"It wouldn't tell you, anyhow," Hudson declared. "It would just give our height then and now—and we were moving, remember—and what about air pockets and relative atmosphere density and all the rest?"
Cooper looked as discouraged as Hudson felt.
"How does this sound?" asked Adams. "We'll build a platform twelve feet high. That certainly should be enough to clear us and yet small enough to stay within the range of the unit's force-field."
"And what if we're two feet higher here?" Hudson pointed out.
"A fall of fourteen feet wouldn't kill a man unless he's plain unlucky."
"It might break some bones."
"So it might break some bones. You want to stay here or take a chance on a broken leg?"
"All right, if you put it that way. A platform, you say. A platform out of what?"
"Timber. There's lot of it. We just go out and cut some logs."
"A twelve-foot log is heavy. And how are we going to get that big a log uphill?"