THE FIRST DROPS OF THE DELUGE
The utterance of the Carnegie Institution indeed fell flat, and Cosmo
Versál's star reigned in the ascendent. He pushed his preparations with
amazing speed, and not only politics, but even the war that had just
broken out in South America was swallowed up in the newspapers by
endless descriptions of the mysterious proceedings at Mineola. Cosmo
still found time every day to write articles and to give out interviews;
and Joseph Smith was kept constantly on the jump, running for
street-cars or trains, or leaping, with his long coat flapping, into and
out of elevators on ceaseless missions to the papers, the scientific
societies, and the meetings of learned or unlearned bodies which had
been persuaded to investigate the subject of the coming flood. Between
the work of preparation and that of proselytism it is difficult to see
how Cosmo found time to sleep.
Day by day the Ark of Safety rose higher upon its great platform, its
huge metallic ribs and broad, bulging sides glinting strangely in the
unbroken sunshine--for, as if imitating the ominous quiet before an
earthquake, the July sky had stripped itself of all clouds. No
thunder-storms broke the serenity of the long days, and never had the
overarching heavens seemed so spotless and motionless in their cerulean
depths.
All over the world, as the news dispatches showed, the same strange calm
prevailed. Cosmo did not fail to call attention to this unparalleled
repose of nature as a sure prognostic of the awful event in preparation.
The heat became tremendous. Hundreds were stricken down in the blazing
streets. Multitudes fled to the seashore, and lay panting under
umbrellas on the burning sands, or vainly sought relief by plunging into
the heated water, which, rolling lazily in with the tide, felt as if it
had come from over a boiler.
Still, perspiring crowds constantly watched the workmen, who struggled
with the overpowering heat, although Cosmo had erected canvas screens
for them and installed a hundred immense electric fans to create a
breeze.
Beginning with five hundred men, he had, in less than a month, increased
his force to nearer five thousand, many of whom, not engaged in the
actual construction, were preparing the materials and bringing them
together. The ark was being made of pure levium, the wonderful new metal
which, although already employed in the construction of aeroplanes and
the framework of dirigible balloons, had not before been used for
shipbuilding, except in the case of a few small boats, and these used
only in the navy.
For mere raw material Cosmo must have expended an enormous sum, and his
expenses were quadrupled by the fact that he was compelled, in order to
save time, practically to lease several of the largest steel plants in
the country. Fortunately levium was easily rolled into plates, and the
supply was sufficient, owing to the discovery two years before of an
expeditious process of producing the metal from its ores.
The wireless telegraph and telephone offices were besieged by
correspondents eager to send inland, and all over Europe and Asia, the
latest particulars of the construction of the great ark. Nobody followed
Cosmo's advice or example, but everybody was intensely interested and
puzzled.
At last the government officials found themselves forced to take
cognizance of the affair. They could no longer ignore it after they
discovered that it was seriously interfering with the conduct of public
business. Cosmo Versál's pressing orders, accompanied by cash, displaced
or delayed orders of the government commanding materials for the navy
and the air fleet. In consequence, about the middle of July he received
a summons to visit the President of the United States. Cosmo hurried to
Washington on the given date, and presented his card at the White House.
He was shown immediately into the President's reception-room, where he
found the entire Cabinet in presence. As he entered he was the focus of
a formidable battery of curious and not too friendly eyes.
President Samson was a large, heavy man, more than six feet tall. Every
member of his Cabinet was above the average in avoirdupois, and the
heavyweight president of the Carnegie Institution, Professor Pludder,
who had been specially invited, added by his presence to the air of
ponderosity that characterized the assemblage. All seemed magnified by
the thin white garments which they wore on account of the oppressive
heat. Many of them had come in haste from various summer resorts, and
were plainly annoyed by the necessity of attending at the President's
command.
Cosmo Versál was the only cool man there, and his diminutive form
presented a striking contrast to the others. But he looked as if he
carried more brains than all of them put together.
He was not in the least overawed by the hostile glances of the
statesmen. On the contrary, his lips perceptibly curled, in a
half-disdainful smile, as he took the big hand which the President
extended to him. As soon as Cosmo Versál had sunk into the embrace of a
large easy chair, the President opened the subject.
"I have directed you to come," he said in a majestic tone, "in order the
sooner to dispel the effects of your unjustifiable predictions and
extraordinary proceedings on the public mind--and, I may add, on public
affairs. Are you aware that you have interfered with the measures of
this government for the defense of the country? You have stepped in
front of the government, and delayed the beginning of four battleships
which Congress has authorized in urgent haste on account of the
threatening aspect of affairs in the East? I need hardly say to you that
we shall, if necessary, find means to set aside the private agreements
under which you are proceeding, as inimical to public interests, but you
have already struck a serious blow at the security of your country."
