n the West Indies.
The first man to invent a road-map all citizens could unfold and
understand was a Spink."

Zmorro turns to Zahooli and Wurpz. "Don't ask us anythin'!" they yelp in
unison. "You would only git a silly answer."

"A world inside of a world you said once, Spink. Ha--"

"Is that impossible? You have seen those ancient sailing ships built
inside of a bottle, Mr. Zmorro," I says.

He paws at his dome and takes a hyperbenzadrine tablet. "Well, thank
you, Septimus Spink. And have a good trip."

It is Friday. We climb up the ladder and into the Magnificent Mole.
"Check everything," I says to Wurpz. "You are the sub-strata
astrogator."

"Rogeria. I hope this worm can turn," Wurpz says.

* * * * *

Zahooli checks the instruments. We don't put on space suits, but have a
pressure chamber built in to insure against the bends. I wave good-bye
to the citizens outside and close the door.

"I have got to git out," D'Ambrosia Zahooli says and heads for the door.
"I forgot somethin'."

"Huh?"

"I forgot to resign," he says, and I pull a disintegrator Betsy on him
and tell him to hop back to the controls.

"Awright, we have computed the masses of fuel we need. Stand by for the
takeoff--er, takedown. Eight seconds. Seven--Six--Five--Four--"

"I know now my mother raised one idiot," Zahooli says.

"Three seconds--two seconds--one second!" I go on. "Awright, unload the
pile in one and three tubes! Then when we have gone about five hundred
miles, give us the radium push."

Whir-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-o-o-om! The Mole shudders like a citizen looking
at his income tax bite and then starts boring. There is a big bright
light all around us, changing color every second, then there is a sound
like all the pneumatomic drills in all the universe is biting through a
thousand four-inch layers of titanium plate. And with it is a rumble of
thunder from all the electric storms since the snake bit Cleopatra. In
less than five seconds we turn on the oxygen just in case, and I jump to
the instrument panel and look at the arrow on a dial.

"Hey," I yell, "we are makin' a thousand miles per hour through the
ground!"

"Don't look through the ports," Wurpz says. "In passin' I saw an
angleworm three times the size of a firehose, and a beetle big enough to
saddle."

"Git into the compression chamber quick," I says to him. "You are
gettin' hallucinations."

I turn on the air conditioning as it gets