They proceeded down the dim-lit corridor the way they had come, descended a flight of stairs and headed along another corridor—to pause suddenly and gasp with astonishment. For through the door whence they had entered the rocket poured a flood of sunshine.
toddard stared at it a moment incredulously, and then glanced at his watch.
"Ten o'clock, I make it!" he muttered. "Am I crazy, or what?"
"No, I hardly think so," smiled Professor Prescott, recovering from his own surprise. "It is merely that we are in some part of the world quite a few thousand miles removed from India. Back on Kinchinjunga, it is still ten o'clock at night, but here, it is quite obviously daytime."
"That must be the explanation," Stoddard agreed. "But it certainly gave me a start at first!"
Approaching the door, followed by the professor, he peered cautiously out, to confront a desolate stretch of scrubby growth, hemmed in by a background of rugged mountains.
"Now where the devil would you say we are?" he demanded, gazing around perplexedly.
"Either in the United States or in Mexico," was the astonishing reply.