over an open fire. It wavered, grew misty, swayed in a sinuous column.
"'Out of the everywhere into the here.'" Doctor Satan's voice was harsh with final triumph. "The old legends had a basis, Keane. The tales of dragons. . . . There was such a thing, is such a thing. Only the creations the ancients called dragons do not ordinarily roam the earth in visible form."
The sinuous misty column at the right of the red-robed form was materializing into a thing to stagger a man's reason.
Keane found himself gazing at a shimmering figure that looked like a great lizard, save that it was larger than any lizard, and had smaller legs. It was almost like a snake with legs, but it was a snake two feet through at its thickest part, and only about fourteen feet long, which is not typical serpentine proportion. There were vestigial stubs of wings spreading from its trunk about a yard back of its great, triangular head; and it had eyes such as no true lizard ever had—eight inches across and glittering like evil gems.
"A dragon, Keane," Doctor Satan purred. "You have seen old pictures of some such thing, painted by artists who had caught a glimpse of these things that can only visit earth when some necromancer conjures them to. A 'mythical' creature, Keane. But you shall feel how 'mythical' it is when it attacks you."
A hiss sounded in the dim room. The serpentine form was so solidly materialized now that it could scarcely be seen through. And in a few more seconds it was opaque. And weighty! The floor quivered a little as it moved—toward Keane.
Its great, gem-like eyes glinted like colored glass as it advanced, foot by foot, on the man who had pitted himself against Doctor Satan till the death of one of them should end the bitter war. But Keane did not move. He stood with shoulders squared and arms at his sides, facing the red-robed form.
"'Out of the everywhere into the here,'" he murmured. His lips were pale but his voice was calm. "There is another saying, Doctor Satan. It is a little different. . . . 'Out of the hereafter into the here!'"
The unbelievable thing Doctor Satan had called into being in the midst of a city that would have scoffed at the idea of its existence, suddenly halted its slow, deadly approach toward Keane. Its hiss sounded again, and it raised a taloned foot and clawed the thin air in a direction to Keane's left.
It retreated a step, slinking low to the floor, its talons and scales rattling on the smooth cement. It seemed to see something beyond the reach of mortal eyes. But in a moment the things it saw were perceptible to the eyes of the two men, too. And as Doctor Satan saw them an imprecation came from his masked lips.
Three figures, distorted, horrible, yet familiar! Three things like statues of mist that became less misty and more solid-seeming by the second!
Three men who writhed as though in mortal torment, and whose lips jerked with soundless shrieks—which gradually became not entirely soundless but came to the ears of Satan and Keane like far-off cries dimly heard.
And the three were Varley and Croy and Kessler.
A gasp came from Doctor Satan's concealed lips. He shrank back, even as the monstrosity he had called into earthly being shrank back.
"'Out of the hereafter into the here,'" Keane said softly. "These three you killed, Doctor Satan. They will now kill you!"
Varley and Croy and Kessler advanced
