I felt a strong grip on my arm.

"Easy, Arnold," Armstrong was saying, a warning look in his eyes. "This is one moment when we have to keep our heads, or more than just us will lose them. Hold tight here for a day. Washington probably got Disney's report on your trip to the Congo. I think I can talk my way out of the mess. If I don't," he shrugged hopelessly, "it's all up to you."

All next day I sweated for a word from Armstrong. About five o'clock a call came from one of his friends in Washington. He was under house arrest but still striving desperately to wake the government up to Chetzisky's threat.

I drink lightly but if at that moment I had a bottle I would have emptied it at one swift sitting. Instead, I took an ice cold shower to calm myself. Half-way through the shower I ran out and picked up the phone to put in a long-distance call. I had an idea.

Nevil Oxford answered. I poured out my story. His voice shook as he talked with me. I had him on the ropes and I kept pouring it on. The earth had only six days to live unless the nation did something about it. We were just a stone's throw, so to speak, from catching up with Chetzisky. What was needed was to rouse public opinion and force the complacent hand of the swivel-chair bureaucrat. As a crusher I told him that the world-wide radioactive count had gone up five roentgens. If only he knew how absurd that was ... but it turned the trick.

"All right, Arnold, I'll go on the air tonight with the story," he said wearily with the tone of a man acquiescing in an inevitable surrender.

I dressed, arranged for a plane to take me and Johnny Eagle into Tweedsmuir early next morning, and settled back with a drink for Nevil Oxford's broadcast. The commercial came on. I gritted my teeth and waited. Then Nevil broke in, his voice tense and pregnant with fear: "Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Tonight I am breaking the biggest story of my career. It has taken me a long time to decide on telling it. But it must be told."

There was a pause. I sat bolt-upright. Had he lost his courage again? Then Nevil was speaking again, his tone almost inaudible. "If a letter that went out to the governments of the world a month ago is true—and I fear horribly that it is—you and I have only six days to live. The world will end next Monday. Yet nothing is being...."

The voice was cut off and organ music filled the air waves. I stood up and flung my glass at the wall. You warn them and they throttle you; the ostrich hadn't a thing on them.