Tragor spoke tonelessly, as if the tumult within him had risen to such unprecedented heights that its ebbing had left him exhausted. "Take her to my sleeping compartment. I am quite sure that she will go willingly." He looked at the woman as he spoke, and was not too surprised when she nodded. She at least had the good sense to realize that further struggle would be useless. "If you harm her in any way I will kill you," Tragor said, surprised and shocked by the explosive violence which gave his words so much added weight that the warrior-caste brute paled and stared with alarm in his eyes at the slumped form at the end of the passageway. From the slain warrior's dart-pierced skull a thin ribbon of blood was descending to the deck and spreading out in a widening pool which gleamed in the overhead lamps. "I warn you," the slender woman said. "If you touch me again I will find a way to kill myself." She turned then and followed the waiting warrior down the passageway to where it turned sharply to the right. FOUR The landscape beneath the Martian mother ship was changing rapidly now, but no Martian eyes watched a lake sweep into view and the dwarfed evergreens surrender their sovereignty to a forest of tall, straight pines, their boles dark against the pale, blue-gray sky. A speedboat came suddenly into view from behind a mile-wide island densely overgrown with scrub oak and hemlocks, and headed northward, throwing up a curtain of silvery spray that slowly blended with the haze that hung over the southern part of the lake. The observation compartment was deserted and only the tele-communication screen opposite the view-glass glimmered with light and movement. The light was very bright, the movements of absorbing interest to Martian eyes on every ship that had tuned in on that particular broadcast. Twenty-two Martian ships had tuned in. On the screen a man was fitting a key into a lock in the hallway of a building in New York City. The man was an artist and every Martian watcher knew that the man's name was David Loring. They knew that he was about to walk into the apartment and change the entire pattern of his life. And that change would be a small but vital part of a larger change--the Martian pattern for world conquest. It was all a part of the Great Plan. And every Martian knew exactly what that plan would do to the man even if he failed to behave as he was expected to behave. Even if he failed. He was in deadly danger, but he did not know that and it was not important that he should know. Nothing but the Great Plan itself was important. It was a plan tremendous in scope, unbelievable in its daring.