"Put on your helmet."
"Yes—yes, I will. You put yours on."
We had them adjusted in a moment. Our Erentz motors were pumping.
I gripped her. "Put out your helmet light."
She extinguished it. I handed her my projector.
"Hold it a moment. I'm going to take that belt of bombs."
The trap door was all but broken under the ramming blows of the men. I leaped over the body of the dead duty man, seized the belt of bombs and strapped it around my waist.
"Give me the projector."
She handed it to me. The trap door burst upward! A man's head and shoulders appeared. I fired a bullet into him—the leaden pellet singing down through the yellow powder flash that spat from the projector's muzzle.
The brigand screamed, and dropped back out of sight. There was confusion at the ladder top. I flung a bomb at the broken trap. A tiny heat ray came wavering up through the opening, but went wide of us.