Murray Leinster (Duke Classic SiFi) (6 page)

Arthur knew, however, that long concrete piles reached far down to
bedrock. It was these piles that had sunk into the Fourth Dimension,
carrying the building with them.

Arthur had followed the plans with great interest when the
Metropolitan was constructed. It was an engineering feat, and in
the engineering periodicals, whose study was a part of Arthur's
business, great space had been given to the building and the methods
of its construction.

While examining the earth carefully he went over his theory of the
cause for the catastrophe. The whole structure must have sunk at
the same time, or it, too, would have disintegrated, as the other
buildings had appeared to disintegrate. Mentally, Arthur likened
the submergence of the tower in the oceans of time to an elevator
sinking past the different floors of an office building. All about
the building the other sky-scrapers of New York had seemed to
vanish. In an elevator, the floors one passes seem to rise upward.

Carrying out the analogy to its logical end, Arthur reasoned that the
building itself had no more cause to disintegrate, as the buildings
it passed seemed to disintegrate, than the elevator in the office
building would have cause to rise because its surroundings seemed
to rise.

Within the building, he knew, there were strange stirrings of
emotions. Queer currents of panic were running about, throwing
the people to and fro as leaves are thrown about by a current of
wind. Yet, underneath all those undercurrents of fear, was a rapidly
growing resolution, strengthened by an increasing knowledge of the
need to work.

Men were busy even then shifting all possible comfortable furniture
to a single story for the women in the building to occupy. The
men would sleep on the floor for the present. Beds of boughs could
be improvised on the morrow. At sunrise on the following morning
many men would go to the streams to fish, guarded by other men. All
would be frightened, no doubt, but there would be a grim resolution
underneath the fear. Other men would wander about to hunt.

There was little likelihood of Indians approaching for some days, at
least, but when they did come Arthur meant to avoid hostilities by
all possible means. The Indians would be fearful of their strange
visitors, and it should not be difficult to convince them that
friendliness was safest, even if they displayed unfriendly desires.

The pressing problem was food. There were two thousand people in
the building, soft-bodied and city-bred. They were unaccustomed
to hardship, and could not endure what more primitive people would
hardly have noticed.

They must be fed, but first they must be taught to feed
themselves. The fishermen would help, but Arthur could only hope
that they would prove equal to the occasion. He did not know what
to expect from them. From the hunters he expected but little. The
Indians were wary hunters, and game would be shy if not scarce.

The great cloud of birds he had seen at sunset was a hopeful
sign. Arthur vaguely remembered stories of great flocks of
wood-pigeons which had been exterminated, as the buffalo was
exterminated. As he considered the remembrance became more clear.

They had flown in huge flocks which nearly darkened the sky. As late
as the forties of the nineteenth century they had been an important
article of food, and had glutted the market at certain seasons of
the year.

Estelle had said the birds he had seen at sunset were
pigeons. Perhaps this was one of the great flocks. If it were really
so, the food problem would be much lessened, provided a way could be
found to secure them. The ammunition in the tower was very limited,
and a shell could not be found for every bird that was needed,
nor even for every three or four. Great traps must be devised, or
bird-lime might possibly be produced. Arthur made a mental note
to ask Estelle if she knew anything of bird-lime.

A vague, humming roar, altering in pitch, came to his ears. He
listened for some time before he identified it as the sound of the
wind playing upon the irregular surfaces of the tower. In the city
the sound was drowned by the multitude of other noises, but here
Arthur could hear it plainly.

He listened a moment, and became surprised at the number of
night noises he could hear. In New York he had closed his ears to
incidental sounds from sheer self-protection. Somewhere he heard
the ripple of a little spring. As the idea of a spring came into
his mind, he remembered Estelle's description of the deep-toned
roar she had heard.

He put his hand on the cold stone of the building. There was still
a vibrant quivering of the rock. It was weaker than before, but
was still noticeable.

