large stone. The engine stopped. Wildly I tried to start
it again. There was a whine, then another. And then the ignition key only
clicked meaninglessly, again and again. Suddenly I was bathed in yellow light
and I screamed. It hovered over me. I fled from the car, into the darkness.
The light moved about, but it did not catch me again.
I reached the trees.
In the trees, terrified, I saw the dark disklike shape hover over the Maserati.
A bluish light then seemed, momentarily, to glow from the shape.
The Maserati seemed to shiver, rippling in the bluish light, and then, to my
horror, it was gone.
I stood with my back against a tree, my hand before my mouth.
The bluish light then disappeared.
The yellowish light switched on again.
The shape then turned toward me, and began to move slowly in my direction.
I found that I clutched the handbag. Somehow I had seized it, instinctively, in
running from the car. It contained my money, jewelry, the butcher knife I had
thrust into it before leaving the penthouse. I turned and ran, wildly, through
the dark woods. I lost my sandals. My feet were bruised and cut. My blouse was
torn. Branches caught at my clothing and hair. A branch lashed my belly and I
cried in pain. Another stung my cheek. I fled. Always the light seemed (pg. 26)
near, but it did not catch me. I ran from it, forcing my way through the brush
and trees, scraped and torn. Time and time again it seemed on the verge of
illuminating me, yellow on the trees and brush only feet from me, but it would
pass by, or I would turn away from it and run again. I stumbled on through the
woods, my feet bleeding, gasping for breath. My hands, my right clutching the
handbag, fought the brush and branches that tore at me. I could run no further.
I collapsed at the foot of a tree, gasping, each muscle in my body crying out.
My legs trembled. My heart pounded.
The light turned my way again.
I scrambled to my feet and ran wildly before it.
Then I saw some small lights beyond the trees and brush some fifty yards in
front of me, in a sort of clearing in the woods.
I ran toward them.
I stumbled wildly into the clearing.
“Good evening, Miss Brinton,” said a voice.
I stopped, stunned.
At the same time I felt a man’s hands close on my arms from behind.
I tried weakly to free myself but could not.
I shut my eyes against the reflection of yellow light from the ground.
“This is point P,” said the man. I recognized his voice. It was that of the
larger man who had been in my penthouse in the afternoon. He no longer wore his
mask. He was dark haired, dark eyed, handsome. “You have been very troublesome,”
she said. Then he turned to another man. “Bring Miss Brinton’s anklet.”
4 The Slave Capsule
(pg. 27) The man holding me guided me from where I stood to a place at one side
of the clearing. The other man accompanied him, and some others.
The yellow light flashed off, and the dark, disklike shape settled gently to the
grass of the clearing.
It was still dark, but could not be long before morning.
In one of the lights I saw a hatch in the top of the disk open. A man crawled
out. He wore a black tunic. The other men were dressed conventionally, those I
saw then in the clearing.
Some further lights then, gradually, increased in intensity.
I gasped.
In the center of the clearing there was a large, dark shape, much larger than
the small one, but not particularly different in design or appearance. It might
have been thirty feet in diameter, perhaps some seven or eight feet in
thickness. It rested on the grass. It was made of black metal. There were
various ports in it, and hatch apertures. A large door, in the side facing me,
had been opened. It opened in such a way as to touch the ground and formed a
sort of ramp, by means of which the ship could be loaded.
“Who are you? What is this?” I had whispered.
“You may release her,” said the man to he who held me.
He did