Our water division of ten boats headed into the center of Kalima Bay, and there I halted them. They lay drawn in a black ring on the placid water. To one side of me, the squadron of girls flew now in a circle at about the threshold foot level. The platforms hovered near them.
Along the shore I could see the slow-moving line of Jim’s army, crawling like a black snake over the winding, moonlit road. I had hoped that the head of it would be approaching the bluff near the west channel of the Virgins’ Island. But it was not that far as yet.
I spoke into my aerial. “Make it faster, Jim!” The image of him showed his smiling face. Good old Jim, always smiling. “Right,” he said.
From this height there was no sign of Talon. Behind me, from Kalima, Maxite had sent out an aerial image-finder. Its pink whirling ball came sailing past me overhead.
I sat enshrouded in my black insulated suit. I switched the current into it; I could hear the current hum; smell its faint acrid odor. The apparatus of the Frazier projector was already assembled. The pulse-motor was on my wrist; the head-band I now adjusted on my forehead. I made all the connections, but I did not turn on the current.
Before me were my smaller instruments. A bank of image-grids was lashed here; voice receivers were at my ears, my speaker aerial was on my shoulder. I caught the rays from the image lens mounted in Maxite’s castle room. I tuned into it, saw his pale, intent face, heard his grave voice.
“No sign of Talon, Leonard?”
“No. I’m holding the girls and the boats ready. I’ll go higher myself—your lens just passed me.”
“Yes. But it shows nothing yet.”
“I’ll send one beyond it.”