Father had sent us in the cylinder one bulky envelope which expressly he had stated was not to be opened until we were within two hundred and fifty thousand miles of our destination. He called it "Landing Instructions." He had mentioned it several times in a way almost ominously mysterious. Everything concerning Xenephrene itself father had omitted from his other notes, as though not to confuse our minds with details not then necessary. But now, we felt, as we neared the other world, the mystery that clung to it would have to be unfolded. The prospect made our hearts pound; for there clung always to our thoughts of this other world a sense of the uncanny--we were plunging, very soon now, into something weird, gruesome perhaps. But I thought of little Zetta and I knew it would be a strange world; weird, perhaps bizarre, but hardly gruesome. Freddie was holding father's envelope. "Here it is--we're entitled to open it now. It's addressed to you, Peter--you read it to us." I took the envelope, broke its seal with fingers that were trembling in spite of all my efforts to steady them. CHAPTER X LANDING TO FACE THE UNKNOWN To one of omniscience who could have observed us three as we sat there, it must have been a very strange scene indeed. The tiny white globe which was our world, rotated slowly on its vertical axis, a mere white speck hanging in the black intensity of space. With its concave, encircling shell, that lower compartment, with the iron ladder leading above; the three of us sitting there at the table; Freddie alert, with keenly roving eyes, his hand out of habit resting idly beside the control buttons; Dan's great length sprawled in his low chair, his shirt open at the throat, a growth of blond stubble on his face, his hair tousled--he lounged in an attitude of ease, yet the tenseness of him was obvious; myself, sitting upright, with father's papers in my trembling hands; shadows around us; one small light casting its glow upon me; and through the window beneath our feet, the upflung glare of Xenephrene, like a tremendous crescent moon bathing us in its purple light. The silence! There is no silence like that of Space! Upon earth we hear always a myriad tiny sounds and are unaware of them; without them, in Space, the silence seems to scream its emptiness. Dan cleared his throat nervously. "Go ahead, Peter--what does it say?" I rustled the papers. Father's script began with characteristic abruptness. "If you have done as I requested you are now within a quarter of a million miles of this world. Comparatively so close to us--oh, my son, I do hope that you are there! Soon, then, I shall see you--have you with me. I am growing old, Peter. The ties of blood seem to strengthen as we grow older. It has been lonely without you, my son, even though I have had dear Hulda--and little Zetta, of whom we grow more fond every day.