crying, and Jim was bringing up the rear.

"What in the world's the matter?" I asked.

"Oh, Ralph," Mary sobbed, "It's Duchess ... she's gone!"

"She just flew right up in the air!" Johnny added.

"What do you mean, 'flew right up in the air', what are you all talking about?"

"She got out of the window, Dad," Jim said. "We were out in the garden talking, and I guess she heard us. Looks like she went to the window, scratched the screen loose, and out she went."

"Oh, Ralph, it was just horrible," Mary sobbed. "That poor thing, going up just like a balloon ... getting smaller and smaller."

"Yeah, Dad," Johnny sniffed, "We watched her till she went clear out of sight ... she was kickin' her legs and we could hear her barkin' too."

"For heaven's sake, Ralph," Mary cried, "don't you go near that window!"

"Yes, you'd go up too, Dad," Jim added.

Clutching tightly to the mattress, I assured them I wouldn't go near the window, or the door either, for that matter. Just the thought of that poor dog sailing up in the air made me sick in the pit of my stomach.

"How high will she go, Jim?" I asked.

"Gee, I don't know, Dad. But I think she'll just keep right on going, clear up out of the air." Jim had a hard time keeping a sob out of his voice too.

"What'll happen to her, son?"

"Well, you see, between the cold and the lack of oxygen, she'll just go to sleep.... I remember reading about fliers at high altitude."

"Thank Heaven," Mary breathed. And I added a silent "Amen."

About 3:30 Professor Jordan arrived and Jim brought him in and introduced us. The professor was probably 40, but looked hardly older than Jim, and was built along the same tall and gangly lines. A very business-like man though, thank heaven, and he got right to the point. After the first shock of seeing me on the ceiling, he turned to Jim, "Now, tell me. Exactly what happened, and what is this rig you have here?"

Jim told him the whole story of how Duchess and I got caught, then went into great detail about the plastic plate, the kinds of metal he had used, and the different settings on the transformer. He finished by telling how Duchess had sailed off into space.

At this, Professor Jordan looked more closely at the transformer hookup. "You say the settings are still the same?"

"Yes, sir, it's still the same. I haven't changed a thing except to pull the plate out in the hall."

"Have you tried it since your father was caught?"

"No, sir ... in all the excitement I haven't gotten around to fooling with it again."

The professor walked out in the hall, reached in his pocket for a handkerchief, tossed it over the plate. It rose! Straight up, and stuck to the ceiling!

"My gosh!" Jim blurted. "Somebody must have plugged that thing in again!"

Mary and Johnny, who were watching in silence, both spoke up to say that neither of them had. Jim reached down and picked up the AC line. Sure enough, it wasn't plugged in!

"Well, this is going to take some studying," Professor Jordan muttered, looking rather awed at Jim's gadget. "Jim, let's start at the beginning again, and be sure you tell me everything you did, every move you made, what kind of metal you used, how finely divided it was, what concentration you used and what voltages and frequencies you used."

"I'll try, Professor," Jim said, "But it's going to be sort of a hit or miss proposition because I fiddled with this thing for an hour or so before accidentally dropping my cigarettes on the plate. When they went up, I was surprised, to say the least, so I tried other things."

"What we've got to figure put first of all, is whether it was caused by a combination of changes, or whether it was the last setting you used," Professor Jordan said. "If it was a combination of voltage and frequency changes, then we've certainly got a problem on our hands."

All this time of course, Mary and Johnny had been standing more or less