He drew back from the rock and looked up into the sky. It seemed
to blaze with stars, far more stars than Arthur had ever seen in
the city, and more than he had dreamed existed.

As he looked, however, a cloud seemed to film a portion of the
heavens. The stars still showed through it, but they twinkled in
a peculiar fashion that Arthur could not understand.

He watched in growing perplexity. The cloud moved very swiftly. Thin
as it seemed to be, it should have been silvery from the moonlight,
but the sky was noticeably darker where it moved. It advanced toward
the tower and seemed to obscure the upper portion. A confused motion
became visible among its parts. Wisps of it whirled away from the
brilliantly lighted tower, and then returned swiftly toward it.

Arthur heard a faint tinkle, then a musical scraping, which became
louder. A faint scream sounded, then another. The tinkle developed
into the sound made by breaking glass, and the scraping sound became
that of the broken fragments as they rubbed against the sides of
the tower in their fall.

The scream came again. It was the frightened cry of a woman. A
soft body struck the earth not ten feet from where Arthur stood,
then another, and another.

Arthur urged the elevator boy to greater speed. They were speeding up
the shaft as rapidly as possible, but it was not fast enough. When
they at last reached the height at which the excitement seemed to
be centered, the car was stopped with a jerk and Arthur dashed down
the hall.

Half a dozen frightened stenographers stood there, huddled together.

"What's the matter?" Arthur demanded. Men were running, from the
other floors to see what the trouble was.

"The—the windows broke, and—and something flew in at us!" one of
them gasped. There was a crash inside the nearest office and the
women screamed again.

Arthur drew a revolver from his pocket and advanced to the door. He
quickly threw it open, entered, and closed it behind him. Those
left out in the hall waited tensely.

There was no sound. The women began to look even more frightened. The
men shuffled their feet uneasily, and looked uncomfortably at one
another. Van Deventer appeared on the scene, puffing a little from
his haste.

The door opened again and Arthur came out. He was carrying something
in his hands. He had put his revolver aside and looked somewhat
foolish but very much delighted.

"The food question is settled," he said happily. "Look!"

He held out the object he carried. It was a bird, apparently a
pigeon of some sort. It seemed to have been stunned, but as Arthur
held it out it stirred, then struggled, and in a moment was flapping
wildly in an attempt to escape.

"It's a wood-pigeon," said Arthur. "They must fly after dark
sometimes. A big flock of them ran afoul of the tower and were
dazed by the lights. They've broken a lot of windows, I dare say,
but a great many of them ran into the stonework and were stunned. I
was outside the tower, and when I came in they were dropping to
the ground by hundreds. I didn't know what they were then, but if
we wait twenty minutes or so I think we can go out and gather up
our supper and breakfast and several other meals, all at once."

Estelle had appeared and now reached out her hands for the bird.

"I'll take care of this one," she said. "Wouldn't it be a good
idea to see if there aren't some more stunned in the other offices?"

In half an hour the electric stoves of the restaurant were going at
their full capacity. Men, cheerfully excited men now, were bringing
in pigeons by armfuls, and other men were skinning them. There was
no time to pluck them, though a great many of the women were busily
engaged in that occupation.

As fast as the birds could be cooked they were served out to the
impatient but much cheered castaways, and in a little while nearly
every person in the place was walking casually about the halls
with a roasted, broiled, or fried pigeon in his hands. The ovens
were roasting pigeons, the frying-pans were frying them, and the
broilers were loaded down with the small but tender birds.

The unexpected solution of the most pressing question cheered
every one amazingly. Many people were still frightened, but less
frightened than before. Worry for their families still oppressed
a great many, but the removal of the fear of immediate hunger led
them to believe that the other problems before them would be solved,
too, and in as satisfactory a manner.

Arthur had returned to his office with four broiled pigeons in
a sheet of wrapping-paper. As he somehow expected, Estelle was
waiting there.

"Thought I'd bring lunch up," he announced. "Are you hungry?"

