"Well, I--" Kit tried to duck, but couldn't. "Yes, Dad, I'm afraid it's check." Two big hands met and gripped; and Kinnison went to take leave of his wife. There is no need to go into detail as to what those two strong souls said or did. He knew that he was going into danger; that he might not return. That is, he knew empirically or academically, as a nongermane sort of fact, that he might die. He did not, however, really believe that he would. No man who is not an arrant coward really believes, ever, that any given event will or can kill him. In his own mind he goes on living indefinitely. Kinnison expected to be captured, imprisoned, questioned, and perhaps tortured. He could understand all of those things, and he did not like any one of them. That he was more than a trifle afraid and that he hated to leave her now more than he ever had before were both natural enough--he had nothing whatever to hide from her. She, on the other hand, knew starkly that he would never come back. She knew that he would die in that trap. She knew that she would have to live a lifetime of emptiness, alone. Hence she had much to conceal from him. She must be just as scared and as apprehensive as he was, but no more; just as anxious for their continued happiness as he was, but no more; just as intensely loving, but no more and in exactly the same sense. Here lay the test. She must kiss him good-by as though he were going into mere danger. She _must not_ give way to the almost irresistible urge to act in accordance with what she so starkly, chillingly knew to be the truth, that she would never--_never_--NEVER kiss her Kim again! She succeeded. It is a measure of the Red Lensman's quality that she did not weaken, even when her husband approached the boundary of the Hell Hole and sent what she knew would be his last message. "Here it is--about a second now. Don't worry--I'll be back very shortly. Clear ether, Chris!" "Of _course_ you will, dear. Clear ether, Kim!" * * * * * His speedster did not mount any special generators. He had not thought that they would be necessary. Nor were they. He and his ship were sucked into that trap as though it had been a maelstrom.