ggered back. For there were only
two men in the cabin with him--Reg and Max. Pete had gone!

"He just disappeared," Max jabbered. "He was standing there in front of
us. Then all at once he seemed to fade, as if he was turning into smoke.
Then he was gone."

* * * * *

Something had descended about Pete. There was no sound, no light, no
heat. He had no sense of weight. It was as if, suddenly, his mind had
become disembodied.

Seeing and hearing and awareness came back to him as one might turn on a
light. From the blackness and the eventless existence of a split second
before, he was catapulted into a world of light and sound.

It was a world that hummed with power, that was ablaze with light, a
laboratory that seemed crammed with mighty banks of massive machinery,
lighted by great globes of creamy brightness, shedding an illumination
white as sunlight, yet shadowless as the light of a cloudy day.

Two men stood in front of him, looking at him, one with a faint smile on
his lips, the other with lines of fear etched across his face. The
smiling one was Gregory Manning and the one who was afraid was Scorio!

With a start, Pete snatched his pistol from its holster. The sights came
up and lined on Manning as he pressed the trigger. But the lancing heat
that sprang from the muzzle of the gun never reached Manning. It seemed
to strike an obstruction less than a foot away. It mushroomed with a
flare of scorching radiance that drove needles of agony into the
gangster's body.

His finger released its pressure and the gun dangled limply from his
hand. He moaned with the pain of burns upon his unprotected face and
hands. He beat feebly at tiny, licking blazes that ran along his
clothing.

Manning was still smiling at him.

"You can't reach me, Pete," he said. "You can only hurt yourself. You're
enclosed within a solid wall of force that matter cannot penetrate."

A voice came from one corner of the room: "I'll bring Chizzy down next."

Pete whirled around and saw Russell Page for the first time. The
scientist sat in front of a great control board, his swift, skillful
fingers playing over the banks of keys, his eyes watching the instrument
and the screen that slanted upward from the control banks.

Pete felt dizzy as he stared at the screen. He could see the interior of
the ship he had been yanked from a moment before. He could see his three
companions, talking excitedly, frightened by hi