All that pleasant, necessary place was now a mass of white-hot ruin; all those books and pictures now had turned to ash.
The five remaining comrades paused by the hangar, and looked mournfully back at the still-leaping volcano of destruction.
"Poor Brevard! Poor old chap!" said Craig.

He peered at the women.
Neither one was crying--they were not that type--but both were pale.
"I don't feel that way," said Gabriel.

"Brevard is not to be pitied.
He's to be envied! He died in the noblest war we can conceive--the war for the human race! And his last act was to take part in a battle that stamped out two vipers, Air Trust spies, who would have joyed to burn us all alive!" [Illustration: The spy's body burst into a sheaf of fire.] "Thank God, I got the Hell-hounds!" muttered Craig.

"Two less of Slade's infamous army, anyhow." Though Gabriel knew it not, the first one to fall was the same who had battled with him in the trap at Rochester, the same who had trailed him when he, Gabriel, had left the Federal pen.

So one score, at least, was settled.
"They're gone, anyhow," said Gabriel, "and five of us still live--and I've still got the plans and all.