res, a
six-foot circular projector with a mirror reflector close beneath it
and a series of prisms and lenses just above. It all glowed opalescent
in a moment, a dazzling glare.

Then the tower tops were swinging. The lights from them had reached
the intensity of an upflung beam, and the projectors were swinging to
focus the beam inward. The focal point seemed about a thousand feet
overhead. All the beams merged there; and guided by the towers
directly underneath, a single shaft was standing into the sky.

The entire cauldron depression was now a blinding mass of opalescent
light. We could see nothing but the milk-white inferno of glare. It
painted the rocks up here on the rim so that we shrank back, shaded
our eyes and gazed into the sky. And from the cauldron, the hum and
the hiss of the current, the snapping of sparks, were all lost in a
wild electrical screaming turmoil.

Overhead, we saw the Wandl beam from Venus.

Apparently this control station had two functions: the control of the
planet's movements, its axial rotation and its orbital flight, and its
ability to apply gravitational force to other celestial bodies.

Wandl was controlling her own movements by applying gravity force,
attraction and repulsion, to all the celestial starfield; and
doubtless also by applying the repulsive beam tangentially against the
ether like rocket streams. In this respect, I realized, the planet was
probably operated not unlike one of our familiar spaceships. In
effect, it was itself a gigantic globular vehicle. Later I learned
that it was thought that Wandl's atmosphere could be highly
electronized at will, with a resulting aberration of the natural
light-ray reflected from her into space. This could have caused the
blurring of the image of Wandl when viewed telescopically from other
worlds.

Again, for a moment of the contact, there was that bursting light in
the sky.

The contact with the Venus beam lasted a minute or two. Snap and I, on
the cauldron rim, were engulfed in the blaze of reflected light and
the wild scream of sound. Then presently the turmoil subsided. The
contact in the sky was broken. The tow-rope of Venus jerked itself
away. But on the next Venus rotation it would be attacked again.

Another few minutes passed. The little circular depression beneath us
was dim and silent as we had first seen it. Figures were moving within
the dwelling structure. From several of the underground entrances
figures came u