DuQuesne will over-reach himself. We could convict him
of abduction now, but the penalty for that is too mild for what he has
done. Perkins' death was not murder, then?"

"Oh, no, it was purely self-defense. Perkins would have killed him if he
could. And he really deserved it--Perkins was a perfect fiend. The
Doctor, as they call him, is no better, although entirely different. He
is so utterly heartless and ruthless, so cold and scientific. Do you
know him very well?"

"We know all that about him, and more. And yet Dorothy said he saved her
life?"

"He did, from Perkins, but I still think it was because he didn't want
Perkins meddling in his affairs. He seems to me to be the very
incarnation of a fixed purpose--to advance himself in the world."

"That expresses my thoughts exactly. But he slips occasionally, as in
this instance, and he will again. He will have to walk very carefully
while he is with us. Nothing would please Dick better than an excuse for
killing him, and I must admit that I feel very much the same way."

"Yes, all of us do, and the way he acts proves what a machine he is. He
knows just exactly how far to go, and never goes beyond it."

They felt the Skylark lurch slightly.

"Oh, Mart!" called Seaton. "Going to pass that star we were headed
for--too fast to stop. I'm giving it a wide berth and picking out
another one. There's a big planet a few million miles off in line with
the main door, and another one almost dead ahead--that is, straight
down. We sure are traveling. Look at that sun flit by!"

* * * * *

They saw the two planets, one like a small moon, the other like a large
star, and saw the strange sun increase rapidly in size as the Skylark
flew on at such a pace that any earthly distance would have been covered
as soon as it was begun. So appalling was their velocity that their ship
was bathed in the light of that sun for only a short time, then was
again surrounded by the indescribable darkness. Their seventy-two-hour
flight without a pilot had seemed a miracle, now it seemed entirely
possible that they might fly in a straight line for weeks without
encountering any obstacle, so vast was the emptiness in comparison with
the points of light that punctuated it. Now and then they passed so
close to a star that it apparently moved rapidly, but for the most part
the silent sentinels stood, like distant mountain peaks to the travelers
in an express train, in th