e
ship up at the bottom of the layer, and as soon as the road has been
opened, two of the lamps will cut off to allow us through. Then the
battery will hold the road open while we pass out into space and
return."

"Suppose we meet with Hadley's fate?" I demanded.

"We won't. Even if I am wrong--which is very unlikely--we won't meet
with any such fate. We have two stern motors and four bow motors. As
soon as we meet with the slightest resistance to our forward progress we
will stop and have twice the power plus gravity to send us earthwards.
There is no danger connected with the trip."

"All the same--" I began.

"All the same, you're going," he replied. "Man alive, think of the
chance to make a world scoop for your paper! No other press man has the
slightest inkling of my plan and even if they had, there isn't another
space flyer in the world that I know of. If you don't want to go, I'll
give some one else the chance, but I prefer you, for you know something
of my work."

* * * * *

I thought rapidly for a moment. The chance was a unique one and one that
half the press men in San Francisco would have given their shirts to
get. I had had my doubts of the accuracy of Jim Carpenter's reasoning
while I was away from him, but there was no resisting the dynamic
personality of the man when in his presence.

"You win," I said with a laugh. "Your threat of offering some of my
hated rivals a chance settled it."

"Good boy!" he exclaimed, pounding me on the back. "I knew you'd come. I
had intended to take one of my assistants with me, but as soon as I knew
you were here I decided that you were the man. There really ought to be
a press representative along. Come with me and I'll show you our flyer."

The flyer proved to be of the same general type as had been used by
Hadley. It was equipped with six rocket motors, four discharging to the
bow and two to the stern. Any one of them, Carpenter said, was ample for
motive power. Equilibrium was maintained by means of a heavy gyroscope
which would prevent any turning of the axis of its rotation. The entire
flyer shell could be revolved about the axis so that oblique motion with
our bow and stern motors was readily possible. Direct lateral movement
was provided for by valves which would divert a portion of the discharge
of either a bow or stern motor out through side vents in any direction.
The motive power, of course, was furnished by the atomic d