With his right hand Wofforth ran a length of pliable cable around his waist and through a ring-bolt on the decking. He touched the engine controls, and they pulled away from camp.
The sled coursed over great knoll-like swellings of the terrain, coated with the dull-pale frozen atmosphere. Beyond, it gained speed on a vast flat plain, almost as smooth as a desert of glass.
"What's this big rink. Lieutenant?" asked Jenks.
"Maybe a sea, or maybe just a sunken area, full of solid gases. Stand by the helm, I'm going to gun a few more M. P. H. out of her."
"No wind," grunted Corbett. "Nothing moving except us. The floor of hell."
"If you was in hell, the rest of us would be better off," said Jenks sourly.
Wofforth began to sing, though he did not feel like it:
Trim your nails and scrape your face,
They're all on the Other Side of space!
Tokyo—Baltimore, Maryland—