Page:Weird Tales volume 24 number 03.djvu/75

346 as rock. A fresh leaf sailed out of the foliage and reached the ground about ten feet in front of him. He picked it up absently, and as he stood there for a moment, genuinely troubled, he twisted the leaf idly in his fingers and noted that it was as limp and as tough as leather. He turned slowly and retraced his steps up the hill.

More of those leaves, and the leaves of other trees in the woods, flapped against the windows of the building during the day. The wind was steadily rising. Leaves like patterns cut in the skins of animals.

Some time ago, there was that item in the local paper concerning the tree that had moved. The Laboratories people told jokes about the ignorance and superstitions of the people who lived in South: how the hunkies hated the whine of the generators, the complicated glass and metal apparatus, and the living blue sparks that jumped all over the laboratories like fireflies. But finally the tree had left the yard entirely to stand at the edge of the woods. Now there was an investigation; sliding substrata were discovered, in which the roots were involved. Odd that the layer of earth should have moved uphill! And now a tree on the very hill on which the laboratories were built, playing the same tricks, tearing up the sod.

URING the day Haverland several times discovered Schommer standing at the window area looking down speculatively at the woods. Young Harriss had the phenomenon pointed out to him, and twice left his work to make an examination. Cowl shrugged; he would not have been surprized if a hen had crowed after laying an egg.

The plumbers did come in the afternoon. Having taken a sounding from the building they dug in at a point midway between the tree and the laboratories. Advantage was taken of the ditch in the turf, since it was discovered that below it, down to the sewer, was a cleavage line of broken, friable earth. It was as though a giant plow had followed the sewer-pipe from end to end, breaking the ground. Actually, one of the extraordinarily long .roots of the oak tree had entered a joint in the pipes. All manner of refuse had caught on the obstruction and damned the sewer effectively. The difficulties of repair, however, were negligible.

By this time the wind outside had become rather heavy, in the midst of which the laboratories were an isolated calm. The wind occasionally gusted with still increasing violence, and now and then small objects struck the walls and windows with faint rappings. Haverland could fancy he heard shoutings from down the hill; there was a waterfall of sound among the cottonwoods. At this moment the night-bell rang.

With some degree of surprize and curiosity he left his chambers to see what was wanted. He was alone in the building, it was late, and this was a place where few visitors came. He had locked the door, of course, after Schommer had gone at last; and now, to his further surprize, there was no one on the steps when he opened it. He stood there in the doorway wondering. It was those queer little dark people in South, and their total lack of comprehension of the purpose in these researches, their distrust of everything mechanical, and their absolute fear of electricity; but it was rather a quaint expression of hatred, to ring the bell because the machinery whined. Annoying, too.

It was an unlucky night for ignorant, fearful people, though. The sky was heavy with storm, and the wind was