"In an airplane. I'm an aviator. They shot me down somewhere and when I came to, put me in one of those cages. How did you get here?"
"The birds. I was at West Point with Stevens and that old fool Vanderschoof. They started shooting at the birds and the birds just picked us up and flew away with us."
"Where were you after you came to? I mean after the comet."
"New York. Century Roof. I was dancing there before."
"You aren't Marta Lami, the dancer?"
"Sure. Who the hell do you think?"
He turned and regarded her deliberately, careless of the aroused attention of the sentry. So this was the famous dancer who had blazed across two continents and three divorce suits—who had been proclaimed the most beautiful woman in the world in starring electric lights before an applauding Broadway; for whose performances speculators held tickets at prize-fight premiums! How little she resembled it now, a parody of the human form, working her fingers off as the slave of an alien and conquering race.
She asked the next question:
"Where have they got you?"