I know is the higher we go the colder we get. Come on back to the shop
and warm up."
They turned at the sound of engines. Two of the five remaining P-38's
had detached themselves from their cover of the chutist and were flying
around the rim of Superior--as if unwilling to risk another flight
across the surface of the town that seemed determined to become a
satellite of Earth.
* * * * *
When Don Cort reached the campus he was shivering, in spite of the
sweater and topcoat Ed Clark had lent him. He asked a student where the
Administration Building was and at the desk inquired for Professor
Garet.
A gray-haired, dedicated-looking woman told him impatiently that
Professor Garet was in his laboratory and couldn't be disturbed. She
wouldn't tell him where the laboratory was.
"Have you seen Miss Jervis?" Don wondered whether the redhead
appreciated the demonstration her boss, the flying Senator, had put on
for her.
The woman behind the desk shook her head. "You're two of the people from
the train, aren't you? Well, you're all supposed to report to the dining
room at two o'clock."
"What for?"
"You'll find out at two o'clock."
It was obvious he would get no more information from her. Don left the
building. It was half-past one. He crossed the near-deserted campus. His
legs still felt heavy and he assumed Superior was still rising. It
certainly seemed to be getting increasingly colder.
He wondered how high they were and whether it would snow. He hoped not.
How high did you have to be before you got up where it didn't snow any
more? He had no idea. He did recall that Mount Everest was 29,000 feet
up and that it snowed up there. Or would it be _down_ there, relatively
speaking? How high could they be, and didn't anybody care?
The frosty old receptionist seemed to be typical in her
business-as-usual, come-what-may attitude. Even Ed Clark didn't seem as
concerned as he ought to be about Superior's ascent into the
stratosphere. Clark was interested, certainly, but he'd given Don the
impression that he was no more curious than he would be about any other
phenomenon he'd write about in next week's paper--a two-headed calf, for
instance.
Don remembered now that the conquerors of Everest had needed oxygen in
the rarefied atmosphere near the summit and he experimentally took a
couple of deep breaths. No difficulty. Therefore they weren't 29,000
feet up--yet. Small comfort, he thought, as he shivered again.
He picked out a building at random. Classes were in session behind the
closed but windowed doors along the hall. From the third door he saw
Alis Garet, sitting at the back of a small classroom. Her attention had
wandered from the instructor and when she saw Don she smiled and
beckoned. He hesitated, then opened the door and went in as quietly as
he could. The instructor paused briefly, nodded, then went back to a
droning lecture. It seemed to be an English literature class.
Alis cleared some books off a chair next to her and Don sat down. "Who
turned you loose?" she whispered.
He realized she was referring to his de-handcuffed wrist and grinned,
indicating that he'd tell her later.
"I see you've been outfitted for our new climate," she went on. A
student in the row of chairs ahead turned and frowned. The instructor
talked on, oblivious.
Don nodded and said "_Sh_."
"Don't let them intimidate you. Did you see the planes?"
More students were turning and glaring and Don's embarrassment grew.
"Come on," he said. "Let's cut this class."
"Bravo!" she said. "Spoken like a true Cavalier."
She gathered up her books. The instructor, without interrupting his
lecture, followed them with his eyes as they left the room.
"Now I'll never know whether the young princes got out of the tower
alive," she said.
"They didn't. The question is, will we?"
"I certainly hope so. I'll have to speak to Father about it."
"He's locked up in his lab, they tell me. Where would that be?"
"In the tower, as a matter of fact. The bell tower that the founding
fathers built and then didn't have enough money to buy bells for. But
you can't go up there--it's the holy of holies."
"Can you?"
"No. Why? You don't think Father is making all this happen, do you?"
"Somebody is. Professor Garet seems as good a suspect as any."
"Oh, he likes to act mysterious, but it's all an act. Poor old Father is
just a crackpot theorist. I told you that. He couldn't pick up steel
filing with a magnet."
"I wonder. Look, somebody's called a meeting for us outsiders from the
train at two o'clock. It's almost that now. Maybe I'll have a chance to
ask some questions. Will your father be there?"
"I'm sure he will. He's a great meeting-caller. I'll go with you. And,
since you have two free hands now, you can hold my books. Maybe later
you'll get a chance to hold me."
