_Tentacles of Terror_
Dalis had always been a stormy petrel, but as he sat before his
Micro-Telescope, watching his Gens go into battle against the Moon-men,
not even Sarka the Second guessed the depth of infamy of which Dalis
was capable.
Dalis had given a hint, but Sarka had, in his sudden realization of the
fact that Jaska really loved him, and was no traitor, forgotten that
hint. How had Dalis learned the secret sign-manual of Jaska and Sarka?
Therein lay the hint.
Dalis, in common with all other Earth's scientists, possessed the
ability to think deeply, yet to so mask his thoughts that no one else
could grasp them telepathically--and it was well for the peace of mind
of the Sarkas that they could not read the black thought of the man, or
look into the future, even so far as a dozen years.
The Gens of the yellow stars moved into contact with the Aircars of the
Moon. Earth and Moon were gripped in the horror of war, the war between
worlds, where no quarter might be asked or given, because fought between
alien peoples who did not so much as comprehend each other's languages,
or even their signals.
The people of the Gens swarmed about the Aircars like myriad swarms of
angry bees, but it was only to Dalis that this simile came, for only
Dalis, of these three, had ever seen a swarm of bees.
* * * * *
Sweeping in closely, the Gens brought forth from their resting places in
their Sarka-Belts their Ray Directors and their Atom-Disintegrators, and
turned the blighting rays of them against the gleaming, ice-colored
sides of the aerial monsters.
But even as the Gens brought their instruments of destruction into play,
the mighty tentacles of the first hundred Aircars had got into action.
Down they whirled to catch at the flying bodies of the pigmylike
individuals of the Gens, and hundreds of Earthlings were caught in those
tentacles in the first moment of conflict.
Sarka studied the reaction of the people, thus captured. He could see
the expressions of unutterable agony on their faces, could see their
cheeks turn black with--what? There was no way of knowing; but all sorts
of guesses were possible. Those tentacles, from their action upon the
human beings which they encompassed, might be charged with electricity.
For the people they captured turned black, then shriveled slowly--and
were released by the tentacles....
They fell sluggishly away, through the great space which yet separated
the Earth and the Moon. But the people who fell, fell aimlessly, going
neither toward the Earth or the Moon, like black feathers in a vagrant
breeze.
"Great God, do you see father?" cried Sarka. "The--whatever it is--that
turns our people into cinders and drops them, has no effect on the
Anti-Gravitational Ovoids in the skull-pans of the helmets, and without
mental direction, the Ovoids neither rise nor fall but wander aimlessly!
"See? As the fight continues, those who still live, as they dart here
and there through the battle area, will be confronted continually by the
blackened faces and shriveled figures of their departed friends,
relatives and neighbors, and will see at first hand what will happen to
themselves if they are caught by the tentacles!"
* * * * *
From the lips of Dalis came one single burst of laughter, filled with
bitterness. No other word came from his lips, no other sign. He merely
sat and stared, and masked his hell-black thoughts so that neither of
the Sarkas might read them. But in the fertile mind of Dalis a plan was
being born--a plan that, he knew, had always been growing back in his
mental depths, somewhere, down the centuries, since first he had become
an enemy of the Sarkas. The Sarkas ruled the Earth, and....
But he would spring his surprise when he believed the time right, for
Dalis possessed a faculty which neither of the Sarkas possessed--an
example of it being his incomprehensible knowledge of the secret code
of moving fingers used by Sarka and Jaska.
The Gens of Dalis drew back in consternation at this wholesale taking
off of the first line of attack. Out of that first line, comprising
perhaps a thousand families, scarcely a hundred had escaped the groping
of those mighty tentacles of the Aircars--and the black, shriveled
things which had been men floated all about the Aircars which had
destroyed them, warnings to those who followed them into the fray. Those
who had somehow escaped the wrath of the tentacles in the first
engagement fled back into the heart of the next line of sky-skirmishers,
fear and horror in their faces.
Here, answering to the will of Jaska, a mile or so above the heart of
the conflict, they reformed with their people, and prepared again to
attack. But how to attack these formidable Aircars successfully?
* * * * *
That was the question. Ray Directors had been turned against them, but
something was decidedly wrong. The first car to feel the blast of even
one of those Ray Directors should have vanished, become as nothing, as
had the body of Sarka the First before the Ray Director of Dalis.
But apparently nothing had happened. Why?
Grimly Dalis and the two remaining Sarkas pondered the problem,
wondering at the same time what Jaska would now do, how reform her Gens,
how send it again to an attack that seemed hopeless.
"There they go again!" whispered Sarka.
The first two myriads of the Gens of Dalis had now crowded together
until they formed a veritable cloud which masked, for a moment, the
Aircars of the Moon. Then, as one person, answering to the will of
Jaska, they swept in to the attack again.
But as they approached the Aircars, they divided four ways--up, down,
to right and to left, and smashed into the Aircars from four directions
at once. Jaska, knowing that countless lives must be lost to destroy
these monsters of the Moon, was trying to down them by mass attack,
hoping that, while the inner groups gave their lives, those who followed
after them would get in close enough to use their Ray Directors and Atom
Disintegrators.
"She is wasting lives to no avail!" cried Dalis. "There is a way to beat
these people!"
"It is really your responsibility, O Dalis!" snapped Sarka. "Why do you
not go out and lead your Gens? If you know, why remain here and watch
the destruction of all the people of your Gens?"
"You know why our Ray Directors and Atom Disintegrators do not work, or
work but poorly? Because our fighters are within the gravitational pull
of the Moon, instead of the Earth, and machines which work perfectly on
Earth are thrown out of balance when under the influence of the Moon!"
"Then," cried Sarka, "we must sweep in close enough to our people...."
* * * * *
Without waiting to say another word, for thousands of men were dying
each breath-space, Sarka raced into the laboratory and gave the signal
to race up the speed of the Beryls, to attune them with the increasing
speed of the Master Beryl, whose jade lever now was set at the halfway
mark in the onyx slot.
When he returned to the Observatory, Dalis was gone, and Sarka the
Second sat alone.
"I knew he would go," said Sarka, "for he cannot endure to see someone
else take credit for winning this first victory--if it is even possible
to win it! I knew that, vain though he is, Dalis is yet a man!"
"I am not so sure of that, son!" replied the Elder Sarka. "For I have
known him longer than you have! There's something else in that brain of
his which takes no thought of the death of people of his Gens--or for
the betterment of the other people of the Earth! I wonder...."
But even as he spoke, Dalis was away, flying free and fast toward the
scene of battle. In a few minutes his will would be felt by his Gens,
and Jaska could return again. Sarka sought for her. She was still safe,
high above the battle. Thousands and thousands of those shriveled things
now floated in the space about the cars, above them, below them,
everywhere. But the Gens of Dalis had at last caused some trouble to the
Aircars of the Moon.
A hundred of them, like stricken birds, were falling downward toward the
Moon, great holes torn in their sides. But as they fell, their
tentacles, which whipped here and there like snakes in their
death-throes, carried with them their full capacity in people of the
Gens of Dalis!
* * * * *
With the partial destruction of the Aircars which were falling, the
force that actuated the death-dealing of those tentacles seemed to have
gone out of them. For the people now held in the grip of the mighty
tentacles were still alive! Their squirmings could be plainly seen, and
their cries could have been heard, had it not been that the noise of
battle drowned out all other sounds.
A hundred Aircars falling, and the men and fighting women of the Gens of
Dalis, with new courage in them now they realized that the Aircars were
not entirely invincible, renewed the attack with savage vigor.
Taking no thought of the death which must surely come to them, they
circled and pressed the Aircars; and when the tentacles caught at some
of them, others climbed to the very body of the Aircars, over the
shriveling bodies of the dying, and turned their Ray Directors and Atom
Disintegrators against the gray sides of the monsters.
Even before Dalis had reached the vanguard of his Gens another hundred
Aircars were falling, each with its tentacles wrapped tightly about such
of the earthlings as they could grasp. Falling ... falling ... still
living, plunging down.
Now Dalis had reached the scene of the fray, and was assuming command.
As he did so a single white-robed figure, life-size when seen through
the Micro-Telescopes, darted out of the fray and headed at top speed for
the dwelling place of Sarka. Jaska, relieved, was returning home!
But though Jaska flew at top speed, she did not seem to grow larger, or
draw nearer to the Earth!
* * * * *
Out of the ruck of the defenders of the Moon, a single Aircar, whose
gleaming gray side was marked with queer crimson splashes, broke free to
pursue Jaska!
She fled at top speed, yet the Aircar was gaining, proof that the Moon
had developed speed greater than Earth had attained.
"But why," queried Sarka, "does she draw no nearer?"
"Great God!" ejaculated Sarka the Second, after a brief examination of
certain chartographs beside his Micro-Telescope. "We are moving away
from the Moon! Something is forcing us away! The people of the Moon have
something whose nature we do not know, capable of forcing them away from
us--while they pull our people toward them! You see? If they pulled us
toward them, we could overthrow them, for we outnumber them perhaps
thousands to one; but if they force themselves away faster than the Gens
of Dalis, if defeated, can follow us, they can destroy, or capture, the
Gens at their leisure!"
* * * * *
Suddenly, out of the Earth, past the all-seeing eyes of the
Micro-Telescopes, swept a new myriad. Men in white, wearing the Red Lily
of the House of Cleric! Cleric was sending out men to rescue Jaska from
the Aircar which pursued her! But would Jaska or these who went forth
to fetch her ever be able again to attain landing place upon the Earth!
It looked doubtful.
Even as Sarka asked himself this question fresh Aircars shot from the
rims of Moon craters, rushing outward to add their weight in the battle
against the Gens of Dalis. The Gens of Dalis was doomed!
In the mind of Sarka the Second there still loomed a hellish doubt that
would not down.
The men of Cleric were surrounding Jaska now, protecting her with their
lives against the tentacles of that lone Aircar splashed with
crimson--and all were flying a losing race with the Earth, which was
still being forced outward from the Moon!
* * * * *
_IN THE NEXT ISSUE_
ON THE PLANET OF DREAD
_An Exciting Interplanetary Story_
By R. F. Starzl
EARTH, THE MARAUDER
_Part Two of the Thrilling Novel_
By Arthur J. Burks
THE FLYING CITY
_A Novelet Concerning an
Amazing Aerial Metropolis_
By H. Thompson Rich
MURDER MADNESS
_The Conclusion of the
Gripping Continued Novel_
By Murray Leinster
----And Others!
* * * * *
[Illustration: Marable, in a desperate frenzy, hacked at the reptile's
awful head.]
From An Amber Block
_By Tom Curry_
"These should prove especially valuable and interesting without a doubt,
Marable," said the tall, slightly stooped man. He waved a long hand
toward the masses of yellow brown which filled the floor of the spacious
workrooms, towering almost to the skylights, high above their heads.
