The tower was falling. The explosion had knocked the legs out from under it and it was falling. Somewhere over my head was a thrumming snap. I knew what it meant. The copper high-line cables, strained by the falling tower, were about to break. There were sixty-six thousand volts of electricity in those twanging cables. With Ellen in my arms I dived into a ravine. As I hit and rolled the night was cataclysmic with bursting flame. Arcs like bright flashes of lightning leaped against the sky as the cables parted. The live ends hit the ground and writhed like giant snakes spewing fifteen-feet-long streams of molten fire. There was juice in those cables, plenty of juice, and it was running wild. Somewhere, somebody screamed. Tommy! He was screaming. As if his scream was a signal, the whole earth seemed to gather itself together and hunch upward in one violent explosive blast. It knocked me cold. As I blacked out, I saw a great spout of flame leaping toward the stars and I remember thinking that the whole vault of heaven was on fire. Then something seemed to hit me on the head and I quit thinking. * * * * * When I regained consciousness I was in a hospital and a nurse was bending over me. As soon as I opened my eyes, she went dashing out of the room, to return with a doctor. He poked and pried at me and finally said that he thought I would live. From the way I felt, this was more than I expected. The doctor had no more than left until there was a violent argument at the door. The nurse was telling someone that I couldn't have company and somebody else was saying I was going to have company, or else. Then Ellen was bending over me. "Ben, are you badly hurt?" I told her what the doctor had said and the relief that flooded her face almost made me feel romantic. She had a big patch of adhesive tape on her face and a lot of scratches and bruises but she was able to walk. "Ben, what happened?" she asked. "Those two men, that building, those machines--" "And those atomic bombs!" I said. "What? Atomic bombs? I don't understand. What were those men doing, Ben?" "Sabotage," I said firmly. "But it couldn't have been sabotage," she protested. "If they had wanted to blow up the high-line, they could have done it without any trouble. And that building and the high-line tower existed in the same place. Ben, it couldn't have been attempted sabotage. There must be some other explanation. I've thought and I've thought and I don't see the answer." "Just the same, it was sabotage," I said. "That's the way I am going to write the story." "You will be lying, Ben," said a voice from the doorway. I looked up. It was the sheriff. He came walking into the room. His arm was still in a sling and his face looked grayer than ever. "How did you get here?" I stuttered.