immed with black--cold, fireless black! An
incredible black! There were stars there like pinpoints of flame! But
conviction came only when he saw from a lookout in another wall a circle
of violet that shrank and dwindled as he watched....

A hand was gripping his shoulder; he heard the voice of Walter Harkness
speaking, while Walt's hand crept to raise the triple star that was
pinned to his blouse.

"Master Pilot of the World!" Harkness was saying. "That doesn't cover
enough territory, old man. It's another rating that you're entitled to,
but I'm damned if I know what it is."

And, for once, Chet's ready smile refused to form. He stared dumbly at
his friend; his eyes passed to the white face of Mademoiselle Diane;
then back to the controls, where his hand, without conscious volition,
was reaching to move a metal ball.

"Missed it!" he assured himself. "Hit the fringe of the air--just the
very outside. If we'd been twenty thousand feet nearer!... He was moving
the ball: their bow was swinging. He steadied it and set the ship on an
approximate course.

"A stern chase!" he said aloud. "All our momentum to be overcome--but
it's easy sailing now!"

He pushed the ball forward to the limit, and the explosion-motor gave
thunderous response.

CHAPTER IV

_The Return to the Dark Moon_

No man faces death in so shocking a form without feeling the effects.
Death had flicked them with a finger of flame and had passed them by.
Chet Bullard found his hands trembling uncontrollably as he fumbled for
a book and opened it. The tables of figures printed there were blurred
at first to his eyes, but he forced himself to forget the threat that
was past, for there was another menace to consider now.

And uppermost in his mind, when his thoughts came back into some
approximate order, was condemnation of himself for an opportunity that
was gone.

"I could have jumped him," he told himself with bitter self-reproach; "I
could have grabbed the pistol from Kreiss--the man was petrified." And
then Chet had to admit a fact there was no use of denying: "I was as
paralyzed as he was," he said, and only knew he had spoken aloud when he
saw the puzzled look that crossed Harkness' face.

Harkness and Diane had drawn near. In a far corner of the little room
Schwartzmann had motioned to Kreiss to join him; they were as far away
from the others as could be managed. Schwartzmann, Chet judged, needed
some scientific explanation of these