[Sidenote: A giant amber block at last gives up its living, ravenous
prey.]
"Is that coal in the biggest one with the dark center?" asked an
attractive young woman who stood beside the elder of the men.
"I am inclined to believe it will prove to be some sort of black
liquid," said Marable, a big man of thirty-five.
There were other people about the immense rooms, the laboratories of the
famous Museum of Natural History. Light streamed in from the skylights
and windows; fossils of all kinds, some immense in size, were
distributed about. Skilled specialists were chipping away at matrices
other artists were reconstructing, doing a thousand things necessary to
the work.
A hum of low talking, accompanied by the irregular tapping of chisels
on stone, came to their ears, though they took no heed of this, since
they worked here day after day, and it was but the usual sound of the
paleontologists' laboratory.
Marable threw back his blond head. He glanced again toward the dark
haired, blue eyed young woman, but when he caught her eye, he looked
away and spoke to her father, Professor Young.
"I think that big one will turn out to be the largest single piece of
amber ever mined," he said. "There were many difficulties in getting it
out, for the workmen seemed afraid of it, did not want to handle it for
some silly reason or other."
* * * * *
Professor Young, curator, was an expert in his line, but young Marable
had charge of these particular fossil blocks, the amber being pure
because it was mixed with lignite. The particular block which held the
interest of the three was a huge yellow brown mass of irregular shape.
Vaguely, through the outer shell of impure amber, could be seen the
heart of ink. The chunk weighed many tons, and its crate had just been
removed by some workmen and was being taken away, piece by piece.
The three gazed at the immense mass, which filled the greater part of
one end of the laboratory and towered almost to the skylights. It was a
small mountain, compared to the size of the room, and in this case the
mountain had come to man.
"Miss Betty, I think we had better begin by drawing a rough sketch of
the block," said Marable.
Betty Young, daughter of the curator, nodded. She was working as
assistant and secretary to Marable.
"Well--what do you think of them?"
The voice behind them caused them to turn, and they looked into the face
of Andrew Leffler, the millionaire paleontologist, whose wealth and
interest in the museum had made it possible for the institution to
acquire the amber.
* * * * *
Leffler, a keen, quick moving little man, whose chin was decorated with
a white Van Dyke beard, was very proud of the new acquisition.
"Everybody is talking about the big one," he continued, putting his hand
on Marable's shoulder. "Orling is coming to see, and many others. As I
told you, the workmen who handled it feared the big one. There were
rumors about some unknown devil which lay hidden in the inklike
substance, caught there like the proverbial fly in the amber. Well, let
us hope there is something good in there, something that will make worth
while all our effort."
Leffler wandered away, to speak to others who inspected the amber
blocks.
"Superstition is curious, isn't it?" said Marable. "How can anyone think
that a fossil creature, penned in such a cell for thousands and
thousands of years, could do any harm?"
Professor Young shrugged. "It is just as you say. Superstition is not
reasonable. These amber blocks were mined in the Manchurian lignite
deposits by Chinese coolies under Japanese masters. They believe
anything, the coolies. I remember working once with a crew of them that
thought--"
The professor stopped suddenly, for his daughter had uttered a little
cry of alarm. He felt her hand upon his arm, and turned toward her.
"What is it, dear?" he asked.
She was pointing toward the biggest amber block, and her eyes were wide
open and showed she had seen something, or imagined that she had seen
something, that frightened her.
* * * * *
Professor Young followed the direction of her finger. He saw that she
was staring at the black heart of the amber block; but when he looked he
could see nothing but the vague, irregular outline of the inky
substance.
"What is it, dear?" asked Young again.
"I--I thought I saw it looking out, eyes that stared at us--"
The girl broke off, laughed shortly, and added, "I suppose it was Mr.
Leffler's talking. There's nothing there now."
"Probably the Manchurian devil shows itself only to you," said her
father jokingly. "Well, be careful, dear. If it takes a notion to jump
out at you, call me and I'll exorcise it for you."
Betty blushed and laughed again. She looked at Marable, expecting to see
a smile of derision on the young man's face, but his expression was
grave.
The light from above was diminishing; outside sounded the roar of
home-going traffic.
"Well, we must go home," said Professor Young. "There's a hard and
interesting day ahead of us to-morrow, and I want to read Orling's new
work on matrices before we begin chipping at the amber."
Young turned on his heel and strode toward the locker at the end of the
room where he kept his coat and hat. Betty, about to follow him, was
aware of a hand on her arm, and she turned to find Marable staring at
her.
"I saw them, too," he whispered. "Could it have been just imagination?
Was it some refraction of the light?"
* * * * *
The girl paled. "I--I don't know," she replied, in a low voice. "I
thought I saw two terrible eyes glaring at me from the inky heart. But
when father laughed at me, I was ashamed of myself and thought it was
just my fancy."
"The center is liquid, I'm sure," said Marable. "We will find that out
soon enough, when we get started."
"Anyway, you must be careful, and so must father," declared the girl.
She looked at the block again, as it towered there above them, as though
she expected it to open and the monster of the coolies' imagination leap
out.
"Come along, Betty," called her father.
She realized then that Marable was holding her hand. She pulled away and
went to join her father.
It was slow work, chipping away the matrix. Only a bit at a time could
be cut into, for they came upon many insects imbedded in the amber.
These small creatures proved intensely interesting to the
paleontologists, for some were new to science and had to be carefully
preserved for study later on.
Marable and her father labored all day. Betty, aiding them, was
obviously nervous. She kept begging her father to take care, and
finally, when he stopped work and asked her what ailed her, she could
not tell him.
"Be careful," she said, again and again.
* * * * *
Her father realized that she was afraid of the amber block, and he poked
fun at her ceaselessly. Marable said nothing.
"It's getting much softer, now the outside shell is pierced," said
Young, late in the day.
"Yes," said Marable, pausing in his work of chipping away a portion of
matrix. "Soon we will strike the heart, and then we will find out
whether we are right about it being liquid. We must make some
preparations for catching it, if it proves to be so."
The light was fading. Outside, it was cold, but the laboratories were
well heated by steam. Close by where they worked was a radiator, so that
they had been kept warm all day.
Most of the workers in the room were making ready to leave. Young and
Marable, loath to leave such interesting material, put down their
chisels last of all. Throughout the day various scientific visitors had
interrupted them to inspect the immense amber block, and hear the
history of it.
All day, Betty Young had stared fascinatedly at the inky center.
"I think it must have been imagination," she whispered to Marable, when
Young had gone to don his coat and hat. "I saw nothing to-day."
"Nor did I," confessed Marable. "But I thought I heard dull scrapings
inside the block. My brain tells me I'm an imaginative fool, that
nothing could be alive inside there, but just the same, I keep thinking
about those eyes we thought we saw. It shows how far the imagination
will take one."
"It's getting dark, Betty," said her father. "Better not stay here in
the shadows or the devil will get you. I wonder if it will be Chinese or
up-to-date American!"
* * * * *
The girl laughed, said good night to Marable, and followed her father
from the laboratory. As they crossed the threshold a stout, red-faced
man in a gray uniform, a watchman's clock hanging at his side, raised
his hat and smiled at the young woman and her father.
"Hello, Rooney," cried Betty.
"How d'ye do, Miss Young! Stayin' late this evenin'?"
"No, we're leaving now, Rooney. Good night."
"G' night, Miss Young. Sleep happy."
"Thanks, Rooney."
The old night watchman was a jolly fellow, and everybody liked him. He
was very fond of Betty, and the young woman always passed a pleasant
word with him.
Rooney entered the room where the amber blocks were. The girl walked
with her father down the long corridor. She heard Marable's step behind
them.
"Wait for me a moment, father," she said.
She went back, smiling at Marable as she passed him, and entered the
door, but remained in the portal and called to Rooney, who was down the
laboratory.
He came hurrying to her side at her nervous hail.
"What is it, ma'am?" asked Rooney.
"You'll be careful, won't you, Rooney?" she asked in a low voice.
"Oh, yes, ma'am. I'm always careful. Nobody can get in to harm anything
while Rooney's about."
"I don't mean that. I want you to be careful yourself, when you're in
this room to-night."
"Why, miss, what is there to be wary of? Nothin' but some funny lookin'
stones, far as I can see."
* * * * *
The young woman was embarrassed by her own impalpable fears, and she
took leave of Rooney and rejoined her father, determined to overcome
them and dismiss them from her mind.
All the way home and during their evening meal and afterwards, Professor
Young poked fun at Betty. She took it good-naturedly, and laughed to see
her father in such fine humor. Professor Young was a widower, and Betty
was housekeeper in their flat; though a maid did the cooking for them
and cleaned the rooms, the young woman planned the meals and saw to it
that everything was homelike for them.
After a pleasant evening together, reading, and discussing the new
additions to the collection, they went to bed.
Betty Young slept fitfully. She was harassed by dreams, dreams of huge
eyes that came closer and closer to her, that at last seemed to engulf
her.
She awakened finally from a nap, and started up in her bed. The sun was
up, but the clock on the bureau said it was only seven o'clock, too
early to arise for the day's work. But then the sound of the telephone
bell ringing in the hall caused her to get up and don her slippers and
dressing gown and hurry out into the living room.
* * * * *
Before she reached the phone, however, she heard her father's voice
answering.
"Hello.... Yes, speaking. Good morning, Smythe."
Smythe was the janitor of the museum. Betty, standing behind her father,
wondered what he could want that he should phone so early in the
morning. Her father's next words sent a thrill of fright through her
heart.
"My God! I--I can't believe it!" cried Young. "Is he dead?"
There was a pause; Betty caught the sound of the excited Smythe's tones
through the receiver.
"Who--who is it?" she whispered, clasping her parent's arm.
"I'll be right down, yes."
Young hung up, turned to his daughter. His face was sad, heavily lined
with shadows of sorrow.
"Dear, there's been a tragedy at the museum during the night. Poor
Rooney has been murdered--at least so they believe--and Smythe, who
found him, wants me to come down and see if anything has been stolen. I
must go at once. The body is in our laboratory."
"Rooney? Ah, poor fellow."
The girl wept a little, but braced herself to assist her father.
"I'm going with you," she said.
"No, no. You'd better remain here: you can come along later," said
Young. "I don't like to have you see such sights, dear. It wouldn't be
good for you."
"I'll be all right. I promise you I will."
She insisted and he was forced to let her accompany him to the museum.
They hailed a cab and were soon at the door. The elevator took them to
the top floor, and swiftly they passed along the corridors and came to
the portal which led into the rooms where the amber blocks were.
* * * * *
Smythe greeted them, a worried look on his seamed face. "I've sent for
an ambulance, Professor," he said.
Young nodded, brushed past him, and entered the laboratory. In the
morning light the amber blocks had taken on a reddish tinge. Now, they
seemed to oppress the young woman, who had bravely remained at her
father's side as he walked quickly to the base of the biggest block.
