midnight
The horizon hid them . For a long time there was only blueness overhead , and the salt smell of the sea , and now and again flights of small birds which had no memory of the flight of their ancestors from ancient Earth . The planet Kandar rolled grandly in space , awaiting its destiny . The sun shone , the sun set ; in another place it was midnight and at still another it was early dawn . But from the high blue sky near the planet 's capital , there came a stuttering as of a motor going bad . If anyone looked , a most minute angular dot could be seen to be fighting to get back over the land from where it had first appeared , far out at sea . There were moments when the stuttering ceased , and the engine ran with a smooth hum .