boy. Seeing
it was useless to try and jump the burly spaceman, Roger relaxed and
stretched out on the deck. Miles fired again calmly, and after testing
the effect of the ray with his toe, he turned to the ladder.

As the spaceman climbed back to the control deck, Roger, though in a
paralyzed state, could hear the communicator loud-speaker paging Miles.

* * * * *

"Come in, Quent! This is Ross! Come in!"

Tom Corbett sat bound and gagged in the copilot's chair of the black
ship, listening to Miles call again and again over the audioceiver. The
fact that Miles was identifying himself as Ross puzzled the young cadet
and he wondered if it was an alias. Tom was even more puzzled when
Miles addressed the person he was calling as Quent.

"This is Ross! Acknowledge, Quent! Come in!"

Static spluttered over the loud-speaker and then a clear, harsh voice
that was a perfect imitation, answered, "I read you, Ross," it said.
"Where are you?"

Tom watched as Miles made a hasty check on the astrogation chart. "Space
quadrant four," he replied. "Chart C for Charley! Where are you?"

"Same space quadrant, but on chart B for Baker," came the reply. "I
think we can make visual contact on radar in above five minutes. Make
the usual radar signal for identification. O.K.?"

"Good!" the _Space Knight_ pilot replied. "What course are you on?"

There was a pause and then the voice answered, "South southwest. Speed,
emergency maximum."

"Very well. I will adjust course to meet you. But what's the hurry?"
asked Tom's captor.

"Better get out of space as soon as possible."

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

Tom listened intently. He closed his eyes and tried to visualize the
charts and space quadrants he had heard mentioned. He knew the quadrants
by heart, and knew that he was close to the asteroid belt. But each
quadrant had at least a dozen or more charts, each one taking in a huge
area of space.

"Is Brett with you?" asked the voice over the audioceiver.

"No. I'll tell you about it when we get together. All the rockets in
space broke loose up there on Titan for a while."

"What do you mean? Hey! I think I just picked you up on my radar!" said
the voice over the loud-speaker. "Give me the identification signal."

Tom watched Miles go to the radarscope and make a minute adjustment. The
voice came over the loud-speaker again. "That's you, all right. Cut back
to minimum speed and I'll maneuver to