The best the place afforded, however, was a rather ancient axe, of which Sherman possessed himself, and a large pot of vaseline with which they anointed themselves liberally, for the continued damp was making them feel rusty in the joints. They pressed on, and did not halt to consider the situation till full day had come. "Where do we go from here?" asked Marta, perching herself on a tree-bole. "South, I guess," offered Sherman. "They may be looking for us there, but we got to find a city and get some things." "There's Albany," she suggested. "Yes, and Schenectady and they have a lot of electric power there we could use. But I vote for New York. If we head in there I can pick up a plane at one of the airports and walk right away from them." "Well, it's a chance," she said, "but anything is. Come on...." and as they forced their way through the underbrush, "You know, from what I understood of those Lassans' thoughts, they've got something hot cooking up. I'm almost sure there are other people in the world and they're getting ready to fight them." "Let 'em come," said Sherman grimly. "That light-ray won't stand the chance of a whistle in a whirlwind when they get after them with heavy artillery and airplane observation." "That's just where you're all wet," replied the dancer. "They've been figuring on that for a long time. They got a gun from somewhere, and they've had all their fighting machines out, shooting it at them, and then armoring up the fighting machines to stand it. And they're building guns of their own to shoot those light-bombs. I ought to know. I was on the job." Sherman cursed himself inwardly. So that had been the result of his exchange of information with the old Lassan who was so anxious to know about guns. "How do they get away from it?" he asked. "Well, I don't know quite," she said. "I'm a sap about stuff like that. All I know is what the guy that was controlling me thought about and let me have without knowing it. But I got this much out of it--that the outside of these fighting machines is coated with this 'substance of life' they talk about some way, so it's a perfect mirror, and reflects everything that hits it, even shells. The coating reflects their light ray, too, but it has to have a lead backing for that. It's no good without the lead. Seems like lead will stop that light-ray every time." "I wonder how about big guns," murmured Sherman. "Don't know. I didn't get anything like that in what the boss was thinking. He seemed to imagine the gun he had was the biggest there was." They toiled on. As they progressed southward the thinning forest and the increasing walls of the cliffs drove them farther and farther toward the river, till they were forced to take to the main road willy-nilly. Along it they could walk faster, but there was more danger. They watched the heavens narrowly for any sign of the four-winged birds, but the skies seemed deserted.