_by ANTONY CORVAIS_
They were seated in his parked, car, miles from the city, when Robert
told Ellen; "I'll always love you, darling, forever and ever. I just
can't help myself, and I don't want to."
The girl nestled closer without reply.
"And if something should happen to one of us, the other would
wait--because love like ours will never know death--it must go on--for
eternity," he continued. "I know that I'll love you even when I'm dead,
and if there are such things as spirits, I'll come back to you--somehow.
Or would it frighten you?"
Ellen pouted: "Don't be so funereal! It makes me feel strangely inside.
Of course nothing can separate us. It's a beautiful nite and we're
wasting it on--oh, dear!" Her eyes had glanced at the small clock on the
paneling. "It's late, Robert. You must hurry me home now or mother will
be furious!"
Sighing, Robert started the car. As they roared toward town over the
twisting roadway, suddenly the car swerved.
"Lookout, Bob! A man!" It was Ellen's high voice screaming.
The car skidded sickeningly on loose gravel, crashed thunderously
through the railing bordering the highway, and richocheted, turning over
and over, halting as wreckage. Robert was crushed under the metal bulk,
losing consciousness.
Thrown clear, Ellen scrambled to the man, bent over him. Something more
than pain filmed his eyes; he heard himself muttering: "I'll come
back?--you wait--" in a failing whisper as illimitable darkness swept
over him, accompanied by dreadful nausea. A point of light appeared in
the void, expanding into a dazzling rectangle which split into thousands
of lesser planes; these shaped a geometric pattern which whirled
dizzily, humming, the drone rising in pitch with every sickening
revolution, becoming incessant mechanical scream----
"And this is death. This is past human endurance." With sudden
omniscience he knew that he WAS dead and the meaning of the spinning
pattern. The knowledge ebbed and carried with it all of his memories
except for Ellen's face and her name.
The wheeling design parted like a curtain, and Robert observed beyond it
a branching path spreading before him like a flattened tree. At the end
of every fork was Ellen's face, wavering and blurred. He fixed his
attention upon the nearest furcation, aspiring toward it desperately,
and sensed himself hovering in space.
Shock, as of lightning coursing his veins, knotted him with agony.
Involuntarily his eyes squeezed shut. Icy air tortured his lungs. As he
raised his voice in weak protest, the pain ceased and he relaxed, spent.
His eyes continued shut, as though the lids were gummed down. Failing in
many attempts to open them, he quested food, found it, and consoled
himself with it.
Occasionally plaintive voices babbled unintelligibly, arousing him.
Always, if he listened, he heard a gentle murmur reply to the voices.
And then everything was quiet. He felt very sleepy. Finally he dropped
off into slumber, deep and restful.
Between periods of sleep, Robert struggled with his heavy eyelids.
Memories might have associated his sightlessness with blindness--but he
had none. There were only Ellen's face and her name which, when
expecially desperate, he called again and again.
Gradually his vision became clear, and he stared in awe at a world of
immensity which was peopled with Titans. The picture of Ellen in this
gigantic place troubled him, for the colossal beings looked upon him as
an animated toy. Often he was elevated to their reeking mouths, kissed,
and dropped aside; if he were insistent upon attention, inquiring for
Ellen, the giants beat him and thrust him from their presence.
Inert bare-surfaced looming things inclosed him, from some of which,
when he approached them, he was kicked away. Incredibly huge portals
barred egress to an outer world, from which seeped strange sharp odors.
By calling his one word to the world beyond the doors, Robert endeavored
to explain to the Titans that Ellen might possibly be outside. But they
hushed him with amusement, sometimes with abuse.
There had been others prisoned here like himself while he had not seen,
but they had vanished now, but this bothered him not in the least--his
thoughts were of Ellen, and finally the giants lifted him and put him
into a windowless room and clamped a fretted ceiling over it. The
chamber rocked gently; he realized that it was being moved from one
place to another. Leaping frantically he touched the ceiling's lattice,
clung to it, struggling to force himself through its interstices.
Unsuccessful, tiring, he fell back, crouched in a corner, weeping.
Motion of transit ended--the confining ceiling vanished. Robert
scrambled over a wall, dropped to the ground of the outer world, whose
heavy conflicting odors, dazzling lights and moving shadows alarmed him.
Dim with distance was the withdrawing form of a giant, which he pursued,
crying out his one word, "ELLEN!"
The giant vanished among weird wavering plants. Alone, Robert skulked
nervously through tall rustling things, was terrified at times by an
unexpected sound or motion. But the swaying things appeared unaware of
him and he became self-confidant. Discovering a stretch of damp earth
gemmed with puddles, he drank. His head cocked at a sound reminiscent of
Ellen: her soothing voice.
A giantess had appeared over him. She was--ELLEN! At sight of her,
Robert's pent memories burst free, overwhelming his consciousness with
turbulent pageantry. He thrust up his arms; gently indulgent, the girl
bent and drew him to her breast. She cuddled him, cooing to him. At the
moment her monstrous size did not concern him.
"I've found you! I've found you!" he cried. "Oh, Ellen, if only you knew
how lonely it has been--" He opened his glad heart to her in a
stammering urgency, bliss in his eyes, tears in his voice. Breathless,
he raised his face to the girl's; she hesitated. Then she kissed him and
set him down at her feet. She strode away. Crying with hurt amazement,
he followed. She shook her head. She kept walking swiftly. He could not
keep up with her and he stopped forlornly as she disappeared behind an
obstruction. He stared after her with unbelieving eyes. Tho mysteriously
stunted, he had returned to her from death, and she had not accepted
him. He stepped close to one of her prodigious footprints in the mud and
surveyed it grimly. His eyes sought an impression of his own foot. And
suddenly he cried in mingled grief and horror--for there in the mud was
his footprint--small--strange--the footprint of a half-grown cat!