Jeff pounced on his radiation drum graph.
"What does it say?" Peter asked.
Jeff shook his head in astonishment. "Nothing," he answered, "just nothing at all."
"Nothing?" Peter came over to take a look at the graph himself. It was as Jeff had said. The line tracing the white surface of the graph was straight and undisturbed.
"But that's impossible," Peter frowned.
The two men turned back to the screen. As they watched, one final shudder shook the strange ship, and then, like a stranded whale who has given up hope, it lay still.
"My God!" said Pete, and Jeff turned to him in astonishment. It was the closest to profanity his father had come in twenty years. "Jeff, do you know what I think? I think that ship is manned by just one great big creature—like a giant squid. That's why no radiation registered. He was trying to move his ship by sheer strength."
Jeff stared at his father.
"You're crazy," was all he could manage to say. "Why, something big enough to shake that ship would have to fill every inch of space inside it. You can't live in a space ship that way."
"That's right," Pete answered. He clamped his hand on Jeff's shoulder excitedly and led him back to the jigsaw puzzle on the table.