The End of Time Part 2

When the doctor's nerves began to quiver in that manner, Baron always insisted that they all rest. During such recesses they ate, played cards and helped June with the housework. The younger man was continually amazed by the calmness with which the girl faced their desperate situation. Clad in a blue smock which brought out the color of her eyes, she flitted about the apartment, manufacturing delicious meals out of canned goods and always having a cheery word when the others became discouraged. Yet she never would look out the window.

"I can't bear to see those poor souls lying about like rag dolls," she explained. "The only thing that keeps me sane is the hope that we may reawaken them."

It was on the evening of the third day that Baron lifted the headset from his burning ears and admitted failure.

"We've explored everything but the super-short waves," he sighed.

"I'll have to get equipment from the laboratories before we start on those."

June nodded from where she perched on a high stool across the table.

But Manthis did not hear. He was making delicate adjustments on his receiving set and listening with rapt attention.

"I've got something," he cried. "Jack. June. Plug in on my panel.

Someone is talking. It's very loud. Must be close."

Instantly the others did as he ordered, but were able to catch only the last inflections of a ringing voice. Then silence settled once more.

"What did he say," the youngsters cried in one breath.

"Couldn't understand. Some foreign language." The chemist was furious with disappointment. "But I'd recognize that voice among a thousand.

We must get in touch with him. Perhaps he can help us. G.o.d knows we need a.s.sistance. Quick, Jack. You're an expert. See if you can pick up a reply."

Baron leaned over his instruments, heart thumping. The dreadful loneliness against which he had been fighting was broken. Others were alive!

Minutes pa.s.sed and the evening light died away. They were too excited to strike a light. Shadows crept out of the corners and surrounded them. At last a faint voice grew in their ears. But again the words were unintelligible.

"Sounds a little like Greek," puzzled the girl, "but it isn't."

Baron adjusted the direction finder and made scribbled calculations.

"Coming from the southeast and far away," he breathed.

"I caught a word then," gasped the doctor. "'Ganja,' it was."

"What does that tell us?" snapped Jack, his nerves jumping.

"Ganja is the Hindu word for hashish, that's all. My Lord, man, don't you understand? The station is in India. Those who operate it are using Andrev's solution as we are. I--"

"Listen!" shouted Jack.

There was a grinding and clashing in the receivers. Then a new voice, harsh and strained with excitement, almost burst their eardrums.

"Beware! Beware!" it screamed. "Do not trust him. He is a devil and has put the world asleep. His mind is rotten with hashish. He is a demon from--" Then came a dull, crunching sound. The voice screamed and died away.

In the darkened laboratory the faces of the three listeners stood out like ovals of white cardboard.

"What do you make of that?" stammered Baron at last.

"It looks as if the only persons alive, in New York at least, are hashish addicts--the most debased and murderous of drug fiends." The doctor stopped, his eyes dilating with horror. June crept close to him and threw an arm around his shaking shoulders. "Can't you see? Their time-sense expanded too. Like us they were unaffected. But unlike us they use the pure drug. Hashish smokers are without exception homicidal maniacs, vicious criminals. G.o.d!"

"Are they responsible for the end of time?" queried Jack.

"I don't know. Perhaps some master mind among them is back of it--some engineering wizard who has succ.u.mbed to the drug so recently, or who has such a strong const.i.tution that his intelligence has not been destroyed."

The little doctor dragged off his headset, disarranging his spa.r.s.e gray hair. His face was tired and worn but his jaw thrust forward pugnaciously.

"We're making headway," he cried. "We know the probable author of the catastrophe is a drug addict and that he is located nearby. We know he has no scruples, for the man who warned us undoubtedly was killed. And I'm convinced those extremely short wave bands hold the secret. Let's knock off for the day. We look like ghosts. To-morrow morning you and June get what equipment you need from across the river. I'll stay here on guard. You'd better raid a drug-store and get some more of our life-saver, too. It's listed under Cannabis Indica."

The next morning dawned clear and cold. It was early October and there was a chill in the apartment. Baron swung his legs over the edge of the davenport in the living room and stared out at the frost-covered trees of Central Park. The leaves were falling before the brisk wind and forming little eddying mounds over the forms of those lying about the streets. Jack shivered at the thought of the millions and millions of victims of the disaster who littered the Earth. They seemed to accuse him of still being alive. Well, if Manthis was right, perhaps all could be revived before winter set in.

June was singing as he and the doctor came to breakfast. Apparently she wished to forget the events of the previous night, so they laughed and joked as though they intended to go on a picnic rather than across a dead city.

The hotel lobby was as they last had seen it when they descended. The bellboys still nodded on their benches. A travelling salesman was hunched over a week-old Times as if he would awake in a few minutes, glance about guiltily and resume his reading. The child they had rescued still lay on the divan. Her golden hair framed her cheeks like a halo. One arm was thrown above her head. She seemed ready to awake, though she had not breathed for days.

"It all makes me feel so lonely," whispered June, clinging to the engineer's arm. "I want to cry--or whistle to keep up my courage."

"Don't worry," Jack replied softly, patting her hand and speaking with more a.s.surance than he felt. "We'll find a way out."

She squeezed his arm and smiled at him with new courage. For months, in fact ever since his first visit to the Manthis apartment, Baron had admired the doctor's charming daughter. Although nothing had been said of love between them they often had gone to a dance or the theater together, while a firm friendship had been cemented. Now their closer a.s.sociation and the unflinching bravery which she showed was ripening this into a stronger bond.

They went out into the crisp morning, stepped across the body of a street sweeper who lay in the gutter, and entered the doctor's automobile. Through the silent city they drove, Baron watching carefully to avoid striking stalled cars or grotesquely sprawling bodies.

There was a tangle of wrecked automobiles in the center of the Queensboro Bridge and they were forced to push them apart to get through. While they were engaged in this arduous work, a drifting ferry b.u.mped into a pier, shaking the dreaming captain into a semblance of life at the wheel.

"I used to like fairy tales," moaned June. "They're dreadful, really."

She clung to him like a frightened child. He drew her close and kissed her.

"I love you, June," he whispered, as though fearful that the sleeping drivers of the tangled cars might overhear. "Don't be afraid."

"I'm not--now," she smiled through eyes filled with tears. "I've loved you for months, Jack. Whatever happens, we have each other."

He helped her back into the car and drove on in silence. At last the Rothafel plant gloomed before them, forbidding as an Egyptian tomb.

With a feeling that he was entering some forbidden precinct, Jack led the way to his office. Somehow, without its usual bustle and bright lights, it seemed alien.

Once inside he forgot his hesitation and set about collecting equipment--queerly shaped neon tubes, reflectors, coils, electrodes.

Soon there was a pile of material glinting on top of his desk.

They were exploring a deep cabinet with the aid of a flashlight when a strange clicking sound made them whirl simultaneously. In a corner of the room a deeper blot of shadow caught their eyes. Jack snapped on the flash. In the small circle of light a long, cadaverous face appeared. Thin lips were drawn back over wide-s.p.a.ced yellow teeth.

Black eyes stared unwinkingly into the light. The flash wavered as the engineer tried to get his nerves under control.

"It's nothing," he a.s.sured the trembling girl. "A night watchman caught as he was making his rounds, probably. Don't get excited." He wet his lips.