"Liners are stranded in the ocean, unable to move. Their passengers can't drink. The power house at Niagara is useless; the water comes over the falls in drops as big as houses. People are beginning to suffer from thirst. I know a Martian named Olduk who's going to burn alive if he doesn't tell us how to stop the mechanism."
The cigar contacted, lingered. There was a sulphurous odor.
Tiny muscles on the Martian's face began to tense. Sweat broke out on his face.
"You cannot harm me," he said steadily. "Can only kill me. If you kill me, mankind die. We of Mars have then a planet of water to ourselves. That's my warning. Heed me."
Fifteen minutes passed. Olduk's face was a mass of blood and burns. Every nerve in his body was quivering. He had answered none of the questions hurled at him. He had refused to divulge the location of the buried ship. Finally his muscles relaxed, and his double-lidded eyes sagged shut.
The chief of the secret service said ragingly, "Throw him into a cell, the dirty—! We'll work on him later!"
After Olduk was taken away, the iron-gray man looked at the Speaker.
"What do we do now?"
The Speaker looked in horror at the sphere of water in his hand. "We'll have to give in—"
"Damned if we will," the other snarled, pacing up and down. "If we could find out where that ship is, we could send a super-tension ship down and blow it to—" He stopped, his eyes lighting. He wheeled. "Didn't Olduk say 'ten miles' below the surface? Damn! There aren't many places that deep—" He snapped his fingers, and reached for a phone.