"Gregg, let me go with you."
She jerked away from me and bounded back up the stairs. I caught her
on the summit.
"Anita!"
"I'm going with you."
"You're going to stay here."
"I'm not!"
This exasperating controversy!
"Anita, please."
"I'll be safer with you than waiting here, Gregg." And she added,
"Besides, I won't stay and you can't make me."
We ran along the crater top. At its distant edge the lower plain
spread before us. Far down, and far away on the distant broken
surface, the leaping figure of Miko showed. He plunged down the broken
outer slope, reached the level. Soon, as we ran, the little Grantline
crater faded behind us.
Anita ran more skillfully than I. Ten minutes or so passed. We had
seen Miko and the direction he was taking, but down here on the plain
we could no longer see him. It struck me that our chase was
purposeless and dangerous. Suppose Miko were to see us following him?
Suppose he stopped and lay in ambush to fire at us as we came leaping
heedlessly by?
"Anita, wait!"
I drew her down amid a group of tumbled boulders. And then abruptly
she clung to me.
"Gregg, I know what we can do! Gregg, don't tell me you won't let me
try it!"
I listened to her plan. Incredible! Incredibly dangerous. Yet, as I
pondered it, the very daring of the scheme seemed the measure of its
possible success. The brigands would never imagine we could be so
rash!
"But Anita--"
"Gregg, you're stupid!" It was her turn to be exasperated.
But I was in no mood for daring. My mind was obsessed with Anita's
safety. I had been planning that we might see the glow of Miko's
encampment and decide on some course of action.
"But, Gregg, the safety of the treasure--of all the Grantline men...."
"To the infernal with that! It's you, your safety--"
"My safety, then! If you put me in the camp and the brigands attack it
and I am killed--what then? But this plan of mine, if we can do it,
Gregg, will mean safety in the end for all of us."
And it seemed possible. We crouched, discussing it. So daring a thing!
The brigand ship would come down near Archimedes. That was fifty miles
from Grantline. The brigands from Mars would not have seen the dark
Grantline buildings hidden in the little crater pit. They would wait
for Miko and his men to make their whereabouts known.
Miko's encampment was ahead of us now, undoubtedly. We had been
following him toward the Mare Imbrium. Or at least, we hoped so. He
would signal his ship. But Anita and I, closer to it, would also
signal it; and, posing as brigands, would join it!
"Remember, Gregg, I remain Anita Prince, George's sister." Her voice
trembled as she mentioned her dead brother. "They know that George was
in Miko's pay, and I as his sister, will help to convince them."
This daring scheme! If we could join the ship, we might be able to
persuade its leader that Miko's distant signals were merely a ruse of
Grantline to lure the brigands in that direction. A long range
projector from the ship would kill Miko and his men as they came
forward to join it! And then we would falsely direct the brigands,
lead them away from Grantline and the treasure.
"Gregg, we must try it."
Heaven help me, I yielded to her persuasion!
We turned at right angles and ran toward where the distant frowning
walls of Archimedes loomed against the starlit sky.