“Stop! I surrender! Don't shoot me!” 

TOM SWIFT AND
HIS ROCKET SHIP

CHAPTER 1


 

THE MIDNIGHT DROP-IN

“SOMEBODY’S FLYING into our restricted area!” Tom Swift cried as an alarm bell broke the midnight stillness of his rocket laboratory on Fearing Island.
      The blond, eighteen-year-old inventor, tall and rangy, laid two wrenches beside the magtritanium metal column on which he had been working. Turning to the muscular dark- haired youth standing beside him, he said:
      “Hurry, Bud! Switch on the patrolscope!”
      Tense with excitement, Bud Barclay flicked a switch beneath a large monitor screen mounted on the wall of the rocket lab. Three green points of light were moving clockwise in a large circle. Suddenly one of them made a beeline toward a small white dot. xxxxxxxxxxxxx


 

      “Our drone planes are after the pilot!” Bud exclaimed.
      Each of the pilotless jets carried an amazing mechanism called the landing forcer, an invention of Tom’s. This instrument could capture and steer intruding planes to Fearing’s airstrip by electronically overriding their onboard servo- control circuitry.
      “This might be an attack to wreck our rocket base!” Bud cried.
      “Let’s get moving!” Tom urged, dashing toward the door.
      As the boys ran from the building Tom took a quick glance at two towering silhouettes which stood out against the starry night sky. The smaller of the two was a sleek needle-nosed metal spire, a rocket ship of Tom’s own design in which Tom and Bud hoped to cross the threshold of space. The other, an astonishing colossus of metal, utterly dwarfed Tom’s experimental craft. This was the mighty CosmoSoar, principally designed by Tom’s father Damon Swift and intended to become the world’s first truly reusable, and re-flyable, private manned spacecraft.
      The wailing of the siren shrieked over the sandy island. Immense floodlights had been xxxxxxxxxxxx

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switched on the instant the robots had veered toward the intruding plane, and sparkling crystal- white beams from a battery of Swift Searchlights raked the skies. The boys stared anxiously upward over the center of the island, where the patrolscope — the newest version of the Swift Enterprises security radar system — had indicated the presence of an aerial intruder.
      “Tom,” said Bud after a few moments, “do you, er — see anything?”
      “No,” admitted the young inventor. “But we both saw the blip on the scope screen.”
      Suddenly Bud pointed skyward toward a pair of small, streamlined objects darting about in a spiralling circle. “Look, Tom! The drones have caught something. But what is it?”
      In the space between the two pilotless mini- jets the boys could see a small dark shape descending slowly toward the ground. Now and then it flashed through the sweeping searchlight beams, but what the beams revealed only deepened the mystery.
      “It’s a man — I think,” said Tom uncer- tainly. “But what’s holding him up? There’s no chute!”
     Leaping into a jeep, Tom and Bud sped past the two rockets and down a bumpy un- xxxxxxxxxxxx
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paved roadway in the direction in which the descending figure seemed to be headed, passing groups of hustling security personnel on the way.
      “Say, Tom,” Bud asked, “you don’t suppose our phantom fall guy was making a suicide attempt to wreck the rocket ships?”
      “Something’s up,” Tom replied. “Certainly all licensed pilots know that this is a restricted area.”
      As the boys roared along the road to the airfield at the east end of the three-mile-long island, the cry of the sirens tapered away to silence.
      “That means he’s down,” Bud declared. Up above their heads, the pair of drones continued to circle their prey, indicating where the figure had landed.
      The boys braked the jeep to a stop and drew a pair of small hand-held weapons from racks beneath the dashboard. These impulse pistols, called i-guns, caused immobilization or uncon- sciousness by means of an otherwise harmless electrical pulse. They were based upon principles developed decades before by Tom’s great- grandfather and namesake, the first Tom Swift.
      Tom and Bud leapt from the jeep. But before they had had a chance to run more xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

than a few steps, a plaintive voice floated out of the nearby foliage.
      “Stop! I surrender! Don’t shoot me!”
      The shrubs shrugged and a man staggered out into the open. Tom and Bud halted and faced the mystery intruder, eyes wide — though not so wide as the eyes of the man himself.
      The man was young, red-haired, and diminutive in build and stature. He was bent almost double by the weight of a bulky boxlike pack on his back, anchored to a thick, khaki- colored garment which was all one piece from shoulders to boot-tips. A solid-looking helmet was attached to this garment at the back of the collar; the intruder had flipped it back off his head. Two pipes extending right and left from the rear of the backpack ended in cones that pointed downwards, trailing wisps of white vapor.
      “Well, what do you know!” exclaimed Tom admiringly. “A rocket belt!”
      “Yeah,” said the man. “I lost track of my fuel consumption and had to make for the ground.”
      “You wouldn’t be over the ground in the first place if you hadn’t broken the law,” Bud pointed out suspiciously. “Or don’t you know xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

that this island is a restricted area?”
      “Oh, I know,” conceded the rocket man lamely. He managed a sheepish smile. “Name’s Gabriel Knorff. I’m a freelance photographer. They call us — I hate to admit it — paparazzi.”
      “I get it,” said Tom. “You were taking photos of the rockets, weren’t you?”
      “Rockets?” asked Knorff. “Is there more than one? You mean that little dinky thing across from the CosmoSoar is a rocket too?”
      Tom had to grin. “That ‘little dinky thing’ is called the Star Spear, and it happens to be my own special pride and joy!”
      Tom Swift, trained by his father to become the nation’s youngest rocket expert, had set up the robot defenses on this Atlantic coastal island after Swift Enterprises had entered a worldwide rocket-building race. He hoped to be the first person to pilot a privately developed rocket-craft — either his father’s or his own — into space and circle the earth in a ninety-minute orbital flight. The European-American Rocketry League had formalized the contest by offering a prize of ten million dollars and the prospect of longterm contracts with the governments of several nations. When rocket research teams in various countries signified their intention to xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

participate, the Defense Department had cooperated by declaring the tiny thumb-shaped island — formerly a U.S. Navy weapons depot and training station — to be a restricted area.
      “Didn’t mean to insult you, Tom,” said Knorff. “May I call you Tom? Of course, I knew right away who you were. Please call me Gabe.”
      Tom shook hands, awkwardly, with the photographer. Then he moved to introduce Bud. “Gabe, this is — ”
      “I know already,” said Gabe, offering his hand, which Bud accepted warily. “Your friend Budworth Barclay.”
      “Don’t rub it in,” said Bud. “Look — Gabe — how about you tell us your story.”
      Knorff cleared his throat, then kneeled down, unzipping the front of his flight-suit so that he could set the weight of his jetpack down on the ground. While Knorff was doing this Tom put away his pistol and contacted Fearing Island security by means of his televoc, his midget personal communicator, telling them that the situation appeared well in hand.
      “It’s you guys who have the interesting story here, not me,” began Gabe Knorff. “All that happened was, my services were purchased a xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

couple weeks back. I was supposed to use the rocket belt for one quick trip over the CosmoSoar, to take photos for a magazine. They figured I’d be too small to set off your alarm system. So I trained on the belt for a few hours — it’s really pretty easy, you know — and then I went out in the yacht, which is anchored about three miles southwest of here, and took off from the deck. But suddenly there I am a few hundred yards in the air with my fuel alarms going off and those little jets buzzing around me!”
      “We’re not used to midnight drop-ins,” commented Bud wryly.
      “No,” chuckled Gabe apologetically, “I wouldn’t think so. But we didn’t see the harm — you folks have talked a lot about your CosmoSoar project in the media over the last couple years. And I was offered a lot of money to get an unusual picture. From a ‘different’ angle, you know.”
      “By whom?” asked Tom. “Whose yacht is it?”
      “Heliax Odysseus.”
      Tom’s sharp intake of breath was noticed by Bud. “Tom, should I know who that is?”
      “He’s one of the richest men in the world,”  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

