The Cosmic Deflector Part 2

Two rubber truncheons came down upon Dan's defenseless flesh as, with a groan, he struggled back to his bench.

As late August shivered toward September, the world's state became still more terrifying. Whirlwinds rushed more severely than ever through the darkening skies; blizzards raged, and a mantle of white covered the northern United States; agriculture and industry had virtually ceased; and men pa.s.sed their time in mumbling prayers, in making wild, fruitless studies of the heavens, and in the sodden forgetfulness of dissipation.

Dan, however, knew nothing of all this as he labored in his hidden laboratory. Working once more at the Deflector, in the desire to save the earth from freezing, he had made a discovery--one which, as he toiled, had darkened his face with lines of discouragement that gradually gave place to horror. And in the end he had sagged down, exhausted, with bloodshot eyes and drooping limbs ... oppressed with a nightmare realization.

During the weeks of his imprisonment, the earth had moved millions of miles farther from the sun. And the strength of telurox, lessening with the inverse square of the distance, was insufficient to cover the gap.

It was beyond his power to make up the difference. Unless a miracle intervened, the earth was doomed!

Nevertheless, was there not just the remotest hope?--possibly a chance in a million? If only he could gain control of a larger laboratory, with capable a.s.sistants, he might try a certain newly conceived experiment.

But to ask his captors to provide such a laboratory would be to put himself and the earth even more hopelessly in their power.

Instead, his thoughts kept wandering in another direction. If he could once get into touch with his wife, she might be able to help him! But where was she now? Somewhere in hiding? Or imprisoned by the Triumvirs?

Yet if she were still at liberty, was there not a means by which he might still communicate with her? He recalled how, during their years together at Columbia Chemicals, they had worked out a secret code, by which they could tap out love messages on the walls. Could this code not be used over the radio? Could he not transmit signals over various wave-lengths, so that sooner or later--if she still listened to the radio--she would recognize his message?

At any rate, he would try. Hoping to ward off suspicion, he pretended to work at a Cosmic Deflector which, telescope-shaped and two feet in thickness, reached from floor to ceiling. Within this great tube he concealed a small radio transmitter which he had hastily contrived, out of the abundant electrical equipment of the Deflector. Its power, he knew, would be limited, but it could be heard well enough locally. By means of a device resembling an electric bell, he was able to transmit signals, on a dot and dash system. So rapidly did he work that, after a few hours, this novel broadcaster was sending out its rat-tat-tat.

His next step was to repair the half dismantled radio receiver. This task completed, he began to tap out signals, "Lucile! Lucile! Hear me! I am imprisoned by the Triumvirs! Follow my directions, and we may still save the world!"

Time after time--hundreds of times--he repeated this message. Was he but playing a fool's game? So he asked himself as the hours stretched out; as the days dragged past and still no answer came. Was he not wasting his efforts while the earth whirled to its doom?

It was on the fourth day of the experiment. Pale with anxiety and fatigue, Dan still tapped out his messages; still listened at the radio.

Suddenly he stood up, with a start. What was that sound he heard? That answering tap, tap, tap? Three shorts and a long--three shorts and a long! In their code, what did that mean? "Where are you? Tell me, where are you?" Or had he counted the signals wrongly. In desperate eagerness, he stood listening. Now there came two longs and a short; then a short and two longs--

"Well, old man, how's the work going?"

Dan was so shocked that he leapt back several feet. Not more than a yard away, leering with a horse-like grin, was the face of Wiley! And just in the background, devilishly gaping, were Hogarth and Malvine.

Dan's first thought was that the enemy knew what he was about, and had come to mock him at the moment of his seeming success.

"Well, how's she going?" Wiley reiterated. "Any progress?"

With an effort, Dan snapped out of his stupefied silence. "Oh, she's promising very well," he managed to say.

Through the radio, with maddening insistency, came the rat-tat-tat of a message. It was impossible, under the circ.u.mstances, to record or translate it! The thought flashed over Dan that he had been tricked; that the message came from the Triumvirs, who were now enjoying his discomfiture!

"What's that d.a.m.ned noise?" Hogarth demanded, as if to lend confirmation to this theory.

Reaching for a secret switch, Dan snapped off the radio. Only a clever bluff, he knew, could save him now!

"Oh, it's only the magnified sound of the impact of the gravitational rays upon the Deflector," he lied, glibly, still hoping against hope.

