Page:Amazing Stories Volume 15 Number 12.djvu/28

28 the directional cross-hairs hovered about a red bead. Wherever it was going, the ship was going in a straight line.

Dane was about to give it all up when he saw a scrap of paper lying on the floor. He picked it up and read what was written on it. Then he leaned back in the chair and gasped.

"Well, I'll be damned!"

"Good luck, Cabot," the penciled note began. "I wish I were going with you, but it's not in the cards. Remember me to Sam Cabot, when you see him. Don't worry about the controls. The ship will get where she's going without any help from you.

"Tom Benchley

P.S.: If you feel yourself going screwy during the next five days, try to figure out where you're going!"

The note slid from Dane's fingers. "Remember me to Sam Cabot—when you see him!"

Those four words scored themselves in fire across Dane's brain. Then his father was alive! Alive—and on some world just five days away from Earth!

Dane began to stride up and down the floor, in the grip of an impatience he could hardly control. The miracle of his escape was lost on him. His every thought, now, was for the things ahead.

A series of clicks caused him to turn hurriedly to the control board. Levers were snapping this way and that. After a moment they stopped. Dane tested one or two and found them locked.

It was a helpless feeling, like being caught in a runaway elevator. Dane resolved to learn more about the ship. If he had to land the thing, he wanted a speaking acquaintance with its workings. More, however, to keep his overwrought mind occupied than for any other purpose, he commenced nosing about the cabin.

He passed a puzzled hour studying it. He turned up only one clue. In the tail of the ship, welded smoothly against the wall, was a compartment to which all the controls ran. Within that hemispherical box, he knew, lay the secret of the ship's power. Dane eyed the combination lock enviously. For a moment he toyed with it.

Then, like a boy intrigued by a toy bank, he commenced twisting the dial and listening for the fall of tumblers. Something snapped inside it. Dane shook the lock violently, yanked at it. The lock fell apart in his hands.

A startled yell broke from his lips. He threw the lock from him as cold liquid spilled over his hands. But it was a tardy decision. Clouds of sparkling, amber gas were rolling from it and choking the cabin with sweetish fumes. Dane's hands steamed with the stuff where the liquid had wet them. He took an accidental draught of the gas into his lungs.

With the first contact of the vapor on his nostrils, peace flooded Dane Cabot. There was not an ache or pain in his body. His mind was utterly at peace. To lie down and sleep seemed the most natural thing in the world. Dane did it.

E had no inkling of how long he slept, but when he came to he felt better than he had in weeks. Save for the gnawing of hunger-pangs, his body was completely at par.

Gradually a tinkling sound broke into his drugged consciousness. He realized it was this noise, repeated over and over, that had awakened him. He sat up, where he lay on the floor, and stared about him.

Then, he saw a red light frantically glowing and ebbing over the controls, in time to the tinkling of the bell. Dane ran forward and peered through the