Four Hundred and Fifty Thousand Billions--Wolf Turber's price--payable in minted gold, silver, platinum and ancient jewels. And then: Council of Ten in Session. Turberites' Ultimatum expected soon. We flashed into a black vacuum tube. It was a trip of perhaps ten minutes. We emerged into an area where the city was less congested. Descended to a trestle near the ground. The roof was lower. In places it was gone. I saw the daylight--a gray overcast summer day. This was the morning of June 12, 2445 A.D. Alan whispered: "This must be about Tarrytown. There's the river." To the left we saw the Hudson. A solid ground level of metal buildings spread beneath us. Only the streets were roofed over here. Streets were laid out in orderly parallels. Our single car sped above them, flashing over switches. I saw that there were no docks along the river. No sign of boats; occasional low covered bridges crossed over to the other shore which was solid with houses. "Say, look behind us," Alan murmured. A glare of light was back there. The roof seemed nearly a thousand feet up; tracks and viaducts and traffic levels came from it like a tangle of exposed veins and arteries spreading out over this wider northern area. Our guard said: "Here." The car stopped within a towering building near the river. We emerged into a lighted metal corridor. Guards passed us along it; we went through great swinging baize doors. We stood in the presence of the government council. * * * * * I think most strange of all this age, was its rapidity. Its machine-made precision permeating every detail. Within half an hour, at this council of the Anglo-Saxon Republic, of which Great New York and Great London were twin capitals, we were understood and accepted; the part we might play in this crisis Turber was precipitating was grasped by these leaders. I recall now our amazement at the dispatch with which fundamentals were reached. The arrival of our tower had already been investigated; witnesses in some local court near the scene had been interrogated; the reports transmitted to scientific authorities--and the whole lay now before this council. Turber had carefully guarded his aero in that portion of the city which he owned. It had never been seen by the governmental authorities. But its existence was suspected and understood as an explanation of the presence of Turber's rabble. Within half an hour the main details of what we had to tell were drawn from us by swift questions. There were no by-paths. No astonishment; no theories. Half a dozen men of science arrived shortly after we were brought in. They listened; they stated the scientific laws--well known in this age--which made credible what we had to say.