The attempt was to be made from the high-power sending station in the mountains of West North America.[13] Our observatory was there; and the only one of its kind on the Earth. It was equipped to send a radio voice audibly to every part of the Earth; and by helio, also to Mars and Venus, there to be re-transformed from light to sound and heard throughout those other worlds. And moving images of the speakers, seen on the finders all over the Earth, Venus and Mars simultaneously. The power, the generating equipment was at this station; and no matter where in the sky Venus or Mars might be, from the Mountain Station the vibrations of mingled light and sound were relayed elsewhere on Earth to other stations from which the helios could be flashed direct. [Footnote 13: The Rocky Mountains, in the United States or possibly Alberta.] To Skylan, as the Mountain Station was popularly called, Georg and Maida were taken in official aero under heavy convoy. Yet, even then, at their very elbows, spies of Tarrano must have been lurking. The official flyer landed them on the broad stage amid deep, soft snow. It was night--a brief trip from the late afternoon, through dinner and they were there. A night of clear shining stars--brilliant gems in deep purple. Clear, crisp, rarefied air; a tumbling expanse of white, with the stars stretched over it like a close-hung canopy. They were ushered into the low, rambling building. The attempt was to be made at once. Mars was mounting the eastern sky; and to the west, Venus was setting. Both visible from direct helios at that moment--Red Mars, from this mountain top, glowing like the tip of an arrant-cylinder up there. In the brief time since the party had left Washington, the worlds had been notified. The eyes and ears of the millions of three planets were waiting to see and hear this Georg Brende and this Princess Maida. The sending room was small, circular, and crowded with apparatus. And above its dome, opened to the sky, wherein the intensified helios shaded so that no ray of them might blind the operators, were sputtering as though eager to be away with their messages. With a dozen officials around him, Georg prepared to enter the sending room. He had parted from Maida a few moments before, when she had left him to be shown to her apartment by the women attendants. As she moved away, on impulse he had stopped her. "We shall succeed, Maida." Her hand touched his arm. A brave smile, a nod, and she had passed on, leaving him standing there gazing after her with pounding heart. Pounding, not with excitement at the task before him in that sending room; pounding with the sudden knowledge that the welfare of this frail little woman meant more to him than the safety of all these worlds.