"Yes. I'm going away." I was on my feet. Outwardly calm, but within me
was a seething emotion. Going away! Out there into the immensity of the
Unknown, where my friend Brett had gone, not to return. Young Grante
could not guess. He was thinking Great-London perhaps--or the Asiatic
province. Or perchance, Venus, or Mars.
I laughed harshly. "Don't question me, Grante. Just tell them--my post
is vacant."
I left the room with his amazed stare following me. In the corridor,
through a window I caught a glimpse of the tenth pedestrian level; its
crowd of people moving upon the diverse activities of their tiny lives.
Already I felt apart from them. Frank Elgon, Division 4. Presently, to
such of them as knew me, I would be no more than a memory. "That young,
rather quarrelsome Elgon, who walked out of his office in a temper, and
vanished." They would say that, and then forget me.
I laughed again. But the thought brought a pang of regret, and a
shudder.
In ten minutes I was within a pneumatic cylinder, speeding underground
to the Southern Pennsylvania area, to the home of Dr. Gryce.