A vague shape lay in the shadows between the wall and the largest amber
mass. Professor Young bent over the body of Rooney, and felt the pulse.
"He's been dead some time," he said.
She nodded, stricken to the heart by this terrible end of her old friend
Rooney.
"There's nothing we can do for him, now," went on her father soberly.
"It looks as though he had been set upon and stabbed time after time by
his assailant or assailants, whoever they were."
"How--how pale he is," said Betty. "Poor Rooney was so jolly and
red-faced, but his skin is like chalk."
"And he's shrunken, too. It seems there's no blood left in his veins,"
said her father.
* * * * *
Marable, who had been called also, came in then and aided in the
examination. He said good morning to Betty and her father, and then went
to bend over Rooney's body.
"See the look of abject terror on his face," Betty heard Marable say to
her father as the two examined the corpse. "He must have been very much
afraid of whoever killed him."
"They beat him up frightfully," said Young. "There must have been
several of the assassins; it would take more than one man to do such
damage."
"Yes. His ribs are crushed in--see, this gash, Professor, would be
enough to cause death without any of the other wounds."
Betty Young could not take her eyes from the ghastly sight. She steeled
herself to bear it, and prayed for strength that she should not faint
and cause her father trouble. She could see the two men examining a
large blistered area under the corpse's armpit, in the center of which
was a sharp vertical slit which had without doubt punctured the artery
near the surface of the axilla. Perhaps it had pierced even to the
heart.
"Bloodless," exclaimed Marable, noticing the same thing as her father
had spoken of. "It is as if the blood had been pumped out of his body!"
"Yes, I think it has drained out."
"There is not much of a pool here where he lies, though," said Marable,
in a low voice. "See, there are only splotches about, from various cuts
he received."
"Maybe he was dragged here from another room," said Young. "When the
others come, we will soon know if anything is missing. It seems that men
desperate enough to commit such a murder would not leave without trying
to get what they came after. Unless, of course, the killing of Rooney
frightened them away before they could get their booty."
* * * * *
Smythe approached the group, with a physician in tow. The latter
confirmed the facts which Marable and Young had found: that Rooney had
been killed by the deep gash near the heart and that most of the blood
was drained from the body.
"They seem like the slashes from an extremely sharp and large razor,"
said the medical man.
Others were coming in to look at Rooney, and the museum was buzzing with
activity as various curators, alarmed about the safety of their valuable
collections, feverishly examined their charges.
"He punched his clock in here at two A.M.," said Smythe. "I seen that.
It's the last time he'll ever do his duty, poor feller."
"Curious odor," said the doctor, sniffing. "It smells like musk, but is
fetid. I suppose it's some chemical you use."
"I noticed that, too," said Professor Young. "I don't recognize it,
myself."
Marable, who had been looking at the floor between the great block of
amber and the body, uttered an exclamation which caused the two men to
look up.
"There are wavy lines leading around back of the block," said Marable,
in answer to their questions.
The young man disappeared behind the block, and then he called to them
excitedly to join him. Betty Young pressed closer, and finally slipped
past the corpse and stood by her father.
* * * * *
Before her, she saw a large pool of black liquid. It had been hidden by
the corner of the block, so that they had not noticed it, so busy were
they looking at Rooney.
And there was a great cavity in the heart of the amber block. Pieces of
the yellow brown mass lay about, as though they had fallen off and
allowed the inky substance to escape.
"It's hardened or dried out in the air," said Young.
"It looks like black lacquer," said Betty.
The musky smell was stronger here. The great amber block seemed to
stifle them with its size.
"Our chipping and hammering and the heat of the radiator causing it to
expand must have forced out the sepia, or whatever it is," said Young.
There was a disappointed note in his voice "I had hoped that inside the
liquid we would discover a fossil of value," he went on.
Marable looked at Betty Young. They stared at one another for some
seconds, and both knew that the same thought had occurred to the other.
The frightful eyes--had they then been but figments of the imagination?
Marable began looking around carefully, here and there. Betty realized
what he was doing, and she was frightened. She went to his side. "Oh, be
careful," she whispered.
"The giant block has been moved a little," he replied, looking into her
pretty face. "Have you noticed that?"
Now that she was told to look, she could see the extremely heavy amber
block was no longer in the position it had been in. Marks on the floor
showed where it had been dragged or shifted from its original resting
place.
* * * * *
Betty Young gasped. What force could be so powerful that it could even
budge so many tons? A derrick had been used, and rollers placed under
the block when men had moved it.
Reason tried to assert itself. "It--it must have exploded. That would
cause it to shift," she said faintly.
Marable shrugged. His examination was interrupted by the arrival of the
museum's chemist, sent for by Young. The chemist took a sample of the
black liquid for analysis. Reports were coming in from all over the
museum, different departments declaring, one after another, that nothing
had been disturbed or stolen from their sections.
Betty Young went again to Marable's side. She followed the direction of
his eyes, and saw long, clawlike marks on the floor, radiating from the
sepia.
"Doctor Marable," she said, "please don't--don't look any longer. Leave
this terrible place for the day, anyway, until we see what happens in
the next twenty-four hours."
He smiled and shook his head. "I must make a search," he replied. "My
brain calls me a fool, but just the same, I'm worried."
"Do you really think ...?"
He nodded, divining her thought. The girl shivered. She felt terror
mounting to her heart, and the matter-of-fact attitudes of the others in
the great laboratory did not allay her fears.
Rooney's body was removed. The place was cleaned up by workmen, and
Marable's search--if that was what his constant roving about the
laboratory could be called--ceased for a time. The chemist's report came
in. The black liquid was some sort of animal secretion, melonotic
probably.
* * * * *
In spite of the fact that they had learned so many facts about the
murder, they as yet had not solved the mystery. Who had murdered Rooney,
and why? And where had his blood gone to? In no other rooms could be
found any traces of a struggle.
"If you won't do anything else, please carry a gun," begged Betty of
Marable. "I'm going to try to take father home, right after lunch, if
he'll go. He's so stubborn. I can't make him take care. I've got to
watch him and stay beside him."
"Very well," replied Marable. "I'll get a revolver. Not that I think it
would be of much use, if I did find--" He broke off, and shrugged his
broad shoulders.
Leffler came storming into the room. "What's this I hear?" he cried,
approaching Marable. "A watchman killed in the night? Carelessness, man,
carelessness! The authorities here are absurd! They hold priceless
treasures and allow thieves to enter and wreak their will. You, Marable,
what's all this mean?"
Leffler was angry. Marable looked into his red face coolly. "We do the
best we can, Mr. Leffler," he said. "It is unlikely that anyone would
wish to steal such a thing as that block of amber."
He waved toward the giant mass.
Leffler made a gesture of impatience. "It cost me many thousands of
dollars," he cried.
"It is time for lunch, Professor," said Betty.
Marable bowed to Leffler and left the millionaire sputtering away,
inspecting the various specimens he had contributed.
The one o'clock gong had struck, and all the workers and investigators
were leaving in paleontological laboratories for a bite to eat.
* * * * *
Marable, with Betty, went out last. Leffler was over in one corner of
the room, hidden from their sight by a corner of an amber block. They
could hear Leffler still uttering complaints about the carelessness of
the men in charge of that section of the museum, and Marable smiled at
Betty sadly.
"Poor Rooney," he said. "Betty, I feel more or less responsible, in a
way."
"No, no," cried the girl. "How could you have foreseen such a thing?"
Marable shook his head. "Those eyes, you know. I should have taken
precautions. But I had no idea it could burst from its prison so."
For the first time Marable had definitely mentioned his idea of what
had occurred. The girl had understood it all along, from their broken
conversation and from the look in the young scientist's eyes.
She sighed deeply. "You will get a revolver before you search further?"
she said. "I'm going to. Smythe has one, and I know he'll lend it to
me."
"I will," he promised. "You know, Leffler has the same idea we have, I
think. That's why he keeps talking about it being our fault. I believe
he has seen something, too. His talk about the devil inside the block
was half in earnest. I suppose he put it down to imagination, or perhaps
he did not think this fossil to be dangerous."
They went out together, and walked toward the restaurant they
frequented. Her father was there, lunching with one of the
superintendents of the museum. He smiled and waved to Betty.
Everyone, of course, was discussing the killing of Rooney.
* * * * *
After an hour, during which the two young people spoke little, Marable
and Betty Young left the restaurant and started back toward the museum.
Her father was still at his table.
They walked up the driveway entrance, and then Marable uttered an
exclamation. "Something's wrong," he said.
There was a small crowd of people collected on the steps. The outer
doors, instead of being open as usual, were closed and guards stood
peering out.
Marable and Betty were admitted, after they had pushed their way to the
doors.
"Museum's closed to the public, sir," replied a guard to Marable's
question.
"Why?" asked Marable.
"Somethin's happened up in the paleontological laboratories," answered
the guard. "Dunno just what, but orders come to clear the rooms and not
let anybody in but members of the staff, sir."
Marable hurried forward. Betty was at his heels. "Please get yourself a
gun," she said, clutching his arm and holding him back.
"All right. I'll borrow one from a guard."
He returned to the front doors, and came back, slipping a large pistol
into his side pocket.
"I want you to wait here," he said.
"No. I'm going with you."
"Please," he said. "As your superior, I order you to remain downstairs."
The girl shrugged. She allowed him to climb the stairs to the first
floor, and then she hurried back in search of Smythe.
* * * * *
Smythe obtained a gun for her, and as she did not wish to wait for the
slow elevator, she ran up the steps. Smythe could not tell her
definitely what had occurred in the upper laboratory that had caused the
museum to be closed for the day.
Her heart beating swiftly, Betty Young hurried up the second flight of
stairs to the third floor. A workman, whom the girl recognized as a
manual laborer in the paleontological rooms, came running down, passing
her in full flight, a look of abject terror on his face.
"What is it?" she cried.
He was so frightened he could not talk logically. "There was a black
fog--I saw a red snake with legs--"
She waited for no more. A pang of fear for the safety of Marable shot
through her heart, and she forced herself on to the top floor.
Up there was a haze, faintly black, which filled the corridors. As Betty
Young drew closer to the door of the paleontological laboratories, the
mist grew more opaque. It was as though a sooty fog permeated the air,
and the girl could see it was pouring from the door of the laboratory in
heavy coils. And her nostrils caught the strange odor of fetid musk.
She was greatly frightened; but she gripped the gun and pushed on.
* * * * *
Then to her ears came the sound of a scream, the terrible scream of a
mortally wounded man. Instinctively she knew it was not Marable, but she
feared for the young professor, and with an answering cry she rushed
into the smoky atmosphere of the outer laboratories.
"Walter!" she called.
But evidently he did not hear her, for no reply came. Or was it that
something had happened to him?
She paused on the threshold of the big room where were the amber blocks.
