“A good thing they’ve found a new kind of rocket fuel in these last years.” When Dorothy came in, Nick gripped her hands and clung to her. There was no need for words. Silently they looked out of the port onto the scene of their prison, grey twilight world with its sky of starlit black. Finally he straightened up, reached out and pressed the call-button which would summon all hands to the control room. “There is nothing wrong with the rocket tubes, or the fuel,” he said softly when all had come. “Everything is working as it should work. Our rockets just aren’t strong enough to get us off.” “But the contracels?” burst out Marquis bewilderedly. Hartnett shook his head. “No good here.” Bob Vickers went over to the window and looked out, staring at the landscape as if there lay an answer to their problem. “Edgar,” he called after a moment, “are you sure about what you said about the equator?” “No guarantees, but it could very easily be that way.” “Then mightn’t an object at the equator be thrown off the planet by centrifugal force?” Edgar turned to Nick. “It might—matter of fact, it should.” Hartnett bit his lips. “It’s a long chance,” he said, “but still a chance. If the ship will hold together under the terrific punishment it would have to take, sliding along the ground on our rocket blasts, then we may be able to do it.” “Okay,” declared Nick. “Everybody get into space suits, make sure the air-making apparatus is in order, and take your stations. We’ve got to have lookouts covering all sectors to spot any possible punctures of the hull. As soon as everybody’s checked from their posts, Joe, let her rip.” CHAPTER IV ORDEAL They clung to the stanchions, watching the rocky surface of Hastur lurch by them, even in the protection of their suits horribly jolted by the choppy acceleration. They clung wondering how long the _Columbia_ would stand up under a type of punishment for which it had never been designed. “Something’s wrong,” complained Timbie. “The fire should take place so that, to my limited senses it seems continuous. It isn’t doing that at all.” He pressed a button. “I can sense a distinct interval between the release of the firing apparatus and the explosion, and another interval before the reaction shoves us ahead.” “Look at the stars!” cried Bob Vickers. They glanced in the direction of his pointing finger and gasped. Above them in the inky blackness were no longer the tiny pin-points that they had been seeing so far; they had become huge globes of multi-colored light. And there was one immense thing which visibly swam in the ether.