The President pronounced the last sentence with oratorical unction, and
Cosmo was conscious of an approving movement of big official shoulders
around him. The disdain deepened on his lips.
After a moment's pause the President continued:
"Before proceeding to extremities I have wished to see you personally,
in order, in the first place, to assure myself that you are mentally
responsible, and then to appeal to your patriotism, which should lead
you to withdraw at once an obstruction so dangerous to the nation. Do
you know the position in which you have placed yourself?"
Cosmo Versál got upon his feet and advanced to the center of the room
like a little David. Every eye was fixed upon him. His voice was steady,
but intense with suppressed nervousness.
"Mr. President," he said, "you have accused me of obstructing the
measures of the government for the defense of the country. Sir, I am
trying to save the whole human race from a danger in comparison with
which that of war is infinitesimal--a danger which is rushing down upon
us with appalling speed, and which will strike every land on the globe
simultaneously. Within seven months not a warship or any other existing
vessel will remain afloat."
The listeners smiled, and nodded significantly to one another, but the
speaker only grew more earnest.
"You think I am insane," he said, "but the truth is you are hoodwinked
by official stupidity. That man," pointing at Professor Pludder, "who
knows me well, and who has had all my proofs laid before him, is either
too thick-headed to understand a demonstration or too pig-headed to
confess his own error."
"Come, come," interrupted the President sternly, while Professor Pludder
flushed very red, "this will not do! Indulge in no personalities here. I
have, strained a point in offering to listen to you at all, and I have
invited the head of the greatest of our scientific societies to be
present, with the hope that here before us all he might convince you of
your folly, and thus bring the whole unfortunate affair promptly to an
end."
"_He_ convince _me_ !" cried Cosmo Versál disdainfully. "He is
incapable of understanding the A, B, C of my work. But let me tell you
this, Mr. President--there are men in his own council who are not so
blind. I know what occurred at the recent meeting of that council, and I
know that the ridiculous announcement put forth in its name to deceive
the public was whipped into shape by him, and does not express the real
opinion of many of the members."
Professor Pludder's face grew redder than ever.
"Name one!" he thundered.
"Ah," said Cosmo sneeringly, "that hits hard, doesn't it? You want me to
name _one_; well, I'll name _three_. What did Professor
Alexander Jones and Professor Abel Able say about the existence of
watery nebula, and what was the opinion expressed by Professor Jeremiah
Moses about the actual approach of one out of the northern sky, and what
it could do if it hit the earth? What was the unanimous opinion of the
entire council about the correctness of my mathematical work? And what,"
he continued, approaching Professor Pludder and shaking his finger up at
him--"_what have you done with those three dispatches from Iceland,
the North Cape, and Kamchatka, which absolutely confirmed my
announcement that the nebula was already visible?_"
Professor Pludder began stammeringly:
"Some spy--"
"Ah," cried Cosmo, catching him up, "_a spy_, hey? Then, you admit
it! Mr. President, I beg you to notice that he admits it. Sir, this is a
conspiracy to conceal the truth. Great Heaven, the world is on the point
of being drowned, and yet the pride of officialism is so strong in this
plodder--Pludder--and others of his ilk that they'd sooner take the
chance of letting the human race be destroyed than recognize the truth!"
Cosmo Versál spoke with such tremendous concentration of mental energy,
and with such evident sincerity of conviction, and he had so plainly put
Professor Pludder to rout, that the President, no less than the other
listening statesmen, was thrown into a quandary.
There was a creaking of heavily burdened chairs, a ponderous stir all
round the circle, while a look of perplexity became visible on every
face. Professor Pludder's conduct helped to produce the change of moral
atmosphere. He had been so completely surprised by Cosmo's accusation,
based on facts which he had supposed were known only to himself and the
council, that he was unable for a minute to speak at all, and before he
could align his faculties his triumphant little opponent renewed the
attack.
"Mr. President," he said, laying his hand on the arm of Mr. Samson's big
chair, which was nearly on a level with his breast, and speaking with
persuasive earnestness, "you are the executive head of a mighty
nation--the nation that sets the pace for the world. It is in your power
to do a vast, an incalculable, service to humanity. One official word
from you would save millions upon millions of lives. I implore you,
instead of interfering with my work, to give instant order for the
construction of as many arks, based upon the plans I have perfected, as
the navy yard can possibly turn out. Issue a proclamation to the people,
warning them that this is their only chance of escape."
