than I.

The Professor filled our glasses from the bottle I had bought, then put
his face close to mine. "Do you know why no one has ever invented an
anti-gravity belt?" he confided. "_I'll_ tell you--it takes research,
and research takes money. And money is very hard to get. Especially," he
added, gazing somberly at his highball, "in _my_ field of research."

He shrugged, then busied himself with some adjustments on the belt he
had wrapped around me. "There," he said finally, stepping back, "it's
ready." We went outside to the garden behind his laboratory.

"All my life," he mused, "I've wanted to be the first to defy gravity,
but--" here a suspicious wetness glistened in his eyes--"my fondness for
good food and good drink has paid its price. I am far too heavy for the
belt. That's why I am giving _you_ this chance to roar to fame.
You--_you_ will have the glory, while I...." He choked, then quickly
drained his glass.

"Enough! The stars are waiting! The experiment must begin!" He paused to
refill his glass from the bottle he had brought out with him.

"When I say, '_Go!_' push this button on the belt," he explained.
"Ready?"

I nodded.

"A toast first!" he cried. Soberly, he gazed at his glass. "To Man," he
pronounced momentously, "and the Stars." He took a sizable swallow, then
fixed me with a feverish glare.

"_Go!_"

I confess that never, before or since, have I felt such a strange
sensation as when I pushed the button on the belt. Suddenly, I felt like
a leaf, or a feather, floating on a soft warm curl of cloud. It was as
if all the troubles, all the cares of the world had been miraculously
lifted from my shoulders. A glow of well-being seemed to pulse through
my whole body.

The sound of Professor Burdinghaugh's voice brought an abrupt end to
this strange lightness of mind. The Professor was pointing at me with an
intensity I rarely before have seen, muttering, "It works--_it works!_"
He seemed rather amazed.

I looked down and, with a feeling I can only describe as giddiness, saw
that indeed it _was_ working. I was rising slowly from the ground and
was then about a foot in the air.

At this historical juncture, we looked at each other for a moment, then
began to laugh as success rushed to our heads. The Professor even did a
mad little jig while, for my part, I gyrated in the air unrestrained.

It was not until I was about ten feet off the ground that I began to
feel uneasy. I was never one to s