About the vast floor space stood the numerous masses of stone and amber,
some covered with immense canvas shrouds which made them look like ghost
hillocks in the dimness. Betty Young stood, gasping in fright, clutching
the pistol in her hand, trying to catch the sounds of men in that
chamber of horror.
She heard, then, a faint whimpering, and then noises which she
identified in her mind as something being dragged along the marble
flooring. A muffled scream, weak, reached her ears, and as she took a
step forward, silence came.
She listened longer, but now the sunlight coming through the window to
make murky patches in the opaque black fog was her chief sensation.
"Walter!" she called.
"Go back, Betty, go back!"
The mist seemed to muffle voices as well as obscure the vision. She
advanced farther into the laboratory, trying to locate Marable. Bravely
the girl pushed toward the biggest amber block. It was here that she
felt instinctively that she would find the source of danger.
"Leffler!" she heard Marable say, almost at her elbow, and the young man
groaned. The girl came upon him, bending over something on the floor.
* * * * *
She knelt beside him, gripping his arm. Now she could see the outline of
Leffler's body at her feet. The wealthy collector was doubled up on the
ground, shrivelled as had been Rooney. His feet, moving as though by
reflex action, patted the floor from time to time, making a curious
clicking sound as the buttons of his gray spats struck the marble.
But it was obvious, even in the murky light, that Leffler was dead, that
he had been sucked dry of blood.
Betty Young screamed. She could not help it. The black fog choked her
and she gasped for breath. Leaving Marable, she ran toward the windows
to throw them open.
The first one she tried was heavy, and she smashed the glass with the
butt of the gun. She broke several panes in two of the windows, and the
mist rolled out from the laboratory.
She started to return to the side of Marable. He uttered a sudden shout,
and she hurried back to where she had left him, stumbling over Leffler's
body, recoiling at this touch of death.
Marable was not there, but she could hear him nearby.
Cool air was rushing in from the windows, and gradually the fog was
disappearing. Betty Young saw Marable now, standing nearby, staring at
the bulk of an amber block which was still covered by its canvas shroud.
Though not as large as the prize exhibit, this block of amber was large
and filled many yards of space.
"Betty, please go outside and call some of the men," begged Marable.
But he did not look at her, and she caught his fascinated stare.
Following the direction of his gaze, the girl saw that a whisp of smoky
mist was curling up from under the edge of the canvas cover.
"It is there," whispered Betty.
* * * * *
Marable had a knife which he had picked up from a bench, and with this
he began quietly to cut the canvas case of the block, keeping several
feet to each side of the spot where the fog showed from beneath the
shroud.
Marable cut swiftly and efficiently, though the cloth was heavy and he
was forced to climb up several feet on the block to make his work
effective. The girl watched, fascinated with horror and curiosity.
To their ears came a curious, sucking sound, and once a vague tentacle
form showed from the bottom of the canvas.
At last Marable seized the edge of the cut he had made and, with a
violent heave, sent the canvas flap flying over the big block.
Betty Young screamed. At last she had a sight of the terrible creature
which her imagination had painted in loathing and horror. A flash of
brilliant scarlet, dabbed with black patches, was her impression of the
beast. A head flat and reptilian, long, tubular, with movable nostrils
and antennae at the end, framed two eyes which were familiar enough to
her, for they were the orbs which had stared from the inside of the
amber block. She had dreamed of those eyes.
But the reptile moved like a flash of red light, though she knew its
bulk was great; it sprayed forth black mist from the appendages at the
end of its nose, and the crumpling of canvas reached her ears as the
beast endeavored to conceal itself on the opposite side of the block.
* * * * *
Marable had run to the other side of the mass. The air, rushing in from
the windows, had cleared the mist, in spite of the new clouds the
creature had emitted, and Betty could see for some feet in either
direction now.
She walked, with stiff, frozen muscles, around to join Marable. As she
came near to him, she saw him jerking off the entire canvas cover of the
block to expose the horrible reptile to the light of day.
And now the two stood staring at the awful sight. The creature had
flattened itself into the crevices and irregular surfaces of the block,
but it was too large to hide in anything but a huge space. They saw
before them its great bulk, bright red skin blotched with black, which
rose and fell with the breathing of the reptile. Its long, powerful
tail, tapering off from the fat, loathsome body, was curled around the
bottom of the block.
"That's where it's been hidden, under the shroud. We've been within a
few feet of it every moment we've been at work," said Marable, his voice
dry. "There were many hiding places for it, but it chose the best. It
came out only when there was comparative quiet, to get its food...."
"We--we must kill it," stammered the girl.
But she could not move. She was looking at the immense, cruel, lidless
eyes, which balefully held her as a serpent paralyzes a bird. The
tubular nostrils and antennae seemed to be sniffing at them, waving to
and fro.
"See the white expanse of cornea, how large it is," whispered Marable.
"The pupils are nothing but black slits now." The interest excited by
this living fossil was almost enough to stifle the dread of the creature
in the man.
But the girl saw the huge flat head and the crinkled tissue of the
frilled mouth with its sucker disks.
* * * * *
Suddenly, from the central portion of the sucker-cup mouth issued a
long, straight red fang.
The two drew back as the living fossil raised a short clawed leg.
"It has the thick body of an immense python and the clawed legs of a
dinosaur," said Marable, speaking as though he were delivering a
lecture. The sight, without doubt, fascinated him as a scientist. He
almost forgot the danger.
"Oh, it's horrible," whispered the girl.
She clung to his arm. He went on talking. "It is some sort of
terrestrial octopus...."
To the girl, it seemed that the living fossil was endless in length.
Coil after coil showed as the ripples passed along its body and the
straight fang threatened them with destruction.
"See, it is armored," said Marable.
"Betty, no one has ever had such an experience as this, seen such a
sight, and lived to tell of it. It must be ravenous with hunger, shut up
in its amber cell inside the black fluid. I--"
A sharp, whistling hiss interrupted his speech. The reptile was puffing
and swelling, and as it grew in bulk with the intake of the air, its
enamel-like scales stood out like bosses on the great body. It spat
forth a cloud of black, oily mist, and Marable came to himself at last.
He raised his revolver and fired at the creature, sending shot after
shot from the heavy revolver into the head.
* * * * *
Betty Young screamed as the reptile reared up and made a movement toward
them. Marable and the girl retreated swiftly, as the beast thumped to
the floor with a thud and started at them, advancing with a queer,
crawling movement.
It was between them and the door. Betty thrust her gun into Marable's
hands, for his own was empty and he had hurled it at the monster.
"Hurry! Run for your life!" ordered Marable, placing himself between
Betty and the reptile.
She would not leave him till he swerved to one side, going dangerously
close to the beast and firing into its head. The rush of the flowing
body stopped; it turned and pursued him, leaving the girl safe for the
moment, but separated from Marable.
Luckily, on the smooth marble it could not get an efficient grip with
its clawlike arms. It was clumsy in its gait, and for a time the man
eluded it.
Betty Young, looking about for a weapon, calling for help at the top of
her lungs, caught sight of a fireman's ax in a glass case on the wall.
She ran over, smashed the glass with the small hammer, and took out the
heavy ax.
Shot after shot reverberated through the big laboratory as Marable tried
to stop the monster. Betty, bravely closing in from the rear, saw
Marable leaping from side to side as the brute struck viciously at him
time and again.
The creature had been emitting cloud after cloud of black fog, and the
atmosphere, in spite of the open windows, was dim in its vicinity.
Vaguely Betty heard shouts from the far hall, but all she could do was
to call out in return and run toward the horror.
* * * * *
Marable, out of breath, had climbed to the top of an amber block. Betty,
close by, saw the reptile rear its bulk up into the air, until it was
high enough to strike the man.
Before it could send forth its death-dealing fang to pin Marable to the
block, however, Betty Young brought the ax down on its back with all her
strength.
There was a sickening thud as the sharp weapon sunk deep into the fleshy
back. She struck again, and the creature fell in folds, like a
collapsing spring. It lashed back at her, but she leaped clear as it
slashed in agony, thrashing about so that the whole room seemed to rock.
Marable came scrambling down the side of the block to help her. He was
breathing hard, and she turned toward him; as Betty looked away, a
portion of the scarlet tail hit her in the body and she fell, striking
her head on the floor.
Marable reached down, seized the ax, and in a desperate frenzy hacked at
the reptile's awful head. He leaped in and out like a terrier, sinking
the ax deep into the neck and head of the beast. He gave the impression
of slashing at heavy rubber, and Betty Young, trying to drag herself
away from that dangerous body, heard his whistling breath.
They were almost hidden from one another now, in the mist which came
from the thing's nostrils.
"Help, help!" screamed the girl, mustering her last strength in the
despairing cry.
She saw Marable go down, then, as the reptile hit him a glancing blow
with its body. When the powerful young fellow did not rise, the girl
thought it was all over. The air really became black to her; she fainted
and lay still.
* * * * *
When Betty Young opened her eyes, the air had cleared greatly, and she
could see the familiar outlines of the paleontological laboratory and
the bulks of the amber blocks. Her father was holding her head in his
lap, and was bathing her temples with water.
"Darling," he said, "are you badly hurt?"
"No," she murmured faintly. "I'm--I'm all right. But--but Walter--did
it--"
"He's all right," said her father. "The reptile was dying, and could do
him no damage. We finished it off."
Then, Marable, covered with blood, which he was trying to wipe from his
hands and clothes, came and smiled down at her.
"Well," said Professor Young, "you two have mutilated a marvelous and
unique specimen between you."
There were several men examining something nearby. Turning her eyes in
their direction, Betty saw they were viewing the remains of the reptile.
* * * * *
Marable helped her to her feet, and stood with one arm about her.
Professor Orling, the famous specialist on fossil reptiles, was speaking
now, and the others listened.
"I think we will find it to be some sort of missing link between the
dinosaurs and mososaurs. It is surely unbelievable that such a creature
should be found alive; but perhaps it can be explained. It is related to
the amphibians and was able to live in or out of the water. Now, we have
many instances of reptiles such as lizards and toads penned up in solid
rock but surviving for hundreds of years. Evidently this great reptile
went through the same sort of experience. I would say that there has
been some great upheaval of nature, that the reptile was caught in its
prison of amber thousands and thousands of years ago. Through
hibernation and perhaps a preservative drug it emitted in the black
fluid, this creature has been able to survive its long imprisonment.
Naturally, when it was released by the cutting away of part of the amber
which penned it in, it burst its cell, ravenous with hunger. The
fanglike tooth we see was its main weapon of attack, and it set upon the
unfortunate watchman. After knocking him unconscious, its sucker-like
fringe glued the mouth near the heart while the fang shot into the
arteries and drew forth the body fluids. There is a great deal to be
done with this valuable find, gentlemen. I would suggest that--"
* * * * *
Marable grunted. "Oh, hell," he murmured in Betty Young's ear. "To the
devil with paleontology, Betty. You saved my life. Come out and let's
get married. I love you."