Tom responded. “His father, Demetriou Odysseus, founded a worldwide news and publishing empire. The son took over when the father retired a few years back.”
      “Now I remember,” said Bud. “They own NCN TeleCable — I watch it all the time.”
      Knorff nodded. “The guy’s loaded all right. My fee for this gig isn’t small, and these rocket belts rent at a thousand dollars an hour!”
      “Which is way too much for these old antiques,” Tom observed. “They’re not safe. But why does Mr. Odysseus want a special photo of the rocket ship?”
      “For one of his European slick-paper magazines, he said.” Knorff looked down at the dirt and shuffled his feet. Then he looked up and asked plaintively, “I suppose — you’re gonna confiscate my pictures?”
      Tom grinned. He found Knorff a likable self- entrepreneur. “Perhaps there’s no harm in letting you keep them. The government imposed a greater degree of security here than my father and I think is really necessary. We’re not building secret weapons — just our own little version of the U.S. space program!”
      Tom and Bud drove Gabe and his equipment back to the island’s main cluster of buildings, xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

where they would make contact with the Odysseus yacht. On the way, the photographer asked Tom where the small rocket fit into the EARL competition.
      “Maybe it doesn’t fit in at all,” replied the young inventor wistfully.
      Several years previously, before Tom had begun taking active part in the doings of Swift Enterprises, Tom’s father had formally tossed the Swift hat into the ring of the EARL contest. Damon Swift, once a consulting engineer on the space shuttle program, had in mind some radically new approaches to the design of manned multi-stage rockets. The result was the mammoth rocket ship now poised for its first flight on the Fearling Island launchpad — the CosmoSoar.
      Naturally Tom wished every success to his father’s project, which had tied up a great deal of the assets of the inventing firm started by the original Tom Swift and his son. But it was equally natural for the 21st Century’s own young inventor to have some new ideas that were his alone. Thus began a friendly competition be- tween father and son.
      “I suppose Dad is just being indulgent in letting me use Enterprises resources on the Star   xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

Spear,” Tom observed. “He thinks his own approach to private commercial spaceflight is the more practical one, and for all I know he may be right.”
      “How is your approach different, Tom?” asked Gabe. “Of course, I can see it’s smaller. But size doesn’t matter — look at me, I’m 5 foot 5!”
      As Tom laughed at this remark, Bud commented, “Tom’s into the old Buck Rogers thing — your own compact rocket ship that takes you where you want to go without coming apart. It has just one stage.”
      “Unlike the Cosmo, which has five of ’em!” Tom added.
      “Man alive!” exclaimed Gabe Knorff. “A five-stage rocket, taller than the Washington Monument!”
      “But will it get off the ground?” asked Bud jokingly. “My money’s on genius boy here and the Star Spear.”
      An hour later, his background as an international press photographer having been verified by Phil Radnor, chief of security on Fearing Island, the boys saw Knorff off at the island pier. An Enterprises employee was to pilot him to the Odysseus yacht, the Heraklona, xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

in a speedboat.
      “Thanks, guys!” the photographer called out, waving his camera. “And thanks for the invite to the launch!”
      “Just remember to tell Mr. Odysseus he’s welcome to come along!” Tom called in reply. He winked at Bud, who grinned back at his pal. They both knew Knorff’s mega-wealthy patron would be unlikely to respond to anything as informal as a verbal invitation.
      As the speedboat roared out of sight, Tom said, “He’s kind of a fun guy.”
      “I guess so,” Bud admitted. “He didn’t do any harm — except for the sleep we lost.”
      “Bud, why don’t you go make up for lost time,” urged Tom.
      “Not you?”
      “Too wide-awake. I’ll finish what I was working on in the lab before hitting the sack. In fact, I’ll just use the cot there in the lab, I think.”
      Arriving at the rocket lab, Tom noted that the magtritanium column on which he had been working was still undisturbed in its clamps on the metal lab table. He opened a nearby equipment locker and withdrew from it a basketball-sized spherical object, made of crystal which gleamed like diamond. This was his new invention, the  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

fuel solarizer, which would allow his small rocket to perform like the “big boys” — if he could make it work!
      Tom carried the instrument to his workbench and connected it to the test column, which contained a microminiaturized version of the motors that would propel the Star Spear into space.
      The stillness of the night was broken for a time as Tom switched on one of the pumps that would be used by the solarizer, testing the rate of flow. As it ran, he made some careful ad- justments until he had achieved a satisfactory result, then switched it off.
      As the laboratory became deathly still again, Tom was aware of a slight noise in the adjacent lab. Thinking it might be one of the chemists back to shut off an experiment, Tom, eager for company, hurried into the room.
      The bright light from his laboratory revealed the intruder’s face — a face Tom had never seen before! The man scowled at Tom and suddenly darted toward the lab door!
      “Stop!” Tom shouted, having decided that Halt! was a shade too formal. The intruder raced into the corridor with Tom after him. But before Tom lunged through the doorway, he xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

pressed a button to sound the alarm. As it clanged, he looked up and down the corridor. There was no sign of Tom’s quarry.
      “He must have ducked into the chemical supplies room to hide,” Tom decided. “There’s no other possible place!”
      Tom spun into the dark supply room opposite his lab. He snapped on a light, cautious and ready for a fight. But no one was in the room but himself.
      “He slipped out!” Tom groaned.
      Realizing that his solarizer invention now stood exposed as he had left it, Tom stepped into the corridor. Treading as softly as he could, he reentered his rocket laboratory.
      The stranger was bending over the solarizer, trying to unscrew one of the feed pipes with a wrench.
      Tom crept toward him noiselessly, tensing every muscle for a lunge at the intruder. Suddenly the man straightened up and stared at the magtritanium housing. In its gleaming surface he had seen the young inventor’s reflection!



 

      Tom flung himself forward. At the same instant his adversary swung around and hurled the wrench. Its handle hit Tom above his left ear.
      He pitched to the floor, unconscious!      


 

CHAPTER 2

FOLLOWING A CLUE

“TOM MUST BE in trouble!” Bud muttered to himself as he jumped from bed and pulled on trousers and moccasins. “That alarm bell’s going off in the rocket lab!”
      As Bud dashed outside, he could see guards and sleepy-eyed engineers trotting to their various posts for the second time in one night. In the distance he could hear the whine of patrolling powerboats.
      Bud ran straight to Tom’s private workshop where he found his friend lying limp on the floor, and for a horrifying second Bud thought that the young inventor was not breathing. He bent down and grasped Tom’s wrist lightly in his fingers. Feeling a strong, steady pulse, he whistled in xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

relief.
      Bud broke a vial of aromatic spirits from the first-aid cabinet in the laboratory and waved it under Tom’s nose. Within a few seconds the young inventor’s eyelids began to flutter. Bud gently lifted his pal onto a couch. Then Tom moaned, opened his eyes, and sat up.
      “The fuel solarizer!” were his first words.
      To the boys’ relief, the instrument stood where Tom had left it and a quick glance reassured them that the intruder had not made away with any part of it.
      Contacting Phil Radnor by televoc Tom explained what had happened, ending with: “He was starting to disconnect the machine, but I guess the alarm bell frightened the guy off.”
      At that instant the broader picture of what had taken place struck Bud. “Listen, Tom, it can’t be just a coincidence that that photo- grapher dropped down on us at the same time a thief dropped in!”
      Tom nodded, grimly. “You’re right,” he said. “The intruder was able to sneak onto the island because the whole security system was dealing with Knorff. But that doesn’t mean the two are in cahoots — Knorff might be just a patsy.”
      “Yeah,” Bud agreed. “But either way, it points in the same direction.”


