k a little time to convince them of the
necessity. After that, people had to be evacuated, which took more time.

Then orders were made out, and five atomic bombs were checked out of a
cache. A patrol rocket was assigned, given orders, and put under
General O'Donnell's command. This took a day more.

Finally, the stubby scout rocket was winging its way over New York. From
the air, the grayish-black spot was easy to find. Like a festered wound,
it stretched between Lake Placid and Elizabethtown, covering Keene and
Keene Valley, and lapping at the edges of Jay.

The first bomb was released.

* * * * *

It had been a long wait after the first rich food. The greater radiation
of day was followed by the lesser energy of night many times, as the
leech ate away the earth beneath it, absorbed the air around it, and
grew. Then one day--

An amazing burst of energy!

Everything was food for the leech, but there was always the possibility
of choking. The energy poured over it, drenched it, battered it, and the
leech grew frantically, trying to contain the titanic dose. Still small,
it quickly reached its overload limit. The strained cells, filled to
satiation, were given more and more food. The strangling body built new
cells at lightning speed. And--

It held. The energy was controlled, stimulating further growth. More
cells took over the load, sucking in the food.

The next doses were wonderfully palatable, easily handled. The leech
overflowed its bounds, growing, eating, and growing.

That was a taste of real food! The leech was as near ecstasy as it had
ever been. It waited hopefully for more, but no more came.

It went back to feeding on the Earth. The energy, used to produce more
cells, was soon dissipated. Soon it was hungry again.

It would always be hungry.

* * * * *

O'Donnell retreated with his demoralized men. They camped ten miles from
the leech's southern edge, in the evacuated town of Schroon Lake. The
leech was over sixty miles in diameter now and still growing fast. It
lay sprawled over the Adirondack Mountains, completely blanketing
everything from Saranac Lake to Port Henry, with one edge of it over
Westport, in Lake Champlain.

Everyone within two hundred miles of the leech was evacuated.

General O'Donnell was given permission to use hydrogen bombs, contingent
on the approval of his scientists.

"What have the bright boys decid