? How do I know but you
have forgotten everything you ever knew? You remember your name?"

"My name, sir?" The man laughed in a foolish fashion. "Why--of course I
remember--my name. I wouldn't--be likely--to forget--that:
Atterbury--I'm Atterbury--electrician of the _Chimaera_." And he drew
himself up.

"That's all right," said Bennie, "but what were we doing yesterday? What
is the very last thing that you can go back to?"

The man wrinkled his forehead. "The last thing? Why, sir, you told us
you were going--to turn over the pole a bit--and freeze up Europe. I was
up here--loading the condenser--when you cut me off from the alternator.
I opened the switch--and put on the electrometer to see--if we had
enough. Next--everything was clouded, and I went--over to the window to
see--what was going on."

"Yes," commented Bennie approvingly, "all right so far. What happened
then?"

"Why, after that, sir, after that, there was the Ray of course, and
er--I don't seem to remember--oh, yes, a short circuit--and I ran--out
on the platform--forgot all about the danger! After that, everything's
confused. It's like a dream. Your coming up--the ladder--seemed--to wake
me up." The machinist smiled sheepishly.

The plan was working well. Professor Hooker was learning things fast.

"Do you think that the two of us can fly the _Chimaera_ south again?" he
asked, inspecting the map.

"Why not?" answered Atterbury. "The balancer is working--better
now--and--doesn't take--much attention--and you can lay the course--and
manage--the landing. I was going to put a fresh uranium cylinder in the
tractor this morning--but I--forgot."

"There you go, forgetting again!" growled Bennie, realizing that his
only excuse for asking questions hung on this fiction. And there were
many, many more questions that he must ask before he would be able to
fly. "You don't seem quite right in your coco this morning, Atterbury,"
he said. "I think we'll look things over a bit--the condenser first."

"Very well, sir." Atterbury turned and groped his way through a doorway,
and they passed first into what appeared to be a storage-battery room.
Huge glass tanks filled with amber-coloured fluid, in which numerous
parallel plates were supported, lined the walls from floor to ceiling.

An ammeter on the wall caught Bennie's attention. "Weston Direct Reading
A. C. Ammeter," he read on the dial. Alternate current! What were they
doing with an alternating current in t