Page:Avon Fantasy Reader 10.djvu/128

 "Great cracks are beginning to appear in the ground, from which smoke and molten lava issue. I have fled to Manhattan in order that the skeletons of the tall buildings may hide them from my sight.

"Small objects have begun to move of their own volition. I am afraid to walk, as each step hurls me off my balance. The heat is awful. I cannot breathe."

There was a short interval, that came as a relief to our tightly screwed nerves. The tension to which the experiment had pitched us was terrible, yet I, for one, could no more have torn myself away than I could have passed into the fourth dimension.

Suddenly the voice cut the air like a knife!

"The buildings!" it shrieked. "They are swaying! They are leaning toward each other! They are crumbling, disintegrating; and the crumbs are flying outward instead of falling! Tiny particles are being thrown off by everything around me. Oh, the heat! There is no air!"

Followed a hideous gurgling; then:

"The earth is dissolving beneath my feet! It is the end. Creation is returning to its original atoms! Oh, my God!" There was a sickening scream that rapidly grew fainter with the effect of fading on radio.

"Williams!" shouted Mortimer. "What happened?"

There was no answer.

"Williams! Williams!" Mortimer was on his feet, fairly shrieking into the instrument. "Do you hear me?"

The only response was utter silence.

Mortimer clutched me by the arm and dragged me with him from the laboratory and down the hall.

"Is—is he dead?" I choked as we ran.

Mortimer did not answer. His breath was coming in quick, short gasps that would have made speech impossible even had he heard me.

At the door of the lead room he stopped and fumbled with his keys. From beyond we could hear no sound. Twice Mortimer, in his nervousness and hurry, dropped the key and had to grope for it; but at last he got it turned in the lock, and flung the door open.

In our haste, we collided with each other as we hurried into the room. Then as one man we stopped dead in our tracks. The room was empty!

"Where—" I began incredulously. "He couldn't have gotten out! Could he?"

"No," Mortimer answered hoarsely.

We advanced farther into the room, peering into every crack and corner. From the back of the chair, suspended by their cord, hung the earphones; while dangling from the chair's seat to the floor were the tattered and partially charred remains of what seemed to have been at one time a suit of men's clothing. At sight of these, Mortimer's face went white. In his eyes was a look of dawning comprehension and horror.

"What does it mean." I demanded.