Barry Williams watched the last sunshine lance across the red sands of the Martian Desert. The sun dropped abruptly behind the flat horizon.
With the black curtain of night, the usual sharp chill came to the thin Martian atmosphere.

The cold bit into Williams through the warm ore-seeker's outfit he'd adopted for this venture. He laughed suddenly, realizing why he noticed the cold. His body was tense, rigid. Unconsciously he was crouching, waiting, eyes narrowed, one heavily-gloved hand on his ray gun.

With the laugh, Barry relaxed, although his sharp blue eyes never ceased their wary sweep over the rolling sands. His hand dropped from the weapon. It would be useless anyway against the deadly white mist, for which he waited.

That it would come, Barry never doubted. It was known and dreaded by Earthmen in every Terrestrial Center on the red planet. In the past few weeks, Earthmen had disappeared, vanishing for the last time into the Martian night. Whispers said the white mist, the pale nemesis, sucked the life from them.

Only once had Earthmen seen the mist and lived to tell of it. A spaceship, beating toward one of the Centers on a night flight from a desert camp, had passed over a pale patch on the red sand. Its occupants, in their haste did not stop to investigate. Only later, telling of the strange sight, did they realize it had been mist—on a planet too arid for water vapor. Only then did they remember seeing an Earthman making his way on foot toward the same Center, within the patch.

Barry Williams' searching glance covered the terrain once more. Deimos, the smaller moon, was already high. The larger, swifter Phobos was rapidly overhauling its companion. Under their light, the scene was clear. But it was so every night on Mars, yet Earthmen who ventured into the desert at night died! Barry waited.

He waited as had the occupants of that Center for the man to come in and tell the story of that strange light patch against the red sand.
In the morning a searching party brought in his body. The story would never be told by him.

Nor by any other Earthman, it seemed. Later, a spaceship again sighted the mist, and radioed that it was landing to investigate. Again, Earthmen, now frightened and grim, waited through the Martian night.
Once more, a daylight searching party found only the dead.

"Ain't fer human understandin'," one superstitious miner whispered in awed tones. "Twenty year I bin on this cursed planet—nor ever heerd the like o' this."

"It's clear enough for me," answered a pink-cheeked youngster up to Mars to make a fortune in rich ore dust. "I stay off the desert at night. Only the miserable Martians can live out there then."

"Justice from the Crypt," a third muttered, quoting the threat of an old Martian, dying from wounds he'd received fighting Earthmen. "It's like from the grave—this mist, the way it creeps from the sand white and ghosty!"

That was the spirit Barry Williams, special investigator for the Terrestrial Bureau of Martian Affairs, found when he arrived. Behind the fear were rumors, dead bodies, nothing more. At first, he'd blamed superstition and the natural hazards of work in the desert. But now he was here in the desert at night, waiting.

It wasn't for this he'd been sent to Mars, Barry told himself half-angrily. His mission here was important. But this threat to all Terrestrials on Mars was ominous. There were no government agencies to deal with the threat here. Mars was just a frontier where untold riches lay for the taking beneath some of the red sand.

The sullen, cowed Martians, working at the bigger mines, or following their nomadic courses across the desert no longer attempted an organized government. Despite their great majority in numbers, the Martians played no part in running the planet. How they must be rejoicing now, Barry thought, as death stalked their conquerors, death striking from the desert in the night.

Suddenly, Williams felt an icy tingle course through his blood. His hand dropped again to his ray gun, tore it from the holster. He stood erect, fighting an urge to crouch low against the danger.

Along the crest of the sand-swell before him, something was rising.
Bright moonlight shimmered as the rays broke against a pale barrier.

To the right, the left, behind him, it was the same. The white mist was rising, surrounding him. Escape was cut off. Even to reach his nearby spaceship was impossible without cutting through. Barry tried to relax.
There was nothing to do but wait.

He remembered the words of the old Martian desert wanderer to whom he'd spoken. This man had once been a chieftain, before the conquest of Mars by Earth. His keen black eyes had bored into Barry.

"If you wish the answer," he'd advised, "go into the desert at night.
You are different—you may return. I can tell you no more."

Thicker grew the mist. A silver blanket, wrapping closer and closer about Barry Williams. The moons and the barren landscape were blotted out. All perspective vanished. High above, a tiny patch of stars was visible—perhaps for the last time to Williams.

He gripped the ray gun tighter. The strange white blanket touched his skin now—seemed to press against him with a great weight. He raised the gun grimly, then a picture flashed into his mind.

One of the bodies that had come out of the desert had been shown him.
The dead fingers still gripped a ray gun. They had crushed against the trigger for a long time—until the badly overheated weapon had at last burned out, charring the unfeeling hand that had held it. But the power that had brought oblivion had stood up against the ray.