"Starving!" Estelle replied, and laughed.

The whole catastrophe began to become an adventure. She bit eagerly
into a bird. Arthur began as hungrily on another. For some time
neither spoke a word. At last, however, Arthur waved the leg of
his second pigeon toward his desk.

"Look what we've got here!" he said.

Estelle nodded. The stunned pigeon Arthur had first picked up was
tied by one foot to a paper-weight.

"I thought we might keep him for a souvenir," she suggested.

"You seem pretty confident we'll get back, all right," Arthur
observed. "It was surely lucky those blessed birds came along.
They've heartened up the people wonderfully!"

"Oh, I knew you'd manage somehow!" said Estelle confidently.

"I manage?" Arthur repeated, smiling. "What have I done?"

"Why, you've done everything," affirmed Estelle stoutly. "You've
told the people what to do from the very first, and you're going
to get us back."

Arthur grinned, then suddenly his face grew a little more serious.

"I wish I were as sure as you are," he said. "I think we'll be all
right, though, sooner or later."

"I'm sure of it," Estelle declared with conviction. "Why, you—"

"Why I?" asked Arthur again. He bent forward in his chair and fixed
his eyes on Estelle's. She looked up, met his gaze, and stammered.

"You—you do things," she finished lamely.

"I'm tempted to do something now," Arthur said. "Look here, Miss
Woodward, you've been in my employ for three or four months. In all
that time I've never had anything but the most impersonal comments
from you. Why the sudden change?"

The twinkle in his eyes robbed his words of any impertinence.

"Why, I really—I really suppose I never noticed you before,"
said Estelle.

"Please notice me hereafter," said Arthur. "I have been noticing
you. I've been doing practically nothing else."

Estelle flushed again. She tried to meet Arthur's eyes and
failed. She bit desperately into her pigeon drumstick, trying to
think of something to say.

"When we get back," went on Arthur meditatively, "I'll have nothing
to do—no work or anything. I'll be broke and out of a job."

Estelle shook her head emphatically. Arthur paid no attention.

"Estelle," he said, smiling, "would you like to be out of a job
with me?"

Estelle turned crimson.

"I'm not very successful," Arthur went on soberly. "I'm afraid I
wouldn't make a very good husband, I'm rather worthless and lazy!"

"You aren't," broke in Estelle; "you're—you're—"

Arthur reached over and took her by the shoulders.

"What?" he demanded.

She would not look at him, but she did not draw away. He held her
from him for a moment.

"What am I?" he demanded again. Somehow he found himself kissing
the tips of her ears. Her face was buried against his shoulder.

"What am I?" he repeated sternly.

Her voice was muffled by his coat.

"You're—you're dear!" she said.

There was an interlude of about a minute and a half, then she pushed
him away from her.

"Don't!" she said breathlessly. "Please don't!"

"Aren't you going to marry me?" he demanded.

Still crimson, she nodded shyly. He kissed her again.

"Please don't!" she protested.

She fondled the lapels of his coat, quite content to have his arms
about her.

"Why mayn't I kiss you if you're going to marry me?" Arthur demanded.

She looked up at him with an air of demure primness.

"You—you've been eating pigeon," she told him in mock gravity,
"and—and your mouth is greasy!"

It was two weeks later. Estelle looked out over the now familiar
wild landscape. It was much the same when she looked far away,
but near by there were great changes.

A cleared trail led through the woods to the waterfront, and a
raft of logs extended out into the river for hundreds of feet.
Both sides of the raft were lined with busy fishermen—men and
women, too. A little to the north of the base of the building a
huge mound of earth smoked sullenly. The coal in the cellar had
given out and charcoal had been found to be the best substitute
they could improvise. The mound was where the charcoal was made.

It was heart-breaking work to keep the fires going with charcoal,
because it burned so rapidly in the powerful draft of the furnaces,
but the original fire-room gang had been recruited to several
times its original number from among the towerites, and the work
was divided until it did not seem hard.