By a curious operation of the human mind, this speech cost Cosmo nearly
all the advantage that he had previously gained. His ominous suggestion
of a great nebula rushing out of the heavens to overwhelm the earth had
immensely impressed the imagination of his hearers, and his
uncontradicted accusation that Professor Pludder was concealing the
facts had almost convinced them that he was right. But when he mentioned
"arks," the strain was relieved, and a smile broke out on the broad face
of the President. He shook his head, and was about to speak, when Cosmo,
perceiving that he had lost ground, changed his tactics.
"Still you are incredulous!" he exclaimed. "But the proof is before you!
Look at the blazing heavens! The annals of meteorology do not record
another such summer as this. The vanguard of the fatal nebula is already
upon us. The signs of disaster are in the sky. But, note what I
say--this is only the _first_ sign. There is another following on
its heels which may be here at any moment. To heat will succeed cold,
and as we rush through the tenuous outer spirals the earth will
alternately be whipped with tempests of snow and sleet, and scorched by
fierce outbursts of solar fire. For three weeks the atmosphere has been
heated by the inrush of invisible vapor--but look out, I warn you, for
the change that is impending!"
These extraordinary words, pronounced with the wild air of a prophet,
completed the growing conviction of the listeners that they really had a
madman to deal with, and Professor Pludder, having recovered his
self--command, rose to his feet.
"Mr. President," he began, "the evidence which we have just seen of an
unbalanced mind--"
He got no further. A pall of darkness suddenly dropped upon the room. An
inky curtain seemed to have fallen from the sky. At the same time the
windows were shaken by tremendous blasts of wind, and, as the electric
lights were hastily turned on, huge snowflakes, intermingled with
rattling hailstones, were seen careering outside. In a few seconds
several large panes of glass were broken, and the chilling wind,
sweeping round the apartment, made the teeth of the thinly clad
statesmen chatter, while the noise of the storm became deafening. The
sky lightened, but at the same moment dreadful thunderpeals shook the
building. Two or three trees in the White House grounds were struck by
the bolts, and their broken branches were driven through the air and
carried high above the ground by the whirling winds, and one of them was
thrown against the building with such force that for a moment it seemed
as if the wall had been shattered.
After the first stunning effect of this outbreak of the elements had
passed, everybody rushed to the windows to look out--everybody except
Cosmo Versál, who remained standing in the center of the room.
"I told you!" he said; but nobody listened to him. What they saw outside
absorbed every faculty. The noise was so stunning that they could not
have heard him.
We have said that the air lightened after the passage of the first pall
of darkness, but it was not the reappearance of the sun that caused the
brightening. It was an awful light, which seemed to be born out of the
air itself. It had a menacing, coppery hue, continually changing in
character. The whole upper atmosphere was choked with dense clouds,
which swirled and tumbled, and twisted themselves into great vortical
rolls, spinning like gigantic millshafts. Once, one of these vortexes
shot downward, with projectile speed, rapidly assuming the terrible form
of the trombe of a tornado, and where it struck the ground it tore
everything to pieces--trees, houses, the very earth itself were ground
to powder and then whirled aloft by the resistless suction.
Occasionally the darkness returned for a few minutes, as if a cover had
been clapped upon the sky, and then, again, the murk would roll off, and
the reddish gleam would reappear. These swift alternations of
impenetrable gloom and unearthly light shook the hearts of the
dumfounded statesmen even more than the roar and rush of the storm.
A cry of horror broke from the onlookers when a man and a woman suddenly
appeared trying to cross the White House grounds to reach a place of
comparative safety, and were caught up by the wind, clinging desperately
to each other, and hurled against a wall, at whose base they fell in a
heap.
Then came another outburst of lightning, and a vicious bolt descended
upon the Washington Monument, and, twisting round it, seemed to envelop
the great shaft in a pulsating corkscrew of blinding fire. The report
that instantly followed made the White House dance upon its foundations,
and, as if that had been a signal, the flood-gates of the sky
immediately opened, and rain so dense that it looked like a solid
cataract of water poured down upon the earth. The raging water burst
into the basement of the building, and ran off in a shoreless river
toward the Potomac.
The streaming rain, still driven by the wind, poured through the broken
windows, driving the President and the others to the middle of the room,
where they soon stood in rills of water soaking the thick carpet.
They were all as pale as death. Their eyes sought one another's faces in
dumb amazement. Cosmo Versál alone retained perfect self-command. In
spite of his slight stature he looked their master. Raising his voice to
the highest pitch, in order to be heard, he shouted:
"These are the first drops of the Deluge! Will you believe now?"