Then Prokle saw it. The missing life-boat, lying quite still there below, like a tiny silver bug with its nose smashed. And that disseminated whatever slight doubt they may have had. "What now?" Prokle whispered. "We've got to go down!" Garth said hoarsely. "Nothing else. This side doesn't seem so steep; if we get to a point where we can see him, we'll talk to him." "Can't do that, unless he's got a phone, too!" "We'll see about that when we have to. Keep looking down there a while, let your eyes get used to it." Presently, Garth first, they began the descent. It was slow and ticklish work, but now they could dimly see their way enough to proceed in safety. Garth followed a little gully which at times was only arm's width. For perhaps two hundred feet they descended; then Garth stopped so suddenly that Prokle bumped into him and nearly lost balance. "What is it?" Prokle forged carefully forward. Garth merely pointed. They had come nearer to the bottom than they supposed. They now stood upon a narrow ledge scarcely forty feet above the sharp little valley. And below the edge of their protecting ledge they saw a light. That was not surprising. It was half expected. But the light wasn't a signal-flare, it was a crude, open bonfire. "Well, Hype, you were right about that, too!" Prokle murmured. "That means there's air of some kind down here." Hype nodded, and pointed to another ledge perhaps twenty feet below them, and to the right. Carefully they negotiated to it. Again they peered below. * * * * * Then, for the first time, they saw the man, but only a silhouette. Really a smallish figure, but looming up large beside the flickering fire. He stood quite still, one hand at his hip grasping a ray-pistol, peering up at the opposite precipice edge; the edge where he had fired at Prokle. Very still he stood and very still the two men above him watched. Then the figure turned, still very cautious, toward the fire. He bent and threw several handfuls of something on the blaze. It immediately leaped high, illumining the rocky terrain for a hundred feet around. The two men crouched back, but the light did not quite touch the ledge where they stood. His hand still by his hip, the tiny figure turned in a complete circle and surveyed the line of cliffs above him. Then, still peering around, he huddled miserably by the fire, seeking warmth. But that brief glimpse was enough. Both men had recognized the grotesque figure below. And it was Prokle who pronounced the name first, in a hoarse whisper: "Chiswell! J. P. Chiswell, president of EMV Lines! Of all men to survive in this hellish place, it had to be him."