He rambled on for a minute, then broke short. "But good heavens, Lucy, let's forget all that! It's not the Deflector I want to think about! It's you! You, Lucy! Don't you see? Our waiting--it's over now!" She did indeed see. For three years they had been engaged, almost since the day when they had met as laboratory assistants here at Columbia Chemicals. But Dan, saddled with the care of his aged parents, had seen no way out of a financial morass that might mean further years of waiting. Down from her vivid brown eyes and over her lovely face the tears were streaming as his strong arms gathered about her and she pressed close to him in confidence and love. Yet why was it that, even in this moment of their triumph, a gnawing suspicion crept over her, chilling her joy with a dull clutching uneasiness? * * * * * There was a look of steel-and-granite on Dan's ordinarily cheerful face as he came striding home. He had only a wan smile for his bride of three months as she greeted him at the door of their little apartment. "Don't mind me, Lucy, if I act like a man with his last penny gone," he explained, after a moment. "It's those damned fellows Hogarth, Wiley and Malvine. Well, you know I've suspected they weren't all above board." "What's the trouble now?" He came close to her, and she noticed how red his face was, and how his arms trembled. "They're worse than Hitler, that's what the trouble is! Want to make me their stooge, the crawling worms!" He took a turn or two about the room, then went on, more composedly. "Remember how I agreed to use the Deflector to pull the earth a few thousand miles off its course--only a few thousand, for experimental purposes! Well, now it's more than that distance off, and getting further every minute. This afternoon I put it up to them that we'd better send things into reverse. What do you think they did? Laughed at me!" "I don't call it exactly a laughing matter." "Believe me, it's not! That fellow Wiley came up, with his horse-like face and black eyes that seemed to drill right into me. 'Listen here, old boy,' he said. 'I'll let you into a secret. We haven't any idea of putting the earth back on its orbit--not just yet! We'll let the distance widen a few million miles. We're going to raise hell on this planet--simply hell!'" "My glory, is he crazy?" "Not by a long shot! That's the terrible part of it. They outlined their scheme to me--enough, anyhow, to show it's the most diabolical plot ever hatched. Thought I would work with them. 'Never fear, you'll get your share of the swag, old fellow!' Wiley promised. What does he take me for--a louse?" The vivid blue flames of his anger seemed to leap straight out of Dan's eyes. "Well, what is their plot?" "To steal the planet--make themselves a World Triumvirate, the dirty cutthroats! Their scheme is clever too, clever as the devil!" * * * * *