“How’d you arrange that?” Bud asked, amazed.
Ames grinned. “Took a bit of finagling, but Jantree accepted him. This’ll give us an inside line on what they’re up to.”
“Good work, Harlan!” Tom congratulated him. “Let’s hope your plan pays off.”
The next few days were busy ones. Several reports came through from Josef Warturo, indicating that he had succeeded in gaining Jantree’s confidence. But so far he had learned nothing significant.
78
A POWERFUL TAKEOFF 79
Meanwhile, Tom’s monstrous interplanetary ship was nearing completion on Fearing Island. The two boys flew over one afternoon to inspect it.
“Man, it’s out of this world!” Bud gasped.
“That’s where she’s headed.” Tom grinned. “Hank says she’ll be ready for the first test flight tomorrow. Still game to come along?”
“Try and stop me!” Bud said enthusiastically. “How about a guided tour right now?”
“Okay, let’s go aboard.”
More than ever the gleaming spaceship looked like a huge gyroscope, poised on four hydraulic landing struts. At the center was the cube-shaped cabin or fuselage. Auxiliary rocket tubes projected below.
“Those polished cups mounted on the cabin are the energy-conversion units,” Tom pointed out. “And as I told you, the repelatron radiators run on these outside tracks. Incidentally, a special meteor-repelling machine will be turned on all the time.”
“Thank goodness for that,” said Bud. “I’d hate to have a meteor hit us. Say, what’s this? Looks like a front porch” he added, as they climbed up to the cabin.
“Landing platform for auxiliary ships,” Tom explained.
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