THE PLAGUE OF COLD
Without pause, and three steps at a time, Darrow ran down three flights of
stairs. Then, recovering from his initial excitement somewhat, he caught
the elevator and shot to the street. There he walked rapidly to the
subway, which he took as far as City Hall Square. On emerging from the
subway station he started across for the _Despatch_ office as fast as he
could walk. By the entrance to the City Hall, however, he came to an
abrupt halt. From the open doorway rushed his friend, Officer Burns, of
the City Hall Station. The policeman's face was chalky white; his eyes
were staring, his cap was over one side, he staggered uncertainly. As he
caught sight of Darrow he stumbled to the young man and clung to his neck,
muttering incoherently. People passing in and out looked at him curiously
and smiled.
"My God!" gasped Burns, his eyes roving. "I says to him, 'Mike, I don't
wonder you've got cold feet.' And there he was, and the mayor--Heaven
save--and his secretary! My God!"
Darrow shook his shoulder.
"Here," he said decisively, "what are you talking about? Get yourself
together! Remember you're an officer; don't lose your nerve this way!"
At the touch to his pride Burns did pull himself together somewhat, but
went on under evident strong excitement.
"I went in just now to the mayor's office a minute," said he, "and saw my
friend Mike Mallory, the doorkeeper, settin' in his chair, as usual. It
was cold-like, and I went up to him and says, 'Mike, no wonder you get
cold feet down here,' just by way of a joke; and when he didn't answer, I
went up to him, and he was dead, there in his chair!"
"Well, you've seen dead men before. There's no occasion to lose your
nerve, even if you did know him," said Darrow.
The brutality of the speech had its intended effect. Burns straightened.
"That's all very well," said he more collectively. "_But the man was
froze_!"
"Frozen!" muttered Darrow, and whistled.
"Yes, and what's more, his little dog, setting by the chair, was froze,
too; so when I stepped back sudden and hit against him, he tumbled over
_bang_, like a cast-iron dog! That got my goat! I ran!"
"Come with me," ordered Darrow decisively.
They entered the building and ran up the single flight of stairs to the
second-story room which the mayor of that term had fitted up as a sort of
private office of his own. A sharp chill hung in the hallways; this
increased as they neared the executive's office. Outside the door sat the
doorkeeper in his armchair. Beside him was a dog, in the attitude of an
animal seated on its haunches, but lying on its side, one fore leg
sticking straight out. Darrow touched the man and stooped over to peer in
his face. The attitude was most lifelike; the color was good. A deadly
chill ran from Darrow's finger tips up his arm.
He pushed open the door cautiously and looked in.
"All right, Burns," said he. "The atmosphere has become gaseous again. We
can go in." With which strange remark he entered the room, followed
closely, but uncertainly by the officer.
The private office possessed the atmosphere of a cold-storage vault. Four
men occupied it. At the desk was seated the mayor, leaning forward in an
attitude of attention, his triple chin on one clenched fist, his heavy
face scowling in concentration. Opposite him lounged two men, one leaning
against the table, the other against the wall. One had his hand raised in
argument, and his mouth open. The other was watching, an expression of
alertness on his sharp countenance. At a typewriter lolled the clerk, his
hand fumbling among some papers.
The group was exceedingly lifelike, more so, Darrow thought, than any wax
figures the Eden Musee had ever placed for the mystification of its
country visitors. Indeed, the only indication that the men had not merely
suspended action on the entrance of the visitors was a fine white rime
frost that sparkled across the burly countenance of the mayor. Darrow
remembered that, summer and winter, that dignitary had always perspired!
Burns stood by the door, rooted to the spot, his jaw dropped, his eye
staring. Darrow quite calmly walked to the desk. He picked up the inkstand
and gazed curiously at its solidified contents, touched the nearest man,
gazed curiously at the papers on the desk, and addressed Burns.
"These seem to be frozen, too," he remarked almost sleepily, "and about
time, too. This is a sweet gang to be getting together on this sort of a
job!"
Quite calmly he gathered the papers on the desk and stuffed them into his
pocket. He picked up the desk telephone, giving a number. "Ouch, this
receiver's cold," he remarked to Burns. "Hello, _Despatch_. Is Hallowell
in the office? Just in? Send him over right quick, keen jump, City Hall,
mayor's second-story office. No, right now. Tell him it's Darrow."
He hung up the receiver.
