thin a fixed radius. He had dared the wrath of one of the most
powerful officials of Earth; no effort would be spared to run him down;
his picture would be flashing within ten minutes on every television
screen of the Air Patrol. And Chet Bullard knew only one way to go.

Of course they would be watching for him at the airports, yet he knew he
must get away somehow; escape quickly--and find some corner of the world
where he could hide.

He was in the escalator, and wild plans were flashing through his mind
as he watched the levels go past. "First Level; Trains North and South;
Local Service. Second Level; Express Stop for North-shore Lines. Third
Level; Airport Loop Lines; Transatlantic Terminals--"

Chet Bullard, his hair still tangled on his hatless head, his blouse
torn where a hand had ripped off the Master Pilot's emblem, stepped from
the escalator to a platform, then to a cylindrical car that slid
silently in before him and whose flashing announcement-board proclaimed:
"_Hoover Airport Express. No Intermediate Stops._"

* * * * *

Would they be watching for him at the great Hoover Terminal on the tip
of Long Island? Chet assured himself silently that he would tell the
world they would be. But even a fugitive may have friends--if he has
been a master pilot and has a lean, likable face with a most disarming
grin.

Where would he go? He did not know; he had been bluffing a bit and the
Commander had called him when his hand was weak; he had no least idea
where he could find their ship. If only he had had a chance for a word
with Walt Harkness: Walt had been flying it; he had left it apparently
in a storage hangar.

But where? And what was it that Walt had called out? Chet was racking
his brains to remember.

"The ship is yours," Walt had shouted ... and something about "storage."
But why should he have laid up the ship; why should he have stored it?

Chet saw the lights of subterranean stations flashing past as the car
that held him rode silently through a tube that it touched not at all.
He knew that magnetic rails made a grillwork that surrounded the car and
that drew it on at terrific speed while suspending it in air. But he
would infinitely have preferred the freedom of the high levels, and his
own hand on a ship's controls.

A ship!--any ship!--but preferably his ship and Walt's. And Walt had
said something of "_storage--cold storage_." The words seemed written
before hi