"Honor to Loto," cried the Big Business Man. "The youngest and greatest
scientist of all time!"
"There's a double meaning in that," laughed the Doctor, amid the
applause. "The greatest scientist of time! He is, indeed."
It was outwardly a gay little gathering, having dinner in a small
private room of the Scientific Club. But underneath the laughter there
was a note of tenseness, and two of the people--a man and a
woman--laughed infrequently with gayety that was forced.
The man was Rogers; the woman, Lylda, his wife, mother of Loto. She was
the only woman in the room. At first glance she would have seemed no
more than thirty-five, though in reality she was several years older--a
small, slender figure in a simple black evening dress that covered her
shoulders, but left her throat bare. Her beauty was of a curious type;
her face was oval, her features delicately molded and of pronounced
Grecian cast. Yet there seemed about her, also, an indefinable touch of
the Orient; her eyes, perhaps, which were slate gray, large and very
slightly upturned at the corners. Her complexion was fair; her hair
thick, wavy and coal-black.
That she was a woman of intellect, culture and refinement was obvious.
There was about her, too, a look of gentle sweetness, the air of a woman
who could be nothing less than charming. Her eyes, as she met those of
her men friends around her, were direct and honest. But when she
regarded Loto this evening, a yearning melancholy sprang into them, with
a mistiness as though the tears were restrained only by an effort.
The laughter about the table died out. A waiter was removing the last of
the dishes; the men were lighting their cigars.
"Well," said the Banker, breaking the silence, "now let us hear it. If
everyone is as curious as I am--"
"More," put in George. "I'm more curious."
"You're right," agreed Rogers. "We must get on."
"First," the Big Business Man interrupted, "I want to know more about
that screen behind which you saw that other time world of the future."
"I know very little myself," Rogers answered. "So little that Loto and I
could never duplicate it. But the theory is understandable. The space
where Central Park now is has a certain time factor allied to its other
properties. The light, the rays, from that screen, whatever may have
been their character, altered the time factor of that space.
"As Loto told you, the modern conception of the reality of things is
that the future exists--but with a different time dimension. We have a
familiar axiom, 'No two masses of matter can occupy the same space _at
the same time_.' That is just another way of saying it. To reason
logically from that, an infinite number of masses of matter can, and
do, occupy the same space _at different times_."
"I'd rather hear about this new experiment," the Banker said. "You made
the statement--"
"So would I," agreed George. "That girl--"
"You shall," said Rogers. His grave, troubled glance went to his wife's
face, but she smiled at him bravely. "You shall have all the facts as
briefly as I can give them to you.
"Loto became obsessed--I can hardly call it anything less--with the idea
that he could alter the time factor of human consciousness. In theory it
was perfectly possible--I had to admit that. And so I let him go ahead.
He has worked feverishly, with an energy I feared would injure his
health, for nearly two years. But, gentlemen, this is all that counts:
he has succeeded. I'm sure of that; we have already made a test. The
apparatus is ready upstairs now, and--"
"Let Loto tell it," grumbled the Banker. "Go on, boy, can't you tell us
how you did it?"
"Yes, sir. I can in principle." Loto hesitated, then added with a
mixture of sarcasm and deference: "I can explain it to you in a general
way, but the details are very technical."
He paused until the waiter had left the room; then he began speaking
slowly, evidently choosing his words with the utmost care.
"Matter, as we know it now, has four dimensions; the three so-called
planes of space, and one of time. But what is matter? The new science
tells us it is molecules, composed of atoms. And atoms? An atom is a
ring of electrons, which are particles of negative, disembodied
electricity, revolving at enormously high speeds around a central
nucleus. Am I clear?"
Loto's gaze rested on the Banker, who nodded somewhat dubiously.
"Then," Loto went on, "we have resolved all matter to one common entity,
that central nucleus of positive electricity which is sometimes called
the proton. All this is now generally known and accepted. But of what
substance, what character, is the proton? For years now, the theory has
been fairly accepted that the proton is merely a vortex, or whirlpool.
And the electron is conceived to be something very similar. Do you grasp
the significance of that? It robs matter of what I, personally, always
instinctively feel is its chief characteristic--substance. We delve into
matter, resolving its complexities to find one basic substance, and we
find not substance but a whirlpool--electrical, doubtless--in space!"
"That makes you rather gasp!" the Big Business Man exclaimed, gazing
about the table.
"It is quite correct," affirmed Rogers. "It transforms our conception of
substance to motion. Of what? Motion of something intangible--the ether,
let us say. Or space itself."
"I can't seem to get a mental grip on it," the Big Business Man
declared. "You--"
"Think of it this way," Rogers went on earnestly. "Motion can easily
change our impression of solidity. This is not an analogous case,
perhaps, but it will give you something to think about. Water is
normally a fluid. You can pass your hand through a stream of water from
a garden hose. But set that water in more rapid motion, and what
physical impression do you get? At Fully, Switzerland, water for a
turbine emerges from a nozzle at a speed of four hundred miles per hour.
What would happen if you tried to pass your hand through that? I have
seen a jet no more than three inches in diameter of such rapidly moving
water, and you cannot cut through it with the blow of a crowbar! There
you have a physical substance--an impression of solidity--derived from
motion."
"But what has all this to do with time?" the Banker objected, after a
moment of silence.
"Everything," said Loto quickly. "Since we are changing the
time-dimension of matter, without altering its space-dimensions, you
must have some conception of what matter really is. When once you
realize the real intangibility of even our own bodies, or this house we
are in, you will be able to understand us better."