midnight
`` Well , there 's little enough time left us , '' he said , `` for we 've hardly an hour before midnight , and at midnight we must be in that transmitting chamber for Nelson to send us flashing out ! '' Randall could never recall but dimly afterward how that tense hour passed . It was an hour in which Milton and Nelson went with anxious faces and low-voiced comments from one to another of the pieces of apparatus in the room , inspecting each carefully , from the great dynamos to the transmitting and receiving chambers , while Lanier quickly got out and made ready the rough khaki suits and equipment they were to take . It lacked but a quarter-hour of midnight when they had finally donned those suits , each making sure that he was in possession of the small personal kit Milton had designated . This included for each a heavy automatic , a small supply of concentrated foods , and a small case of drugs chosen to counteract the rarer atmosphere and lesser gravity which Milton had been warned to expect on the red planet . Each had also a strong wrist-watch , the three synchronized exactly with the big laboratory clock . * * * * * When they had finished checking up on this equipment the clock 's longer hand pointed almost to the figure twelve , and the physicist gestured expressively toward the transmitting chamber .