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they might be a bit of nuisance if they got a big following.'
    'H'm. It's a wonder people don't get sick of Dithernear's stunts, but they don't seem to. Well, I'm glad you came and I hope you are as optimistic as you sounded.'
    'I am nearly,' Dale admitted, as they parted.

     

Chapter IV.   AND REACTIONS.
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    INTO the Curtance sheds where the great rocket rested in its thicket of scaffolding only the faintest ripples of popular excitement penetrated. Though Dale gave interviews freely enough to avid pressmen, he was adamant in his refusal to permit interruption in the routine of his shops, and the reception of those few journalists who attempted to enter by subterfuge was ungentle. An augmented corps of watchmen with the assistance of police dogs guarded doors behind which work went on with the same unhurried efficiency as in the days before the secret was out. The most obvious and concrete result of world wide interest was a new shed hastily run up to accommodate Dale's swollen secretariat.
    The inquest upon the intruder was reported in full detail and followed with close attention, but it failed to provide any sensational revelations, and the body remained unidentified. The chief witness gave his evidence clearly, received the congratulations of the coroner upon his narrow escape and left the court with an increased reputation for courage.
    Two days later the Chicago Emblem announced that the dead man had been an American citizen named Forder. It indignantly demanded a closer inquiry into the circumstances, hinting that Dale might show up less well. The leader on the subject finished by truculently demanding the passage of a special bill through Congress to prevent the Keuntz Prize from going abroad.
    'That's the point,' Fuller said as he showed the article to Dale. 'That's the Keuntz works behind this, I'll bet. They're afraid of you lifting the prize.'
    Dale nodded. 'Looks like it. Still, it's good news in one way. It suggests that they aren't building a rocket to try for it themselves.'
    'I don't know.' Fuller was less sanguine. 'I know our reports say so, but you never can tell how much double and triple crossing is going on with these agents. It might equally well mean that they are having a shot at it and think that any rivals will be put off if there is no chance of their getting the prize.'
    'Well, our men haven't let us down yet. You can be sure that if they were building a space rocket anywhere we'd have heard of it somehow just as they or somebody else seem to have heard of ours.'
    'Perhaps. I should say it was they, since the man you shot was an American. Anyway, they're out to get that prize and the interest it's accumulated. Apart from the money, it'd put them back at the top of the rocket plane industry. Their reputation's been slumping badly the last year or two, you know for anyone else to get it would mean the end of them.'
    The following day the Daily Hail threw overboard its noisy but uninfectious policy of Save Britain's Speed King From Himself and joined with the Excess in a vituperative duet against the Emblem. A scathing reply from the latter involving George III and the American debt was side tracked by the Potsdamer Tageblatt which pointed out on behalf of the Fatherland chat Keuntz, a German before he was an American, had with true German generosity offered his prize to the whole world. Keuntz, replied the Emblem, with some heat, was also a Jew who had been forced to flee from the kindly Fatherland in the days of the first Fi1hrer. America, the land of the free, had given him sanctuary, therefore, etc., etc. And the battle went on.
    Outside the main brawl the Views Record was announcing that 'Mars Must be Internationalized'. Swannen Haffer in the Daily Socialist was asking, 'Will the Martian Workers be Exploited?' The Daily Artisan was predicting the discovery of a flourishing system of Martian Soviets. Gerald Birdy wrote articles on 'Planning a New World' and the need for a Planetician in the