Billy had noticed that for some time it had been getting brighter and brighter, although the Sun had hidden himself behind a great wall of blue-black clouds. Now he looked through the front windows and saw a great star sweeping rapidly down on them, swishing a long tail behind him.
“Is—is it a comet?” he asked in affright, observing that the motorman rushed into the car, slamming the door after him.
“Comet nothing!” said Nimbus. “It’s only a fourth- class Meteor with a message for me. They’re the A.D.T. boys up here, and he’s probably brought some word from the Equine Ox.”
The Meteor came alongside and Billy read in gold letters across his glowing cap the words:
PLANETARY MESSENGER SERVICE
No. 7,622,451
“My!” he exclaimed, “there are a lot of them, aren’t there?”
“Seven million nine hundred thousand six hundred and three,” said Nimbus. “What have you got, boy?”
“Message, sir,” said the Meteor briskly, taking off his cap and extracting a blue envelope.
Nimbus took it and ran his eye over it hastily.
“Here’s a pretty kettle of fish,” he said, handing the paper to Billy.