housand years--I'm in on this, too," Brandon protested,
but was decisively overruled by Newton.

"You belong right here at this board, since no one else can handle it
the way you can. Stay here!" he commanded.

"All right," grudgingly assented the physicist, and held the _Sirius_
upright, with her needle-sharp stern buried a few feet deep in the
ground.

He watched the wreckage jealously while Crowninshield and forty helmeted
men issued from the service door in the lower ultra-light compartment
and advanced upon the two halves of the enemy vessel. As no hostile
demonstrations ensued, scaling ladders were quickly placed and with
weapons at the alert the police boarded the hemispheres, manacled the
still helpless beings visible, and, after laying down a fog of
stupefying gas, vanished into compartments beyond the metal partitions.
After a short time they reappeared and climbed down the scaling ladders,
carrying several inert forms, and Brandon spoke into his transmitter.

"King all x, Crowninshield?"

"I think so. Not being in the control room he was not as badly shocked
by the passage of the beam as were Breckenridge and those you saw. The
things in the other rooms were about ready to fight, so we gave them a
little whiff of tritylamin, but Captain King will be as good as ever in
a few minutes."

"Fine business!" The police entered the _Sirius_, the service doors
clanged shut, and Brandon turned to Westfall.

"While they're coming up, I guess I'll pick up Perce and Miss Newton.
We'd better get them aboard and beat it, while we're all in one piece!"

But even before he could send out the exploring beam of his
communicator, the voice of Stevens came from the receiver.

"Hi, Brandon and Westfall! We've watched the whole show.
Congratulations, fellows! Welcome to Ganymede! You are in our
valley--we're upstream from you about three hundred meters; just below
the falls, on the meadow side."

"All x," Brandon acknowledged. "We saw you. Come on out where we can
pick you up. We've got to get away from here, and get away fast!"

"We'll carry off the pieces of that ship, too, Quince--we may be able to
get a lot of pointers from it," and Brandon swung mighty tractor beams
upon the severed halves of the Jovian vessel, then extended a couple of
smaller rays to meet the two little figures racing across the smooth
green meadow toward the _Sirius_.

CHAPTER X

Among Friends at Last

The time for the landing of t