The pseudo-Dillon smiled at her. "You think he's insane, and naturally
you're scared," it said reassuringly. "But he's sane. He's quite right.
I am from outer space. And I'm not humoring him either. Look!"
He took a knife from his pocket and snapped it open. He deliberately ran
the point down the side of one of his fingers.
The skin parted. Something that looked exactly like foam-rubber was
revealed. There were even bubbles in it.
The pseudo-Dillon said, "You see, you don't have to be afraid of him.
He's sane, and quite human. You'll feel much better traveling with him."
Then the figure turned to Coburn. "You won't believe it, but I really
like you, Coburn. I like the way you've reacted. It's very ... human."
Coburn said to him: "It'll be human, too, when we start to hunt you
down!" He let the staff car in gear. Dillon smiled at him. He let in the
clutch, and the car leaped ahead.
* * * * *
In the two camera-cases Coburn was sure that he had the cryptic device
that was responsible for the failure of a cold-war raid. He wouldn't
have dared drive away from Dillon leaving these devices behind. If they
were what he thought, they'd be absolute proof of the truth of his
story, and they should furnish clues to the sort of science the Invaders
possessed. Show the world that Invaders were upon it, and all the world
would combine to defend Earth. The cold war would end.
But a bitter doubt came to him. Would they? Or would they offer
zestfully to be viceroys and overseers for the Invaders, betraying the
rest of mankind for the privilege of ruling them even under unhuman
masters?
Janice swayed against his shoulder. He cast a swift glance at her. Her
face was like marble.
"What's the matter?"
She shook her head. "I'm trying not to faint," she said unsteadily.
"When you told me he was from another world I ... thought you were
crazy. But when he admitted it ... when he proved it ..."
Coburn growled. The trail twisted and dived down a steep slope. It
twisted again and ran across a rushing, frothing stream. Coburn drove
into the rivulet. Water reared up in wing-like sheets on either side.
The staff car climbed out, rocking, on the farther side. Coburn put it
to the ascent beyond. The trail turned and climbed and descended as the
stony masses of the hills required.
"He's--from another world!" repeated Janice. Her teeth chattered. "What
do they want--creatures like him? How--how many of them are there?
Anybody could be one of them! What do they want?"
"This is a pretty good world," said Coburn fiercely. "And his kind will
want it. We're merely the natives, the aborigines, to them. Maybe they
plan to wipe us out, or enslave us. But they won't! We can spot them
now! They don't bleed. Scratch one and you find--foam-rubber. X-rays
will spot them. We'll learn to pick them out--and when some specialists
look over those things that look like cameras we'll know more still!
Enough to do something!"
"Then you think it's an invasion from space?"
"What else?" snapped Coburn.
His stomach was a tight cramped knot now. He drove the car hard!
* * * * *
In air miles the distance to be covered was relatively short. In road
miles it seemed interminable. The road was bad and curving beyond
belief. It went many miles east and many miles west for every mile of
southward gain. The hour grew late. Coburn had fled Ardea at sunrise,
but they'd reached Naousa after midday and he drove frantically over
incredible mountain roads until dusk. Despite sheer recklessness,
however, he could not average thirty miles an hour. There were times
when even the half-track had to crawl or it would overturn. The sun set,
and he went on up steep grades and down steeper ones in the twilight.
Night fell and the headlights glared ahead, and the staff car clanked
and clanked and grumbled and roared on through the darkness.
They probably passed through villages--the headlights showed stone
hovels once or twice--but no lights appeared. It was midnight before
they saw a moving yellow spot of brightness with a glare as of fire upon
steam above it. There were other small lights in a row behind it, and
they saw that all the lights moved.
"A railroad!" said Coburn. "We're getting somewhere!"
It was a railroad train on the other side of a valley, but they did not
reach the track. The highway curved away from it.
At two o'clock in the morning they saw electric lights. The highway
became suddenly passable. Presently they ran into the still, silent
streets of a slumbering town--Serrai--an administrative center for this
part of Greece. They threaded its ways while Coburn watched for a proper
place to stop. Once a curiously-hatted policeman stared blankly at them
under an arc lamp as the staff car clanked and rumbled past him. They
saw a great pile of stone which was a church. They saw a railroad
station.
Not far away there was a building in which there were lights. A man in
uniform came out of its door.
Coburn stopped a block away. There were uneasy stirrings, and the
white-bearded passenger from the village said incomprehensible things in
a feeble voice. Coburn got Janice out of the car first. She was stiff
and dizzy when she tried to walk. The Greek was in worse condition
still. He clung to the side of the staff car.
"We tell the truth," said Coburn curtly, "when we talk to the police. We
tell the whole truth--except about Dillon. That sounds too crazy. We
tell it to top-level officials only, after they realize that something
they don't know anything about has really taken place. Talk of Invaders
from space would either get us locked up as lunatics or would create a
panic. This man will tell what happened up there, and they'll
investigate. But we take these so-called cameras to Salonika, and get to
an American battleship."
He lifted Dillon's two cameras by the carrying-straps. And the straps
pulled free. They'd held the cases safely enough during a long journey
on foot across the mountains. But they pulled clear now.
Coburn had a bitter thought. He struck a match. He saw the leather cases
on the floor of the staff car. He picked up one of them. He took it to
the light of the headlights, standing there in the resonant darkness of
a street in a city of stone houses.
* * * * *
The leather was brittle. It was friable, as if it had been in a fire.
Coburn plucked it open, and it came apart in his hands. Inside there was
the smell of scorched things. There was a gritty metallic powder.
Nothing else. The other carrying-case was in exactly the same condition.
Coburn muttered bitterly: "They were set to destroy themselves if they
got into other hands than Dillon's. We haven't a bit of proof that he
wasn't a human being. Not a shred of proof!"
He suddenly felt a sick rage, as if he had been played with and mocked.
The raid from Bulgaria was serious enough, of course. It would have
killed hundreds of people and possibly hundreds of others would have
been enslaved. But even that was secondary in Coburn's mind. The
important thing was that there were Invaders upon Earth. Non-human
monsters, who passed for humans through disguise. They had been able to
travel through space to land secretly upon Earth. They moved unknown
among men, learning the secrets of mankind, preparing for--what?