Eddie Dugan was already unhitching one of the home-made grenades from his belt. "Stand out of line with the gate," he said grimly, "and I'll get it for you." He gauged the distance and the weight of the bomb and threw with trained precision. The missile rose in a high arc like a mortar shell's, and hit the ground almost as Dugan did in his dive for cover. Fragments of shattered concrete and metal clanged against the grillework and whistled out into the street. A crash of glass and frightened screams came from the houses across the way; and down the street the patrol-car siren wailed suddenly into life again. Kane sprang to his feet, verifying with a glance the emplacement's destruction, and hurled another bomb at the gateway. Its explosion was blinding, but a moment later they saw the way clear, the grille blown off its hinges and twisted like spaghetti. Simultaneously a rattle of shots, insignificant-sounding after the deafening blasts of high explosive, told that the patrol-car, racing its motor up the street, had opened fire on the entrance. Clark was down on one knee, finger closing on the trigger of his automatic. The oncoming car skidded and spun half around. Two men spilled out and fled for cover; Clark dropped one and missed the other. * * * * * The big noises had begun, and speed was the big thing now. The raiders dashed headlong through the wrecked gateway. "Get clear!" shouted Kane, and on the heels of his cry came the sputter of machine gun fire, first from one side of the entrance and then from the other. Puffs of dust sprang out of the wall and ricochets whined plaintively. Other guard posts were covering the breach, but the German gunners must have hesitated before firing without a target, and they were seconds too late. The Americans crouched, half-sheltered by the ruined emplacement. To the right from a cluster of buildings, the warning whistle shrieked hoarsely on, and they heard through the incessant gunfire the noises of excited voices. Ahead of them stretched the wide, seared waste of the rocket field, its boundaries invisible in the darkness. "We're in," breathed Kane, "and there's the ship!" Out on the field, far from all structures, it towered upright, its blunt nose five hundred feet above the blackened earth. Even though no light shone on or from it, they could recognize its lines as those of the vessel whose stolen plans they had gone over point by point--_Siegfried_, the dust ship. "They must have raised it to launching position only tonight," said Kane harshly. "Otherwise we could have seen it from across the river. So--it must be loaded and ready to go!"