With a grim smile, Barry replaced his weapon. The blanket was tight around him now. He could see nothing. His limbs grew numb under overpowering lethargy. His lungs labored, sucking in the mist.
Consciousness wavered. He reeled, stiffly. His muscles hardened, his braced feet sinking deep into the sand.

Before his glazing eyes, a strange picture formed in the mist. A beautiful Martian maiden, tall, slim, majestic—veiled in silver mesh.
On her lovely features was a look of stern judgment.

Was it fancy, or did the chanting of voices ring in his ears, muffled weirdly by the shroud about him? "Day—ees—a—nocta——Day—ees—a—nocta."

Williams waited, seeing her come through the mists.

The picture, the sounds faded. At last his knees sagged. He pitched face downward into the red sand.

For what seemed a long time, Barry Williams floated in darkness. Then, to a tiny corner of his mind, consciousness returned. He fought to retain it. The mist, he realized dimly, did not harm the body—it paralyzed. While he could think, the battle was not lost. He called upon the deep reserves of his mind.

Suddenly he was aware of sand digging painfully into the skin of his face—the first physical sensation he'd know since he slumped forward into oblivion. Hands tugged at his body, and the sting of the sand was gone from his nostrils. He had been rolled over onto his back.

Wild hope surged through Barry. He struggled against the leaden weight on his eyelids—without success. His muscles did not respond. He tried to move an arm—a leg—a finger. It was no use. Slowly, he realized what had happened.

Some power ruled his mind—had overcome it while he was unconscious.
For some reason, he had been allowed to regain a very limited consciousness—just so much and no more! Perhaps he would learn the answer to this mystery. Why had the white mist not destroyed him?

A murmur of voices beat against his ears. He'd been given back his hearing! The voices were low, soft. They spoke in a language foreign to him—Martian he guessed. Words faded away. There was a moment's silence, then the chant he had heard before.

Above Barry, a voice spoke to him in inter-planetary Esperanto:

"Son of Earth, you are not as the other Earthmen who come here to rob this unhappy planet, and slay its children."

The voice was that of a woman, clear, musical, unutterably sweet—pathetically sad. It paused; spoke again. A new note crept into the words, ringing, thrilling:

"Go your way—leave in peace, but travel far from this planet. The Mist of Mars will destroy all those who remain to despoil and murder here."

Williams felt consciousness slipping from him once more. He struggled to speak. He must speak! These people must be told of his mission here!

But his lips would not move. Struggle was useless. Feeling was gone from his body. The last sound he heard was the voice of a man, deep and full:

"Heed the warning of the Mother of Mist. This once you have been spared."

II

Barry opened his eyes as the red sun climbed over the rim of the rolling desert. His head was clear, his mind refreshed and alert. These symptoms strengthened his convictions that he'd been hypnotized.

The power of a highly trained mind was being used in this campaign against Earthmen. Perhaps the mist was produced both to hide the operator and to frighten the victim—making the latter easier prey to the force that invaded the brain, and had literally torn out the life essence of the other victims.

Shrugging off further speculation for the moment, Barry climbed painfully to his feet. His muscles were stiff and cramped from lying hours on the ground. He flexed his arms and legs, worked his fingers, getting out the soreness. Then he started for his spaceship.

As the rockets throbbed behind him, Barry tried all the controls. The little ship whipped through every intricate maneuver he'd ever known.
It slowed his progress, this senseless stunting, but it showed him the ship was in prime condition, answering his every touch on the controls.

Why was he doing this? It was as if he were going on a trip. Yet he had no such intention. The mist had spared him, and was gone.

The mist! The thought brought the answer to his strange preparations—hypnosis again—post-hypnotic suggestion!

Having spared him and ordered him to flee the planet, the being behind the mist had meant him to remember the advice.

Barry's lips set in a straight line, and hard little muscles stood out on his cheek, along his strong jaw. He hadn't the slightest intention of fleeing Mars. He'd been sent here for a purpose by the Terrestrial Government, and he had come to realize the whole deadly threat of this Martian scourge against Earthmen was tied up with the reason for his being here. Barry William was staying on Mars till he'd finished his job.

Below him, the circular, thick-walled, high-domed Center flashed over the horizon and loomed larger in the lower view-plate before Barry on the control board. Soon he was close enough to see the narrow apertures, where, in the early days of Terrestrial occupation, mighty ray cannon had blasted against bands of Martians who still had crude weapons to use against the victors.

Barry put his ship down neatly in a semi-circular row of other craft.
There were, he noticed, more ships parked outside than was usual for a post not close to the bigger mine. One of them was a large, ornate cruiser type, on which was painted in neat gold letters: "Grey Enterprises, Inc."

