"Don't waste your breath," Stuart said. "This is Asgard." Whoever the girl was, she should know the impossibility of leaving the taboo world. "If I can find a rope--" She said quickly, "You won't find one. Not here, in the temple." "How can I get you out of there? And the others?" "You're mad," the girl said. "What good would it do...." She shook her head. "Better to die at once." Stuart narrowed his eyes at the dozen frozen figures. "I don't think so. Fourteen of us can put up a better fight than one. If your friends wake up--" The girl said, "On your left, between the pillars, there's a tapestry showing Perseus and the Gorgon. Touch the helm of Perseus and the hand of Andromeda. Then go carefully--there may be traps." "What is it?" "It will lead you down here. You can free us. If you hurry--oh, but it's hopeless! The Aesir--" "Damn the Aesir," Stuart snarled. "Wake up the others!" He whirled and ran toward the distant wall, where he could see the Perseus tapestry, brown and gold, a huge curtain between two columns. If the Aesir saw, they made no move.... Stuart's lips twisted in a bitter smile. The crazy confidence had not left him, but he was conscious of a reassuring warmth; at least he was no longer completely alone. That would help. Between the worlds, and on the desolate planets that swing along the edge of the System, loneliness is the lurking terror, more horrible than the most exotic monster ever spawned by the radioactive Plutonian earth. He touched the tapestry twice; it swept away from him, and a staircase was visible, leading down through stone or metal--he could not tell which. Stuart fought back the impulse that urged him to race down those curving spiral steps. The girl had spoken of traps. He went warily, testing each tread before he put his weight upon it. Though he did not think that the snares of the Aesir would be so simple. At the bottom, he emerged into a vaulted chamber, tiny by comparison with the one he had left. It was oval, domed ceiling and walls and floor shining with a milky radiance--except at one spot. There he saw a door--transparent. Through it he looked into the pit. He was on a level with the floor of that shaft now; he could see the dozen figures still standing motionless in a huddled group, and a few feet beyond the glassy pane was the Earthgirl. She was looking directly at him, but her dark eyes had a blind seeking, as though the door was opaque from her side. Stuart paused, his hand on the complicated mechanism that, he guessed, would open the portal. His hard, dark face was impassive, but he was conscious of an unfamiliar stirring deep within him. From above, he had not seen the girl's beauty. He saw it now. * * * * *