_ ring to the command: 'Lamps! Both watches stand by!
Lamps! Lamps! Lamps!'

'Keep still!' Takahira whispered to me. 'Blinkers, please,
quartermaster.'

'It's all right--all right!' said Pirolo from behind, and to my horror
slipped over my head some sort of rubber helmet that locked with a snap.
I could feel thick colloid bosses before my eyes, but I stood in
absolute darkness.

'To save the sight,' he explained, and pushed me on to the chart-room
divan. 'You will see in a minute.'

As he spoke I became aware of a thin thread of almost intolerable light,
let down from heaven at an immense distance--one vertical hairsbreadth
of frozen lightning.

'Those are our flanking ships,' said Arnott at my elbow. 'That one is
over Galena. Look south--that other one's over Keithburg. Vincennes is
behind us, and north yonder is Winthrop Woods. The Fleet's in position,
sir'--this to De Forest. 'As soon as you give the word.'

'Ah no! No!' cried Dragomiroff at my side. I could feel the old man
tremble. 'I do not know all that you can do, but be kind! I ask you to
be a little kind to them below! This is horrible--horrible!'

'When a Woman kills a Chicken,
Dynasties and Empires sicken,'

Takahira quoted. 'It is too late to be gentle now.'

'Then take off my helmet! Take off my helmet!' Dragomiroff began
hysterically.

Pirolo must have put his arm round him.

'Hush,' he said, 'I am here. It is all right, Ivan, my dear fellow.'

'I'll just send our little girl in Bureau County a warning,' said
Arnott. 'She don't deserve it, but we'll allow her a minute or two to
take mamma to the cellar.'

In the utter hush that followed the growling spark after Arnott had
linked up his Service Communicator with the invisible Fleet, we heard
MacDonough's Song from the city beneath us grow fainter as we rose to
position. Then I clapped my hand before my mask lenses, for it was as
though the floor of Heaven had been riddled and all the inconceivable
blaze of suns in the making was poured through the manholes.

'You needn't count,' said Arnott. I had had no thought of such a thing.
'There are two hundred and fifty keels up there, five miles apart. Full
power, please, for another twelve seconds.'

The firmament, as far as eye could reach, stood on pillars of white
fire. One fell on the glowing square at Chicago, and turned it black.

'Oh! Oh! Oh! Can men be allowed to do such things?' Dragomiroff cried,
and fell across our knees.