It was the personal, space-going ship of Craig Grey, billionaire ore-king, himself. The latter was probably inside the Center. That would account for the unusual number of ships, for Grey never travelled anywhere without a large following.

As Barry stepped through the door-lock onto the field, a small knot of men, dressed for travel, stopped outside the building door. They stared open-mouthed at the Government identification letters on Barry's craft, then at him.

Obviously, they'd turned and bolted inside—bolted with a speed and singleness of purpose that seemed like panic!

Puzzled, Barry pushed aside the heavier, outer door. From inside, an excited murmuring of voices came through the second door.

Silence fell over the big room within, as he entered. Every man there, most of them free-lance ore-seekers, was in the crowd pressing around one man who stood against the bar. That man was easily recognizable, for his picture had been printed from Mercury to Pluto. He was Craig Grey. A subordinate stood on each side of him, keeping the others at a respectable distance.

Grey looked at Barry with bleak, cold eyes. The ore-king was a dapper little man, who apparently fought his advanced years with the aid of science. His hair was coal black, as was the tapering, precise mustache—though both should have been gray long ago. He lifted a well-manicured hand, and sucked on a cigarette through a long holder.
Despite his culture and small stature, Barry Williams sensed that this man could be a deadly enemy.

The glowing cigarette in its long holder swept out in a graceful arc toward the men Barry had seen outside. "This is the searching party that was about to set out for you, Williams," said Grey in a flat, thin voice. "A spaceship reported seeing you last night on the desert—with the white mist closing in."

"Very decent of you fellows to worry," Williams said amiably. "I came in under my own power."

His words fell into a silence that was tenser than before. They had just been discussing him, Williams was positive. Grey, who had never seen him, had known his name!

Barry said nothing. He waited calmly for the answer to this odd reception. Somehow, he sensed hostility in the Earthmen here.

Beneath the poised, still friendly gaze of his blue eyes, the others grew restless. Feet shuffled. Murmurs came from the rear of the group.

"These Martian savages are behind this mist."

"They're out to kill all us Earthmen," came another voice.

And a third questioned: "How could a man get out of that mist alive?"

"Unless he's a friend of those killers," finished another.

The color of Barry's eyes deepened into the blue-grey of carbon steel.
"I owe explanations only to Earth Government!" he snapped. "Is that clear?"

Murmurs rose again—angry now, and the faces of the men grew dark and menacing. But Grey waved his long cigarette holder for silence. He was the unquestioned leader on Mars. His company owned most of the largest mines.

He spoke coolly: "What you say may be true, Williams, but we feel we've a right to some answer. After all, my company has billions invested here. And these men," his gesture took in the miners and ore-seekers, "have their lives invested. All of us are threatened by this mist."

"Fair enough," said Barry Williams. "I'll be glad to tell you, since you're asking."

He told them briefly of his encounter with the mist. When he'd finished, the taut silence in which they'd listened was snapped by angry mutterings. This time the anger seemed directed against the accusations of the Martian maiden, rather than against Barry.

"Those savages calling us murderers!"

Craig Grey's voice was scornful. "Ridiculous of course. These creatures are human only in superficial resemblance." He drew deeply through his long holder, and blew a great cloud of smoke toward Barry. "Of course, you know that Earth laws have declared them savages, and provided that none save humans of Earth descent can hold property on Mars, or citizenship in the Earth state. How could we murder or rob them—since they're not human and own nothing?"

"True—and interesting," conceded Williams. "I know too the laws were passed on suggestion of exploring parties sent here by three big inter-planetary combines, of which your own was the largest. That was fifty years ago. You were at the head of your company then—excuse me for giving your age away." Williams was speaking slowly, thinking his way. Some of the puzzle of Mars was unfolding as he spoke, against this background of resentful Earthmen.

"Those laws gave you and your friends control of great wealth in the ore mines. You broke the resistance of the Martians, and used some as cheap labor in the mines. The others had to find ore dust and sell it to you for a song, to buy food and other things from you at your price.
And they had to avoid being shot by ore-seekers who wanted the dust."

Again the other men growled toward Barry.

"Martian lover!"

"Justice from the Crypt, eh? We'll send you back there!"

"'Tain't murder or robbery to kill savages!"

"Go running back to Earth with that phoney story."

"No!" he answered them. "I'm not leaving Mars until I finish my job.
The Bureau of Martian Affairs sent me here to see if some educational program could be started among the Martian savages. I think it could.
These people could pass for Earth citizens in the streets of Washington itself. As soon as I get to the bottom of the mist, and stop it, I'll be ready to go back with my recommendation."

The men began to surge toward Barry. Apprehension, as well as anger showed in their faces. What he suggested would mean

Mists of Mars