The girl smiled up into his eyes. The scientists close by were listening
fascinatedly to Orling's words, and had no time to watch the two young
people, for they stared at the reptile's body as the great man went from
section to section, lecturing upon one point after another.
"You've forgotten paleontology for a moment, thank goodness," said
Betty. "I'm glad."
"Yes, Betty dear. This terrible experience has shaken me, and I realized
how much I love you when I saw you in danger. What an awful few minutes!
If I had to live them over again, I don't think I could face them."
"Never mind," she murmured. "We are safe, Walter. After all, it's not
every woman who is helped by a living fossil to make the man she loves
realize he loves her!"
[Illustration: The SF-22 and her convoy were surrounded by these
unearthly rays.]
The Terror of Air-Level Six
_By Harl Vincent_
It was a sweltering evening in mid-August, during that unprecedented
heat wave which broke Weather Bureau records in 2011. New York City had
simmered under a blazing sun for more than three weeks, and all who were
able had deserted the city for spots of lesser torridity. But I was one
of those unfortunates who could not leave on account of the pressing
urgency of business matters and, there being nothing else to do, kept
doggedly at my work until it seemed that nerves and body must soon give
way under the strain. To-night, as I boarded the pneumatic tube, I
dropped into the nearest seat and could not even summon the energy to
open my newspaper.
[Sidenote: From some far reach of leagueless Space
came a great pillar of flame to lay waste
and terrorize the Earth.]
For some minutes I sat as in a daze, wishing merely that the journey was
over, and that I was on my own front porch out in Rutherford. After
awhile I stirred and looked around. Seeing none of my acquaintances in
the car, I finally opened the newspaper and was considerably startled by
the screaming headlines that confronted me from its usually conservative
first page:
SECOND COAST TRANSPORT
PLANE LOST!
Disaster Like First in Air-Level
Six!
No wonder the newsboys had been crying an extra on Broadway! I had given
no heed to the import of their shoutings, but this was real news and
well worthy of an extra edition. Since the mysterious loss of the SF-61,
only four days previously, the facilities of the several air
transportation systems were seriously handicapped on account of the
shaken confidence of the general public. It was not surprising that
there was widespread reluctance at trusting human lives and valuable
merchandise to the mercies of the inexplicable power which had
apparently wiped out of existence the SF-61, together with its
twenty-eight passengers and the consignment of one-half million dollars
in gold. And now the NY-18 had gone the way of the other!
Details were meager. Both ships had failed to reply to the regular
ten-minute radio calls from headquarters and had not since been seen or
heard from. In both cases the last call had been answered when the ship
was proceeding at full speed on its regular course in air-level six. The
SF-61 last reported from a position over Mora in New Mexico, and four
days of intensive search by thousands of planes had failed to locate
ship or passengers. To-day, in the early hours of the morning, the NY-18
reported over Colorado Springs, on the northern route, and then, like
the SF-61, dropped out of existence insofar as any attempts at
communicating with or locating her were concerned. She, too, carried a
heavy consignment of specie, though only eleven passengers had risked
the westward journey.
* * * * *
Someone had dropped into a seat at my side, and I looked up from my
reading to meet the solemn eyes of Hartley Jones, a young friend whom I
had not seen for several months.
"Why, hello, Hart," I greeted him. "Glad to see you, old man. Where in
Sam Hill have you been keeping yourself?"
"Glad to see you, too, Jack," he returned warmly. "Been spending most of
my time out at the hangar."
"Oh, that's right. You fellows built a new one at Newark Airport, didn't
you?"
"Yeah. Got a great outfit there now, too. Why don't you drop around and
see us one of these days?"
"I will, Hart, and I want you to take me up some time. You know I have
never been in one of these new ships of yours. But what do you think of
this mess?" I pointed to the black headlines.
He grinned joyously and flipped back the lapel of his coat, displaying a
nickeled badge. "George and I are starting out to-night to look around a
little," he gloated. "Just been appointed deputy air commissioners; and
we got a couple of guns on our newest plane. Air Traffic Bureau thinks
there's dirty work afoot. Twelve-motored planes don't disappear without
leaving a trace. Anyhow, we've got a job, and we're going to try and
find out what's wrong. How'd you like to come along?"
"What?" I replied. "You know darn well I'm too busy. Besides, I'd be no
good to you. Just extra load, and not pay load at that. And then, I'm
broke--as usual."
* * * * *
Hartley Jones grinned in his engaging way. "You'd be good company," he
parried; "and, what's more, I think the trip would do you a lot of good.
You look all shot to pieces."
"Forget it," I laughed. "It's just the heat. And I'll have to leave you
here, Hart. Drop in and see us, will you? The wife was asking for you
only yesterday."
"Jack, dear," my wife greeted me at the door of my modest suburban home,
"Mr. Preston just called, and he wants you to call him right back."
"Oh, Lord," I groaned, "can't I forget the office for one evening?"
Preston was manager of the concern for which I worked.
Nevertheless, though our two fine youngsters were clamoring for their
dinner, I made the telephone call at once.
"Makely," came the voice of the boss, when the connection was completed,
"I want you to take the night plane for Frisco. Hate to ask you, but it
must be done. Townley is sick and someone has to take those Canadian Ex.
bonds out to Farnsworth. You're the only one to do it, and after you get
there, you can start on that vacation you need. Take a month if you
wish."
The thought of Hartley Jones' offer flashed through my mind. "But have
you read of the loss of the NY-18?" I asked Preston.
"I have, Makely. There'll be another hundred a month in your check, too,
to make up for the worry of your family. But the government is sending
thirty Secret Service men along on the SF-22, which leaves to-night. In
addition, there will be a convoy of seven fighting planes, so there is
not likely to be a repetition of the previous disasters."
That hundred a month sounded mighty good, for expenses had been mounting
rapidly of late. "All right, Mr. Preston," I agreed. "I will be at the
airport before midnight. But how about the bonds?"
"I'll drive around after dinner and deliver them to you. And thanks for
your willingness, Makely. You'll not be sorry."
* * * * *
My wife had listened intently and, from my words, she knew what to
expect. Her face was a tragic mask when I replaced the receiver on its
hook, and my heart sank at her expression.
Then there came the ring of the telephone and, for some reason, my pulse
raced as I went to the hall to answer it. Hartley Jones' cheerful voice
greeted me and he was positively gleeful when I told him of my
projected trip.
"Hooray!" he shouted. "But you'll not take the SF-22. You'll take the
trip with me as I wanted. I tell you what: You be out at Newark Airport
at eleven-thirty, but come to my hangar instead of to that of the
transportation company. We'll leave at the same time as the regular
liner, and we'll get your old bonds to Frisco, regardless of what might
happen to the big ship. Also we might learn something mighty
interesting."
I argued with him, but to no avail. And the more I argued, the greater
appeal was presented by his proposition. Finally there was nothing to do
but agree.
* * * * *
Preston arrived with the bonds shortly after the children were tucked in
their beds. I did not tell him of my change in plans. He did not stay
long, and I could see that he was uncomfortable under the accusing eyes
of Marie, for all his own confidence in the safety of the trip in the
closely-guarded SF-22.
At precisely eleven-thirty I reached the great steel and glass hangar
where Hart Jones and George Boehm carried on their experiments with
super-modern types of aircraft. Hart Jones had inherited more than two
million dollars, and was in a fair way to spend it all on his favorite
hobby, though those who knew him best vowed that he would make many
times that amount through royalties on his ever-growing number of
valuable inventions.
The immense doors were open, and I gazed for the first time into the
hangar whose spacious interior provided storage and manufacturing
facilities for a dozen or more planes of Hart Jones' design. A curiously
constructed example of his handiwork stood directly before me, and
several mechanics were engaged in making it ready for flight. My friend
advanced from their midst to meet me, a broad smile on his grease
smeared countenance.
"Greetings, Jack," he said, taking my small bag from my hands. "Right on
time, I see. And I can't tell you how glad I am that you are coming with
us. So is George."
"Well, I didn't expect to," I admitted; "but there is no need of telling
you that I had far rather be in your ship than in the big one."
* * * * *
George Boehm, the same jolly chap I had several times met in Hart's
company, but fatter than ever, crawled from beneath the shiny metal body
of the plane and scrambled to his feet at my side.
"Going in for a bit of adventuring, Mr. Makely?" he asked, wiping his
hand with a piece of cotton waste before extending it.
"Yes," I replied, as I squeezed his chubby fingers. "Can't stick in the
mud all my life, George. And I wouldn't want to be in better company for
my first attempt either."
"Nor we," he returned, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. "Rather have a
greenhorn on the Pioneer than some government agent, who'd be butting in
and trying to run everything. Think you'll be scared?"
"Probably," I admitted; "but I guess I can stand it."
"Hear the latest news broadcast?" interrupted Hart Jones.
"No. What was it?" I asked.
"There has been a report from out near Cripple Creek," said Hart
solemnly, "that a pillar of fire was observed in the mountains shortly
after the time the NY-18 last reported. The time and the location
coincide with her probable position and the report was confirmed by no
less than three of the natives of that locality. Of course the
statements are probably extravagant, but they claim this pillar of fire
extended for miles into the heavens and was accompanied by a tremendous
roaring sound that ceased abruptly as the light of the flame
disappeared, leaving nothing but blackness and awe-inspiring silence
behind."
* * * * *
"Lot of bunk!" grunted George, who was vigorously scrubbing the back of
his neck.
"Sounds like a fairy tale," I commented.
"Nevertheless, there may be something in it. In fact, there must be.
Three of these mountaineers observed practically the same phenomenon
from quite widely separated points, though one of them said there were
three pillars of fire and that these looked more like the beams of
powerful search-lights. All agreed on the terrific roar. And, after all,
these two liners did disappear. There must be something quite out of the
ordinary about the way in which they were captured or destroyed, and
this occurrence may well be supposed to have a bearing on the matter."
"Possibly they were destroyed by some freak electrical storm," I
suggested.
"Where then are the wrecked vessels?" asked Hart. "No, Jack, electrical
storms do not destroy huge air liners and then suck them out into space
beyond our vision. These two ships are no longer on the surface of the
earth, else they would have been long since located. The magnetic
direction finders of the transportation people have covered every inch
of the United States, as well as Mexico and Canada."
"Of course they might have been carried halfway around the world by a
wind of unprecedented velocity." I commenced a silly argument in favor
of the theory that the elements had accounted for the two vessels, but
was interrupted by the mounting roar of great engines throbbing
overhead.
"Hurry up there, George!" shouted Hart. "It's the SF-22 coming in. We
have to be ready for the take-off in five minutes!"
* * * * *
He hastened to take George's place at the washbowl and all was activity
within the confines of our hangar. George and I left the office and went
out to the landing field, which was now brilliant with the glare of
floodlights. The _Pioneer_ had been trundled into the open and stood
ready for the flight. Not a hundred feet above the field, the huge
silver moth that was the SF-22 swept by in a wide circle that would
bring her into the wind. The roar of her engines died as she swung out
of the circle of light into the surrounding darkness.