 

      “Right,” said Tom. “Heliax Odysseus!”
      The boys checked with the island control tower for a report on the patrolscope record-tapes.
      “No plane has taken off since the alarm sounded, Mr. Swift,” said the employee on duty. “And no activity out on the water, except for the big yacht, which is miles away, and the speedboat leaving and returning.” Tom immediately made contact with the speedboat pilot, who reported that Knorff had been ferried to the yacht without incident, and that no one could possibly have stowed away on the boat when it returned. “Besides, Tom,” he said, “I didn’t get back until ten minutes ago, and you’d already been attacked by that time.”
      As the boys stood uncertainly in the night air outside the laboratory building, Hank Sterling pulled up in a jeep. He was the talented head of the Swift Enterprises engineering division, and had been stationed on Fearing Island for the last month to oversee the final work on the CosmoSoar.
      “I heard all about what happened from Phil,” said Sterling, “and I’ve discovered something!”
      “What?” asked Tom anxiously.
      In answer Sterling directed Tom’s attention xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

to the back seat of the jeep.
      “A scuba outfit!” Bud cried. “Tanks and all!”
      Hank nodded. “It was just dumb luck — I saw it lying in a heap on the northwest beach.”
      “This is how the guy got onto the island,” Tom said. “But how did he get off?”
      “Or has he gotten off?” asked Hank.
      Hank drove Tom and Bud to the island infirmary, where the attending physician, Dr. Carman, examined the bruise on Tom’s head. “Tom, let me put some antiseptic on that baseball you’re growing.”
      After a bandage had been taped over Tom’s scalp the boys left the infirmary, wondering where to look next for the would-be thief.
      Bud put a hand on Tom’s shoulder and squeezed it. “Tom, give it a rest for a few hours. Phil Radnor’s guys are combing the island. You go get some sleep, pal!”
      Tom gave a rueful sigh. “Okay.”
      Tom went to his private quarters and spent a few hours tossing and turning in shallow sleep. As dawn paled the Atlantic sky, he rose and showered, and then returned to the lab complex in hopes that continuing his work on the solarizer would take his mind off this new mystery. xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

It seemed he had been working only minutes — though in fact it had been three hours — when he looked up from his machinery, distracted by a delicious aroma floating in through the half-opened lab window.
      “C’mon, Tom!” boomed a foghorn voice with a western twang. “Open up this here door and have some flapjacks, Albuquerque style!”
      “Okay, Chow,” Tom replied, admitting the larger-than-life form of Chow Winkler, the Swifts’ personal chef and a close friend.
      Chow bore a platter of flapjacks, a pitcher of syrup, a tub of melted butter, a glass of juice, a pile of sausage links, and a steaming-hot cup of strong coffee.
      “Whoa!” said Tom in mock alarm. “A real artery-choker!”
      “But brand my skillet, it’ll give you a taste o’ heaven goin’ down!” Chow remarked as he set down his tray.
      As Tom ate, he motioned for Chow to join him. “Be glad to, boss,” said the native Texan. “I’as gonna ask you, how’re things going on that skyrocket o’ yours?”
      “The Star Spear? All right, I guess,” Tom replied without enthusiasm. “Dad’s ship laun- ches for a pilotless test in a few days, you xxxxxxxxxxxx 

 

know. Then it won’t be long before the manned launch.”
      “Aw, that big cosmo-saurus hasn’t got a thing on your space bronco, Tom,” Chow observed reassuringly. “I prefer those compact jobs any day o’ the week!”
      Tom smiled. “Thanks, pard. But now we’ve got another worry — a phantom thief.”
      “I heard tell o’ that. But you’ll get ’im!”
      After the roly-poly cook had left with his tray, Tom spent some time in sober thought about his mysterious adversary.
      What clues do we have? Tom wondered. He was wearing gloves — so no fingerprints. But what about — ?
      Though the young inventor was eager to get back to his work on the rocket, he felt that the menace to the project took first priority for the moment. An idea flashed into his mind, and Tom went straight to Phil Radnor’s security office.
      “Phil’s out with the search team right now, Tom,” said the woman behind the desk, whose name was Nancy Mott.
      “I think you can help me, Nancy,” Tom responded. “I’d like to borrow those scuba tanks Hank Sterling found on the beach.”
      “I’ll get them from the locker,” she said.


 

      As Tom was leaving the office, Bud hailed him. “What’s up now, skipper?” he asked.
      “Just a little detective work. Come on.”
      They went to one of the temporary labs Tom had set up in “laboratory row.” Tom carefully placed the the pair of tanks in a holding cradle of ultra-thin wire mesh. He then slid the cradle beneath a camera-like mechanism.
      “Looking for prints?” Bud asked.
      “Yes,” Tom answered, “but not of the finger variety. It’s sometimes possible to trace a buyer of paint. Manufacturers have been asked to include some secret chemical ‘markers’ in small quantities in their paint so that it can be identified by police if necessary. The rule has come and gone since it began after the second world war, but it’s now encouraged again as part of the defense against terrorism.”
      “I get it,” said Bud. “You’re looking for chemical ‘fingerprints’.”
      “Right. A while back the FBI gave Harlan access to the encrypted internet website that continuously updates the chemical marker-codes,” Tom continued, referring to Harlan Ames, Swift Enterprises’ overall chief of security. “I’ll plug the current codes into this ultraviolet fluorophotometer and we’ll see what xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

comes up.”
      The machine operated silently, scanning the surface of the tanks from every angle as the holding cradle rotated beneath its lenses. Tom and Bud watched the readout monitor.
      “Well, it’s found something,” said Tom quietly. “But it may not be enough for a reliable analysis.”
      Nevertheless, in a moment the screen displayed a name.
      “Worthy Paint Company!” Bud exclaimed. The boys started phoning, first to Worthy, then to a Philadelphia watercraft and seaplane builder that had purchased that particular batch of commercial paint some years before. After a lengthy discussion, Tom and Bud were able to determine that the paint had been used in the construction of a type of craft that seemed a “likely suspect.”
      “We call them our WaveSkimmer-Sevens,” said the manager of the company. “You can see pictures of them on our website, if that would help. They’re basically ultra-small slim-hulled boats for racing enthusiasts, low to the water and equipped with jet engines.”
      “Could they be used in ocean waters?” asked Tom.


 

      “Very dangerous,” the man replied, “and we don’t encourage it. Still, I know people who’ve done it. One thing about our WaveSkimmer series — they can easily be modified to sit especially low in the water. Maybe that’s important, huh?”
      Tom gave Bud a significant glance. “Could be. How widely are these distributed for sale?”
      “We sell direct,” the manager responded, “and if you’re looking for something a little odd, I recall one case from last year. See, the enthusiast world is still small enough that people know people — everybody knows your name, so to speak. But in this case, I dealt with some guy I never heard of, who bought three boats and had them delivered up some place in New England. I’ll look it up right now.”
      When Tom hung up the telephone, the young inventor’s eyes glistened with excitement. Reporting the conversation to Bud, he said: “Besides the other things that were unusual about the sale, the buyer paid cash. That was a lot of money for one man to be carrying around.”
      “Yeah,” commented Bud, “just like it cost a bundle to rent a rocket belt!”
      “The man gave his name as Arthur Gray, xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

and delivery was made to the public pier at Hankton, Maine.”
      “What about an address on Gray?”
      “Turns out he didn’t give an address, and because he paid cash on the barrelhead he wasn’t required to. There was a phone number, but it was to a local hunting lodge where Gray claimed to be staying.”
      Bud grinned. “Well, when do we start for Hankton, Tom?”
      “Why not right now?” Tom replied. “I need to clear my poor bruised head a little anyway. We’ll borrow the amphibian Dad’s technician from Richmond flew in on. I don’t want to attract attention by using an Enterprises plane.”
      Within the hour Tom and Bud were winging out over the eastern tip of Fearing Island, Bud at the controls. They circled the island once, viewing the twin rocket ships on their launchpads, and then headed northeast.
      The amphibious plane was high over the Atlantic, opposite the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, when the radio buzzed with an incoming message from Phil Radnor. “Tom, it looks like we know how the intruder got off the island. As you know, we’ve been searching since the xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

incident last night, and we just wrapped it up a while ago. When one of our guys didn’t report in, we instituted a search for him, and found him bound and gagged near warehouse three, pretty beat up. He’s in the infirmary.”
      “Let me guess,” Tom groaned. “He was one of the guys searching the perimeter of the island in a boat — right?”
      “You got it, Tom. Which means his boat was equipped with one of those patrolscope-nullifiers. We don’t know which way he went. To the mainland, I’d guess.”
      “Or to the Heraklona!” Tom added. “Thanks for the update, Phil.”
      Less than an hour later Bud banked and lost altitude at Tom’s direction. Flying close to the sun-flecked waves, he hugged the shore.
      “There’ll be a red-striped lighthouse on the last jut of land before we hit the bay we want,” Tom told Bud.
      “Hey, I see it!” the pilot cried. “Looks like a big barber’s pole!”
      Smoothly as a sea gull, the plane flew past the lighthouse and leveled toward the anchorage in one of the coves. A village of about ten houses hove into sight. At the end of a spit of land was a small dock. Bud set the amphibian down about half a mile out and taxied in. As xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

