Kashtanov!
Istafiev hissed:
"It iss all right. He will be finished in a moment. But you—go! The box iss aboard the plane; don't wait! You must not take chance of being hurt. Go to your work. Call Grigory in. Go, Kashtanov!"
"I go, Istafiev."
"No, you don't!" Chris Travers croaked almost inaudibly. "You don't!"
Thought of the Canal lying there defenseless, of Kashtanov speeding towards it on his wrecker's errand, kindled within him a strength that was unnatural, superhuman. Like a wildcat he tore loose from the choking grip on his throat; Istafiev tried to subdue that sudden, unlooked-for surge of power, but could not. Five piston-like, jabbing blows crunched into him from Chris's hurtling fist, and with the fifth Istafiev faded quietly out of the picture....
Chris sprang up and started a leap for the door he could not see. A body brushed against him; dimly through the smoke he saw the man called Grigory, and Grigory saw him, but not for long. A whaling swing lifted him two inches clear of the floor, and then he went down onto the peacefully recumbent Istafiev; and Chris Travers, fighting mad, stormed from the hut into the clearing outside.
The camouflaged framework had been raised; soft motors were purring helicopter propellers around and lifting a plane up towards the stars hanging high above.
The airplane was already feet off the ground and sweeping straight up. A sane man wouldn't have thought of it, but Chris wasn't quite sane just then. With a short sprint, he launched himself into a flying leap, grabbed out desperately—and felt the bar of the undercarriage between his hands.
The plane jolted. Then it steadied; rose with terrific acceleration. And Chris hauled himself up onto the undercarriage and clung to one of the wheel-stanchions, breathing, hard, hidden by the fuselage from the invisible pilot.