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Updated: June 10, 2025
"According to my calculations," said Jeter, when the eastern sky was just paling into dawn, "Kress has now reached a point higher than man has ever flown before, higher than any living " Jeter stopped on the word. Both men remembered Kress' last words. Kress, upset or not, properly or improperly, had hinted of living things in the stratosphere perhaps utterly malignant entities.
Silly, of course, but behind the silliness of the thought Jeter thought there might be something of interest, something on which to work. The Jeter-Eyer space ship still was not finished though almost when the world moved into the third week since the disappearance of Franz Kress. An Indian in the Southwest had reported seeing one of those columns of light.
Jeter and Eyer went across to him as he was saying his last words into the microphone before stepping into his sealed cabin for the flight. Kress saw them coming and his face lighted up. "Lord," he said, "I'm glad to see you two. I've something I must ask you." "Anything you ask will be answered," said Jeter, "if Tema and I can answer it. Or granted if it's a favor you wish."
Kress, like most Germans, set to the development of an idea which others had originated; he followed de la Landelle and Forlanini by fitting two superposed propellers revolving in opposite directions, and with this machine he achieved good results as regards horse-power to weight; Kimball, it appears, did not get beyond the rubber-driven model stage, and any success he may have achieved was modified by the theory enunciated by Berriman and quoted above.
And while the newspaper reporters went wild over Kress' return, the partners started making additional plans. Strange Levitation "In two days we'll be ready, Tema," said Lucian Jeter quietly. "And make no mistake about it; when we take off for the stratosphere we're going to encounter strange things. Nobody can tell me that Kress' plane actually flew three weeks! And where did it come down?
From somewhere up here in this immensity, Franz Kress had dropped to his death. Of course, if it had happened at this height he hadn't lived to suffer. Or had he? What had been done to him by the the denizens of the stratosphere? Jeter sat down beside Eyer. It seemed strange to eat breakfast here, but the sandwiches and hot coffee in a thermos bottle were extremely welcome.
It was just here, in the dawning of the first day after Kress' departure, that the dread began to grow on Jeter and Eyer. And during the day they labored like Trojans at their work, as though to forget it. The world had begun its grim wait for the return of Kress. They waited all that day ... and the next ... and the next!
Why didn't Kress use the parachute ball? Where is it? I'll wager we'll find answers to plenty of those questions if we live!" "If we live?" repeated Eyer. "You mean ?" "You know what happened to Kress? Or rather you know the result of what happened to him?" "Sure." "Why should we be immune? I tell you, Eyer, we're on the eve of something colossal, awe-inspiring perhaps catastrophic."
Nobody knew how high Kress had gone, for the only information which had come back had been the corpse of the sky pioneer. Jeter and Eyer hoped to land, too, but to be able to tell others, when they did, what had happened to them. Somehow, away up here, the affairs of the Earth seemed trivial, unreal.
There were other scientists present, but the fact that Jeter and Eyer, who were so soon to follow Kress into the stratosphere and eternity? held the places of honor near the desk of the spokesman, was significant. "What do you gentlemen think?" asked Hadley quietly. "There is undoubtedly some connection between the two happenings," said Jeter.
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