* * * * *
Among the people sitting around the bare tables in the dining room, Don
recognized the conductor and other trainmen, two stocky individuals who
had the look of traveling salesmen, an elderly couple who held hands, a
young couple with a baby, two nuns, a soldier apparently going on or
returning from furlough, and a tall, hawk-nosed man Don classified on no
evidence at all as a Shakespearean actor. All had been on the train. He
didn't see Geneva Jervis anywhere.
An improvised speaker's table had been set up at one end of the room,
near the door to the kitchen. A heavy-set man sat at the table talking
to Mrs. Garet, the professor's wife.
"The stoutish gentleman next to Mother is the president of Cavalier,"
Alis said. "Maynard Rubach. When you talk to him be sure to call him
_Doctor_ Rubach. He's not a Ph.D. and he's sensitive about it, but he
did used to be a veterinarian."
They sat down near the big table and Mrs. Garet smiled and waved at
them. Mayor Civek came in through the kitchen door, licking a finger as
if he'd been sampling something on the way, and sat down next to Mrs.
Garet.
At that moment Don's stomach gave a hop and he felt blood rushing to his
head. Others also had pained or nauseous expressions.
"Ugh," Alis said. "Now what?"
"I'd guess," Don said when his stomach had settled back in place, "that
we've stopped rising."
"You mean we've gone as high as we're going to go?"
"I hope so. We'd run out of air if we went much higher."
Professor Garet came in presently, looking pleased with himself. He
nodded to his wife and the men next to her and cleared his throat as he
looked out over the room.
"Altitude 21,500 feet," he announced without preamble. "Temperature
sixteen degrees Fahrenheit. From here on out--" he paused, repeated
"out" and chuckled--"it's going to be a bit chilly. Those of you who are
inadequately clothed will see my wife for extra garments. I believe you
have been comfortably housed and fed. There will, of course, be no
charge for these services while you are the guests of the Cavalier
Institute of Applied Sciences. Thank you. I now present Mr. Hector
Civek, the mayor of Superior, who will answer any other questions you
may have."
Don looked at Alis, who shrugged. The conductor stood and opened a
notebook which he consulted. "I have a few questions, Mr. Mayor. These
people have asked me to speak for them and there's one question that
outweighs all the others. That is--are you going to take us back to
Earth? If so, when? And how?"
Civek cleared his throat. He took a sip of water. "As for the first
question--we certainly hope to take you and ourselves back to Earth. I
can't answer the others."
"You hope to?"
"Earnestly. I turn blue easily myself, and I'm as anxious as you are to
get back. But when that will be depends entirely on circumstances.
Circumstances, uh, beyond my control."
"Who's controlling them, then? Your friend with the whiskers?"
Professor Garet smiled amiably and patted his beard. The portly Maynard
Rubach got up and Civek sat down.
"I am Dr. Maynard Rubach, president of Cavalier. I must insist that in
common decency we all refrain from personal references. Mr. Civek has
done his best to give you an explanation, but of course he is a layman
and, while he has many excellent qualities, we cannot expect him to be
conversant with the principles of science. I will therefore attempt to
explain.
"As you know, science has been aware for hundreds of years that the
Earth is a giant magnet...."
Don saw Geneva Jervis. She was at the kitchen door beyond the speaker's
table.
"... the isogenic and the isoclinic ..."
The red-haired Miss Jervis saw Don now and put her finger to her lips.
"... an ultimote, which is simultaneously an integral part of ..."
Now the redhead was beckoning to him urgently. He excused himself to
Alis, who frowned when she saw the other girl; then he went back of the
speaker's table ("... 1,257 tenescopes to the square centimeter ...")
into the kitchen. Jen Jervis was by now at the far end of it, motioning
him to hurry up.
"I've found something," she said. She was wearing a shapeless fur coat,
apparently borrowed.
"Come on. You'll have to see it."
"All right, but why me?"
"Aside from myself you seem to be the only one from the train with any
gumption. I know you've been spying around doing things while everybody
else sat back and waited for deliverance. Though I can't say I admire
your choice of companions. That tawdry blonde--"
"Now, really, Miss Jervis!"
"Tawny, then; sometimes I mix up my words."
"I'll bet."
She led him out the back door and across the frozen ground past several
buildings. They reached what once must have been an athletic field.
"At the far end," she said. "Come on."
"Where were you when your boy friend and his daredevil aces came over?"
"I saw them."
"Did they see you?"
"None of your business."
He shrugged. They were at a section of the grandstand at the end of the
field. Jen Jervis indicated a door and Don opened it. It led to a big
room under the stands. "What does this remind you of?" she asked.
