Argo was at my elbow. His pencil-ray dug into my ribs. Had I made a false move it would have drilled me clean with its tiny burning light. I told the pilot we would descend. It placated him; but he saw Argo's face, mumbled something about damned foreigners—general orders probably coming tomorrow to clean out Venia—damned well rid of the traitors. Then he disconnected. Venia, Georg and I were sure, was where Argo was now taking us. But the rest of his comments I did not clearly understand until later.
We descended, and the flyer came up over the horizon and passed us overhead. We were pointing southward now, had picked up the 67th West Meridian and were following it down. The Hays station[8] challenged us; but they were satisfied with my explanation. Argo had us up in speed around four hundred miles per hour. We went down Davis Strait, over Newfoundland, avoiding the congested cross-traffic of mid-afternoon in the lowest lanes, and out over the main Atlantic. Night closed down upon us. It was safer for Argo now. We flew without lights. Outlawed. Had they caught us at it, we would have been brought down, captured by the patrol and imprisoned. Yet Argo doubtless considered the chance of that less dangerous than a reliance upon my ability to trick the succeeding directors.
With darkness we ascended again to the upper mail lanes. Over the main Eastern Atlantic now, and out here this night, there was little local traffic. The mail and passenger liners went by at intervals—the spreading beams of their lurid headlights giving us warning enough so that we could dive down and avoid being caught in their light. I prayed that one of their lights might pick us up, but none did.
North of Bermuda, a division of the North Atlantic patrol circled over us. The ocean was calm. Argo dropped us to the surface. We floated there like a derelict—dark, silent, save for the lapping of the water against our aluminite pontoons. The patrol's searching beams swept within a hundred feet of us—missed us by a miracle. And as the patrol passed on, we rose again to our course.
Argo gave us one of the small cabins to ourselves that night. He was still deferential to Elza, but in his manner and in the glitter of those little black eyes, there was irony, and an open, though unexpressed, admiration for her beauty.
We slept little. Georg and I—one or the other of us—was awake all night. We talked occasionally—not much, for speculation was of no avail. We wondered what could be transpiring abroad through all these hours. Hours of unprecedented turmoil on Earth, and on our neighboring worlds. We wondered how the Central State of Venus might be faring with the revolution. Would they ask aid of the Earth? This Tarrano—merely a name to us as yet, but a name already full of dread. Where was he? Had he been responsible for all this? Dr. Brende's secret was in his hands now, we were sure. What would he do next?
About three o'clock in the morning—a fair, calm night—our power died abruptly. We were in the Caribbean Sea not far above the Northern coast of South America, at 15° North latitude, 67° West longitude. Our power died. Elza was fast asleep, but the sudden quiet brought Georg and me to alertness. We joined Argo in the pit. He was perturbed, and cursing. We dropped, gliding down, for there was no need of picking a landing with the emergency heliocopter batteries—glided down to the calm surface. For a moment we lay there, rocking—a dark blob on the water. I heard a sudden sharp swish. An under-surface freight vessel, plowing from Venezuelan ports to the West Indian Islands, came suddenly to the surface. Its headlight flashed on, but missed us. It sped past. I could see the sleek black outline of its wet back, and the lines of foam as it sheered the water. We lay rocking in its wake as it disappeared northward.
Then, without warning, our power came on again. An inadvertent break perhaps; or maybe some local or general orders. We did not know. Argo was picking from the air occasional news, but he said nothing of it to us; and he was sending out nothing, of course.
Dawn found us over the mountains. The Director at Caracas challenged us. Argo kept me by his side constantly now. Dutifully we answered every call. The local morning traffic was beginning to pick up; but we mingled with it, at 8,000 feet and more, to clear the mountains comfortably.
Elza again cooked and, with Argo joining us, we had breakfast. Argo's good nature continued, as we successfully approached the end of our flight. But still he volunteered nothing to us. We asked him no questions. Elza was grave-faced, solemn. But she did not bother Georg and me with woman's fears. Bravely she kept her own counsel, anxious only to be of help to us.