The old man was right. It was a slim chance, but—a chance! To strap themselves into the pneumatic hammocks used by passengers at times of acceleration, hope that by some miracle the Orestes would not be crushed into a metal pancake when they crashed, pray that it might land on a slope, or some yielding substance.

It was a breathless moment and a mad one. Frenzied winds and the groan of scorching metal, the thick panting of Captain Lane as he strapped himself into a hammock between Tim and Dorothy, Dorothy's voice, "Tim, dear—" And his own reply, "Hold tight, youngster!"

Then heat increasing, heat like a massive fist upon his breast, hot beads of sweat, salt-tasting on his lips, an ear-splitting tumult of sound from somewhere.... A swift, terrifying glimpse of solid earth rushing up to meet them.... The last, wrenching shudder of the Orestes as it plunged giddily groundward. Heat ... pain ... flame ... suffocation....

Then darkness.

Out of the darkness, light. Out of the sultriness, a thin, cool finger of breeze. Out of the silence of death, life!

Tim Mallory opened his eyes. And a thick, wordless cry of thanksgiving burst from his lips as he stared about him. The impossible had happened!

The ship had crashed. Its control-room was a fused and twisted heap of wreckage smoldering in the giant crater it had plowed. But somehow the observation turret, offset in a streamlined vane of the Orestes, had escaped destruction.

Great rents gaped where once girders had welded together sturdy permalloy sheets, purposeless shards lay strewn about, even the hammocks had been wrenched from their strong moorings, but he and his companions still lived!

Even as Tim fought to loose the straps that circled him, Captain Lane groaned, stirred, opened his eyes. Dully, then with wakening recollection. And his first word—

"Dorothy?"

"Safe," said Mallory. "She's safe. We're all safe. I don't know how. We must bear charmed lives." He bent over the girl, loosened her straps, chafed her wrists gently. Her eyes opened, and the image of that last moment of panic was still mirrored in their depths. "Tim!" she cried. "Are we—Where's Daddy?"

"Easy, sugar!" soothed Tim. "He's here. It's all over. We pulled through. It was a miracle."

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