Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 146 No. 4 — page 19: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE the red and green beam swung toward it, and a moment later picked it up. [I caught a fleeting glimpse of what I took to be a little biplane. It remained for an instant illuminated by the weird red and green flare; then the Mercutian Light swung back to its vertical position. A sec- ond later the biplane burst into flames and fell. The thing left me shuddering. I turned our searchlight permanently off and sat staring down at the shadowy country scur- rying away beneath us. Mercer had evidently not seen this trag- edy. He did not look at me, but kept facing the front. We were now somewhat to the west of Garland, with it between us and the Mercutians. The few lights of the town could be seen plainly. The country be- neath us seemed fairly level. To the west, half a mile away, perhaps, I could make out a sheer, perpendicular wall of rock. We seemed to be flying parallel with it and about level with its top. We were rising a little, I think, when, suddenly our ‘engines stopped. T remember it flashed through my mind to wonder how Mercer would dare shut them off when we were flying so low. The sudden silence confused me a little. I started to ask him if he had seen the biplane fall, when he swung back abruptly and gripped me my the arm. “ Turn on the light—you fool—we’ve got to land!” I fumbled with the searchlight. Then, just as I turned the switch, I saw, rising from a point near the base of the Mercu- tian Light, what appeared to be a sky- rocket. It rose in a long, graceful arc, reached the top of its ascent, and came down, still flaming. I remember deciding it would fall In or near Garland. It seemed to go out just before it landed —at least I did not follow it all the way down. Then there came a flash as though a huge quantity of red and green smoke- less powder had gone off in a puff; a brief instant of darkness, and then flames rose from a hundred points in the little town. The next second our wheels ground in the sand. FIRE PEOPLE. I heard a splintering crash; something struck me violently on the shoulder; then— blackness. CHAPTER IV. THE MEETING. ROFESSOR NEWLAND and his fam- Pp ily were living in seclusion in their Florida home at the time the Mer- cutian invaders landed in Wyoming. The - curious events in Florida, which connected them so directly with the invasion and caused Alan later to play so vital a part in it, are so important that I am impelled to relate them chronologically, rather than as they were told me afterward by Alan and Beth. se When, on . March g, the news that the Mercutians had landed in Wyoming reached Professor Newland, he immediately estab- lished telegraphic communication with Har- vard. Thus the was kept fully informed on the situation—indeed, he saw it as a whole far better than I did, | On March 12, three days after the land- ing, orders from Washington were given out, regulating all passenger transportation in the direction of the danger zone. One hundred miles was the limit set. State troops were placed on all trains, State roads were likewise guarded, and the State air- plane patrols united in a vigilant effort to keep outside planes from getting it. On the 13th the President of the United States issued an appeal to all persons living within the hundred-mile limit, asking them to leave. 3 On March 14 the Canadian government offered its assistance in any way possible— its Saskatchewan airplane patrol was al- ready helping Montana maintain the hun- dred-mile limit. Similar offers were imme- diately made by re every govemnmnenit in the world. Such were the first main steps taken to safeguard the people. By March 14 the actual conditions of af- fairs in the threatened section of Wyoming was fairly well known. The town of Gar- land was destroyed by fire on the night of the roth, and the towns of Mantua and CONNICHOOOKS «COIN