"That was merely optical, Frannie. Our velocity away from Saturn was steadily increasing. But with our increasing size, the space seemed dwindling--as though Saturn were following after us. With the growth checked there was a visual reaction--an apparent leaping away. It was merely optical. Anything else?" "I'd like to know," I said, "the relation of your Time in the vehicle at the ten-mile size--its relation to our earth-Time." "The proportion of one to one thousand," he answered readily. "Seven seconds to me, then, was about two hours on earth. Could I have seen the earth when I reached that maximum, it would have made a complete rotation on its axis--a day of yours--in a minute and twenty-four seconds to me. "It's all clear, isn't it? Suppose I go back to the details of our trip? With ten miles of earthly size, at a velocity of 200 million miles a minute we were dropping into the black void of Space. The Solar System was lost presently, even to telescopic vision, but with the naked eye the firmament of stars was very little changed. I searched with the myrdoscope for the image of the girl, but did not chance to pick it up. We were hot again within the vehicle, from the ether friction--as hot as we had been before. "Beneath us, in the star-field for which I was heading, was Alpha Centauri. It is, as you know, one of the very closest stars to our Solar System--to our earth. In miles, roughly some 25,000,000,000,000. Four and a third light-years of distance, 4.35 light-years to be exact. At 200 million miles a minute we would have been some eighty-eight days getting there." "I couldn't have stood a trip so long," Martt exclaimed. "I told him we'd have to increase our size again. Nearly three months to get to the nearest star--with others a thousand times farther on!" "There was no reason for us to stay so small," Brett agreed. "Out there, with the Solar System so far away, I had no fear of disturbing it." Again I interrupted. "Brett, the vehicle's velocity was then much greater than the velocity of light----" "About eighteen times greater." "It seems inconceivable," I added. "Impossible for any tangible entity in Space to attain such velocity." "Ah, but Frank, that's where you're using the wrong viewpoint," Dr. Gryce exclaimed warmly. "You're still imagining yourself an observer on earth. But take the viewpoint of the vehicle. Space was proportionately smaller than before. Brett gives you the earth-size figures in order to avoid confusion. From the vehicle's enlarged viewpoint, Brett, what was its comparative velocity?" "About twelve million miles an hour," Brett said. "As against a former seven and one-half million. Not so great a change, Frank?" "No," I admitted. "But----" "But you can not quite grasp how the two velocities can be the same? Existing simultaneously in the same vehicle, only with a differing viewpoint?"