LAB IN THE WILDS 119
Presently he turned down a rutted dirt lane. After a few minutes of bumpy travel, he pulled up outside a startling structure. It looked to the Swifts like a giant silver igloo!
“Here we are,” Furster said as he switched off the ignition and climbed from the car.
The odd-shaped laboratory was built of narrow sheets of aluminum woven together in crisscross fashion. Though very light in weight, it probably was ultrastrong and rigid, Tom realized. Nearby stood a small windowed shed.
“Quite a surprise to see such a place out here in the woods,” Tom said admiringly.
Furster smirked. “You’ll be even more surprised when we go inside.”
Something about his tone made Tom glance at the man sharply. Furster returned a bland smile and ushered them into the building.
The Swifts’ eyes widened at sight of the completely outfitted laboratory.
Banks of electronic gear, racks and coils of chemical equipment, a miniature electric furnace for smelting alloys, high-precision optical devices-everything of the newest and best design.
Two men were lounging at a workbench. One was heavily built, about fifty, with a bulldog jaw. The other was a hard-faced younger man with slick black hair.
“My research assistants,” Furster introduced them. “Bruggin and Howard.”
120 MEGASCOPE SPACE PROBER
As Tom and his father shook hands with them, they heard a snickering laugh, and whirled to face their host. Furster was holding a gun!
“We can skip the comedy now that I have you two covered,” he told the inventors.
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