* *

Chet had seen a movement across the room. "Let's start all over again,"
he broke in abruptly. He covered the writing with a clean sheet of paper
where he set down more figures. He was well under way when
Schwartzmann's quick strides brought him towering above them. Again the
detonite pistol was in evidence; its small black muzzle moved steadily
from Harkness to Chet.

"For your life--such as is left of it--you may thank Herr Doktor
Kreiss," he told Chet. "I thought at first you would have attempted to
kill us." His smile, as he regarded them, seemed to Chet to be entirely
evil. "You were near death twice, my dear Herr Bullard; and the danger
is not entirely removed.

"'Forty-seven hours' you have said; in forty-seven hours you will land
us on the Dark Moon. If you do not,"--he raised the pistol
suggestively--"remember that the pilot, Max, can always take us back to
Earth. You are not indispensable."

Chet looked at the dark face and its determined and ominous scowl.
"You're a cheerful sort of soul, aren't you?" he demanded. "Do you have
any faint idea of what a job this is? Do you know we will shoot another
two hundred thousand miles straight out before I can check this ship?
Then we come back; and meanwhile the Dark Moon has gone on its way. Had
you thought that there's a lot of room to get lost in out here?"

"Forty-seven hours!" said Schwartzmann. "I would advise that you do not
lose your way."

Chet shot one quizzical glance at Harkness.

"That," he said, "makes it practically unanimous."

Schwartzmann, with an elaborate show of courtesy, escorted Diane
Delacouer to a cabin where she might rest. At a questioning look between
Diane and Harkness, their captor reassured them.

"Mam'selle shall be entirely safe," he said. "She may join you here
whenever she wishes. As for you,"--he was speaking to Harkness--"I will
permit you to stay here. I could tie you up but this iss not necessary."

And Harkness must have agreed that it was indeed unnecessary, for either
Kreiss or Max, or some other of Schwartzmann's men, was at his side
continuously from that moment on.

* * * * *

Chet would have liked a chance for a quiet talk and an exchange of
ideas. It seemed that somewhere, somehow, he should be able to find an
answer to their problem. He stared moodily out into the blackness ahead,
where a distant star was seemingly their goal. Harkness stood at his
side or pac