by Arthur Train and Robert Williams Wood

“ The professor hesitated in embarrassment, and the general scowled.
"Well?" he demanded, biting off the chewed end of his cigar. "Well? This is not a lecture room. Time is short. Out with it."
"Your Excellency!" stammered the poor professor, "I—I——The observations are so—inadequate—one cannot determine——"
"What?" roared Von Helmuth. "But you said you had!"
"Only approximately, your Excellency. One cannot be positive, but within a reasonable distance——" He paused. ”

“ I won't! How can a man think? I'm a member of the faculty of the Imperial University. I've been decorated twice—twice!"
"Fiddlesticks!" returned the general, amused in spite of himself. "Don't be absurd. I merely wish you to hurry. Have a cigar?"
"Oh, your Excellency!" protested the professor, now both ashamed and frightened. "You must excuse me. The war has shattered my nerves. May I smoke? Thank you."
"Sit down. Take your time," said Von Helmuth, looking out and up at a monoplane descending toward the landing in slowly lessening spirals. ”

“ A compressional wave of air had been started in the far north and had spread out over the earth with the velocity of sound. Though the barographs themselves gave no indication whence this wave had come, the variation in its intensity at different meteorological observatories could be accounted for by the law of inverse squares on the supposition that the explosion which started the wave had occurred at fifty-five degrees north, seventy-five degrees west."
The professor paused and wiped his glasses. With a roar a Taube slid off the landing stage, shot over toward the hangars, and soared upward. ”