Tom made her fast to the dock, the boys saw a lobsterman, who was busy dumping the morning’s catch into a square scow.
      “Mutty fine plane y’got there,” the man observed without turning around.
      “We like it,” said Tom noncommittally, and asked if this was Hankton.
      “S’whut we call it.”
      “We’re looking for a man named Gray,” Tom said.
      “Are ye now? Gray?” responded the man. “I ast ya a’cause my sister married a man o’ that name.”
      “Oh?”
      “O’course he’s been dead these twenty years.”
      Tom smiled. “I’m looking for an Arthur Gray. He was living — or at least staying — around these parts within the last year or so.”
      “Now yuh’re cookin’ with gas,” said the lobsterman. “Arthur Gray! Well then. Nev’ heard of ’im!”
      Tom shot Bud a helpless glance.
      “He might have been a real outsider,” Bud commented. “Just a visitor.”
      “Oh, thet one!” the lobsterman said with something like disgust. “He ain’t a local variety. But he ain’t exactly jest a summer person, xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

either. He owns a pretty fair-sized house about quarter of a mile to the right up Coveshead Road. Looks like a hotel. Can’t miss it with yer eyes close’t. But ain’t no one living there now s’far as I know. Not a soul.”
      Tom was tempted to ask about the jet mini- boats, but fearing he would arouse the suspicions of the fisherman he simply thanked the man, and the two boys walked along the dock to the street.
      “Yow, it does look like a hotel!” Bud exclaimed, as a huge three-story weather-beaten frame house loomed on the right side of the wooded road. “It’s closed up — just as the fisherman said.”
      “At least that’s the way it looks,” Tom snorted. “Not like he’d put out a sign, LOOK INSIDE FOR PHANTOM ROCKET THIEF!”
      The two boys walked around the place but saw nothing unusual. “Let’s go down this path to the water,” Tom suggested.
      They walked down the pine-needled slope which led to another cove. The path ended on a pier that extended about a hundred feet into the inlet. A sheet-metal hut stood on the dock about halfway out.
 xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

      “Let’s see what’s in that shack,” Bud proposed. “Bet you could stack three of those WaveSkimmers in there!”
      The boys had just started forward when sudden footsteps sounded behind them and a gruff voice commanded:
      “Don’t ye move!”

      


 

CHAPTER 3


 

IONOSPHERE MELTDOWN

STARTLED BY the ominous command to halt, Tom and Bud stood motionless. The strange voice growled: “Turn around! Quick!”
      The boys obeyed and pivoted to face an elderly man who carried a shotgun cradled in his arm like a baby.
      “Now then, what d’you mean by goin’ down that path?” he demanded, circling to get behind them.
      “Listen a minute,” Tom protested. “We’re not — ”
      “Nevuh said I cared what yuh’re not,” the man barked. “Jest want t’know what ya are! Mr. Gray a-hire’t me to keep strangers off his xxxxxxxxxxxx


 

place, and strangers is jest what yew look t’ these old eyes!”
      Tom spoke quickly. “Haven’t you heard the bad news about Arthur Gray?” he asked, looking at the watchman over his shoulder.
      “What’s that ye say?” the old man asked as if he hadn’t heard the question. Then, as its import sunk in, he added: “Gol-sarn it, yuh’re jest talking foolish to get something out of me.”
      Tom said no more and started walking up the path. Bud, sensing his friend’s strategy, winked at him and trudged along in silence beside him. They had moved only a hundred feet when the caretaker exclaimed: “Hold on there!” The file halted. The old man stepped in front of the boys. “What’s the matter with Mr. Gray?” he asked, staring at Tom.
      “He’s in bad shape, sir,” Tom replied. “That is, if we’re talking about the same Arthur Gray. What’s your boss look like?”
      “Middlin’ height, dark, has a gold-capped tooth in front o’ his mouth. He has the biggest hands I saw on a man his size, considerin’ I never see him usin’ them to do any work.”
      Tom and Bud tried not to show their elation at the identification — the description matched the man Tom had seen perfectly! “That’s him,” Tom said.
      “You won’t be seeing him for a long time,” xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

Bud spoke up, hoping this bit of news might elicit even more information from the man. “We thought by coming here we might find out about his family or friends — ” He left the sentence unfinished.
   The old man set his shotgun on the ground. Losing his look and tone of authority, he asked: “What’s wrong with him? And who ayre ye, anyway?”
   “We’re employees of a company that’s working on a big project,” Tom replied. “It’s confidential stuff having to do with space flight!”
   The man’s eyes widened. “You mean rockets and such?”
   “Yes,” Tom confirmed. He decided to level with the watchman. “Arthur Gray managed to sneak into our facility, which is protected by the U.S. government. I caught him trying to damage one of our pieces of equipment.”
   The man nodded and indicated Tom’s head. “Gave you that goose-egg, did he?”
   The young inventor grinned. “He sure did! Then he ran off, and we don’t know where he is, or who he’s working for.”
   “For all we know, he might be a spy!” Bud exclaimed. “He might be working for some fo- xxxxxxxxxxxx


 

reign government.”
      “I see. Well, ye look honest enough, an’ old Asa Pike ain’t one to be taken in. Which is why, afore I trust you, I expect t’ see some papers. Not likely I’d believe a story like that on the say- so o’ two youngsters!”
      Tom and Bud produced their wallets, and Mr. Pike examined their driver’s licenses and other identifying materials, including their Swift Enterprises employee ID’s. “Hmm,” he said finally. “Thomas Swift and Budworth Barclay.” He handed them back their wallets. “Now both o’ those names are mighty familiar here in Maine, and up and down the coast. But you sure-t’-hey ain’t thet same Tom Swift who built all them blimps and contraptions back when my granddaddy was a lad.”
    “No, sir,” said Tom. “That was my great- grandfather.”
    Mr. Pike nodded judiciously. “Seems to me I’ve heard of you.” He thought for a moment. “Tell ye what. There’s no place for strangers to eat around here, so come up to my house for some victuals. I might have sutthin’ to tell ye after all.”
    The boys thanked him and followed readily.  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

