Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-07-06

Xodar and / succeeded in grasping the
| handrail, but the boy would have plunged
| overheard had I not fortunately grasped
| MS ankle as he was already partially over.
Unguided, our vessel careened wildly on
its mad fight, rising ever nearer the rocks
| above.
1t took but an instant however. for me
| to regain the levers, and with the roof
| barely fifty feet above | turned her nose
once more into the horizontal plane and
headed her again for the black mouth of
| the shaft
The collision had retarded our progress,
| and now hundred swift scouts were close
| upon us, Xodar had told me that ascend
| Ing the shaft by virtue of our repulsive
| rays alone would give our enemies their
| best chance to overtake us, since our pro-
| pellers would be idle. and in rising we would
| be outclassed by many Of our pursuers.
The swifter craft are seldom equipped with
large buoYancy tanks, since the added bulk
OF them tends to reduce n vessels speed.
As many boats were now quite close to
US 1t was Inevitable that we would be quick
ly overhauled In the shaft and captured
or killed In short order.
To me there always seems way to gain
the opposite side of an obstacle. If one
cannot pass over 1t or below 1t or around
1t. why, then, there Is but single alterna-
tive left, and that is to pass through It.
I could not get around the fact that many
OF these other boats could rise faster than
ours by the fact of their greater buoyancy
put l was none the less determined to reach
the outer world far in advance of them or
die death of my own choosing in event
of failure.
Reverse !" screamed Xodar, behind me-
For the love of your first ancestor, re-
verse We are at the shaft"
Hold tight !" 1 screamed in reply. Grasp
tho boy and hold tIght-we are going
straight UP the shaft"
The words were scarce out of my mouth
as we swept beneath the pitch black OPEN
ing. / threw the bow hard up dragged
the speed lever to It's last notch. and.
clutching stanchion with one hand and
the steering wheel with the other, hung on
ike grim death and consigned my soul to
its Author.
1 heard a little exclamation of surprise
from Xodar, followed by a grim laugh.
Inc boy laughed, too and said something
which could not catch for the whstllng
or the wind of our awful speed.
looked above my head hoping to catch
the CLEAN of stars by which l could direct
our course and hold the hurtling thing
that bore us true to the centre of the
shaft. To have touched the side at the
speed we were making would doubtless
nave resulted In instant death for us all
But not star showed above-only utter
and impenetrable darkness.
Then 1 glanced below me- and there I
saw rapidly diminishing circle of light
tho mouth OF the opening above the phos-
phorescent radiance OF Omean. BY this I
steered. endeavoring to keep the circle of
light below me ever perfect
: At best II was slender cord that held
US from destruction. and I think that I
steered that night more by intuition and
blind faith than by skill or reason.
We were not long In the shaft. and pos
sbly the very fact of our enormous speed
saved us, for evidently we started in the
right direction, and so quickly were we out
again that we had no time to alter our
course.
Omean lies perhaps two miles below the
surface crust OF Mars Our speed must
have approxlmated two hundred miles an
hour, for Martan hiers are swift, so that
at most we were in the shaft not over 40
seconds
We must have been out of 1t for some
seconds before l realized that we had ac-
complshed the impossible.
Black darkness enshrouded all about u.s.
There were neither moons nor stars. Never
before had l seen such a thing upon
Mars. and for the moment was non
plused.
Then the explanation came to me. It
was summer at the south pole. The ice
cap was melting and those meteoric pheno-
mena, clouds, unknown upon the greater
part of Barsoom, were shutting out the
lights of heaven from this portion OF the
planet.
CONTINUED TOMORROW