The crowds which had gathered to witness her landing buzzed with excited
comment and speculation. Her nose brought slightly up, she dropped to a
perfect three-point landing, the brakes screeching as she was brought to
a standstill at the hangar of the transportation company.
"Come on now, you fellows," came the voice of Hart Jones from the hangar
entrance, "there's no time to lose. The _Pioneer_ takes off immediately
after the big fellow."
We hurried to the waiting ship, which seemed like a tiny toy when
compared with the giant SF-22. I had observed very little of the
construction of the _Pioneer_, but I could now see that she was quite
different in design from the ordinary plane. A monoplane she was, but
the wing structure was abnormally short and of great thickness, and
there were a number of tubes projecting from the leading edge that gave
the appearance of a battery of small cannon. The body, like all planes
designed for travel in air-level six, was cigar-shaped, and had
hermetically sealed ports and entrance manholes. A cluster of the
cannon-shaped tubes enclosed the tail just back of the fins and rudder
and, behind the wing structure atop the curved upper surface of the
body, there was a sphere of gleaming metal that was probably three feet
in diameter.
* * * * *
Before I could formulate questions regarding the unusual features of the
design, we were within the _Pioneer's_ cabin and Hart Jones was engaged
in clamping the entrance manhole cover to its rubber seat. A throbbing
roar that penetrated our double hull attracted my attention and, looking
through a nearby porthole, I saw that the convoy of army planes had
taken off and was circling over the SF-22 in anticipation of her start.
Trim, speedy fighting ships these were, with heavy caliber machine-guns
in turrets fore and aft and normally manned by crews of twelve each. The
under surfaces of their bodies glistened smooth and sleek in the light
from the field, for the landing gears had been drawn within and the
openings sealed by the close-fitted armor plate that protected these
ordinarily vulnerable portions when in flight.
The SF-22 was ready to take off and the crowds were drawing back into
the obscurity beyond the huge circle of blinding light. One after
another her twelve engines sputtered into life, and ponderously she
moved over the field, gathering speed as the staccato barking of the
exhausts gradually blended into a smooth though deafening purr. The tail
of the great vessel came up, then the wheels, and she was off into the
night.
* * * * *
Hart Jones sat at a bewildering array of instruments that covered almost
the entire forward partition of the cabin. He pressed a button and the
starting motor whined for a moment. Then the single engine of the
_Pioneer_ coughed and roared. Slowly we taxied in the direction taken by
the SF-22, whose lights were now vanishing in the darkness. I saw George
open a valve on the wall and Hart stretched the fingers of his left hand
to what appeared to be the keyboard of a typewriter set into the
instrument board. He pressed several of the keys and pulled back his
stick. There was a whistling scream from astern and I was thrown back in
my seat with painful force. With that, the motor roared into full speed
and we had left the airport far behind.
"What on earth?" I gasped.
"Rocket propulsion," laughed Hart. "I should have warned you. Those
tubes you saw outside at the tail and along the leading edge of the
wings. Only used three of them, but that was sufficient for the
take-off."
"But I thought this rocket business was not feasible on account of the
wastage of fuel due to its low efficiency," I objected.
"We should worry about fuel," said Hart.
I looked about me and saw that there was very little space for the
storage of this essential commodity. "Why?" I inquired. "What fuel do
you use?"
"Make our own," he replied shortly. He was busy at the moment,
maneuvering the _Pioneer_ into a position above and behind the SF-22 and
her convoy.
"You make your own fuel enroute?" I asked in astonishment.
"Yes. That sphere you saw on top. It is the collecting end of an
electrical system for extracting nitrogen and other elements, from the
air. This extraction goes on constantly while we are in the atmosphere
and my fuel is an extremely powerful explosive of which nitrates are the
base. The supply is replenished continuously, so we have no fear of
running short even in the upper levels."
* * * * *
George had crawled through a small opening into some inaccessible region
in the stern of the vessel. I pondered over what Hart had just told me,
still keeping my eyes glued to the port, through which could be seen the
fleet we were following. The altimeter registered thirty-five thousand
feet. We were entering air-level six--the stratosphere! Below us the
troposphere, divided into five levels, each of seven thousand feet,
teemed with the life of the air. The regular lanes were filled with
traffic, the lights of the speeding thousands of freight and pleasure
craft moving in orderly procession along their prescribed routes.
Up here in the sixth level, which was entirely for high-speed traffic of
commercial and government vessels making transcontinental or
transoceanic voyages, we were the only adventurers in sight--we and the
convoyed liner we were following. The speed indicator showed six hundred
miles an hour, and the tiny spot of light that traveled over the chart
to indicate our position showed that we were nearing Buffalo.
Glancing through one of the lower ports, I saw the lights of the city
shining dimly through a light mist that fringed the shore of Lake Erie
and extended northward along the Niagara. Then we were out over the
lake, and the luminous hue was slipping rapidly behind. I looked ahead
and saw that the distance to the SF-22 and her convoy had somewhat
increased. We were a mile behind and some two thousand feet above them.
Evidently Hart was figuring on keeping at a safe distance for
observation of anything that might happen.
* * * * *
Our motor was running smoothly and the angle of the propeller blades had
been altered to take care of the change in air density from the lower
altitudes. It flashed across my mind that this was an ideal location for
an attack, if such was to be made on the SF-22.
Then, far ahead, I saw a beam of light stab through the darkness and
strike the tossing surface of the lake. Another and another followed,
and I could see that the SF-22 and her convoy were surrounded by these
unearthly rays. They converged from high above to outline a brilliant
circle where they met on the surface of the waters, and in the midst of
the cone formed by the beams, the liner and its seven tiny followers
could be seen to falter, and huddle more closely together.
It all happened in the twinkling of an eye--so quickly, in fact, that
Hart and I had not the time to exchange remarks over the strange
occurrence. For a moment the eight vessels hovered, halted suddenly by
this inexplicable force from out the heavens. Then there rose from the
apex of the inverted cone of light a blinding column of blue-white
radiance that poured skyward an instant and was gone. To our ears came a
terrific roaring that could be likened to nothing we had heard on earth.
The _Pioneer_ was tossed and buffeted as by a cyclone, and George came
tumbling from the opening he had entered, his round face grown solemn.
Then came eery silence, for the _Pioneer's_ motor had gone dead. Ahead
there was utter darkness. The liner and her convoy had completely
vanished and the _Pioneer_ was slipping into a spin!
* * * * *
"What's up?" asked George of Hart, who was tugging frantically at the
controls.
"The liner has gone the way of the first two," he replied: "and the yarn
about the pillar of fire was not so far wrong after all."
"You saw the same thing?" asked George incredulously.
"Yes, and so did Jack. There came some beams of light from the sky; then
the pillar of fire and the roaring you heard, after which the vessels
were gone and our electrical system paralyzed."
"Holy smoke!" ejaculated George. "What to do now?"
As he spoke, the _Pioneer_ came out of the spin, and we were able to
resume our positions in the seats. None of us was strapped in, and we
had been clinging to whatever was handiest to keep from being tossed
about in the cabin. Hart wiped his forehead and growled out an oath. The
instrument board was still illuminated, for its tiny lamps were supplied
with current from the storage battery. But the main lights of the cabin
and the ignition system refused to function. We were gliding now, but
losing altitude rapidly, having already dropped to the lower limits of
level five.
"Can't you use the rocket tubes?" I inquired hesitatingly.
"They are fired in the same manner as the motor," replied Hart; "but we
might try an emergency connection from the storage battery, which is
ordinarily used only in starting and for the panel lights."
* * * * *
George was already fussing with the connections in a small junction box
from which he had removed the cover. Meanwhile, the black waters of Lake
Erie were rushing upward to meet us, and the needle of the altimeter
registered twelve thousand feet.
"Here's the trouble!" shouted George, triumphantly holding up a small
object he had removed from the junction box. "Ignition fuse is blown."
"Probably by some radiations from the cone of light and the column that
destroyed the liner. Lucky we were no closer," were Hart's muttered
comments.
George produced a spare fuse and inserted it in its proper place. The
cabin lights glowed instantly and the motor started at once.
"Well, I'm going up after the generators of this mysterious force that
is destroying our cross-country ships and killing our people," asserted
Hart. "The rays came from high above, but the _Pioneer_ can go as high
as anything that ever flew--_higher_."
He snapped a switch and a beam of light that rivalled the so-called
pillar of fire bored far into the night, dimming the stars by its
brilliance. Again his fingers strayed to the rows of white keys and the
rocket tubes shrieked in response to his pressure. This time I was
prepared for the shock of acceleration, but the action was maintained
for several seconds and I found the pressure against my back growing
painful. Then it was relieved, and I glanced at the altimeter. Its
needle had reached the end of the scale, which was graduated to eighty
thousand feet!
"Good Lord!" I exclaimed. "Do you mean to tell me that we are more than
sixteen miles in the air?"
"Nearly thirty," replied Hart, pointing to another dial which I had not
seen. This one was graduated in miles above sea-level, and its needle
wavered between the twenty-nine and thirty mark!
* * * * *
Again Hart pressed the rocket buttons, and we shot still higher into the
heavens. Thirty, forty, fifty miles registered the meter, and still we
climbed.
"Great Scott!" blurted a voice I knew was my own, though I had no
consciousness of willing the speech. "At this rate we'll reach the
moon!"
"We could, if we wished," was Hart's astounding reply; "I wish you
wouldn't say too much about it when we return. We have oxygen to breathe
and an air-tight vessel to retain it. With the fuel we are using, we
could easily do it, provided a sufficient supply were available.
However, the _Pioneer_ does not have large enough storage tanks as yet,
and, of course, we cannot now replenish our supply with sufficient
rapidity, for the atmosphere has become very rare indeed--where we are.
My ultimate object, though, in building the _Pioneer_, was to construct
a vessel that is capable of a trip to the moon."
"You think you could reach a great enough velocity to escape the
gravitational pull of the earth?" I asked, marveling more and more at
the temerity and resourcefulness of my science-minded friend.
"Absolutely," he replied. "The speed required is less than seven miles a
second, and I have calculated that the _Pioneer_ can do no less than
twenty."
Mentally I multiplied by sixty. I could hardly credit the result. Twelve
hundred miles a minute!
"But, how about the acceleration?" I ventured. "Could the human body
stand up under the strain?"
"That is the one problem remaining," he replied; "and I am now working
on a method of neutralizing it. From the latest results of our
experiments, George and I are certain of its feasibility."
