The four pioneers gave them no heed, but pushed steadily on. In the road lay a couple of pigeons, farther on a sparrow, and still farther a sleeping dog, showed how complete had been the effect of the lethal pellets. The inner stockade was now close. It stood about twice as high as the outer, was also topped with live wires and lights, and was loopholed for defense. This formidable barrier was pierced by a small gate, flanked by two machine-guns. On the gate-post was affixed an elaborate set of rules regarding those who might and might not enter. The Master smiled dryly, and opened the gate. Even from without, the loom of the monstrous airship had been visible. The eye could hardly at first glance take in the vastness of this stupendous thing, that overshadowed all the central portion of the huge enclosure. It gave a sense of power, of swift potentialities, of speed unlimited. It stood there, tense, ready, waiting, with a hum of engines audible in its vast heart, a thing almost of life, man's creation but how illimitably greater than man! For a moment, as this tremendous winged fabric came to the Master's view, he halted, and a look of exultation, pride, and joy came over his face. But only for a moment. Quite at once his dark eyes veiled themselves with their habitual impassivity. Once more he strode forward, the others following him. Now that they were inside the second barrier--where sleeping men were scattered more thickly than ever--they stood under the very wings of the most stupendous hydroplane ever conceived by the brain of man or executed by the cunning of his hand. That this hydroplane had been almost on the moment of departure for its trial trip, was proved by the sleepers. Two were on the gangplank leading up to the entrance door in the fuselage. A number who had been knocking out the last holding-pins of the last shackles that bound it to its cradle, had fallen to earth, their sledge-hammers near at hand. In the pilot-house, a figure had collapsed across the sill of an observation window. And the engines, purring softly, told that all had been in readiness for the throwing-in of the clutches that would have set the vast propellers spinning with roaring speed. "Yes, they were certainly just on the dot of getting away," said the Master, nodding as he glanced at his watch. "This couldn't be better. Gas, oil, stores, everything ready. What more proof do you require, my dear Bohannan, of the value of exact coordination?" The major could only answer: "Yes, yes--" He seemed quite amazed by this extraordinary mechanism--gigantic, weird, unreal in the garish electric lights. Rrisa was frankly staring, for once shaken out of his fatalistic Mussulman tranquillity. As for Captain Alden, he stood there a compact, small figure in his long coat with the rucksack strapped to his shoulders, peering up with the eye of the connoisseur. His smile was of contentment absolute. "My beauty--ah, my beauty!" he was murmuring.