Skylark Three | Page 4

opaque to any wave whatever, propagated through air or through ether,
clear down to cosmic rays. Behind it, we would be blind and helpless,
so we can't use it at all. It drives me frantic! Think of a barrier of pure
force, impalpable, immaterial, and exerted along a geometrical surface
of no thickness whatever--and yet actual enough to stop even a

Millikan ray that travels a hundred thousand light-years and then goes
through twenty-seven feet of solid lead just like it was so much vacuum!
That's what we're up against! However, I'm going to try out that model,
Mart, right now. Come on, guy, snap into it! Let's get busy!"
"You are getting idiotic again, Dick," Crane rejoined calmly, without
moving. "You know, even better than I do, that you are playing with
the most concentrated essence of energy that the world has ever seen.
That zone of force probably can be generated----"
"Probably, nothing!" barked Seaton. "It's just as evident a fact as that
stool," kicking the unoffending bit of furniture half-way across the
room as he spoke. "If you'd've let me, I'd've shown it to you yesterday!"
"Undoubtedly, then. Grant that it is impenetrable to all matter and to all
known waves. Suppose that it should prove impenetrable also to
gravitation and to magnetism? Those phenomena probably depend
upon the ether, but we know nothing fundamental of their nature, nor of
that of the ether. Therefore your calculations, comprehensive though
they are, cannot predict the effect upon them of your zone of force.
Suppose that that zone actually does set up a barrier in the ether, so that
it nullifies gravitation, magnetism, and all allied phenomena; so that the
power-bars, the attractors and repellers, cannot work through it? Then
what? As well as showing me the zone of force, you might well have
shown me yourself flying off into space, unable to use your power and
helpless if you released the zone. No, we must know more of the
fundamentals before you try even a small-scale experiment."
"Oh, bugs! You're carrying caution to extremes, Mart. What can
happen? Even if gravitation should be nullified, I would rise only
slowly, heading south the angle of our latitude--that's thirty-nine
degrees--away from the perpendicular. I couldn't shoot off on a tangent,
as some of these hot-heads have been claiming. Inertia would make me
keep pace, approximately, with the earth in its rotation. I would rise
slowly--only as fast as the tangent departs from the curvature of the
earth's surface. I haven't figured out how fast that is, but it must be
pretty slow."

"Pretty slow?" Crane smiled. "Figure it out."
"All right--but I'll bet it's slower than the rise of a toy balloon." Seaton
threw down the papers and picked up his slide-rule, a twenty-inch
trigonometrical duplex. "You'll concede that it is allowable to neglect
the radial component of the orbital velocity of the earth for a first
approximation, won't you--or shall I figure that in too?"
"You may ignore that factor."
"All right--let's see. Radius of rotation here in Washington would be
cosine latitude times equatorial radius, approximately--call it thirty-two
hundred miles. Angular velocity, fifteen degrees an hour. I want secant
fifteen less one times thirty-two hundred. Right? Secant equals one
over cosine--um-m-m-m--one point oh three five. Then point oh three
five times thirty-two hundred. Hundred and twelve miles first hour.
Velocity constant with respect to sun, accelerated respecting point of
departure. Ouch! You win, Mart--I'd kinda step out! Well, how about
this, then? I'll put on a vacuum suit and carry rations. Harness outside,
with the same equipment I used in the test flights before we built
Skylark I--plus the new stuff and a coil. Then throw on the zone, and
see what happens. There can't be any jar in taking off, and with that
outfit I can get back O. K. if I go clear to Jupiter!"
Crane sat in silence, his keen mind considering every aspect of the
motions possible, of velocity, of acceleration, of inertia. He already
knew well Seaton's resourcefulness in crises and his physical and
mental strength.
"As far as I can see, that might be safe," he admitted finally, "and we
really should know something about it besides the theory."
"Fine, Mart--let's get busy! I'll be ready in five minutes. Yell for the
girls, will you? They'd break us off at the ankles if we pull anything
new without letting them in on it."
A few minutes later the "girls" strolled out into Crane Field, arms
around each other--Dorothy Seaton, her gorgeous auburn hair framing

violet eyes and vivid coloring; black-haired, dark-eyed Margaret Crane.
"Br-r-r, it's cold!" Dorothy shivered, wrapping her coat more closely
about her. "This must be the coldest day Washington has seen for
years!"
"It is cold," Margaret agreed. "I wonder what they