* * * * *
The _Pioneer_ was now losing altitude once more, and Hart played the
beam of the searchlight in all directions as we descended. He and George
watched through one of the floor ports and I followed suit. We were
falling, unhampered by air resistance, and our bodies were practically
weightless with reference to the _Pioneer_. It was a strange sensation:
there was the feeling of exhilaration one experiences when inhaling the
first whiff of nitrous oxide in the dentist's chair--a feeling of
absolute detachment and care-free confidence in the ultimate result of
our precipitous descent.
I found considerable amusement in pushing myself from side to side of
the cabin with a mere touch of a finger. There was no up nor down, and
sometimes it seemed to me that we were drifting sideways, sometimes that
we fell upward rather than downward. Hart and George were unconcerned.
Evidently they were quite accustomed to the sensations. They bent their
every energy toward discovering what had caused the disaster to the
SF-22 and its convoy.
For several hours we cruised about on the strangest search ever made in
the air. Alternately shooting skyward to unconscionable altitudes and
dropping to levels five and six to replenish our fuel supply, we covered
the greater portion of the United States before the night was over. But
the powerful searchlight of the _Pioneer_ failed to disclose anything
that might be remotely connected with the disappearance of the SF-22.
For me it was a never-to-be-forgotten experience. Lightning dashes from
coast to coast which required but a few minutes of time--circling many
miles above New York or Washington or Savannah in broad daylight with
the sun low on the up-curved horizon; then shooting westward into the
darkness and skirting the Pacific coast less than fifteen minutes later,
but with four hours' actual time difference. Space and time were almost
one.
* * * * *
Hart had not provided the _Pioneer_ with a radio or television
transmitter, but there was an excellent receiver, and, through its
agency we learned that the world was in a veritable uproar over the
latest visitation of the mysterious terror of the sixth air level. All
commercial traffic in levels four, five and six was ordered
discontinued, and the government air control stations were flashing long
messages in code, the import of which could but be guessed. Vision
flashes showed immense gatherings at the large airports and in the
public squares of the great cities, where the general populace become
more and more excited and terrified by the awful possibilities pictured
by various prominent speakers.
The governments of all foreign powers made haste to disclaim
responsibility for the air attacks or for any attempt at making war on
the United States. News broadcasts failed to mention Hart Jones or the
_Pioneer_, since the mission had been kept secret. The phenomenon of the
rays and the roaring column of light had been observed from many points
on this occasion and there was no longer any doubt as to the nature of
the terror as visible to the eye, though theories as to the action and
source of the rays conflicted greatly and formed the basis of much
heated discussion.
Eventually the advancing dawn reached San Francisco, and with its advent
Hart decided to make a landing in that city so that my bonds could be
delivered.
* * * * *
Jones was apparently a very much mystified and discouraged man. "Jack,"
he said, "it seems to me that this thing is but the beginning of some
tremendous campaign that is being waged against our country by a clever
and powerful enemy. And I feel that our work in connection with the
unraveling of the mystery and overcoming the enemy or enemies is but
begun. It's a cinch that the thing is organized by human minds and is
not any sort of a freak of the elements. Our work is cut out for us, all
right, and I wish you would stick to George and me through the mess.
Will you?"
"Sure," I agreed, readily enough. "After these bonds are delivered I am
free for a month."
"Ha! Ha!" cackled George, without mirth. "A month! We're doggoned lucky
if we get to the bottom of this in a year."
"Nonsense!" snapped Hart, who was considerably upset by the failure to
locate the source of the disastrous rays. "There is nothing supernatural
about this, and anything that can be explained on a scientific basis can
be run to earth in short order. These rays are man-made and, as such,
can be accounted for by man. Our greatest scientists must be put to work
on the problem at once--in fact, they have quite probably been called in
by the government already."
* * * * *
He was maneuvering the _Pioneer_ to a landing on the broad field of the
San Francisco airport. Hundreds of idle planes of all sizes lined the
field, and, unmindful of the earliness the hour, a great crowd was
collected in expectation of sensational reports from the occupants of
arriving ships. The unusual construction of the _Pioneer_ attracted
considerable attention and it was with difficulty that the police kept
back the crowd when she rolled to a stop near the office of the local
government supervisor. We hustled inside and were greeted by that
official with open arms.
"Glory be!" he exclaimed. "Hart Jones and the _Pioneer_. Every airport
in the land has been on the lookout for you all night. It was feared you
had been lost with the SF-22 and the others. Code messages to the
supervisors of all districts advised of your mission, though it has been
kept out of the general news, as has the message from the enemy."
"Message from the enemy!" gasped Hart, George and I, echoing the words
like parrots.
"Yes. A demand that the United States surrender, and a threat to descend
into the lower levels if the demand is not complied with in twenty-four
hours!"
"Who is this enemy?" asked Hart, "and where?"
"Who they are is not known," replied the official gravely; "and as to
the location, the War Department is puzzled. Direction finders
throughout the country took readings on the position of their radio
transmitter and these readings differed widely in result. But the
consensus of opinion is that the messages originate somewhere out in
space, probably between fifty and one hundred thousand miles from our
earth."
"Great guns!" Hart glanced at George and me, where we stood with
stupidly hanging jaws. "And what does the government want of me now?"
"You are considered to be the one man who might be able to cope with the
problem, and are ordered to report to the Secretary of War, in person,
immediately."
* * * * *
Hart was electrified into instant activity. "Here," he said in a voice
of authority that commanded the official's attention and respect, "see
that this package of bonds is delivered at once to the addressee and
that the addressor is advised of its safe arrival. We're off at once."
Suiting action to the words, he thrust my packet into the hands of the
astonished supervisor. Then, turning sharply on his heel, he flung back,
"Advise the Secretary of War that I shall report to him in person in
less than one hour."
As we stepped through the entrance of the _Pioneer_, he shot a final
look at the official and laughed heartily at his sudden accession of
energy. We had not the slightest doubt that Hart's orders would be
immediately and efficiently carried out.
* * * * *
In precisely forty-five minutes, we stood before the desk of Lawrence
Simler, then Secretary of War, in Washington.
"You are Mr. Hartley Jones?" inquired the stern-visaged little man.
"I am, Mr. Secretary, and these are my friends and co-workers, George
Boehm and John Makely."
The Secretary acknowledged the introduction gravely, then plunged into
the heart of the matter at hand with the quick energy for which he was
famed.
"It may or may not be a serious situation," he said, "but certainly it
has thus far been quite alarming. In any event, we have taken the matter
out of the hands of the Air Traffic Bureau. We are prepared to defy the
ultimatum of the enemy, whoever he may be. But we want your help, Mr.
Jones. Every ship of the Air Navy will be in the upper levels within the
prescribed twenty-four hours, and we will endeavor to stave off their
attacks until such time as you can fit the _Pioneer_ for a journey to
their headquarters."
"How can your antiquated war vessels, capable of hurling a high
explosive shell no more than fifty miles, fight off an enemy that is
thousands of miles distant?" asked Hart.
"It is believed by the research engineers of the government that, though
their headquarters may be located at a great distance, the raiders drop
to a comparatively low altitude at the time of one of their attacks,
returning immediately thereafter to their base."
Hart Jones shook his head. "The engineers may be correct," he stated;
"but how on earth can you expect a little vessel like the _Pioneer_ to
battle an enemy who is possessed of these terribly destructive weapons
and who has sufficient confidence in his own invulnerability to declare
war on the greatest country on earth?"
* * * * *
Secretary Simler dropped his voice to a confidential tone, and his keen
gray eyes flashed excitement as he unfolded the details of the
discoveries and plans of the War Department. We three listened in
undisguised amazement to a tale of the unceasing labors of our Secret
Service agents in foreign countries, of elaborate experiments with
deadly weapons and the chemicals of warfare.
We heard of marvelous new rays that could be projected for many miles
and destroy whole armies at a single blast; rays that would, in less
time than that required to tell of the feat, reduce to a mass of fused
metal the greatest firstline battleships of the old days of ocean
warfare. We heard of preparations for defensive warfare throughout the
civilized world, preparedness that insured so terrible and final a war
that it was literally impossible for a great world conflagration to
again break out. We learned that the present mysterious signs of a
coming war could not possibly have originated in any country on earth,
else they would have been known of long in advance, due to the network
of the Secret Service system. This war, so unexpectedly thrust upon us,
was undoubtedly a war of planets!
"But," objected Hart, "the messages were in English, were they not?"
"They were," continued Secretary Simler, "and that puzzled our experts
in the beginning. But, it may well be that our enemy from out the skies
has had spies among us for many years and could thus have learned our
languages and radio codes. In any event, we are to meet destructive rays
with others equally destructive, and you, Hartley Jones, are the man who
can make our effectiveness certain."
"I?"
"Yes. How long a time will be required in fitting out the _Pioneer_ for
reliable space flying?"
* * * * *
Hart Jones pondered the matter and I could see that he was overjoyed at
the prospect of getting into the thing in earnest. "About one week," he
replied, "providing you can send a force of fifty expert mechanics to my
hangar at once and supply all material as fast as I shall require it."
"Excellent," said the Secretary. "We'll have the men there in a few
hours and will obtain whatever you need, regardless of cost, for
immediate delivery. Incidentally, there will be several scientists as
well, who will supervise the installation of two types of ray generators
and their projecting mechanisms on the _Pioneer_. You will need them
later."
"I don't doubt we shall," said Hart. "And now, with your permission, we
shall leave for the hangar. I'm ready to start work."
"Capital!" Secretary Simler pressed every one of a row of buttons set in
his desk top. We were dismissed.
"Well," said I, when we reached the outside, "he has given you quite a
job, Hart!"
"You said something," he replied. "But, if this threat from the skies
proves as real and as calamitous as I think it will, we all have our
work cut out for us."
"Do you really believe this enemy comes from another planet?" asked
George as we entered the _Pioneer_ for the trip home.
"Where else can they be from?" countered Hart. "But, really it makes no
difference to us now. We have to go after them in earnest. Don't want to
quit, do you, George?"
"Wha-a-at?" shouted George, as he jerked savagely at the main switch of
the _Pioneer_. "You know me better than that, Hart. Did I ever let you
down in anything?"
"No," admitted the smiling Hart, "you never did, bless your heart. But
Jack here is another matter. He has a wife and two kids to look after.
That lets him out automatically."
* * * * *
My heart sank at the words, for I knew that he meant what he said. And,
truth to tell, I saw the justice in his remarks.
"But, Hart," I faltered, "I'd like to be in on this thing."
"I know you would, old man. But I think it's out of the question, for
the present at least. You can help with the reconstruction of the
_Pioneer_, however."
And meekly I accepted his dictum, though with secretly conflicting
emotions. Little did I realize at the time that Hart knew far more than
he pretended and that he had merely attempted to salve his own
conscience in this manner.
