The official took the proffered hand, and no sooner had he grasped it than he stiffened and became as rigid as stone.
With one bound Ralph was in his machine crying to the stupefied audience:
"Don't worry about him. I pricked his hand with a little Catalepsol. In fifteen minutes he will be all right again."
He slammed the door of his space flyer and simultaneously the machine rose as if shot from a cannon, and in ten seconds was lost to sight.
Since the Dark Ages, men have had a powerful longing to leave Earth and visit other planets. Towards the end of the twenty-first century, when atmospheric flying had become common, scientists began seriously to think of constructing machinery to enable man to leave the confines of the planet to which humanity had been chained for ages.
Towards the beginning of the twenty-second century economic conditions had become acute and the enormous population of Earth, which had passed the twelve billion mark, clamored for an adequate outlet which the planet itself could no longer furnish.
The moon was regarded with longing eyes, and although that body was known to have no atmosphere and was known to be sterile, it was equally well known that Earth's scientists and engineers felt that they could, in a few years' time, make it habitable.
Atmospheric flying machines were, of course, totally unsuited, as they could not even reach the limits of the Earth's atmosphere, only forty miles away.
Obviously to reach the moon or any other celestial body, it was necessary to devise a method of overcoming the enigmatical force known as the Earth's gravity, which chains all bodies to the planet.