g, as the men in the
crater knew.

* * * * *

They had begun arriving with the earliest light of morning. Smithy had
come in with the first lot. And when the first big auto-gyro transport
had settled and risen again from the crater, another had taken its
place, and another and many others after that.

That first crew had been a machine-gun battalion, and Smithy had
smiled with grim satisfaction at the unhurried way in which their
young captain had snapped them into position without the loss of a
second. And their guns, Smithy noticed, were trained inward upon the
crater itself.

Inside that protecting circle the other transports landed one by one:
men, mobile artillery, ammunition cases, big searchlights, and a
dozen engine-generator outfits. The last transports brought in strange
cargo--short sections of aluminum struts with bolts and splice plates
to join them together: blocks, and tackle and sheaves; then spools of
steel alloy cable at least ten miles in length.

From the last ship they took a hoisting engine and an assortment of
aluminum plates and bars which were bolted together by waiting
mechanics, and which grew magically to a crude but exceedingly
substantial elevator, on which fifty men, by considerable crowding,
could stand.

Only a floor of bolted plates, with corner posts and diagonal bracing
and a single guard rail running around the four sides--but for the
first time Smithy began to feel that he was actually going down; that
this was not all make-believe, or a futile gesture. He would stand on
that platform; he would go down where Dean had gone. And then.... But
what would come after he knew he could never imagine.

* * * * *

A little crane swung the first metal work into position above the
shaft. One end of the assembled framework of aluminum alloy dragged
loosely on the ground; the other end swung out and projected above the
shaft, swayed for an instant--and then came the first direct knowledge
of the enemy's presence. The end of a metal strut, though nothing
visible was touching it, grew suddenly white hot, sagged, then broke
into a shower of molten, dazzling drops that rained down into the pit.

"Good," said Colonel Culver, who was standing beside Smithy. "Now we
know they are there--but it means we will have to go down there with
our gas masks on."

To Smithy it was not immediately apparent how gas masks were to
protect them