by D. L. JAMES
_The ice stone was a time warp, a
pathway through 500,000 years!_
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Comet December 40.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
It all started at Bandar Shahpur. You see, I'm a railroad construction
man. Our job was finished, and the whole outfit was waiting at Bandar
Shahpur, which is on the inlet Khor Musa of the Persian Gulf, for a
boat to take us back to America.
And there, out of nowhere, this Dr. Champ Chadwick showed up. He seemed
to be starving for a little good old U.S.A. palaver, and I guess that's
why we struck up an acquaintance.
"I've been doing a little digging over in Iraq," he said offhand.
"But things quieted down there. So now I'm bound for the desert
and mountains to the north of here. This railroad has opened things
up. It's difficult to get an expedition financed, you know, and
transportation is sometimes the chief item."
I began to catch on that he was one of those guys who dig up ruins
and things, and read a country's whole past from what they find.
Then he went on to tell that he'd been sent out by a university in
Pennsylvania, but that this present trip was just a sudden idea of his
own.
And as he talked I began to like Dr. Chadwick. He was a serious-faced,
rawboned little guy--not half my size--with steady eyes, a firm chin,
and black hair plastered down slick on his head. By and by he got
around to mention that he was looking for a strong-backed man to take
along with him.
"I intend to strike out from Qum, the holy city," he said. "I'll try to
get hold of a motor-truck there--and one of these desert men to drive
it. They're rotten drivers though," he added, "and next to a dead loss
on a trip like this." Then he sighed. "But I'm getting used to 'em."
"What do you expect to find up there?" I asked.
"The usual thing," he answered, as if that ought to explain everything.
"This country is full of ruins. It's so old, in fact, that sometimes I
think that everything that can happen has already happened here, at one
time or another. Take Qum, for instance. A few years back there were
twenty thousand ruined and deserted buildings still standing. These
walled towns are like coral islands, surrounded and upheld by the dust
and decay of their own past. But I'm looking for something farther
back--much farther back."
He paused, then suddenly his eyes brightened. "There's one thing,
though. I may have a try at finding the Ice Stone."
"The Ice Stone?" I echoed. "And what's that?"
"Perhaps just a legend. It isn't likely you would ever have heard of
it. It's supposed to be a black stone, a huge, square block, set in
the side of a mountain. If a man touches it, his hand sinks in, and he
can get loose only by amputating. The queer part is, there seems to be
some basis for the legend. All down through Iran's history there are
disconnected references. The thing keeps cropping up. Vague reports
from wandering tribes, with one or more cripples, minus an arm or leg,
to verify the yarn. So, I may take a shot at locating the Ice Stone."
Queer stories like that are quite common in Iran. Ordinarily I'd have
laughed and forgotten it. But as I say, I'd taken a sort of liking to
this serious-faced little Dr. Champ Chadwick. And when you like a man
you're bound to think twice before discrediting what he believes in.
"So you'll be taking a ride over this crazy railroad," I remarked
thoughtfully, somewhat later.