* * * * *

Flos, mischievous as usual, rounded her great blue eyes and gazed at
Mollon with an expression of rapt admiration.

"Oh, Senator," she thrilled, "I think it's wonderful of you to give
Senator Mane an opportunity to debate with you. You are so kind!"

Mollon failed to detect any mockery, luckily for Flos. He looked at
her with half-closed eyes.

"The public must be satisfied," he rumbled. "Senator Mane has aroused
in them great hopes. A small matter might be adjusted, but only a
Referendum will satisfy them in this."

"But Senator, the race is going to ruin. If we could get into the Sun
again--wouldn't you want that?"

"I don't believe there is a 'Sun'," Mollon replied; then, with the
candor of one who is perfectly sure of himself, added:

"If Mane were right, I still couldn't permit the Frozen Gate to be
opened. I can control the people for their own good, here; it might
not be possible Outside."

A deep musical note sounded. Suddenly the myriad inhabitants of
Subterranea seemed to be milling around in the room. Actually their
bodies were in their dwelling cells, but their telucid images filled
the hall. By a simple adjustment of the power circuit, their images,
instead of being life size, were made only about an inch high,
permitting the accommodation of the entire nation in the hall. Their
millions of tiny voices, mingling, made a sighing sound.

* * * * *

Mane rose and stepped forward, raising his hand.

"Citizens of Subterranea," he began in powerful, resonant tones, and
then went on to put into his address all the fervor of a lifetime of
endeavor. He told them of those times in the dim past when the human
race still dwelt on the surface of the earth. Of the Sun that poured
out inexhaustible floods of life and light; of the green things that
were grown, not only to look at, but for food for all living things
before food was made synthetically out of mined chemicals. Of the
world overrun by a teeming, happy, dynamic civilization.

"Then something happened. The Sun seemed to give less light, less
heat. Perhaps we ran into a cloud of cosmic dust that intercepted the
Sun's rays. Perhaps the cause was to be found in some change in the
Sun's internal structure. But the effects could not be doubted. Ice
began to come down from the poles. Ice barriers higher than the
highest towers covered the world, wiping out all life but the most
energet