At that moment there was a clang of opening doors, and a tramp of feet. Haskell Trask strode into the cell, his bony face and deep eyes ablaze with excitement.
'You reported that the girl has finally told what she knows about Erebus, Cheerly?” the dictator exclaimed.
'Yes, sir,” answered the obese spymaster triumphantly. “Her mental control finally weakened, and she thought of what her father had told her. The psychophone put it all into the record.
'With what she told to guide us, we can land safely on Erebus and get the radite, sir!” the Uranian continued exultantly. “We wouldn't have had a chance without her secret. For it seems that there's only one spot on Erebus where men can land without meeting a ghastly fate.'
Haskell Trask's pale green, bony face twitched with visible emotion. The dictator's gloomy eyes flashed.
'You'll sail at once for Erebus and get the radite!” he ordered Cheerly. “A naval cruiser is waiting in the court now. As soon as you get the radite and start back with it, flash word to me by audio. When I get your message, I'll order our fleets to blast sunward at once for the attack on the Alliance.'
His fists clenched. “Then at last our day will have come! Even while our fleets are crushing the Alliance navies, we will be making that radite into bombs that will break the resistance of the inner worlds utterly.'
'I'll take the girl and a psychophone with me to Erebus, sir,” Cheerly said shrewdly. “She may know a little more about Erebus than her conscious thoughts have revealed. If that is so, I'll get it out of her.'
Trask, recalled from his oratorical flight, nodded his head indifferently.
'Take her, then. But make all speed to Erebus and back. Remember, the mightiest armada in the system's history will be waiting for your message as a signal for it to sail sunward!'
John Thorn had listened in gathering horror. This was the end of all hope, surely! Cheerly would get the radite and there would be no chance for the Alliance ever to operate Philip Blaine's great secret weapon in the lunar caverns—'Philip Blaine's great secret weapon in the lunar caverns,” the psychophone attached to Thorn was blaring.
Too late, Thorn suppressed his thoughts! In his momentary horror, he had let his thoughts stray, and the psychophone over his head had been speaking them.
'Did you hear that, sir?” cried Jenk Cheerly to the dictator. “A secret weapon of the Alliance, built by the physicist Philip Blaine in the caverns of Earth's moon! That's why the Alliance wanted the radite — to operate that weapon!'
Haskell Trask's eyes snapped. The dictator strode to where Thorn sat cursing his own loss of mental control that gave the secret away.
'What is the weapon that the Alliance has hidden in the lunar caves?” he demanded of Thorn. “Speak, Earthman!'
Thorn remained rigidly silent. With a violent burst of anger, the dictator struck him across the face.
'We've got to find out what that secret Alliance weapon is!” Trask snapped to his spymaster. “There's just a chance they might be able to operate it without the radite.'
'He'll give it away to the psychophone, in time,” Cheerly assured his master. “He can't help but give it away — the psychophone pulls out all their secrets, sooner or later.'
'You're wrong this time,” John Thorn said bitterly. “I don't know the nature of the Alliance weapon. None of us know it — and I'm damned glad now we don't!'
'He's lying, of course,” Jenk Cheerly said calmly. “But he'll have to think the truth, sooner or later.'
'We'll keep these Planeteers; under the psychophones until they do tell what that weapon is,” Trask declared harshly. “Meanwhile, don't delay, Cheerly. Get started now for Erebus!'
John Thorn writhed as Lana was brought out of her cell by two of Cheerly's men, and carried down the corridor. He could just glimpse her white, worn face through the grating in the door, and heard her despairing, sobbing cry.
'John, I gave up the secret to them. I couldn't keep from thinking of it longer! And now they're taking me with them to Erebus. Everything is lost, and it's all my fault!'
'Lana, it's not your fault!” Thorn cried hoarsely. “Lana,'
But she was gone. For a moment Jenk Cheerly's fat, green face grinned in at them through the grating. His eyes were sinister and hateful.
'Goodbye, Planeteers,” the Uranian squeaked mockingly. “Wish me a pleasant voyage to Erebus — for by the time I get back with the radite, you three will be dead!'
CHAPTER XV
Through the Tempest
Storm raged over nighted Saturnopolis. Dazzling sheets of weird light seared across the sky, and thunder bawled hoarsely like a hubbub of giants. Torrents of rain and of big hailstones battered the dark metropolis. This was one of the periodic “satellite storms” which occur whenever three or more of the ringed planet's moons are in conjunction, exerting their combined gravitational pull to set up tidal disturbances in the deep atmosphere.
The great citadel of the dictator loomed vague and black in the tempest, its windows shining with blue light. Even night and storm could not lessen the intense activity that was going on in this nerve-center of the League of Cold Worlds, as Haskell Trask and his lieutenants drew up their final plans for the greatest, conquest in history.
Deep down in the dungeon below the citadel, the roar of the raging storm was muted to a deep, continuous rumbling. And down here in the blue-lit cell, John Thorn was working feverishly.
He was hitching his chair across the floor, an inch at a time, by throwing his body forward in his leather bonds. Slowly, he was edging toward the chairs of his two sleeping comrades.
'Got to make it tonight or never!” Thorn's psychophone was droning. “They'll read my plan from the record when they next take and examine it. We've got to make it before then—” Thorn's face was haggard, his eyes burning with a febrile light. His brain had conceived a desperate hope of escape.
Days and nights had passed since Jenk Cheerly had sailed for Erebus, with Lana Cain his prisoner. How many days and nights, Thorn could not estimate exactly. Time had become a blur to him as he and his comrades sat bound here beneath the psychophones.
Thorn had felt his mind cracking from strain as the hours and days dragged He had almost felt that if he had known what Trask wanted to know, the nature of the Alliance's secret weapon, he would have told it. He had been glad then they did
Most agonizing of all in those blurred hours had been the thought of Cheerly, on his way to far Erebus with Lana. The Uranian would come back with the radite. But he would not bring Lana back, once all her possible usefulness was ended!
Tonight, an hour before, Trask's men had removed from the Planeteers’ psychophones the spools of tape which contained the record of their thoughts for the last day and night. New spools had been inserted and the men had left. It had been then that Thorn's feverish mind had suddenly conceived his crazy plan of escape.
As he thought of the plan, the psychophone had spoken it and the recorder had transcribed it. And so Thorn knew that he must put the plan into effect before the record was examined again, or his plan would be read from the record and forestalled:
Thorn, convulsively rocking his chair forward, prayed inwardly that the rumble of the storm would keep the two guards out in the corridor from hearing. He inched on, his chair moving slowly, the thin black wires that connected his skull to the psychophone above, slowly lengthening out. Finally Thorn had got his chair close to those in which Gunner Welk and Sual Av were sleeping exhaustedly.
'Gunner!” Thorn whispered fiercely. “Wake up!'
'The big Mercurian slowly opened bleared, red-rimmed eyes. Sual Av also awoke, yawning. Their psychophones started droning their awakening thoughts.
'Gunner, I want you to tip your chair over to bring your head down on my chair,” Thorn whispered. “Then maybe you can chew through one of these leather straps that bind my arms.'
'What good would that do?” said Gunner with dull hopelessness, “Even if we all three got free of our bonds,
