dor.

He left the vantage point by the stairs and paced between the control
boards and their empty swinging seats. This was the main control room,
of that he was certain. From this point all the vast bulk beneath him
had been set in motion, sailed here and there. Had it been on the sea,
or through the air? The globe shape suggested an air-borne craft. But a
civilization so advanced as this would surely have left some remains.
Ross was willing to believe that he could be much farther back in time
than 2000 B.C., but he was still sure that traces of those who could
build a thing like this would have existed in the twentieth century A.D.

Maybe that was how the Reds had found this. Something they had turned up
within their country--say, in Siberia, or some of the forgotten corners
of Asia--had been a clue.

Having had little schooling other than the intensive cramming at the
base and his own informal education, the idea of the race who had
created this ship overawed Ross more than he would admit. If the project
could find this, turn loose on it the guys who knew about such things....
But that was just what they were striving for, and he was the only
project man to have found the prize. Somehow, someway, he had to get
back--out of this half-buried ship and its icebound world--back to where
he could find his own people. Perhaps the job was impossible, but he had
to try. His survival was considered impossible by the men who had thrown
him into the crevice, but here he was. Thanks to the men who had built
this ship, he was alive and well.

Ross sat down in one of the uncomfortable seats to think and thus
avoided immediate disaster, for he was hidden from the stairs on which
sounded the tap of boots. A climber, maybe two, were on their way up,
and there was no other exit from the control cabin.

CHAPTER 12

Ross dropped from the web-slung chair to the floor and made himself as
small as possible under the platform at the front of the cabin. Here,
where there was a smaller control board and two seats placed closely
together, the odd, unpleasant odor clung and became stronger to Ross's
senses as he waited tensely for the climbers to appear. Though he had
searched, there was nothing in sight even faintly resembling a weapon.
In a last desperate bid for freedom he crept back to the stairwell.

He had been taught a blow during his training period, one which required
a precise delivery and, he had been warned, was often