Dallas moved away from the ship. Rapidly the whirling accelerated until it was a pulsing vortex of exquisite hues of living light. Then, it began to move slowly forward toward the walking man. In the macabre landscape of the planetoid, the rotund Dallas was not unlike a sphere himself, as gun in hand he unhesitatingly went forward to meet the globe. Calmly he aimed the atom-blast and suddenly there was a flash from the muzzle of the gun. But the flood of vicious atomic energy failed to harm the globe, on the contrary, it seemed to flame in a cataract of colors, flaming into living light. Then the fluorescent flare died down to normal again and the sphere stopped, motionless as if it were appraising Dallas. In unfeigned wonder, the blimp-like Dallas Bernan stared at the globe. "A full charge from the blaster, and the damn thing takes it like a drink of milk!" he murmured audibly. Reaching over he picked up a good sized rock and threw it at the sphere. But the rock bounced back as if it had hit an impenetrable wall of energy. The globe was unharmed, it merely hung there quiescent now, as if observing the strange creature from another planet that had suddenly appeared. Another rock followed the first, then another and another, until rocks were flying in every direction as they rebounded from the globe. And Dallas began to laugh! To his matter-of-fact mind, the sphere was merely a bunch of radio-active gas that repelled matter of certain types like the stones he had thrown, and was drawn by organic matter. A bunch of gas! He roared. And the globe was retreating, floating backwards effortlessly, whirling faster and faster, until as Dallas flung a final rock it darted upward and swiftly disappeared down the great valley. As Dallas turned to go back to the cruiser, a flicker of movement caught his eye. Instantly he aimed his atom-blast, but as quickly lowered, and a joyous expression came into his vast face. Clambering down the tumbled rocks and boulders just ahead of the spacer, Captain Brooke and Tom Jeffery were hurrying toward him, the latter carrying the insulated leadite specimen box. "Hiya, Captain! We just laid a ghost. See our pretty company?" Dallas roared with laughter. "Yes, we saw it," Captain Brooke replied. "What was it? Looked like a transparent globe of some sort. Radioactive?" "Naw! Just a bunch of gas!" Dallas explained. "Well, we have another kind of company ... about twenty miles from here," Dennis said grimly. "Get into the ship, we're holding a conference, Dallas." * * * * *