Look to the Stars

by Willard E. Hawkins

"Oh, we get around!"

The bearded scientist snorted. "Why bandy words? To show up Lamberton in all his stupidity, I have only to do this—"

With a dramatic gesture, he thrust home the prongs of a huge switch which occupied the central panel of a control board in front of the coils. Involuntarily, Marlin braced himself for a shock. Nothing happened. Nothing, at least, beyond a faint hum which emanated from the towering apparatus.

"Well?" queried DuChane impudently.

Eli shook his beard impatiently. "What did you expect? First it is necessary to build up a magnetic potential. Then, with this lever, I release the current through the repulsion plates." He caressed the device but refrained from demonstrating. "Naturally, I will make the first tests with utmost caution. The lever acts as a rheostat, by which the power is applied in any degree required, governing the acceleration. If I should move it to the extreme limit we would be hurled away from the earth with such violence as to crush every bone."

"How about steering?" queried Marlin. "Wouldn't you be condemned to travel in a straight line from any object which the plates happened to be facing at the start?"

"Do you take me for a numskull? Naturally the plates are segmented. They can be turned like a—like a—"

"Like the sections of a Venetian blind," interposed DuChane. "I get you. And—er—when do you start?"

Eli frowned. "I shall not delay long. All essentials are in place—the storage batteries, fully charged to furnish current for at least seven months, the dynamos, the conversion coils. First comes the trial flight. It will be brief—but sufficient to astonish the world. Then, when I have enjoyed the sight of Lamberton and those imbecile financiers groveling in the dust, I shall finish the sphere—without their assistance—and go—who knows where? To the moon, the planets—"

His grandiloquent vision was interrupted by another of the periodic lurches, which caused them all to grasp for support. Overhead, the girders groaned as they accommodated themselves to a new stress. Somewhere, a heavy object fell.