Page:Amazing Stories Volume 01 Number 02.djvu/52

Rh Martyn has made the calculations. I shall appear to her no more than a few hours after the departure of that person who is following all my adventures. It will, of course, be in the next cycle of time, and there will be changes. But surely my Vinda will be there, and I shall be able to take her in my arms and tell her of all the love I have for her. I cannot believe that it will be another woman. No—just as this Martyn is the same Martyn I left, so will that Vinda be my Vinda. Surely it is the soul that counts, and the soul is the same.

There is one thing that sometimes worried my leaping mind. There is this other Kirby—this double of mine, this other me. Perhaps he will have more perception than I have had (for does not each cycle bring a finer civilization, and is not the man the basis of civilization?). Perhaps he will have the intelligence to remain with Vinda, and I shall meet him there—meet myself! How impossibly it savours of Poe and William Wilson! For if we meet, and we both love Vinda, there will be only one way to settle it—we must fight, fight to the death perhaps, for this love is very great. And, if we are the same man, will the death of one mean the death of the other too? It does not matter. At least I shall be able to say at least once to Vinda that I love her.…



Then the storm outside broke into its full fury. Lightning played in rapid streams, and thunder echoed and re-echoed with mighty din.

Suddenly a bolt of blinding light reached down from the sky to the tower upon the dome. The partially fused metal gave to the weight, and the great ray slowly fell in a wide arc to the earth. There was a series of frightful reports, as it tore the mountain asunder with its mighty force.

In the room below the image no longer showed sharp and clear upon the screen, but was entirely obscured by a mass of whirling grayish green. Then as the awful crashes rent the air, Faxworthy gave a terrible cry. "THE RAY!" he shrieked and leaped toward the far end of the switchboard! But it was too late!

With a sudden lurch, the thing on the roof had fallen completely to the perpendicular. There was a second frightful din as it rent asunder all within its path, ripping out the very vitals of the delicate apparatus that gave it life! Then it grew dark.

And above in wild cadence the thunder drums of Nature rolled out a pean of victory, over the shattered fragments of the rash mortals who fain would know her innermost secrets.

