flyer was seated with his head bowed low in his
cupped hands. His words seemed wrung from an agony of spirit. "So that's
what they brought us here for," he said harshly; "that's why they're
keeping us alive!"

Professor Sykes walked back and forth in their bare room while he shook
his impotent fists in the air.

"I told them everything," he exploded; "everything!" Their astronomical
knowledge must be limited; under this blanket of clouds they can see
nothing, and from their ships they could make approximations only.

"And I have told them--the earth, and its days and seasons--its orbital
velocity and motion--its relation to the orbit of this accursed planet.
They had documents from the observatory and I explained them; I
corrected their time of firing their big gun on its equatorial position.
Oh, there is little I left untold--damn them!"

"I wish to heaven," said the flyer savagely, "that we had known; we
would have jumped out of their beastly ship somehow ten thousand feet
up, and we would have taken our information with us."

Sykes nodded agreement. "Well," he asked, "how about to-morrow, and the
next day, and the next? They will want more facts; they will pump the
last drop of information from us. Are we going to allow it?"

* * * * *

McGuire's tone was dry. "You know the answer to that as well as I do. We
have just two alternatives; either we get out of here--find some place
to hide in, then find some way to put a crimp in their plans; or we get
out of here for good. It's twenty feet, not twenty thousand, from that
window to the ground, but I think a head-first dive would do it."

Sykes did not reply at once; he seemed to be weighing some problem in
his mind.

"I would prefer the water," he said at last. "If we _can_ get away and
reach the shore, and if there is not a possibility of escape--which I
must admit I consider highly improbable--well, we can always swim out as
far as we can go, and the result will be certain.

"This other is so messy." The man had stopped his ceaseless pacing, and
he even managed a cheerful smile at the lieutenant. "And, remember, it
might only cripple us and leave us helpless in their hands."

"Sounds all right to me," McGuire agreed, and there was a tone of
finality in his voice as he added: "They've made us do that traitor act
for the last time, anyway."

* * * * *

Daylight comes slowly through cloud-filled