They had reached Twin Peaks, then, when there was a sudden sputter from the motor, a few halting coughs and then silence.
Allen sat up and there was weariness and utter disgust in his voice, 'What's wrong with this everlastingly-to-be-damned machine now?'
His brother shrugged, 'Nothing that I haven't been expecting for the last hour. We're out o' gas. Doesn't matter at all. We're at Twin Peaks - only ten miles fr'm the city. We c'n get there in an hour, and then they c'n send men out here for the blooms.'
'Ten miles in an hour!' protested Allen. 'You're crazy.' His face suddenly twisted at an agonizing thought, 'My God! We can't do it under three hours and it's almost night. No one can last that long in a Martian night. George, we're -'
George was pulling him out of the car by main force, 'By Jupe 'n' domn, All'n, don't let the tenderfoot show through now. We c'n do it in an hour, I tell y'. Didn't y' ever try running under sub-normal gravity? It's like flying. Look at me.'
He was off, skimming the ground closely, and proceeding in ground-covering leaps that shrank him to a speck up the mountain side in a moment.
He waved, and his voice came thinly, 'Come on!'
Allen started, - and sprawled at the third wild stride, arms flailing and legs straddled wide. The Ganymedan's laughter drifted down in heartless gusts.
Allen rose angrily and dusted himself. At an ordinary walk, he made his way upwards.
'Don't get sore, All'n,' said George. 'It's a knack, and I've had practice on Gannie. Just pretend y'r running along a feather bed. Run rhythmically - a sort o' very slow rhythm -and run close t' the ground; don't leap high. Like this. Watch me!'
The Earthman tried it, eyes on his brother. His first few uncertain strides became surer and longer. His legs stretched and his arms swung as he matched his brother, step for step.
George shouted encouragement and speeded his pace, 'Keep lower t' the ground, All'n. Don't leap 'fore y'r toes hit the ground.'
Allen's eyes shone and, for the moment, weariness was forgotten, 'This is great! It is like flying - or like springs on your shoes.'
'Y' ought t' have lived on Gannie with me. We've got special fields f'r subgravity races. An expairt racer c'n do forty miles an hour at times - and I c'n do thirty-five myself. - O' course, the gravity there's a bit lower than here on Mars.'
Long hair streamed backwards in the wind and skin reddened at the bittercold air that blew past. The ruddy patches of sunlight traveled higher and higher up the slopes, lingered briefly upon the very summits and went out altogether. The short Martian twilight started upon its rapidly darkening career. The Evening Star - Earth - was already glimmering brightly, its attendant moon somewhat closer than the night previous.
The passing minutes went unheeded by Allen. He was too absorbed by the wonderful new sensation of sub-gravity running, to do anything more than follow his brother. Even the increasing chilliness scarcely registered upon his consciousness.
It was George, then, upon whose countenance a tiny, puckered uneasiness grew into a vast, panicky frown.
'Hi, All'n, hold up!' he called. Leaning backward, he brought himself to a short, hopping halt full of grace and ease. Allen tried to do likewise, broke his rhythm and went forward upon his face. He rose with loud reproaches.
The Ganymedan turned a deaf ear to them. His gaze was sombre in the dusk, 'D' y' know where we are, All'n?'
Allen felt a cold constriction about his windpipe as he stared about him quickly. Things looked different in semi-darkness, but they looked more different than they ought. It was impossible for things to be so different.
'We should've sighted Old Baldy by now, shouldn't we have?' he quavered.
'We sh'd've sighed him long ago,' came the hard answer. ' 'Tis that domned quake. Landslides must've changed the trails. The peaks themselves must've been screwed up -' His voice was thin-edged, 'Allen, 'tisn't any use making believe. We're dead lost.'
For a moment, they stood silently - uncertainly. The sky was purple and the hills retreated into the night. Allen licked bluechilled lips with a dry tongue.
'We can't be but a few miles away. We're bound to stumble on the city if we look.'
'Consider the situation, Airthman,' came the savage, shouted answer, ' 'Tis night, Martian night. The temperature's down past zero and plummeting every minute. We haven't any time t' look; - we've got t' go straight there. If we're not there in half an hour, we're not going t' get there at all.'
Allen knew that well, and mention of the cold increased his consciousness of it. He spoke through chattering teeth as he drew his heavy, fur-lined coat closer about him.
'We might build a fire!' The suggestion was a half-hearted one, muttered indistinctly, and fallen upon immediately by the other.
'With what?' George was beside himself with sheer disappointment and frustration. 'We've pulled through this far, and now we'll prob'ly freeze t' death within a mile o' the city. C'mon, keep running. It's a hundred-t'-one chance."
But Allen pulled him back. There was a feverish glint in the Earthman's eye, 'Bonfires!' he said irrelevantly. 'It's a possibility. Want to take a chance that might do the trick?'
'Nothin' else t' do,' growled the other. 'But hurry. Every minute I -'
'Then run with the wind - and keep going.'
'Why?'
'Never mind why. Do what I say - run with the wind!'
There was no false optimism in Allen as he bounded through the dark, stumbling over loose stones, sliding down declivities, - always with the wind at his back. George ran at his side, a vague, formless blotch in the night.
The cold was growing more bitter, but it was not quite as bitter as the freezing pang of apprehension gnawing at the Earthman's vitals.
Death is unpleasant!
And then they topped the rise, and from George's throat came a loud 'B' Jupe 'n' domn!' of triumph.
The ground before them, as far as the eye could see, was dotted by bonfires. Shattered Aresopolis lay ahead, its homeless inhabitants making the night bearable by the simple agency of burning wood.
And on the hilly slortes, two weary figures slapped each other on the backs, laughed wildly and pressed half-frozen, stubbly cheeks together for sheer, unadulterated joy.
They were there at last!
The Aresopolis lab, on the very outskirts of the city, was one of the few structures still standing. Within, by makeshift light, haggard chemists were distilling the last drops of extract.
Without, the city's police-force remnants were clearing desperate way for the precious flasks and vials as they were distributed to the various emergency medical centres set up in various regions of the bonfire-pocked ruins that were once the Martian metropolis.
Old Hal Vincent supervised the process and his faded eyes ever and again peered anxiously into the hills beyind, watching hopefully but doubtfully for the promised cargo of blooms.
And then two figures reeled out of the darkness and collapsed to a halt before him.
Chill anxiety clamped down upon him, 'The blooms! Where are they? Have you got them?'
'At Twin Peaks,' gasped Allen. 'A ton of them and better in a sand-truck. Send for them.'
' A group of police grind-cars set off before he had finished, and Vincent exclaimed bewilderedly, 'A sand-truck? Why didn't you send it in a ship? What's wrong with you out there, anyway? Earthquake-'
He received no direct answer. George had stumbled toward the nearest bonfire with a beatific expression on his worn face.
'Ahhh, 'tis warm!' Slowly, he folded and dropped, asleep before he hit the ground.
Allen coughed gaspingly, 'Huh! The Gannie tenderfoot! Couldn't - ulp - take it!'
And the ground came up and hit him in the face.
Allen woke with the evening sun in his eyes and the odor of frying bacon in his nostrils. George shoved the frying pan toward him and said between gigantic, wolfing mouthfuls, 'Help yourself.',