"Curious phenomenon," he remarked to Burns, who still stood rooted to the
spot. "You see, their bodies were naturally almost in equilibrium, and, as
they were frozen immediately, that equilibrium was maintained. And the
color. I suppose the blood was congealed in the smaller veins, and did
not, as in more gradual freezing, recede to the larger blood-vessels. I'm
getting frost bitten myself in here. Let's get outside."
But Officer Burns heard none of this. As Darrow moved toward the door he
crossed himself and bolted. Darrow heard his heels clattering on the
cement of the corridors. He smiled.
"And now the deluge!" he remarked.
The crowds, terrified, inquisitive, sceptical, and speculative, gathered.
Officials swept them out and took possession. Hallowell and Darrow
conferred earnestly together.
"He has the power to stop heat vibrations, you see," Darrow said. "That
makes him really dangerous. His activities here are in line with his other
warnings; but he is not ready to go to extremes yet. The city is yet
safe."
"Why?" asked Hallowell.
"I know it. But he has the power. If he gets dangerous we must stop him."
"You are sure you can do it?"
"Sure."
"Then, for God's sake, do it! Don't you realize what will happen when news
of this gets out, and people understand what it means? Don't you feel your
guilt at those men's deaths?" He struck his hand in the direction of the
City Hall.
"The people will buy a lot of experience, at cost of a little fright and
annoyance," replied Percy Darrow carelessly. "It'll do them good. When
it's over, they'll come back again and be good. As for that bunch in
there--when you look over those papers I think you'll be inclined to agree
with what the religious fanatics will say--that it was a visitation of
God."
"But the old, the sick--there'll be deaths among them--the responsibility
is something fearful--"
"Never knew a battle fought yet without some loss," observed Darrow.
Hallowell was staring at him.
"I don't understand you," said the reporter. "You have no heart. You are
as bad as this Monsieur X, and between you you hold a city in your
power--one way or the other!"
"Well, I rather like being a little god," remarked Darrow.
Hallowell started once more to plead, but Darrow cut him short.
"You are thinking of the present," he said. "I am thinking of the future.
It's a good thing for people to find out that there's something bigger
than they are, or than anything they can make. That fact is the basis of
the idea of a God. These are getting to be a godless people." He turned on
Hallowell, his sleepy eyes lighting up. "I should be very sorry if I had
not intellect enough and imagination enough to see what this may mean to
my fellow people; and I should despise myself if I should let an
unrestrained compassion lose to four million people the rare opportunity
vouchsafed them."
He spoke very solemnly. Hallowell looked at him puzzled.
"Besides," said Darrow whimsically, "I like to devil Eldridge."
He dove into the subway. Hallowell gazed after him.
"There goes either a great man or a crazy fool," he remarked to an English
sparrow. He turned over rapidly the papers Darrow had found on the mayor's
desk, and smiled grimly. "Of all the barefaced, bald-headed steals!" he
said.
Darrow soon mounted once more the elevator of the Atlas Building. He found
Jack and Helen still waiting. Before entering the wireless office Darrow
cast a scrutinizing glance along the empty hall.
"It's all right," he said. "I'm surer than ever. Everything fits exactly.
Now, Helen," he said, "I want you to go home, and I want you to stay
there. No matter what happens, do not move from the house. This town is
going to have the biggest scare thrown into it that any town ever had
since Sodom and Gomorrah got their little jolt. In the language of the
Western prophet, 'Hell will soon be popping.' Let her pop. Sit tight; tell
your friends to sit tight. If necessary, tell them Monsieur X is captured,
and all his works. Tell them I said so."
His air of languid indifference had fallen from him. His eye was bright,
and he spoke with authority and vigor.
"You take her home, Jack," he commanded, "and return here at once. Don't
forget that nice new-blued pop-gun of yours; we're coming to the time when
we may need it."
Jack rose instantly to his mood.
"Correct, General!" he saluted. "Where'd you collect the plunder?" he
asked, pointing to a square black bag of some size that Darrow had brought
back with him.
"That," said Darrow, "is the first fruit of my larcenous tendencies. I
stole that from the mayor's office in the City Hall."
"What is it?"
"That," said Darrow, "I do not know."
He deposited the bag carefully by his chair, and turned, smiling, to
Helen.
"Good-by," said he. "Sleep tight."
They went out. Darrow seated himself in his chair, drew his hat over his
eyes, and fell into a doze. In the meantime, outside, all through the
city, hell was getting ready to pop.