It was shortly after midnightwhen a persistent nightmarearoused Don Foster fromsleep. For a moment he laydrowsily in his blankets there onthe sand, with memory of thenightmare still vivid.
It had been a monstrous flyingthing like a giant blue-bottle flythat he had been battling in hissleep. Memory of the thing's high-pitched,droning buzz still rang inhis ears. Then abruptly he realizedthat the peculiar buzzing was nomere echo of a nightmare. It wasan actual sound that still vibratedfrom somewhere within the camp.
Startled into full awakening, Fosterpropped himself up on one elbow.The sound was penetrating,but not particularly loud. He wasapparently the only one whom ithad awakened. In the gray gloomof the desert starlight he saw theblanket-shrouded figures of the restof the men still deep in slumber.
He realized the source of thesound now. It came from inside theblack walls of Layroh's tent,pitched there in its usual isolationon a slight rise fifty yards fromthe sleeping group. Foster grunteddisgustedly to himself. More ofLayroh's scientific hocus-pocus!The man seemed to go out of hisway to add new phases of mysteryto this crazy expedition of histhrough the barren wastelands ofthe Mojave.
For a solid week now they hadbeen working their way back andforth over a thirty-mile stretch ofdesert, while Layroh labored withhis intricate instruments searchingfor something known only to himself.Whatever reason Layroh hadfor recruiting a party of fifteen toaccompany him was still a mystery.So far the men had done practicallynothing except trail along afterLayroh while he worked with hisapparatus.
It was a state of affairs thatcaused the men little worry. Aslong as they had enough to eatthey were quite content. They weredown-and-outers, all of them, humanderelicts recruited from thepark benches and cheap flop housesof Los Angeles. They had onlyone thing in common: all of themwere large and powerful men.
Don Foster was the youngest ofthe fifteen, and the only collegeman in the group. A succession ofbad breaks had finally landed himbroke and hungry on a park bench,where Layroh found him. Layroh'soffer of ten dollars a day and allexpenses had seemed a godsend.Foster had promptly jumped at theoffer. Layroh's peculiar conditionsand rules had seemed trivial detailsat the time.
Foster scowled as he lit acigarette and stared throughthe gloom at the violet-lighted tentfrom which the disturbing soundstill came. Seven days of experiencewith Layroh's peculiaritieshad begun to make them a littleirritating. His sternly enforcedcode of rules was simple enough.Never approach Layroh unlesscalled. Never touch Layroh's instruments.Never approach Layroh'stent. Never ask questions.
Layroh neither ate with the mennor mingled with them in any waythat could possibly be avoided. Assoon as they made camp each nighthe set up his small black tent andremained inside it until camp wasbroken the next morning. No oneknew whether the man ever slept.All night long the violet lightglowed inside the black tent. Themen had wondered about the unusualcolor of that light, then hadfinally decided it was probablysomething required by the sameeye weakness that made Layrohwear heavily smoked goggles, bothday and night.
Strange sounds in the night asLayroh worked with his apparat