"In other words, the vibrational impetus of--"

"To h.e.l.l with your long-winded explanations!" Wiley cut him short, impatiently. "What we want to know is, what progress have you made? Any sign of getting the earth back in place?"

"Time we gave you is about up!" said Malvine. "If you're not getting results, better turn things over to some one else!"

"Everything's in the devil's own mess!" sighed Hogarth. "It's h.e.l.l on earth--people freezing to death right and left. By G.o.d! if I thought you weren't getting somewhere, I'd have you choked to death, just for the fun of it!"

"Well, as a matter of fact," fabricated Dan, "the Super-Detectonic rays are a bit slow in getting into operation. But you can't expect miracles.

If you'll give me a little more time--a few more days, maybe a week--I'll promise you results."

A cold sweat had broken out all over him before he had explained, in scientific detail, just why he might succeed if given another week.

Thank G.o.d! they had not suspected! Or had they suspected?--and were they only toying with him? In any case, they had, wittingly or unwittingly, broken into his experiment at the crucial point. Would he ever again catch the interrupted message?

His fingers shaking with eagerness, he turned back to the radio. But even as he did so, the sneer on Wiley's retreating face hit him like a taunt.

After the first cruel shock, Lucile had realized just what was behind Dan's disappearance. She not only was sure that he had been kidnapped by Hogarth and his gang, but that any effort on her part to report to the police would result in her own immediate apprehension. Already her position was perilous--might the conspirators not finish the job by seizing her at any moment? There was nothing to be done, therefore, except to change her residence, without informing anyone where she was going. Then, in secret, she might plan to free her husband.

At first, however, no tenable idea came to her. Meanwhile, through her old professors at Merlin University, where she had been an excellent student, she obtained access to the chemical laboratory, and experimented day and night for means to increase the power of telurox.

If it were possible to divert to the earth enough of the gravity that shot past it into s.p.a.ce, might the planet not even now be drawn back to its...o...b..t?

For weeks she labored, without results. She was merely one more discouraged person in a discouraged world, when at length a startling incident occurred. She had gone out for a hasty bite of lunch, and on her return she noticed that her a.s.sistant, young d.i.c.k Harson, was listening to the radio, as he often did, while munching at a sandwich.

"Well, anything new?" she asked, with a faint smile.

"Nothing but a crazy noise, like a telegrapher breaking in on the broadcast," he answered. "If it's still on, I'll show you."

He switched the dial. "There it is!" he exclaimed, after a moment.

"Doesn't it sound just like a secret code?"

At first she listened indifferently, her mind preoccupied; then gave a start, for she recognized something astoundingly familiar. Surely, it was but an accident! It must be an accident that the succession of long and short syllables made sense, according to her old code with Dan!

"Imprisoned by the Triumvirs! Follow my directions, and we may still save the world."

Harson was astonished to see how eagerly the young woman sprang from her seat; and how she stood staring, as if she had seen a ghost.

With the frenzy of a famished person finding food, she bent down to listen. For a minute she remained there, leaning over the radio with a puzzled look, as if she could not quite make out the message. Then, to Harson's still greater amazement, she dashed to the laboratory's short wave transmitter, and, beating together two bits of metal, began to send out a series of long and short sounds, similar to the signals they had heard.

By this time the rat-tat-tat from the other end had ceased. It was more than half an hour later, when she had paused to rest momentarily, that fresh signals came over the radio. A flood of tears rushed to her eyes as she made out the words, "Lucile! Lucile--it is I!"

"Take this down, Lucy! Bis.m.u.th tetrachloride in combination with the borium salt I just mentioned will have a catalyzing effect on telurox, increasing its activity fifty per cent--more than enough to bring the earth back to its...o...b..t. So my experiments indicate. Try it out just as soon as possible!"

Such was one of the first messages that Dan tapped out to his wife, after a few explanatory interchanges.

"For G.o.d's sake, hurry! At any minute those bandits may catch on!" the message continued. "Let me hear the results as soon as you can! We've just got to succeed, and trap them!"

Several days went by, while the signals still flashed back and forth.

But Dan knew, as did Lucile also, that their time was short, very short.

All too soon the week allowed him by Hogarth, Wiley and Malvine pa.s.sed; all too soon the sinister three paid him another visit.

They found him still working at the Deflector, from whose interior once more a strange rat-tat-tat was issuing.