Slowly the falling sensation faded, and a vast sigh of relief sounded through the room. Then a second chorus of gasps arose from eleven throats. The young engineer on his way to the uranium mines in Borneo rasped out in a choked voice: "Just--passing through the lower lock--into--near vacuum!" Randall nodded with effort and waited breathlessly until finally the Vator had attained an almost constant acceleration. When the eleven passengers had lost a little of their pallor, and a few had even begun to laugh and talk among themselves, Randall arose and strolled around the room. He quietly examined the massive door which could be opened only from the outside. Then he turned and strolled about the room, carefully but covertly scrutinizing every person aboard. There were four middle-aged school teachers who were trying to recover the vicarious thrills of vanished youth. A young couple with the obvious devotion of honeymooners occupied the lounge across the room. A reserved old gentleman with a mane of white hair and a professional mien sat in the big Morris chair to the right of the newlyweds. Randall immediately catalogued him as a doctor, or perhaps a scientist of some sort. On the other side of the four school ma'ms was a chap Randall couldn't quite analyze. He was tall and spare and lithe, with the bronze of the sun in his cheeks, and a thousand tiny wrinkles like ripples surrounded the deep blue of his eyes. Randall instinctively liked the chap. He looked wholesome and true-blue. He looked like a man who'd seen a lot of the world and liked most of it. The young engineer, the lion hunter, and the fat traveling salesman completed the list of passengers. The trouble was, Randall concluded, there wasn't a person in the Vator who looked as if he could be guilty of any real crime, much less the wholesale kidnappings, which had evidently taken place. But if the enigma of the Earth Tube were not instigated by some one in the Vator, how in the name of a thousand mysteries could it happen at all? Randall shrugged. It looked as if a philosophical approach was worse than hopeless. He'd have to map out a plan of direct action. A plan that would tell him more of the true characters of his eleven companions. He looked at the clock on the mantel. It's dial showed a little after 4:00 P.M., so according to the schedule, the Vator should be rapidly nearing the center of the Earth. Randall started toward the professional gentleman in the big chair. He had completed four steps when sudden catastrophe blasted all plans from his mind. * * * * * The women didn't scream this time. It all happened too quickly. There wasn't even time for Randall to complete the step he had started.