In a few minutes they reached a shack in a pine grove. Asa Pike led them into his kitchen. A savory lobster stew was simmering on a kero-sene stove. Ten minutes later the boys were feasting on the best sea food they had ever tasted.
      Tom led the conversation to the topic of Arthur Gray. “We were told Mr. Gray liked to race those little jet-boats. Did you ever see him do it?”
      “Nope, nope,” said Pike. “Never saw him race. But he had three o’ those little boats, thet’s for sure. Used to take ’em out in th’ cove early morning with a couple other men. Made a dang racket — folks complained. Then a couple months back he shipped all three away in a big truck, and left hisself the next day.”
      “Left to where?” asked Bud.
      “Can’t rightly say,” Pike replied. “Mr. Gray jest said he had business ‘away’ and would be gone for months. Arranged with the bank to have me paid reg’lar. So you say Mr. Gray and those other fellers might be spies?”
      “Might be, Mr. Pike.” Tom finished a second helping of the tasty meal and came to a decision. “Look, you’re a loyal American,” he said with a smile. “Bud and I feel sure that Gray and the others are up to something underhanded, xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

possibly to do with this big project Uncle Sam is interested in, the one I mentioned. How would you like to help find out?”
      Asa Pike’s eyes bulged. “Me!” he exclaimed. “You a-deputizin’ me, y’mean?”
      “Oh, you don’t have to unless you want to,” Tom told him quickly. “And we don’t want you to do anything risky — just let us know if Gray, or anyone, comes back around this way.”
      “Ketch me sayin’ no!” the caretaker said. “Anything to help Uncle Sam. Jest wait until I tell — ”
      “You must keep this under your hat,” Tom cautioned him. “I’ll write down a special phone number you can use to contact my security chief. And now I have one more question. Did Mr. Gray ever speak of a man named Heliax Odysseus, or a big yacht, the Heraklona? Or some wealthy friend he knew?”
      Asa Pike thought a moment. “Not so’s I remember. Those two other men — he called the young one somethin’ like ‘Poll-oh,’ and the other was named Goff.”
      “Could it have been Knorff?” Bud asked.
      “Don’t think so,” replied Pike. “Nope.”
      “Better not say a word to anyone about our visit,” Tom warned Asa Pike, adding, “We’ll have to go now.” The boys thanked the now- xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

friendly caretaker for his help, and Tom gave him the Fearing Island telephone number.
      “I won’t fail ye,” Asa Pike promised.
      The two boys headed for their plane at the fishermen’s dock. The place was deserted; even the lobsterman had gone.
      “We picked a good time to drop in,” Bud remarked, as they cast off and prepared to taxi out to the open bay, where Tom, in the pilot’s seat, gunned the engines. The amphibian lunged forward and roared along the surface. A moment later it was airborne, and by three o’clock Tom and Bud were back at Fearing Island, telling their story to Hank Sterling and Phil Radnor.
      “Anything new here?” Tom asked when he had finished.
      “One thing,” said Hank. “A message came in about your family. Your Dad and sister are flying in on the Sky Queen in — well, just about now.” The engineer smiled a mischievous smile. “Bringing that pretty girl along. What’s her name? — oh, Bashalli. To keep Sandy company, I suppose. Those girls sure have an interest in science!”
      Tom and Bud grinned, knowing that they were being needled. The four young people were xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

frequently seen around Shopton as a foursome, despite the heavy schedule of work Tom and Bud carried on.
      Tom’s Flying Lab, the Sky Queen, had been scheduled to arrive on Fearing Island in order to carry Tom up to the edge of space so that he might test his fuel solarizer under conditions similar to space flight. Though Tom had known that his father would be riding along on the trip from Swift Enterprises in Shopton, the presence of the two girls was a nice surprise.
      While Bud went off to shower and shave, Tom returned to his private quarters. This might be a good time to write up my daily record for Dad, he decided. Tom, like all good scientists, kept a day-to-day record of his new ideas, the progress of his inventions, and his data and cal- culations. He had done so since the age of twelve.
      These records already filled several volumes. One recent part told the story of the building of his flying laboratory, and his adventures while prospecting for radioactive ore in the Andes. The record also logged his inven- tion of a midget atomic sub, the jetmarine, and the exciting times he and Bud had had in their encounter with modern-day pirates.


 

      Tom’s records were entered electronically in an encrypted file on the Swift dataserver in Shopton, with duplicates maintained auto- matically at several other locations. No paper was ever involved, save for the occasional sketch that Tom scanned into the computer. Nor was there a password for access: a device on Tom’s keyboard read his thumbprint and several other indicators before allowing him to log on to his personal files. Since coming to Fearing Island after the end of his jetmarine project, Tom had seen relatively little of his father. But he had kept especially detailed records about the status of the Star Spear and the development of his fuel solarizer, which Mr. Swift read whenever he accessed the file.
      “I feel confident now,” Tom wrote, “that we will be ready to launch the passenger rocket ship in ten days or less. The Star Spear itself is complete as it stands. Only the final testing of the solarizer in the ionosphere remains to be done. If this test proves successful, I may have a chance to get my rocket off ahead of Dad’s CosmoSoar. And I have to admit, that’s one of my goals — no offense, Dad!”
      Tom had just finished when a deep, growing roar from overhead told him that the Sky  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

Queen had arrived on the island and was touching down on its special landing pad. Standing in his doorway, Tom watched the sleek, mammoth three-decker sink down like an elevator atop its jet lifters, slowing to the gentlest of stops. The side hatchway opened and a railed rampway was extended down to the tarmac. In moments Damon Swift, Tom’s father, had appeared, followed by Tom’s vivacious blond sister Sandra and her good friend — and Tom’s — Bashalli Prandit, a native of Pakistan.
          Tom strode toward the landing pad and met the new arrivals halfway. At almost the same moment, Bud sped up in a van, ready to carry everyone and their belongings to their quarters.
         “Your mother sends her love,” said Mr. Swift to Tom as they shook hands. “She decided she ought to stay with Aunt Hazel for a few more days.”
       “Oh, Tom, this is so exciting!” cried Sandy. “Pictures are one thing, but seeing the rocket ship close up — it’s like an ocean liner standing on end!”
      “It is quite a sight,” said Tom carefully.
     Bud added: “Each rocket is a beaut in its own way.”


 

      “Each rocket?” asked Bashalli, her eyes twinkling. “Is there more than one?”
      “Tom’s craft is the — er — less extravagant one,” said Mr. Swift. “But it’s close to flight-ready, I understand.”
      “We have a saying in my native Pakistan,” remarked Bashalli. “What matters is the skill of the poet, not the size of his brush.”
      “We have a similar saying, Bash,” commented Bud. “But your way of putting it is — ”
      “ — much nicer,” finished Sandy. “Anyway, Tom, Daddy promised to show us the inside of the ship. The CosmoSoar, I mean.”
      “But I do hope you’ll also show us your rocket, Tom,” Bashalli added smoothly.
      Tom response was somewhat offhand in tone. “Oh, sure, if you like. But it’ll have to be tomorrow. I have a dinner date in the iono- sphere!”
      After dropping off Mr. Swift and the girls, Tom and Bud drove out to the Sky Queen, where Tom oversaw the installation of his fuel solarizer in a special airtight compartment on the third deck, a compartment with a transparent plexi-quartz porthole as its ceiling.
      Boarding the Flying Lab, Tom personally xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

hooked in the pump that was designed to carry liquid oxygen through the solarizer. Next, he attached a flowmeter to the pump to register the speed of the liquid. In rocket flight, oxygen would have to flow through the device at a rate of several thousand gallons per minute to satisfy the hungry motors. Should anything interfere with this flow, the rocket would cease to operate and founder in space.
      He flicked on the power and listened to the even whirring of the pump. “It’s perfect!” he murmured elatedly, as the liquified gases surged through the unit. Satisfied, Tom turned off the power, and contacted Bud, on the command deck, via intercom.
      “Make for the sky, flyboy!” he said. The jet lifters rumbled in response, and in seconds the huge stratoship was javelining toward the ionosphere, the region of the atmosphere lying above the stratosphere — and far above the clouds.
      As planned, the Queen came to a hovering halt at a height of 350,000 feet, the edge of space. The sky was a star-flecked indigo despite the blinding-bright disk of the sun, which was still well above the curving horizon.
      “Hold her steady, Bud,” intercommed Tom. xxxxxxxxxxxx


 

       “Steady as she goes, skipper!” was Bud’s reply.
      The purpose of the test was to determine if Tom’s solarizer could successfully use the unshielded solar rays to convert oxygen to its tri- atomic form, ozone, at a rate which would keep up with the demands of the fuel pump. The energized ozone would be combined with the diethylhydrazine compound developed by Swift chemists, producing the continuous “explosion” that was the basis of rocket thrust. Both of the new ships used the same basic fuel, but Tom believed that his solarizer would allow for greater energy efficiencies during the latter portion of the ascent into space, thus decreasing the size of the fuel tanks.
      Tom activated the solarizer and slowly brought it up to speed, the rays of the sun shining down full-force on the transparent globe that was the heart of the machine.
      The rate and pressure dials slowly crept upward, and Tom’s pulse pounded — his new invention was working!
      “This is great!” he said aloud to himself.
      Suddenly an electronic buzzer went off — and then another! Tom checked the equipment xxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

and gasped in dismay. The solarizer’s intensifier globe was sagging under its own weight.
      Good night! Tom thought. It’s melting!
      The next moment the test compartment was wracked by a flash of brilliant blue-white light and the roar of a powerful explosion!
      


