She was interrupted by the penetrating sound of an alarm bell.
"That's a new note!" exclaimed Seaton, "I never heard that note before."
He stood in surprise at the board, where a brilliant purple light was flashing slowly. "Great Cat! That's a purely Osnomian war-gadget--kind of a battleship detector--shows that there's a boatload of bad news around here somewhere. Grab the visiplates quick, folks," as he rang Shiro's bell. "I'll take visiplate area one, dead ahead. Mart, take number two. Dot, three; Peg, four; Shiro, five. Look sharp!... Nothing in front. See anything, any of you?"
None of them could discover anything amiss, but the purple light continued to flash, and the bell to ring. Seaton cut off the bell.
"We're almost to 'X'," he thought aloud. "Can't be more than a million miles or so, and we're almost stopped. Wonder if somebody's there ahead of us? Maybe Dunark is doing this, though. I'll call him and see." He threw in a switch and said one word--"Dunark!"
"Here!" came the voice of the Kofedix from the speaker. "Are you generating?"
"No--just called to see if you were. What do you make of it?"
"Yes, edge over this way and I'll come over to meet you. Leave your negative as it is--we'll be stopped directly. Whatever it is, it's dead ahead. It's a long ways off yet, but we'd better get organized. Wouldn't talk much, either--they may intercept our wave, narrow as it is."
"Better yet, shut off your radio entirely. When we get close enough together, we'll use the hand-language. You may not know that you know it, but you do. Turn your heaviest searchlight toward me--I'll do the same."
There was a click as Dunark's power was shut off abruptly, and Seaton grinned as he cut his own.
"That's right, too, folks. In Osnomian battles we always used a sign-language when we couldn't hear anything--and that was most of the time. I know it as well as I know English, now that I am reminded of the fact."
He shifted his course to intercept that of the Osnomian vessel. After a time the watchers picked out a minute point of light, moving comparatively rapidly against the stars, and knew it to be the searchlight of the _Kondal_. Soon the two vessels were almost side by side, moving cautiously forward, and Seaton set up a sixty-inch parabolic reflector, focused upon a coil. As they went on, the purple light continued to flash more and more rapidly, but still nothing was to be seen.