n parliament. It might
not be true: the thought, whether spoken or unexpressed, was clinging
to their minds. And even if true--even if this lone ship had wandered
in from space--there might be no further attack.

"Why," they asked, "should there be more unprovoked assaults from the
people of another planet? What was their object? What had they to
gain? ... Perhaps we were safe after all." The answer that destroyed
all hope came to them borne in upon a wall of water that swept the
British coast.

The telescopes of the world were centered now on just one object in
the heavens. The bright evening star that adorned the western sky was
the target for instruments great and small. It was past the half-moon
phase now, and it became under magnification a gleaming crescent, a
crescent that emitted from the dark sphere it embraced vivid flashes
of light. Sykes' report had ample corroboration; the flash was seen by
many, and it was repeated the next night and the next.

What was it? the waiting world asked. And the answer came not from the
telescopes and their far-reaching gaze but from the waters of the
Atlantic. In the full blaze of day came a meteor that swept to the
earth in an arc of fire to outshine the sun. There must have been
those who saw it strike--passengers and crews of passing ships--but
its plunge into the depths of the Atlantic spelled death for each
witness.

* * * * *

The earth trembled with the explosion that followed. A gas--some new
compound that united with water to give volumes tremendous--that only
could explain it. The ocean rose from its depths and flung wave after
wave to race outward in circles of death.

Hundreds of feet in height at their source--this could only be
estimated--they were devastating when they struck. The ocean raged
over the frail bulwark of England in wave upon wave, and, retreating,
the waters left smooth, shining rock where cities had been. The stone
and steel of their buildings was scattered far over the desolate land
or drawn in the suction of retreating waters to the sea.

Ireland, too, and France and Spain. Even the coast of America felt the
shock of the explosion and was swept by tidal waves of huge
proportions. But the coast of Britain took the blow at its worst.

The world was stunned and waiting--waiting!--when the next blow fell.
The flashes were coming from Venus at regular intervals, just twenty
hours and nineteen minutes apart. And