To Babs and me the ride in the golden cage strapped to Polter's chest as
he made his escape outward into largeness was an experience awesome and
frightening almost beyond description. We heard the alarm in the palace
on the island. Polter rushed to Dr. Kent's laboratory door, looked in,
and in a moment banged it shut. Babs and I saw very little. We knew only
that something terrible had happened; we could see only a blur with
formless things in the void beneath our bars; and there were the
choking fumes of chemicals surging at us.
Polter rushed through the castle corridor. We heard rumbling distant
shouts.
"The drug is loose! The drug is loose! Monsters! Death for everyone!"
The room swayed with horrible dizzying lurches as Polter ran. We clung
to the lattice bars, our legs and arms entwined. There were moments when
Polter leaped, or suddenly stooped, and our reeling senses all but
faded.
"Babs! Don't let go! Don't lose consciousness!"
If she should be limp, here in this lurching room, her body to be flung
back and forth across its confines--that would be death in a moment. I
didn't think I could hold her, but I managed to get an arm about her
waist.
"Babs, are you all right?"
"I'm--all right, George. I can stand it. We're--he is enlarging."
"Yes."
I saw water far beneath us, lashed into a turmoil of foam with Polter's
wading steps. There was a brief swaying vista of a toy city; starlight
overhead; a lurching swaying miniature of landscape as Polter ran for
the towering cliffs. Then he climbed and scrambled into the
tunnel-mouth. Had he turned at that instant doubtless he would have seen
the rising distant figures of Glora, Alan and Dr. Kent. But evidently he
didn't see them. Nor did we.
Polter spoke only very occasionally to Babs. "Hold tightly!" It was a
rumbling voice from above us. He made no move to touch the cage, except
that a few times the great blur of his hand came up to adjust its angle.
The lurching and jolting was less violent in the tunnel. Polter's frenzy
to escape was subsiding into calmness. He traversed the tunnel with a
methodical stride. We were aware of him climbing over the noisome
litter of the dead giant's body which blocked the tunnel's further end.
We heard his astonished exclamations. But evidently he did not suspect
what had happened, thinking only that the stupid messenger had
miscalculated his growth and had been crushed.
We emerged into a less dim area. Polter did not stop at the fallen
giant. Nothing mattered now to him, quite evidently, save his own exit
with Babs from this atomic realm. His movements seemed calm, yet
hurried.
We realized now how different an outward journey was from the trip
coming in. This was all only an inch of golden quartz! The stages upward
were frequently only a matter of growth in size; the distances in this
vast desert realm of golden rock always were shrinking. Polter many
times stood almost motionless until the closing, dwindling walls made
him scramble upward into the greater space above.
It may have been an hour, or less. Babs and I, from our smaller
viewpoint, with the landscape so frequently blurred by distance and
Polter's movements, seldom recognized where we were. But I realized
going out was far easier in every way than coming in. Easier to
determine the route, since usually the diminishing caverns and gullies
made the upward step obvious.... We knew when Polter scrambled up the
incline ramp.
It seemed impossible for us to plan anything. Would Polter make the
entire trip without a stop? It seemed so. We had no drugs, and our cage
was barred beyond possibility of our getting out. But even if we had had
the drugs, or had our door been open, there was no escape. An abyss of
distance was always yawning beyond our lattice--the sheer precipice of
Polter's body from his chest to the ground.
"Babs, we must make him stop. It he sits down to rest you might get him
to take you out. I must reach his drugs."
"Yes. I'll try it, George."
Polter was momentarily standing motionless as though gazing around him,
judging what to do next. His size seemed stationary. Beyond our bars we
could see the distant circular walls as though this were some giant
crater-pit in which Polter was standing. Then I thought I recognized
it--the round, nearly vertical pit into which Alan had plunged his hand
and arm. Above us then was a gully, blind at one end. And above that,
the outer surface, the summit of the fragment of golden quartz.
"Babs, I know where we are! If he takes you out, keep his attention.
I'll try and get one of his black vials. Make him hold you near the
ground. If I see you there, in position where you can jump, I'll startle
him. Babs it's desperately dangerous but I can't think of anything else.
Jump. Get away from him. I'll keep his attention on me. Then I'll join
you if I can--with the drug."
Polter was moving. We had no time to say more.
"I'll try it, George." For just an instant she clung to me with her soft
arms about my neck. Our love was sweeping us in this desperate moment,
and it seemed that above us was a remote Earth world holding the promise
of all our dreams. Or were we cross-starred, doomed like the realm of
the atom? Was this swift embrace now marking the end of everything for
us?
Babs called, "Dr. Polter?"
We could feel his movements stopping.
"Yes? You are all right, Babs?"
She laughed--a ripple of silvery laughter--but there was tragic fear in
her eyes as she gazed at me. "Yes, Dr. Polter, but breathless. Almost
dead, but not quite. What happened? I want to come out and talk to you."