 

CHAPTER 4



 

UNSUSPECTED SUSPECTS

AT THE CONTROLS of the Flying Lab, one deck down from the location of the solarizer test compartment, Bud started in his pilot’s seat at the muffled retort of the explosion.
      He instantly snatched up the intercom microphone from its cradle on the padded arm of the contour seat. “Tom!” Bud cried. “What was that? Are you all right?”
      Receiving no answer but a ragged burst of static, Bud catapulted from his seat — and paused. Turning back to the control panel, he reset the autopilot with trembling hands, in-structing the Sky Queen to descend toward the breathable region of the atmosphere with all possible speed. Then he pivoted and scrambled xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

toward the metal stairs that linked the middle deck with deck three above.
      If that blast blew out the porthole, Tom could be gasping for breath — and freezing! shouted Bud’s fearful thoughts.
      But even as the youthful pilot set foot on the stairs, a croaking voice drifted down from above him:
      “I — I’m okay, Bud.”
      Tom was leaning weakly against the stairway rails. His face was pale, and traces of blood were flowing from several small scratches on his hands and arms. Bud clattered up the stairway without a word and helped his friend to the large, comfortable lounge area at the fore of the top deck, easing him down upon a couch. Then Bud treated Tom’s cuts with antiseptic and bandages from a first-aid kit.
      “Doesn’t look too serious,” he commented. “Anything inside those cuts?”
      Tom shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. I guess I raised my hands and arms instinctively, and they took a few flying pieces of sealant material from the pump joints, but that’s all. I was thrown against the wall — I feel like I’ve been tackled by a gorilla!”
      Bud forced a grin. “So what happened in there?”

 

      “What happened? Just an experiment that failed.” Tom’s voice was thick with dis- couragement. “The flow-rate was a little more than half what was required when something happened to the lens-array globe. It started melting, like wax in a flame.”
      “Were you burned when it blew?”
      “It didn’t blow. There was a big electrical discharge — which didn’t reach me due to the safety dampers around the solarizer. That boom you heard was basically a manmade thunder-clap!”
      Tom glanced out the floor-to-ceiling viewpane of the lounge and noticed wisps of cloud fleeing past, vertically. “Is the ship dropping?”
      “Right, skipper,” Bud Barclay replied. “I figured our ionosphere date was over!”
      Leaving Tom to rest on the couch — in reality, the young inventor returned immediately to the test compartment to make some observations — Bud piloted the Sky Queen to a landing on Fearing Island.
      Chow prepared a tasty supper for the two boys and the visitors from Shopton, and, as usual, was invited to join the others and enjoy the fruits of his labors.


 

      “Well, brand my rocket roost!” exclaimed the chunky ex-chuck-wagon cook when Tom and Bud had finished telling the others about the adventures of the day — not only the test of the solarizer, but the trip to Maine. “Here I am, slavin’ over my griddle an’ pots, while you two boys have gone up to Maine an’ way up to that there iron-a-spear!”
      “Do you think there might be some basic design flaw in your solarizer?” Damon Swift asked his son.
      “Maybe so, Dad,” admitted Tom very reluctantly. “It wasn’t a problem with heat inside the globe, but with thermal buildup in the crystal substance of the globe itself, caused by an unexpected piezoelectric effect. I’ll have to completely rethink the fuel solarizer… and…”
      Tom’s voice trailed off. He took a bite of his supper.
      “Now Tom,” said Mr. Swift gently, “the competition that counts is the one we’re both trying to win for Swift Enterprises. We’re not competing against each other.”
      Tom nodded with a polite smile, but said nothing. After a few moments he broke the awkward silence. “Anyway, sis, Bashalli — how’d you like the CosmoSoar?”


 

      “Well, it was — ” she paused, trying not to hurt Tom’s feelings. But then her sentiments could not be contained. “It was just amazing! We went up to the top on the gantry elevator, and all the way Daddy was explaining how everything worked.”
      “Okay, San, what did you learn?” Bud challenged.
      “Ye-ahh, I’d like t’hear this myself,” added Chow.
      Sandy cleared her throat and composed her thoughts. “The CosmoSoar is the world’s first five-stage passenger-carrying rocket, and the biggest rocket ship of any kind ever built. Five- stages — but they’re not on top of one another in the usual way. Stage one is around stage two; and then you go up one layer, and stage three is around stage four.”
      “Shor, I get that,” Chow interupted. “Jest like a bundt cake goes around the hole in the middle!”
      “That’s right, Chow,” Sandy confirmed, suppressing a giggle. “The first stage lifts the ship up just a few miles, and then it sort of opens up like a book and lets loose the second stage, which is inside it.”
      “Let us make this a team effort,” urged xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

Bashalli. “The first stage is tossed aside, but it doesn’t fall down — no, it stays wide open, looking like the wings of a bird. Then this thing pops out — what was it called, Father Swift?”
      “A paraglider,” said Mr. Swift. “It’s actually part of the ‘skin’ of the hull itself, opening out by a simple mechanical arrangement. It contains its own midget guidance system and remote-control receiver; even a pair of para-thrusters, no bigger than your forearm, to help direct it.”
      “So,” Sandy continued, “the outer stage peels off and glides back to earth, while the inner stage, number two, takes over. And that one also has its own glider that it uses when it drops away.”
      Bud looked puzzled. “Mr. Swift, that ship is so huge — I figured the stages would be too heavy to be flown back to the ground!”
      The elder Swift nodded. “Indeed they would be, Bud. But there are two things to consider. First, remember that most of a rocket’s weight is the weight of its fuel. By the time the stage is jetisonned, the fuel will have been used up. But more importantly, the CosmoSoar, like Tom’s Star Spear, consists of a series of Tomasite shells reinforced with a rigid mesh of magtritanium — which is an extraordinarily xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

lightweight combination.”
      Bashalli now took up the narrative. “So you see, the first two stages get the ship going, and the next two push it into orbit. And then all you have left is the little top layer of the wedding cake, where the spacemen are.”
      “But it’s still awfully big,” added Sandy. “Like something you’d see on a sci-fi show.”
      “So how many o’ them astro-nauts does it sleep, Mr. Swift?” Chow inquired.
      “This first model will carry just two,” he answered, indicating Tom and Bud. “There’ll be a good deal of open space. Eventually the line will carry a crew of ten.”
      “Will the top part land back here on the island?” asked Chow.
      “No, although an aeroform-type vehicle is on the drawing board. This model will paraglide into the ocean like the first four stages. You know,” continued Mr. Swift, “the whole idea is to develop a rocket technology that allows for complete re-use of all its parts, not just the command module. Someday we’ll pluck the spent booster stages from the water, refuel them, and send them up again right away!”
      “Oh, and another thing!” said Sandy. “The flaming parts at the bottom of each stage — the xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

real rocket thrusters, I mean — aren’t separated into little cone-shaped things like they usually are. Instead there’s a sort of circular slot that runs all the way around the bottom, just inside the rim.”
      “I believe it was likened to a circular gas burner on a stove,” added Bashalli. “Only it is upside-down, you see.”
      “I see,” Tom said. “Very interesting. You’ve got a couple apt students here, Dad.”
      “But tomorrow morning, you must show us all the outs and ins of your Spear, Tom,” urged Bashalli, sensing that Tom’s feelings were slightly bruised by all the enthusiasm directed toward the CosmoSoar.
      Tom gave a half-wince. “I’m afraid my Spear may be out of business for a while, Bash.” He turned his gaze toward his father. “Dad, I’m guessing the whole engine assembly will have to be pulled and redesigned. I’d prefer to work on it back at Enterprises, so I think I’ll hitch a ride on the Sky Queen when it flies back to Shopton tomorrow.”
      “You may find that the change in scenery clears your head, son,” observed Mr. Swift. “As I’ll be remaining here anyway to oversee the preparation of the CosmoSoar for its pilotless xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