Don looked blank. In the dim light he could see some planking, a
long-deflated football, ancient peanut shells and an empty pint bottle.
"I don't know. What?"
"Stagg Field? At the University of Chicago? Under the stands where they
first made an atomic pile work?" She looked at him with the air of an
investigator hot on the scent.
He shrugged. "Never been there. So what?"
"It's a pattern. This is where they've hidden their secret."
"It looks more like the place a co-ed and her boy friend might go to
have a little fun. In warmer weather, of course."
"Oh!" she said. "You're disgusting! Look over there."
He looked, wondering what made this young attractive woman
hypersensitive on the subject of sex. This was the second time she'd
blazed up over nothing. What he saw where she pointed was a door at a
45-degree angle to the ground, set into a triangular block of concrete.
"Where does that go?" he asked.
"Down," she said as they walked toward it. "And there's some machinery
or something down there. I heard it. Or maybe I only felt the
vibrations. It throbs, anyway."
"Probably the generator for the school's lighting system. Did you go
down and look?"
"No."
"All right, then." He opened the door. "Down we go."
At the bottom of a flight of steps there was a corridor lit by dim
electric light bulbs along one wall. The corridor became a tunnel,
sloping gradually downward. They had been going north, Don judged, but
then the tunnel made a right turn and now they were following it due
east. "I don't hear any throbbing," he said.
"Well, I did, and from way up here. They must have turned it off."
"How long ago was that?"
"An hour, maybe."
"While we were still rising. That would make sense. We've stopped again,
you know. Professor Garet gave us a bulletin on it."
He had been going ahead of her in the narrow tunnel. Now it widened and
they were able to walk side by side. There seemed to be no end to it.
But then they came to a sturdy-looking door, padlocked.
"That's that," Don said.
"That's that nothing," she said. "Break it down."
He laughed. "You flatter me. Come on back."
"Don't you think this is at all peculiar? A tunnel starting under an
abandoned grandstand, running all this way and ending in a locked door?"
"Maybe this was a station on the underground railway. It looks old
enough."
"We're going through that door." She opened her purse and took out a key
ring. On it was an extensive collection of keys. Eventually she found
one that opened the padlock.
"Well!" he said. "Who taught you _that_?"
"Open the door."
The corridor beyond the door was lined--walls, ceiling and floor--with a
silvery metal. It continued east a hundred yards or so, swung north and
then went east again, widening all the time.
It ended in a great room whose far wall was glass or some equally
transparent substance. The room was a huge observatory at the end of
Superior but below its rim. They could look down from it, not without a
touch of nausea, to the Earth four miles below.
Don, thinking of the surface of Superior above, thought it was as if
they were looking out of the gondola slung beneath a dirigible.
Or from one of the lower portholes in a giant flying saucer.
V
There were clouds below that occasionally hid the Earth from sight. For
a minute or more they gazed in silence at the magnificent view.
"This wasn't built in a day," Jen Jervis said at last.
"I should say not," Don agreed. "Millions of years."
She looked at him sharply. "I wasn't talking about the age of the Earth.
I mean this room--this lookout post--whatever it is."
He grinned at her. "I agree with you there, too. I'm really a very
agreeable fellow, Miss Jervis. Obviously, whoever built it knew well in
advance that Superior was going to take off. They also knew how much of
it was going up and exactly where this would have to be built so it
would be at the edge."
"Under the edge, you mean, with a downward view."
"That's right. From a distance I'd say Superior looked as if someone had
cut the end off an orange. The flat part--where the cut was made--is the
surface and we're looking out from a piece of the convex skin."
"You put things so simply, Mr. Cort, that even a child could
understand," she said acidly.
"Thank you," he said complacently. He had remembered that whoever was
listening in for Military Intelligence through the tiny radio under his
shirt could have only a vague idea of what was going on. Any little word
pictures he could supply, therefore, would help them understand. He had
to risk the fact that his companion might think him a bit of an idiot.
Of course with this Geneva Jervis it was easy to lay himself open to the
scathing comment and the barbed retort. He imagined she was extremely
useful in her role as Girl Friday to Senator Bobby Thebold.
"I don't think this is the work of those boobies at the booby hatch,"
she was saying.
"I beg your pardon?"
"The Cavalier Institution of Applied Foolishness, whatever they call it.
They just wouldn't be capable of an undertaking of this scope."