"Not now, little bird."
"But I want to." To me it was a miracle that she could call so lightly
and hold that note of lugubrious laughter in her voice. "I'm hungry.
Didn't you think of that? And frightened. Take me out."
He was sitting down! "You remind me that I am tired, Babs. And hungry,
also. I haf a little food. You shall come out for just a short time."
"Thank you. Take me carefully."
Our tilted cage was near the ground as he seated himself. But it was
still too far for me to jump.
I murmured, "Babs it's not close enough to the ground."
"Wait, George, I'll fix that. You hide! If he looks in he'll see you."
I scrambled back to my hiding place. Polter's huge fingers were fumbling
at our bars. The little door sprang open.
"Come, Babs."
He held the cupped bowl of his hand to the doorway. "Come out."
"No!" she called. "It is too far down!"
"Come. That iss foolish."
"No! I'm afraid. Put the cage on the ground."
"Babs!" His finger and thumb came reaching in to seize her, but she
avoided them.
"Dr. Polter! Don't! You'll crush me!"
"Then come out on my hand."
He seemed annoyed. I had scrambled back to the doorway; I knew he
couldn't see me so long as the cage remained strapped to his shirt
front.
I whispered, "I can make it, Babs!"
Polter was apparently on one elbow now, half turned to one side. From
our cage, the sloping gleaming white surface of his stiff glossy shirt
bosom went down a steep incline. His belt was down there, and the
outward bulging curve of his lap--a spreading surface where I could land
like a scuttling insect, unobserved, if only Babs could hold his
attention.
I whispered vehemently, "Try it! Go out! Leave me--keep talking to him!"
She called instantly, "All right, then. Bring your hand! Closer!
Carefully! It seems so high up here!"
She swung herself into his palm, and flung her arms about the great
pillar of his crooked finger. The bowl of his hand moved slowly away. I
heard her faint voice, and his overhead rumble.
I chanced it! I didn't know his exact position or which way he was
looking.
Again I heard Bab's voice. "Careful, Dr. Polter. Don't let me fall!"
"Yes, little bird."
I let myself down from the tilted doorway, hung by my hand and dropped.
I struck the ramp-like yielding surface of his shirt bosom. I slid,
tumbling, scrambling, and landed softly in the huge folds of his trouser
fabric. I was unhurt. The width of his belt, high as my body, was near
me. I shrank against it. I found I could cling to its upper edge.
My hold came just in time. He shifted and sat up. I was lifted with a
swoop of movement. When it steadied I saw above me the top of his knee.
His left leg was crooked, the foot drawn close to him. Babs was perched
up there on the knee summit. His right leg was outstretched. I was at
the right side of his belt. I could dart off along that curving expanse
of his leg and leap to the ground. If he would hold this position! One
of the pouches of his belt was near me. The vial in it was black. The
enlarging drug! I moved toward it.
But Babs was too high to jump from that summit of his crooked knee! I
think she saw me at his belt. I heard her voice.
"I cannot eat up here. It is too high. Oh, please be careful how you
move! I am so dizzy, so frightened! You move with such great jerks!"
He had what seemed a huge surface of bread and meat. He was breaking off
crumbs to put before her. I reached the pouch of his belt. The vial was
as long as my body. I tugged to try and lift it out.
All the giant contours of Polter's body shifted as he cautiously moved.
I clung. I saw that Babs was being held gently between his thumb and
forefinger. He lowered her to the ground, and she stood beside the bread
and the meat he had placed there.
And she had the courage to laugh! "Why this--this is an enormous
sandwich! You will have to break it."
He was leaning over her, half turned on his side. The vial came free. I
shoved it; but I could not control its weight. I pushed desperately. It
slid over the round brink of his right hip, and fell behind him. I heard
the tinkling thud of it down on the rocks.
There was no alarm. I could not chance leaping from his hip. I scurried
along the convex top of his outstretched leg, and beyond his knee I
jumped.
I landed safely. I could see the black vial back across the broken rock
surface, with the bulge of Polter's hip above it. I ran back and reached
the vial, tugged at its huge stopper. The cork began to yield under my
panting, desperate efforts. In a moment I would have a pellet of the
enlarging drug; make away with it and startle Polter so that Babs might
dart off and escape.
The huge stopper of the vial was larger than my head. It came suddenly
out. I flung it away, plunged in my hand, and seized an enormous round
pellet.
Then abruptly the alarm came, and I had not caused it! Polter ripped out
a startled, rumbling curse and sat upright. Under the curve of his leg
I saw Babs had been momentarily neglected. She was running.
Across the boulder-strewn plain, two tiny men had appeared. Polter had
seen them.
They were the enlarging figures of Dr. Kent and Alan!