"Venta. I was a prisoner--and now I have to tell someone of importance here on Earth. I did escape when I was brought here by Curtmann." She babbled it out, breathless, terrified. "I did not know what to do, he is so bad to my people--to the Midge--to all of us. And I--I do not love him. I am afraid of him. In Shan he rules--and my family now are all in the great Forest City. And Curtmann will capture that too." Blankly Jim and I exchanged glances. And suddenly with a muttered oath, Jim gasped, "My God, Art! Look at that--thing! There--behind you!" I whirled. But whatever he had seen, or thought he saw, was gone. "Behind me? What?" "Why--why--" Jim could only gasp. The girl was staring at us blankly. Jim was stupified into incoherency. "Why--why--a little thing--it ran--" And then he raised his left wrist with another muttered gasp. "What in the devil?" I demanded. "Are you crazy too?" "Electro-eavesdropper on us! Look--" An eavesdropper detector was on his wrist, connected with his watch. Part of his S.S. equipment and he always wore it. The underplate was glowing now, its warmth against his flesh attracting his attention. An eavesdropper being used against us! I knew it was illegal for anyone but a Federal Man to have one; but criminals had them, and most of the other S.S. devices and weapons, of course. Some criminal was near here, listening to us now! "Someone not far away!" Jim gasped. "Look at that dial!" His little detector-needle was swaying violently, in the range of one to two hundred feet. Then it swung back to normal as the ray evidently was shut off. I snatched out my flash-gun. Jim and I crouched with the numbed, terrified girl between us. "Oh--" she muttered. "They have come, and they will kill us." "There it is again!" Jim's hand gripped my arm. "My God--that little thing!" * * * * * The purple shadows of night were deepening in the forest now. But in the gloom I saw it. On the bole of a tree no more than six or eight feet from us a tiny figure stood peering at us. The glistening, brown-bronze figure of a man; a broad-shouldered, stocky little figure no more than a foot high! I had an instant glimpse of a powerfully-muscled body, a tiny hairless round head, then the creature leaped to the ground, recovered its balance and ran. In another second it was lost in the gloom. The girl too, had seen it. "A Midge! Here? Why--then Curtmann's men are here, too!" She stopped abruptly. From the leafy darkness something hurtled into a tree beside us. There was the faint tinkling of fragile glass, then a sickening sweet smell assailed us, and sticky liquid splattered on us. "Anesthesia-bomb!" Jim gasped. "Get away from here--grab the girl!"