en gathered speed
again and shot forward toward the gaping black hole where the gate had
been.

I brought it to a stop at the pile of debris, and climbed through this
to freedom and the night. Stumblingly I made my way out into the open,
and waited.

Behind, and far above me on the mountain peak, the lights of the city
gleamed and flashed, while the iridescent beams of countless
disintegrator ray batteries on surrounding mountain peaks, played
continuously and nervously, criss-crossing in the sky above it.

Then with a swish, a line dropped out of the sky, and a little seat
rested on the ground beside me. I climbed into it, and without further
ado was whisked up into the swooper that floated a few hundred feet
above me.

A half an hour later I was deposited in a little forest glade where the
headquarters of the Wyoming Gang were located, and was greeted with a
frantic disregard for decorum by the Deputy Boss of the Wyomings, who
rushed upon me like a whirlwind, laughing, crying and whispering
endearments all in the same breath, while I squeezed her, Wilma, my
wife, until at last she gasped for mercy.

CHAPTER XIV

The Destruction of Lo-Tan

"How did you know I had been taken to Lo-Tan as a prisoner?" I asked the
little group of Wyoming Bosses who had assembled in Wilma's tent to
greet me. "And how does it happen that our gang is away out here in the
Rocky Mountains? I had expected, after the fall of Nu-Yok, that you
would join the forest ring around Bah-Flo (Buffalo I called it in the
Twentieth Century) or the forces beleaguering Bos-Tan."

They explained that my encounter with the Han airship had been followed
carefully by several scopemen. They had seen my swooper shoot skyward
out of control, and had followed it with their telultronoscopes until it
had been caught in a gale at a high level, and wafted swiftly westward.
Ultronophone warnings had been broadcast, asking western Gangs to rescue
me if possible. Few of the Gangs west of the Alleghanies, however, had
any swoopers, and though I was frequently reported, no attempts could be
made to rescue me. Scopemen had reported my capture by the Han ground
post, and my probable incarceration in Lo-Tan.

The Rocky Mountain Gangs, in planning their campaign against Lo-Tan, had
appealed to the east for help, and Wilma had led the Wyoming veterans
westward, though the other eastern Gang had divided their aid between
the armies before Bah-Flo and Bos-Tan.