rrestrials, they maintained an equally
continuous attack offensive, and in spite of the narrowness of the open
slit and the rapidity with which that slit was changing from frequency
to frequency, enough of the frightful forces came through to keep the
ultra-powered defensive screens radiating far into the violet--and, the
utmost power of the refrigerating system proving absolutely useless
against the concentrated beams being employed, mass after mass of inoson
was literally blown from the outer and secondary skins of the _Skylark_
by the comparatively tiny jets of force that leaked through the
momentarily open slit from time to time, as exact synchronization was
accidentally obtained.

Seaton, grimly watching his instruments, glanced at Crane, who, calm but
watchful at his console, was repairing the damage as fast as it was
done.

"They're sending more stuff, Mart, and it's getting hotter to handle.
That means they're building more projectors. We can play that game, too.
They're using up their fuel reserves fast; but we're bigger than they
are, carry more metal, and it's more efficient metal, too. Only one way
out of it, I guess--what say we put in enough generators to smother them
down by brute force, no matter how much power it takes?"

"Why don't you use some of those awful copper shells? Or aren't we close
enough yet?" Dorothy's low voice came clearly, so utterly silent was
that frightful combat.

"Close! We're still better than two hundred thousand light-years apart!
There may have been longer-range battles than this somewhere in the
Universe, but I doubt it. And as for copper, even if we could get it to
them, it'd be just like so many candy kisses compared to the stuff we're
both using. Dear girl, there are fields of force extending for thousands
of miles from each of these vessels beside which the exact center of the
biggest lightning flash you ever saw would be a dead area!"

He set up a series of integrals and, machine after machine, in a space
left vacant by the rapidly-vanishing store of uranium, there appeared
inside the fourth skin of the _Skylark_ a row of gigantic generators,
each one adding its hellish output to the already inconceivable stream
of energy being directed at the foe. As that frightful flow increased by
leaps and bounds, the intensity of the Fenachrone attack diminished, and
finally it ceased altogether as every iota of the enemy's power became
necessary for the maintenance of the defen