They placed Val Kenton as directed, then left silently, their eyes puzzled as they glanced at Colonel Barber bent over the note book in the bright glow of the landing-field lights. Three minutes later, a scout cruiser fled with roaring jets into the blackness of star-sprinkled space. It took a high trajectory for seconds, then curved into a flattened arc that pointed a few degrees ahead of the green speck of light that was Venus, in the direction of the planet's flight.
Slowly, the rocket-blast dwindled in size until it was a tiny reddish speck in space. After a bit, even that was gone—and there was only the blackness of nothing, against which the stars shone like tiny diamonds on a black velvet drape.
Val Kenton came slowly back to consciousness, his senses blurred and distorted. He opened his eyes, blinked dazedly when they caught sight of shiny familiar instruments on the panel before him. He tried to move, found that he was strapped to the cushions of the pilot seat. He licked dry lips, shook his head, wondering if the beating he had taken had driven him insane. He felt the steady rhythmic vibration of the pounding rockets in the ship, and he relaxed as suddenly as if a dam had broken within his mind.
He saw the note then, for the first time. It was clipped to the instrument panel, and was evidently a sheet of paper torn from a note book. He scowled thoughtfully, lifted it from the clip, tilted it a bit so that he could read it in the radi-light's glow.
"Val, (he read) you have no choice now. By the time you read this, I will have issued orders for you to be shot on sight as a traitor. Your only chance to save your life lies in rescuing Elise and the others. I'm sorry that I must use this method of forcing you to do what you would do if you had not let your hate warp your mind as it has done.
"Elise and the others are marooned on an island they said was shaped like a turtle. Their radio went dead immediately after the single message.
"Find them and bring them back, Val, and I'll do everything in my power to clear your name."
BARBER.