landing-stage of the great interplanetary space-ship.

* * * * *

The immense landing-field reserved for the ships of the Interplanetary
Line was situated a thousand feet above the heart of New York City, in
Westchester County. It was a flat space set on the top of five great
towers, strewn with electrified sand, whose glow had the property of
dispersing the sea fogs. There, at rest upon what resembled nothing so
much as iron claws, the long gray shape of the vacuum flyer bulked.

Nat sneezed as he watched the operations of his men, for the common
cold, or coryza, seemed likely to be the last of the germ diseases
that would yield to medical science, and he had caught a bad one in
the Capitol, while listening to the debate in the Senate upon the
threat to humanity. And it was cold on the landing-stage, in contrast
to the perpetual summer of the glass-roofed city below.

But Nat forgot the cold as he watched the preparations for the ship's
departure. Neon and nitrogen gas were being pumped under pressure into
the outer shell, where a minute charge of leucon, the newly discovered
element that helped to counteract gravitation, combined with them to
provide the power that would lift the vessel above the regions of the
stratosphere.

In the low roof-buildings that surrounded the stage was a scene of
tremendous activity. The selenium discs were flashing signals, and the
radio receivers were shouting the late news; on the great power boards
dials and light signals stood out in the glow of the amylite tubes. On
a rotary stage a thousand feet above the ship a giant searchlight,
visible for a thousand miles, moved its shaft of dazzling luminosity
across the heavens.

Now the spar-aluminite outer skin of the ship grew bright with the red
neon glare. Another ship, from China, dropped slowly to its stage near
by, and the unloaders swarmed about the pneumatic tubes to receive the
mail. The teleradio was shouting news of a failure of the Manchurian
wheat crop. Nat's chief officer, a short cockney named Brent, came up
to him.

"Ready to start, Sir," he said.

* * * * *

Nat turned to him. "Your orders are clear?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Send Benson here."

"I'm here, Sir." Benson, the ray-gunner in charge of the battery that
comprised the vessel's armament, a lean Yankee from Connecticut,
stepped forward.

"You know your orders, Benson? Axelson has seized the Moon and