.
It crashed thunderously down upon smaller trees. There were other
rending noises. The flying things rose higher, seeming agitated. Echoes
sounded in the ears of the two atop the hill.

There was another sharp shock. Babs gave a little, inarticulate cry. She
pointed.

There was much smoke in the distance. Over the far-away cone, which was
indistinct in the smoke of its own making--over the edge of the distant
mountains a glare appeared. It was a thin line of bright white light.
With infinite deliberation it began to creep down the slanting,
blessedly remote mountainside.

The ground seemed to shift abruptly, and then shift back. Across and
down the valley, five miles away, a portion of the stony wall detached
itself and slid downward in seeming slow motion. Two more great trees
made ripping sounds. One crashed. There was an enormous darkness above
one part of the sky. Its under side glowed from fires as of hell, in the
crater beneath it. There were sparkings above the mountaintop.

Very oddly indeed, the sky overhead was peacefully blue. But at the
horizon a sheet of fire rolled down mile-long slopes. It seemed to move
with infinite deliberation, but to move visibly at such a distance it
must have been traveling like an express-train. It must have been
unthinkably hot, glaring-white molten stone, thin as water, pouring
downward in a flood of fire.

There was no longer a sensation of the ground trembling underfoot. Now
the noticeable sensation was when the ground was still. Temblors were
practically continuous. There were distinct sharp impacts, as of violent
blows nearby.

Babs stared, fascinated. She glanced up at Cochrane. His skin was white.
There were beads of sweat on his forehead.

"We're safe here, aren't we?" she asked, scared.

"I think so. But I'm not going to take you through falling trees while
this is going on! There's another tree down! I'm worrying about the
ship! If it topples--."

She looked at the nose of the space-ship, gleaming silver metal, rising
from the trees about the landing-spot it had burned clear. A third of
its length was visible.

"If it topples," said Cochrane, "we'll never be able to take off. It has
to point up to lift."

Babs looked from the ship to him, and back again. Then her eyes went
fearfully to the remote mountain. Rumblings came from it now. They were
not loud. They were hardly more than dull growlings, at the lower limit
of audible pitch. They were like faint a