rockets made in air! Not quite such comet-like expansion as in space, but
unparalleled brilliancy and even some smoke. How Kammerman would sputter when he
told him about that smoke; it meant wasted power, and waste in a rocket engine
was to Kammerman as leprosy in a man is to the normal woman.
The air-speed indicator registered eighty now. Any slower and the Icarus would
fall of its own weight, despite the stubby wings. He shut off the ocean of fire
and peered eagerly downward–
But on Manhattan Island and all the land visible to Gregory Marshall, there was
nothing but the dense, wild forest.
CHAPTER II of PHOENIX PLANET
IN SICK TERROR he sent the lcarus in as tight spirals as he dared, scanning the
ground below, almost skimming the tree-tops. What could have happened to a whole
city in twelve years?
The forest was not as dense as it had looked from above; it was mostly scrub,
and there were occasional thin spots and clearings. Nowhere, however did he see
any sign of a building or even a ruin. New York–vanished!
What could have been the cause? Some local epidemic, perhaps, which had caused
the city to be abandoned? But the buildings would still be there, certainly–the
great, familiar skyscrapers….
Abruptly he got a clear look at a larger clearing. The ground in it looked
wrong, somehow–it seemed to glisten in spots, like lava–
It was lava. Whole areas had been fused as if with tremendous heat. He thought
of the teeming millions in the city, and felt suddenly ill. Had the city been
evacuated before the cataclysm, whatever it had been, had struck? Had there been