test flight, I can keep an eye on the retrofitting of your ship as well.”
      “Thanks a lot, Dad,” said the young inventor quietly.
      The next morning, the Sky Queen was zooming its way north toward Shopton, the damaged and disgraced fuel solarizer still latched down in its test compartment. Besides a small crew of flight technicians, the giant skyship carried Tom, Bud, the two girls, and Hank Sterling, who was anxious to be reunited with his family. Chow Winkler would remain on Fearing Island for the present, to serve as cook for Mr. Swift.
      The several passengers had gathered in the lounge for refreshment and conversation as the dome of the deep blue sky looked in on them through the viewpane.
      “Tom, have you heard anything from this watchman in Maine, Mr. Pike?” asked Sandy.
      “No,” Tom answered. “But it’s only been a day.”
      “Sandra and I have been talking,” said Bashalli, “and we agree — for we are a team, you know — that this mystery must be approached in a logical way.”
      Bud gave a broad grin. “Logic, huh. More  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

Martian invaders, Sandy?”
        Sandy Swift made a face at Bud. “It could have been true, Mister Barclay!”
        “What have you two come up with, then?” asked Hank.
        “It is really a most simple and elementary approach,” replied Bashalli, “based upon a care- ful and deconstructive analysis of deductive fiction.”
        “She means who-done-it type stories,” San- dy explained.
        Bashalli nodded. “Precisely so. Now you see, the true villain, to be revealed on the last page, must not be anyone you would suspect.”
        “True!” admitted Tom, smiling.
        “Yet he cannot be simply a stranger. So we must identify all persons who have been connected to the plot, but who thus far might be taken to be peripheral. One of them is your ‘bad guy’,” Bashalli concluded.
        Sandy produced a piece of notebook paper. “Last night we made a list of suspects — unsuspected suspects!”
        “Are any of us five on the list?” asked Tom. “I’d say I’m a pretty good unsuspected subject — maybe I slugged myself!”
       “Come to think of it, Sandy, how do we xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

know you two girls didn’t sneak on to the island the other night?” remarked Bud with raised eyebrows and narrowed eyes.
      “If you’re done with your feeble sarcasms, I’ll go ahead,” said Sandy with a dainty snort. “There’s that flying photographer you men- tioned — of course he’s a little bit suspected already, but we thought we’d throw him in.”
      “We don’t mind,” commented Hank.
      “Then there’s the old man, Asa Pike.”
      “Sure!” Bud exclaimed. “He could be the brains of the operation.”
      “And how about the lobsterman?”
      Tom gave a quizzical look. “Who’s that?”
      “You know, Thomas,” replied Bashalli. “You spoke of a man who gave directions.”
      “Well — he’s unsuspected, all right!”
      “And how about that man you talked to from the boat company?” Sandy exclaimed. “Isn’t it suspicious that he just happened to have so much information?”
      “Not really, sis. That’s why we went to him in the first place.”
      “I’m just trying to be logical,” responded Sandy coolly. “I’ll just bet that when this is all over, one of the people on this list will have been xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

involved!”
      Tom laughed. “Nothing would surprise me, Sandy!”
      For the next several days Tom sequestered himself in his lab, leaving only to go home for supper and breakfast and a night’s sleep. Bud sensed that his pal needed some time alone, but early afternoon on the fourth day he casually made his way into the lab and perched on a stool.
      Tom gave Bud barely a glance, so concerned was he with some sketches on the table in front of him. But finally Tom muttered, “So how’s it going, flyboy?”
      “What? You knew I was here all along?” Bud slipped onto his feet and held out his hand.
      Tom looked up. “What?” he asked.
      “I’m taking you out, genius boy!” declared Bud firmly. “You’re getting some air and sun whether you want it or not!”
      “But I don’t need — ”
      “Your Mom thinks you do, and so do I. C’mon, it’ll clear out your brain cells.”
      Tom sighed and put down his electronic pencil. “Maybe you’re right. I’m sure not getting anywhere here.”


 

      The two drove out to Lake Carlopa in Bud’s convertible and rented a rowboat at the recreation pier. They also bought a couple sandwiches and sodas.
      They rowed out into the lake, and soon Bud’s humorous banter had Tom laughing.
      “I feel better,” said Tom. “But I can’t understand why I’m not getting a breakthrough on solving the problem of the fuel solarizer.”
      “If you’ll excuse some unqualified psy- chology — I think it’s because you’re trying too hard to compete with your Dad,” Bud remarked in a serious tone. “Sometimes you look sort of… well, obsessed. I think it’s putting up a brain barrier for you.”
      “I guess there could be something in what you’re saying,” Tom conceded.
      As they talked, Bud rowed along parallel to the shore. After a time, they came upon a small group of youngsters tossing a football between them. One of them, football in hand, noticed Tom and Bud.
      “Say!” the boy called out. “I recognize you! Look, guys!”
      “That’s right,” called Tom in reply. “I’m Tom Swift!”
      The boy looked blank. “Who? I mean him  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

— you’re Bud Barclay, right? Winning touch- down two seasons back, Dalewood Chips versus Shopton Hammerers!”
      Bud looked embarrassed. “Um — yeah, guys. That was me.” But not too embarrassed.
      At the boys’ behest Bud rowed the boat closer and chatted with the small, admiring group. Then the boy with the football tossed it to Bud and asked him to throw a long pass back to them.
      “Better’n that!” Bud exclaimed, unsteadily rising to his feet. “Go way long!”
      “Er — Bud — ” Tom cautioned. But it was too late. Bud was determined to drop-kick the ball from the boat. And he did. Immediately, arms windmilling, he tumbled over the side away from the shore, plummeting rear-first into the lake, sending the boat into a spasm of rocking that Tom could barely contain. The boys on the shore were so busy laughing that they barely tried to catch the ball.
      Thoroughly soaked, Bud threw his forearms over the edge of the rowboat and pulled himself up and in, with Tom’s help. Then the two close friends dissolved in hoots of laughter.
      “Man!” cried Bud ruefully. “I thought I had better balance than that!”


 

      “It was an unfamiliar situation, that’s all,” Tom reassured his friend. “Besides — pardon my saying — you were showing off, flyboy, and probably packed more force into that kick that was really needed.”
      “Guilty!” Bud admitted, waving goodbye to the boys on the shore. As he rowed the boat back to the pier, drying off rapidly in the afternoon sun, he noticed that Tom had fallen silent. Finally, in the convertible, he asked Tom: “Okay, pal, what’s wrong?”
      Tom gave him a surprised look and broke into a broad grin. “Nothing. Matter of fact, thanks to you we’re closer to launching the Star Spear than ever before!”
      


 

CHAPTER 5


 

THE TOPPLING ROCKET

“COME ON, TOM!” cried Bud, amazed. “All I did was fall out of a boat!”
      “Sure. But you did it so — gracefully!” Tom joked.
      Bud gunned the engine and pulled the convertible out of its parking space. “So now you’re launching the rocket ship from a rowboat, or what?”
      Tom didn’t reply for a moment, as he seemed to be getting his thoughts in order and making some quick calculations.
      “I’ll tell you what I’m thinking, and skip the details,” he said. “What makes a rocket go up?”
      “The thrust.”
      “Sure, but what is thrust, anyway?”