"Oh, I agree. That's why I let you drag me away from the meeting. It was
a lot of pseudo-scientific malarkey. Old Doc Rubach, D.V.M., was going
on about the ultimote being connected to the thighbone, way up in the
middle of the air. Tell me, who do _you_ think is behind it all?"
She was walking around the big-sided room as if taking mental inventory.
There wasn't much to catalogue--six straight chairs, heavy and
modern-looking, with a large wooden table, a framed piece of dark glass
that might be a television set, and a gray steel box about the size and
shape of a three-drawer filing cabinet. This last was near the big
window-wall and had three black buttons on its otherwise smooth top. Don
itched to push the buttons to see what would happen. Jen Jervis seemed
to have the same urge. She drummed on the box with her long fingernails.
"I?" she said. "Behind it all?"
"Yes. What's your theory? Is this something for the Un-Earthly
Activities Committee to investigate?"
"Don't be impertinent. If the Senator thinks it's his duty to look into
it, he will. He undoubtedly is already. In the meantime, I can do no
less than gather whatever information I can while I'm on the scene."
"Very patriotic. What do you conclude from your information-gathering so
far?"
"Obviously there's some kind of conspiracy--" she began, then stopped as
if she suspected a trap.
"--afoot," Don said with a grin. "As I see it, all you do is have Bobby
the Bold subpoena everybody up here--every last man-jack of 'em--to
testify before his committee. They wouldn't dare refuse."
"I don't find you a bit amusing, Mr. Cort, though I have no doubt this
sophomoric humor makes a big hit with your teen-age blonde. We'd better
get back. I can see it was a mistake to expect any co-operation from
you."
"As you like, Madame Investigator." Don gave her a mock bow, then turned
for a last look down at the vast segment of Earth below.
Geneva Jervis screamed.
He whirled to see her standing, big-eyed and open-mouthed, in front of
the framed dark glass he had taken for a television screen. Her face was
contorted in horror, and as Don's gaze flicked to the screen he had the
barest glimpse of a pair of eyes fading with a dissolving image. Then
the screen was blank and Don wasn't sure whether there had been a face
to go with the eyes--an inhuman, un-earthly face--or whether his
imagination had supplied it.
The girl slumped to the floor in a faint.
* * * * *
_COLUMBUS, OHIO, Nov. 1 (AP)--Sen. Robert (Bobby) Thebold landed here
today after leading his Private Pilots (PP) squadron of P-38's on a
reconnaissance flight which resulted in the loss of one of the six World
War II fighters in a crash landing on the mysteriously airborne town of
Superior, Ohio. The pilot of the crashed plane parachuted safely to
Earth._
_Sen. Thebold told reporters grimly:_
_"There is no doubt in my mind that mysterious forces are at work when a
town of 3,000 population can rise in a body off the face of the Earth.
My reconnaissance has shown conclusively that the town is intact and its
inhabitants alive. On one of my passes I saw my secretary, Miss Geneva
Jervis."_
_Sen. Thebold said he was confident Miss Jervis would contact him the
moment she had anything to report, indicating she would make an
on-the-spot investigation._
_The Senator said in reply to a question that he was "amazed" at
official Washington's "complete inaction" in the matter, and declared he
would demand a probe by the Senate Investigations Subcommittee, of which
he is a member. He indicated witnesses might include officials of the
Defense Department, the Central Intelligence Agency, and "possibly
others."_
* * * * *
_LADENBURG, Ohio, Nov. 1 (UPI)--Little Ladenburg, former neighbor of
"The City in the Sky," complained today of a rain of empty beer cans and
other rubbish, apparently being tossed over the edge by residents of
airborne Superior._
_"They're not so high and mighty," one sanitation official here said,
"that they can make Ladenburg their garbage dump."_
* * * * *
_WASHINGTON, Nov. 1 (Reuters)--American officials today were at a loss
to explain the strange behaviour of Superior, Ohio, "the town that took
off."_
_Authoritative sources assured Reuters that no military or scientific
experiments were in progress which could account for the phenomenon of a
town being lifted intact thousands of feet into the air._
_Rumors circulating to the effect that a "Communist plot" was at work
were greeted with extreme scepticism in official quarters._
* * * * *
BULLETIN
_COLUMBUS, Ohio, Nov. 1 (UPI)--The airborne town of Superior began to
drift east across Ohio late today._
VI
The unconscious Geneva Jervis, lying crumpled up in the oversized fur
coat, was the immediate problem. Don Cort straightened her out so she
lay on her back, took off her shoes and propped her ankles on the lower
rung of a chair. He found she was wearing a belt and loosened it. It was
obvious that she was also wearing a girdle but there wasn't anything he
wanted to do about that. He was rubbing one of her wrists when her eyes
fluttered open.
