"We can't let him go!" Allen repeated. "You can't expect us to risk murder!" "There'll be plenty of that before this winter's over!" "Our lives depend on this food, you know that," Tucker said desperately to Ken. "You take your share, and we'll all be in this together. Then we know we'll be safe." Ken considered, his panic increasing. To refuse might mean his life. If he could pretend to fall in with them.... "You can't trust him!" Allen raged. "No one is going to be in on this except us." Suddenly the lawyer stepped near, his hand raised high in the air. Before Ken sensed his intention, a heavy club smashed against his head. His body fell in a crumpled heap on the sidewalk. * * * * * It was after 2 a.m. when Professor Maddox awoke with the sensation that something was vaguely wrong. He sat up in bed and looked out the window at the starlit sky. He remembered he had left Ken at the university and had not yet heard him come in. Quietly he arose from the bed and tiptoed along the hallway to Ken's room. He used the beam of a precious flashlight for a moment to scan the undisturbed bed. Panic started inside him and was fought down. Probably Ken had found something interesting to keep him from noticing the alarm clock on a shelf in the laboratory. Perhaps someone had even forgotten to wind the clock and it had run down. Perhaps, even, the bearings of its balance wheel had finally become frozen and had brought it to a stop! Mrs. Maddox was behind him as he turned from the door. "What's wrong?" she asked. He flashed the light on the bed again. "I'd better go up to the laboratory and have a look," he said. Ken's mother nodded. She sensed her husband's worry, and wanted not to add to it. "Take Ken's bicycle," she said. "It will be quicker, even if you have to walk it uphill. I'll have some hot chocolate for you when you come back." Professor Maddox dressed hurriedly and took the bicycle from the garage. He did have to wheel it most of the way up the hill, but it would be easier coming down anyway, he thought. He wondered how much longer the bearings in it would hold up without freezing. As he came within view of the laboratory building he saw that the windows were utterly dark. He knew that even with the shades down he would have been able to see some glow of the oil lamps which they used, provided Ken were still there. He waited a full 10 minutes against the chance that Ken had put out the lamps and was on his way out. Then he knew Ken had gone long ago. He ought to call the Sheriff and have the police cars search for him, but there were no phones and no cars. He mounted the bicycle in fresh panic and rode recklessly down the hill to town. At Sheriff Johnson's house he pounded frantically on the door until the Sheriff shouted angrily through an open window, "Who is it?"