Then she stopped and mounted again above the broken circle of the fleet, while the pieces of the air-ship and what was left of her crew plunged downwards through the crimson clouds in a fall of nearly thirty thousand feet.
Within the next few moments the rest of the Martian fleet had followed it, sinking rapidly down through the clouds and scattering in all directions.
"They seem to have had enough of it," laughed Redgrave, as the _Astronef_, in obedience to another signal, began to drop towards the surface of Mars.

"Now we'll go down and see if they're in a more reasonable frame of mind.

At any rate we've won our first scrimmage, dear." "But it was rather brutal, Lenox, wasn't it ?" "When you are dealing with brutes, little woman, it is sometimes necessary to be brutal." "And you look a wee bit brutal right now," she replied, looking up at him with something like a look of fear in her eyes.

"I suppose that is because you have just killed somebody--or somethings--whichever they are." "Do I, really ?" The hard-set jaw relaxed and his lips melted into a smile under his moustache, and he bent down and kissed her.
"Well, what do you suppose I should have thought of them if _you_ had had a whiff of that poison ?" "Yes, dear," she whispered in between the kisses, "I see now.".