The Radiant Shell | Page 9

to get it undone, the guards had recovered from their surprise and
had joined the Arvanians who poured in from the dining room under
Kori's lead.
With a score of men crowding the kitchen, Thorn looped back in his
tracks like a hunted creature, and sought the cellar door. Four men he
upset, one after another, aided by the fact that his twisting body could
be only approximately placed by the papers and the wound.
Then Kori's hand swept through the air above the waving packet, to
clamp over Thorn's wrist.
With an effort--that bulged the muscles of that blacksmith's fore-arm of
his till it seemed they must burst through the film, Thorn whirled Kori
clear off his feet and sent him stumbling into the charge of three guards.
But in the meantime the cellar was barred to him by a double line of
men.
Fighting for his life--and, far more important, the existence of his
country--Thorn lashed out with his invisible right fist while his left
clutched the plans.
A score of men arrayed in a death struggle against one! But the odds
were not twenty to one. Not quite. The score could mark Thorn's
general whereabouts--but they could not see his flying right fist! That
was an invisible weapon that did incredible damage.
But if they could not see the fist to guard against it, they could see the
results of the fist's impacts. Here a nose suddenly crumpled and an
instant later gushed red. There a head was snapped back and up, while
its owner slowly sagged to the floor. And all the while the still dripping
wound and the packet of documents kept with devilish ingenuity

between the body of some swordless guard and the impatient blades of
the Arvanian nobles.
Almost, it seemed to Thorn, he would win free. Almost, it appeared to
the Arvanians, the unseen one would reach the big window near the
door--which the path of his wreckage indicated was his goal. But one of
the wildly swinging fists of a guard caught Thorn at last.
It landed on the glass cup over his right eye, cutting a perfect circle in
the skin around the eyesocket, and tearing the film over the glass!
* * * * *
Now there were three things about the lithe, invisible body that the
Arvanians could see: the crumpled papers, a slowly drying patch of
blood that moved shoulder high in the air, and a blood-rimmed,
ice-gray eye that glared defiance at them from apparently untenanted
atmosphere.
Then came what seemed must be the end. Soyo appeared in the pantry
doorway with a machine gun.
"Everybody to the end of the kitchen by the window!" he cried. "To the
devil with silence--we'll spray this room with lead, and let the sound of
shots bring what consequences it may!"
The men scattered. The machine gun muzzle swept toward the place
where the eye, the papers, and the blood spot were to be seen.
That spot was now at one end of the great kitchen range on which a few
copper pots simmered over white-hot electric burners. At the other end
of the range, in the end wall of the kitchen, was a second window. It
was small, less than a yard square, and had evidently been punched
through the wall as an afterthought to carry off some of the heat of the
huge stove.
Soyo's face twisted exultantly. The machine gun belched flame.
Chasing relentlessly after the dodging, shifting blood spot, a line of

holes appeared in the wall following instantly on the tap--tap--tap of
the gun.
Eye and papers and blood spot appeared to float through the air. One of
the copper pots on the range flew off onto the floor. The glass of the
small ventilating window smashed to bits. In the jagged frame its
broken edges presented, the Arvanians saw for a flashing instant the
seared, blistered soles of a pair of human feet.
"Outside!" bawled Kori. "He jumped onto the range and dove through
the window! After him!"
* * * * *
After precious seconds had been wasted, the rear door was unchained
and wrenched open. The Arvanians, swords and guns drawn, raced out
to the rear yard.
His Excellency's town car, that had been standing in front of the open
garage doors, leaped into life. With motor roaring wide open, it tore
toward the Arvanians, some of whom leaped aside and some of whom
were hurled to right and left by the heavy fenders....
Startled people on Sixteenth Street saw a great town car swaying down
the asphalt seemingly guided by no hand other than that of fate; some
said afterward they saw a single eye gleaming through the windshield,
but no one believed that. Equally startled people saw the car screech to