all x," he announced, after completing his calculations, and
he reduced their negative acceleration by a third. "There--we'll be just
about traveling with it when we get there," he said. "Now, little K. P.
of my bosom, our supper's been on minus time for hours. What say we
shake it up?"

"I check you to nineteen decimals," and the two were soon attacking the
savory Ganymedean goulash which Nadia had put in the cooker many hours
before.

"Should we both go to sleep, Steve, or should one of us watch it?"

"Sleep, by all means. There's no meteoric stuff out here, and we won't
arrive before ten o'clock tomorrow, I-P time," and, tired out by the
events of the long day, man and maid sought their beds and plunged into
dreamless slumber.

While they slept, the "Forlorn Hope" drove on through the void at a
terrific but constantly decreasing velocity; and far off to one side,
plunging along a line making a sharp angle with their own course, there
loomed larger and larger the masses which made up the nucleus of
Cantrell's Comet.

Upon awakening, Stevens' first thought was for the comet, and he
observed it carefully before he aroused Nadia, who hurried into the
control room. Looming large in the shortened range of the plate, their
objective hurtled onward in its eternal course, its enormous velocity
betrayed only by the rapidity with which it sped past the incredibly
brilliant background of infinitely distant stars. Apparently it was
a wild jumble of separate fragments; a conglomerate, heterogeneous
aggregation of rough and jagged masses varying in size from grains of
sand up to enormous chunks, which upon Earth would have weighed millions
of tons. Pervading the whole nucleus, a slow, indefinite movement was
perceptible--a vague writhing and creeping of individual components
working and slipping past and around each other as they all rushed
forward in obedience to the immutable cosmic law of gravitation.

"Oh, isn't that wonderful!" Nadia breathed. "Think of actually going to
visit a comet! It sort of scares me, Steve--it's so creepy and crawly
looking. We're awfully close, aren't we?"

"Not so very. We'd probably have lots of time to eat breakfast. But just
to be on the safe side, maybe I'd better camp here at the board, and you
bring me over something to eat."

"All x, Chief!" and Stevens ate, one eye upon the screen, watching
closely the ever-increasing bulk of the comet.

* * * * *