Page:Amazing Stories Volume 15 Number 12.djvu/27

Rh faced news-hawk. He shot a glance, over his shoulder. "Cabot, I told you to beat it! I can't hold them here all day. Get in that ship and make fast tracks away from Earth!"

With a start, Dane came to life. Excitement and gratitude so confused his emotions that all he could do was choke.

"You—you're all right, Benchley!" Then he darted toward the stairs.

He could hear the elderly reporter bawling threats at the guards as he sped up the stairway. Steps fell away under his flying feet by fours. He had put five flights under him when he heard two muffled explosions far below. Dane's lips stretched thin across his clenched teeth. Benchley was out of the way, now, and nothing but debris would slow down pursuit. Gratitude and wonder filled him. Who was Benchley, in reality, and why had he sacrificed his life for him?

Then, suddenly, the last flight of steps was before Dane, and he was springing free into the sunlight. In the middle of the wide, flat roof squatted a stubby little cruiser, of a type he had never seen before. But the door of it yawned invitingly. Dane sprinted across the roof.

Plunging inside the craft, he heaved the thick door solidly into its jamb and tightened the wing-nuts. Then he turned to the controls. He studied them. They were entirely unfamiliar. He saw no fuel tanks overhead, no rocket buttons. His trembling hands darted over gleaming levers, as though by touching them he could learn their purpose.

Faintly, through the ship's insulated shell, came the popping of revolvers. Dane’s gaze flashed through the glass windshield. Vedette men and uniformed policemen were streaming like ants through the door, their guns flashing. Lead spattered against the glass and rang with high pings on the polished metal shell.

It came to Dane that the few moments Fate had granted him were almost at an end. Soon, heavy disruptors would be turned on the ship. He made a quick decision. Turning his back on the approaching guards, he began pulling at every lever on the switchboard.

All of them resisted his efforts. They were locked. Then Dane saw a master lever. Savagely, he wrenched at it.

That was all he knew for a while. Without a sound, the ship shot upward, and Dane landed on his head on the floor.

AKING up with headache had become the usual thing for Dane. He had been slugged and tortured until his body ached from head to toe. His awakening in the mystery ship was no novelty. He still had his headache.

After complete consciousness came, he clambered to his feet and went to a port-hole. Looking back, he made out Earth, a rapidly shrinking green dime against the blue-black velvet of outer space.

Abruptly, Dane remembered that the ship was without a hand on the controls. Hurrying forward, he seated himself in the pilot's chair and took a long, pensive look at the complicated switchboard. A frown began between his eyes and soon his whole forehead was included.

"Whatever this ark runs on, it isn't gas, oil, or rocket fuel!" he muttered.

There were no fuel gauges, no pet-cocks. There was something that appeared to be a rheostat, but it was locked. In a small, glass-covered bowl,