She smiled self-consciously. "I guess I was a sissy."
"Not at all. I saw it, too. A pair of eyes."
"And a face! A horrible, horrible face."
"I wasn't sure about the face. Can you describe it?"
She darted a tentative look at the screen but it was comfortingly blank.
"It wasn't human. And it was staring right into me. It was awful!"
"Did it have a nose, ears, mouth?"
"I--I can't be sure. Let's get out of here. I'm all right now. Thanks
for being so good to me--Don."
"Don't mention it--Jen. Here, put your shoes on."
When he had closed the big wooden door behind them, Don padlocked it
again. He preferred to leave things as they'd found them, even though
their visit to the observation room was no longer a secret.
He was relieved when they had scrambled up the steps under the
grandstand. There had been no sense of anyone or anything following them
or spying on them during their long walk through the tunnel.
They were silent with their separate thoughts as they crossed the frosty
ground and Jen held Don's arm, more for companionship than support. At
the campus the girl excused herself, saying she still felt shaky and
wanted to rest in her room. Don went back to the dining room.
The meeting was over but Alis Garet was there, having a cup of tea and
reading a book.
"Well, sir," she said, giving him an intent look, "how was the
rendezvous?"
"Fair to middling." He was relieved to see that she wasn't angry. "Did
anybody say anything while I was gone?"
"Not a coherent word. You don't deserve it but I made notes for you.
Running off with that redhead when you have a perfectly adequate blonde.
Did you kiss her?"
"Of course not. It was strictly business. Let me see the notes, you
angel."
"Notes, then." She handed over a wad of paper.
"Rubach," he read, "Magnology stuff stuff stuff etc. etc. Nothing.
"Q. (Conductor Jas Brown) Wht abt Mayor's proclamation Superior seceded
frm Earth?
"A. (Civek) Repeated stuff abt discrimination agnst Spr & Cavlr & bubl
gum prices.
"Q. Wht u xpct gain?
"A. Stuff abt end discrimination.
"Q. Sovereignty?
"A. How's that?
"Q. R u trying set up Spr as separate city-state w/govt independent of U
S or Earth? ('That Conductor Brown is sharper than I gave him credit
for,' Alis elaborated.)
"A. Hem & haw. Well now.
"Q. Well, r u?
"A. (Father, rescuing Civek) Q of sovereignty must remain temporarily
up in the air. Laughter (Father's). When & if Spr returns wil acpt
state-fed laws as b4 but meantime circs warrant adapt to prevailing
conditions.
"Rest of mtg was abt sleeping arngmnts, meals, recreation privileges,
clothing etc."
Don folded the notes and put them in his pocket. "Thanks. I see I didn't
miss much. The only thing it seems to add is that Mayor Civek is a
figurehead, and that if the Cavalier people know anything they're not
talking, except in gobbledygook."
"Check," Alis said. "Now let's go take a look at Pittsburgh."
"Pittsburgh?"
"That's where we are now. One of the students who lives there peeped
over the edge a while ago. I was waiting for you to come back before I
went to have a look."
"Pittsburgh?" Don repeated. "You mean Superior's drifting across the
United States?"
"Either that or it's being pushed. Let's go see."
* * * * *
There hadn't been much to see and it had been too cold to watch for
long. The lights of Pittsburgh were beginning to go on in the dusk and
the city looked pretty and far away. A Pennsylvania Air National Guard
plane came up to investigate, but from a respectful distance. Then it
flew off.
Don left Alis, shivering, at her door and decided he wanted a drink. He
remembered having seen a sign, _Club Lyric_, down the street from the
_Sentry_ office and he headed for it.
"Sergeant Cort," said a muffled voice under his collar.
Don jumped. He'd forgotten for the moment that he was a walking radio
station. "Yes?" he said.
"Reception has been excellent," the voice said. It was no longer that of
Captain Simmons. "You needn't recapitulate. We've heard all your
conversations and feel we know as much as you do. You'll have to admit
it isn't much."
"I'm afraid not. What do you want me to do now? Should I go back and
investigate that underground room again? That seems to be the best lead
so far."