I was very anxious to return to my family, and, as I sped homeward in a
taxicab after the _Pioneer_ landed at her own hangar, my mind was filled
with doubts and fears. Secretary Simler had been very brief in his talk,
but his every word carried home the gravity of the situation. What if
these invaders carried the war to the surface? Suppose they seared the
countryside and the cities and suburbs with rays of horrible nature that
would shrivel and blast all that lay in their path? My heart chilled at
the thought and it was a distinct relief when I gazed on my little home
and saw that it was safe--so far. I paid the driver with a much too
large bank note and dashed up my own front steps two at a time.
A few hours later I tore myself away and returned to the hangar, where
the _Pioneer_ now reposed in a scaffolded cradle. The sight which met my
eyes was astonishing in the extreme, for the hangar had been transformed
into a huge workshop with seemingly hundreds of men already at work. It
was a scene of furious activity, and, to my utter amazement, I observed
that the _Pioneer_ was already in an advanced stage of disassembly.
* * * * *
I had no difficulty in locating Hart Jones, for he was striding from
lathe to workbench to boring mill, issuing his orders with the sureness
and decision of a born leader of men. He welcomed me in his most brisk
manner and immediately assigned me to a portion of the work in the
chemical laboratory--something I was at least partly fitted for.
We labored far into the night, when a siren called us to rest and food.
This was to be a night and day job, and not a man of those on duty gave
thought to the intense nervous and physical strain. Sixty-five of us I
learned there were, though it had seemed there were several times that
number.
During the rest period, Hart switched on the large television and sound
mechanism of the public news broadcasts. Great excitement prevailed
throughout the United States, for there had been a leak and the news had
gone abroad regarding the message from the enemy. There was widespread
panic and disorder and the government was besieged with demands for
authentic news. The twenty-four hours of grace had nearly expired.
Finally the public was told of what actually was happening. Our entire
fleet of one thousand air cruisers was in air-level six, waiting for the
enemy. America was going to fight in earnest!
* * * * *
Flashes of our air cruisers in construction and in action came over the
screen; voice-vision records of the popular officers of the fleet
followed in quick succession. Then came the blow--the first of the
strange war.
Two vessels of the air fleet had been destroyed by the triple rays and
pillar of fire! Fifty cruisers rushing to the scene had been unable to
find any traces of the source of the deadly rays. And, this time, there
was an alarming added element. The pillar of fire had risen from a point
near Gadsden in Alabama and, in its wake, there spread a sulphurous,
smoldering fire that crept along the ground and destroyed all in its
path. Farms, factories, and even the steel rails of the railroads were
consumed and burned into the ground as if by the breath of some
tremendous blast furnace. Hundreds of inhabitants of the section
perished, and it was reported that the fumes from the strange fires were
drifting in the direction of Birmingham, terrifyingly visible in
blue-green clouds of searing vapor.
With the first news of the disaster came a wave of fear that spread over
the country with the rapidity of the ether waves that carried the news.
Then came stern determination. This enemy must be swept from the skies!
Gatherings in public places volunteered en masse for whatever service
the government might ask of them. The entire world was in an uproar, and
from Great Britain, France, Germany and Russia, came immediate offers of
their air fleets to assist in fighting off the Terror.
* * * * *
In less than an hour there were nearly five thousand cruisers in
air-level six, patroling its entire depth from thirty-five thousand to
one hundred thousand feet altitude.
We resumed work in the hangar, but the news service was kept in
operation as far as the amplifiers were concerned, though the television
screen was switched off on account of the likelihood of its distracting
the workers.
Again came the report of a major disaster, this time over Butte in
Montana. Four American vessels and one British were the victims in level
six. And the city of Butte was in flames; blue, horrible flames that
literally melted the city into the ground. Again there was no trace of
the invaders.
How puny were the efforts of the five thousand air cruisers! Marvels of
engineering and mechanical skill, these vessels were. Deadly as were the
weapons they carried--weapons so terrible that war on earth was
considered impossible since their development--they were helpless
against an enemy who could not be located. Though our vessels were
capable of boring high into the stratosphere, the enemy worked from
still higher.
"Holy smoke!" gasped Hart Jones, who had stopped at my side. "What a
contract I have on my hands!"
* * * * *
He looked in the direction of the partly dismantled _Pioneer_, and I
could see by the fixedness of his stare that he was thinking of her
insignificant size in comparison with the job she was to undertake.
Above the din of the machines in the hangar rang the startled voice of a
news announcer. Panic-stricken he seemed, and we stopped to listen.
Another blow of the terror of the skies--and now close by! Over
Westchester County in New York State there was a repetition of the
previous attacks. Only two of the cruisers had vanished this time; but
several towns, including Larchmont and Scarsdale, were pools of molten
fire!
Sick at heart, I thought of my little home in Rutherford and of the dear
ones it contained. I thought of telephoning, but, what was the use?
There was no warding off of this terrible thing that had so suddenly
come to our portion of the world. It was the blowing of the last
trumpet, the way things looked.
The announcer had calmed himself. His voice droned tonelessly now, as
was the custom. Another raid, on the Mexican Border now. We were
stupefied by the rapidity of the enemy's attacks; then electrified once
more by the most astounding news of all. Alexandria, in Egypt, was the
base of a pillar of fire! Fully half of the city was wiped out, and the
remainder in a mortal funk, terrorized and riotous. The United States
was not alone in the war!
The foreign fleets which reinforced our own were ordered home
immediately. But to what avail? The world was doomed!
* * * * *
In the morning, after nine fearful attacks during the night, there came
another message from the enemy and this was repeated in five languages
and addressed to the entire world:
"People of Earth," it read, "this is our final warning. One chance has
been given and you have proved stubborn. Consider well that your
civilization be not entirely destroyed, and answer as the expiration of
forty-eight hours, using our transmitting frequency. Our hand is to be
withheld for that period only, when, unless our demands are met, all of
your large cities and towns will be destroyed. Our terms for peace are
that we be permitted to land without resistance on your part; that you
surrender farm and forest lands, cities and towns, able-bodied men of
twenty to forty, selected women of seventeen to thirty, and tribute in
the form of such supplies and precious metals as we may specify, all to
the extent of forty per cent of your resources. No compromise will be
accepted."
That was all. It was during a rest period at the Jones hangar and I had
brought Hart and George to my home for breakfast. We sat at the table
when the news instrument brought the message. Marie was pouring the
coffee, and my two small boys, Jim and Jack, had gone to the playroom,
from whence their joyous voices could be heard. We four were struck dumb
at the announcement, and Marie looked at me with so awful an expression
of dread that my coffee turned bitter in my mouth. Marie was just
twenty-eight!
"What beasts!" cried Hart. "Allow them to land without resistance? I
should say not! Rather we should fight them off until all of us perish."
* * * * *
He had risen from his chair in his anger. Now he sat down suddenly and
shook a forefinger in my face.
"Say!" he exploded. "You can't tell me that some master mind of our own
world is not back of this!"
"I'm not telling you," I replied, startled at the fierce fire that
flashed from his eyes.
"I know. I'm just trying to think aloud and I'm liable to say anything.
But this sort of business is the work of humans as sure as you're born.
Still I believe that what Simler says is true. I can't believe that any
country on earth is back of the thing. It must be an attack from beings
of another planet, but I think they have as a leader a man who is of
our own earth."
Marie's eyes opened wide at this. "But how could that be?" she asked.
"Surely no one from our earth has made the trip to one of the other
planets?"
"It may be that someone has," replied Hart. "Do you remember Professor
Oradel? Remember, about ten years ago, I think it was, when he and a
half dozen or more of extremely radical scientists built a rocket they
claimed would reach the moon? They were ridiculed and hissed and
relegated to the position of half-baked, crazy inventors. But Oradel had
a large private fortune, and he and his crowd built themselves a
workshop and laboratory in a secluded region in the Ozarks. Here they
labored and experimented and eventually the rocket ship was constructed.
No person was in their confidence, but when the machine was completed
they issued a statement to the press to the effect that they were ready
for the voyage to the moon, and that, when they returned, a reckoning
with the world was to be made for its disbelief and total lack of
sympathy. Again the press subjected Oradel to a series of scathing
denunciations, and the scientific publications refused to take
cognizance of his claims in any way, shape or form."
* * * * *
"Then, one night, a great rocket roared into the heavens, leaving a
terror-stricken countryside in the wake of its brilliantly visible tail.
Several observatories whose telescopes picked up and followed the trail
of the contraption reported that it described a huge parabola, mounting
high into the stratosphere and falling back to earth, where it was lost
in the depths of the Pacific Ocean. There the thing ended and it was
soon forgotten. But I believe that this rocket ship of Oradel's reached
Mars or Venus and that the peoples of whichever planet they reached have
been prevailed upon and prepared to war upon the world."
"That would explain their knowledge of our languages and codes." I
ventured, "and would likewise account for the fact that the first of our
ships to be attacked were those carrying large shipments of currency.
Though if these were destroyed by the fire columns, I can not see what
good the money would do them."
"Don't believe the first three were destroyed," grunted Hart. "You'll
remember that in these cases the pillars of fire, or whatever you want
to call them, were of a cold light, whereas now they are viciously hot
and leave behind them the terrible destructive fires that spread and
spread and seemingly never are extinguished. No, I think that the force
used is something of the nature of an atom-disrupting triad of beams and
that these set up the column as a veritable tornado, a whirling column
of roaring wind rushing skyward with tremendous velocity. The first
ships, I believe, were carried into the stratosphere and captured intact
by the enemy.
"Since the declaration of war the nature of the column has altered. The
three beams, instead of meeting at or near the surface of the earth, now
join high in the heavens and the column strikes downward instead of
expending its force upward. An added energy is used which produces the
terribly destructive force below. And now we are able to locate
fragments of the ships destroyed above, whereas previously there were no
traces."
* * * * *
"Sounds reasonable," commented George. "But why have they not landed and
waged their war right here without warning, if that is what they now
intend to do?"
"A natural question, George. But I have a hunch that the space flier or
fliers of the enemy are conserving fuel by remaining beyond gravity. You
know, in space flying, the greatest expenditures of energy are in
leaving or landing on a body and, once landed, they might not have
sufficient fuel for a getaway. They know we are not exactly helpless,
once they are in our midst, and are taking this means of reducing us to
the point of complete subjection before risking their precious selves
among us."
The telephone startled us by its insistent ring. It was a call from the
hangar for Hart. The news broadcast announcer was in the midst of a long
dissertation regarding the discovery only this morning that there were
certain apparent discrepancies in the movements of the tides and
unwonted perturbations of the moon's orbit. There flashed on the screen
a view of the great observatory at Mount Wilson, and Professor Laughlin
of that institution stepped into the foreground of the scene to take up
the discussion so mechanically repeated by the announcer.
"Must leave for the hangar at once," declared Hart, returning from the
telephone. "Simler and his staff are there and we are wanted
immediately."
"Oh, Jack!" Marie begged with her eyes.
"Got to be done, Honey," I responded, "and, believe me, I am going to do
what little I can to help. Suppose we surrendered!"
* * * * *