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      Bud frowned. “You got me. It’s like a powerful explosion going off underneath the rocket — except, unlike something like a stick of dynamite, the explosion just goes on and on.”
      Tom nodded his approval. “Exactly! A rocket ship is just a solid metal structure that gets blown up, continuously upward so that it never falls back to earth.”
      “Okay. So?”
      “So that’s only one kind of thrust, the thrust of external combustion,” Tom explained. “But there’s also projective thrust. You just gave a good demonstration, Bud.”
      Bud grinned. “So call me professor! But what is it exactly? Throwing something?”
      “Sure,” Tom replied. “Projecting something away from you by whatever means — throwing, kicking, anything. To call on your Mom’s illus- trious ancestor, it’s just another example of Newton’s Third Law of Motion.”
      “I know that one. Every motion in one direction causes an equal motion in the op- posite.”
      “In other words, accelerate a football toward the shore, and you yourself get a push away from the shore.”
      “I’d say the theory is pretty well field- xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

tested,” said Bud ruefully. “But what’s your idea, Tom? Lift the rocket by kicking a lot of footballs toward the ground?”
      Tom winced. “You think you’re kidding, flyboy, but you’re closer to the truth than you know. What I have in mind is a mass-accelerator that will use the rocket’s fuel as its subject mass — sort of a fuel kicker. If we can accelerate the fuel downward toward its combustion cham- ber at some very high rate, we’ll produce upward thrust before the fuel even ignites!”
      Bud was intrigued by the concept. “Maybe you could lift the ship without burning the fuel at all.”
      “I don’t think that would be practical,” responded the young inventor. “But by creating a thrust prior to combustion, the ship won’t need to burn so much fuel at a time, which means we can keep the solarizer turned down to within its safety limits.”
      Naturally, Tom threw himself into developing this new idea. With the help of Hank Sterling and his chief model-maker and metallurgist Arvid Hanson, Tom had a small working prototype in hand within forty-eight hours, ready for a series of grueling tests. Finally, the day before the CosmoSoar was scheduled to blast off for its xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

pilotless test flight, Tom was able to phone his father and report that the Star Spear project was again on track.
      “Fortunately, we won’t need to replace the combustion chambers or fuel tanks, just the pump array and feed pipes,” Tom explained.
      “Still a tall order,” commented Damon Swift.
      Tom agreed and added, “I’m having the new mass-accelerator assemblage made here at Enterprises. The core unit will be flown down to Fearing on the Sky Queen. Meanwhile, it makes sense for Bud and I to jet back down there ourselves. I can oversee the first modifications to the rocket ship.”
      “If you can possibly make it by five in the afternoon tomorrow, you might enjoy watching the CosmoSoar lift off,” remarked Mr. Swift. “And no, Tom, I am not rubbing it in!”
      Tom laughed heartily. “We’ll be there, Dad!”
      By noon the day following, Tom and Bud were back on Fearing Island. They flew down on the Kangaroo Kub, a midget jet that was normally carried within the Sky Queen, but had been temporarily removed to make room for the fuel kicker equipment that was to be transported.
      “How goes it, Dad?” asked Tom, greeting his father with a warm handshake. The young  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

inventor’s demeanor had totally changed: he was once again relaxed and enthusiastic.
      “All systems go — as we used to say,” Mr. Swift replied. He glanced at his watch. “Less than five hours to launch.”
      “So what’s the plan, Mr. Swift?” Bud inquired. “Is the Cosmo going all the way into orbit?”
      “Indeed so. We’ll be testing out all systems from launch to splash-down. I’m particularly interested in making sure that the paraglide units function without difficulty. Your lives will depend on it!”
      “Don’t we know it!” said Tom.
      Tom went to his quarters and had a light snack prepared by Chow.
      “Say, boss, I been meanin’ to ask you something,” said the convex cowpoke.
      “Sure, Chow. What is it?”
      “Wa-aal, what happened to them space fellas you’n your Dad ’as trying to get in touch with? The ones you said not t' talk t' anybody about?” he asked. “You ever figger out all them injun signs?”
      Tom smiled. “If you mean the mathematical symbols on that missile from space — not completely. It’s not just a problem in math and science, but a real problem in logic, too. We xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

don’t know anything about these beings, not even what they look like.”
      Chow looked troubled. “So they may be little green men. Or monsters!”
      “Maybe,” replied Tom. “But you know, the basic laws of chemistry and physics are presumed to be the same throughout the universe, and that puts some limits on the forms viable intelligent life can take. Our space friends may look and think a lot like us.” He stood up from the table. “Here, look at this.”
      Tom switched on a laptop computer and accessed his private, password-protected site. As he scrolled down, row after row of symbols, followed by a word or phrase in English, appeared on the screen.
      “What’s that?” asked Chow. “A diction-ary?”
      “Exactly, pardner — my Space Dictionary, as I call it.” Tom switched off the computer. “It includes all the symbols, and arrays of symbols, that Dad and I feel fairly certain about. We have a pretty good portion of the missile inscription translated now.”
      “What’s it say, Tom?” Chow was wide-eyed with curiosity. “Somethin’ like ‘Take me to yer leader!’ ?”


 

      “’Fraid not,” Tom responded. “More like this.”
      He picked up a pen and wrote some short phrases on a piece of notebook paper.
      WE ARE FRIENDS
      WE SEEK KNOWLEDGE
      FOUR TO THREE
      DIFFICULTIES OF SURROUNDINGS
      CAN NOT ADAPT
      POSSIBLE THAT YOU ASSIST
      CARRY ACROSS
      “Well, some o’ that’s mighty clear, but the rest is clear as mud.” Chow shook his head im-patiently. “Whats this here ‘four to three’ mean?”
      “I think it means they want to travel from the fourth planet — Mars — to the third.”
      “Yeah, an’ that’s us, ain’t it! So they got ‘difficulties’ cause o’ our ‘surroundings,’ I guess. What is it they want to ‘carry across,’ you s’pose?”
      Tom shrugged. “It’s just an early translation, Chow. Maybe ‘carry across’ means something more like ‘transmit to you through space’.”
      “A person sure would like t’know fer sure,” said Chow.
      “We may know our friends better very xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

soon,” Tom commented. “The Star Spear will carry along a special video-oscillograph transmitter-receiver setup. From the moment we blast off, we’ll be continuously transmitting an array of symbols on a ‘logical’ frequency that will signify that we desire to exchange mes- sages. Could be we’ll hear back from them!”
      Chow’s eyes grew wider yet at the thought. “Ooo-ee! Now that’d be somethin’!”
      After a short nap, Tom decided to join his father and the various technicians and engineers in the mission-control “blockhouse,” where the CosmoSoar countdown was proceeding. There were still almost two hours to go before the launching of the unmanned test flight.
      As he walked across the old, cracked blacktop that lay between the various buildings of the complex, a slight wisp of motion in the distance caught his eye and caused him to pause. By this point in the countdown, the Cosmo’s three utility gantries were supposed to be off- limits to all personnel. But Tom thought he had seen the edge of a figure duck out of sight behind a support pylon.
      What was it? Tom wondered. A seagull?
      He stood uncertainly for a time, unsure of whether his half-sighting was significant enough  xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

to warrant televoc’ing project security.
      I’m sure Phil has enough to do right now! Tom thought. Yet he was troubled. Finally he decided to make a brief side-trip to the gantry, just to put his mind at ease.
      Because of its huge size, the rocket ship seemed a good deal closer than it really was. It took Tom a good five minutes of extra walking to reach the gantry. There he halted, leaning back and looking up at the awesome metal pinnacle. The sheer immensity of it seemed to captivate his thoughts, and he had to force himself to remember that he had intended to check out a possible threat.
      He began to circle the base of the CosmoSoar, which at the very bottom was almost 100 feet in diameter, with a cir- cumference of about 315 feet. Though the rocket rested upon the looming stabilizer fins that radiated from the base, it was also steadied by the gantries spaced evenly around it.
      Having walked more than halfway around without sighting anything untoward, Tom was about to leave the area and resume his walk to the command center when a slight metallic sound coming from somewhere above him brought him to a halt. It was repeated, somewhat loud- xxxxxxxxxxxx