Page:Weird Tales volume 32 number 05.djvu/47

Rh commissary, and I made a little impression with that, but I had no vise in my tent and I was afraid I'd shatter the thing, so I gave that up. I'm damned glad now that I did.

Bowen, that plug is some sort of wax, some sort of plastic; you can see how it was put in there: it was poured in there hot. So I decided to try to melt it out. I made a little oven out of bricks, and took the top off my gasoline lamp, and set the lamp inside. Then I lit her up, and put the jug on top, bottom-side up. That brought results, but not the results I'd anticipated.

Listen; the plug didn't melt any; my flame wasn't hot enough. But whatever's inside didn't like that heat treatment a little bit. About two minutes after I'd set that jug on the fire it began to jump around like a teakettle on a stove; I couldn't hold it still. And I tell you I didn't try very hard to hold it still, either, when I saw that; I took it off the fire quick and put my lamp back together again, and in about five minutes it stopped jiggling. And that's the gospel truth, so help me.'

"I thought that over for a minute. 'You haven't necessarily proved that whatever's in there is alive,' I pointed out. 'There have been chemists, of a sort, since time immemorial, haven't there? Maybe you've dug up some ancient alchemist's pet brew. It's a wonder you weren't blown to blazes.'

"He shook his head. 'The thing's alive,' he reiterated stubbornly. 'I'll show you.'

"He walked out into the hall, and I could hear him prying the boards off one of the crates. After a moment he came back with a half-dozen half-inch boards and a bundle of excelsior; he arranged those combustiles in the fireplace, put the ancient vessel on top, lit a match and touched off the excelsior. A bright, hot flame that quickly singed our faces and drove us back from the fireplace sprang up at once.

Watch the jug,' Fothergill grunted.

"I watched, all right. The vessel lay on its side in a bed of fire; as the excelsior burned away from beneath, it sank down between two blazing boards; it was certainly getting hot.

jug began to move! It moved in violent jerks—as though whatever was imprisoned inside was hurling itself again and again against the stone-like seal. And it moved purposefully—in one direction! Jerk—jerk—jerk—inch by inch it shifted along the trough between the blazing boards, until it slid with a thump down to the hot tiles. Then it began to roll on its circumference—quite swiftly, too—out toward the center of the room. When it was about ten feet from the fire it stopped abruptly and decisively, as though the whole of its enigmatic contents had suddenly thrown their mass into one quick braking movement.

My God, Bowen; you never saw water boiling in a pot, or a mess of chemicals, either, act like that!' Fothergill groaned. 'You want a drink? I've got practically a full quart in my bag.'

"I did want a drink, desperately, but I didn't want Fothergill to see how severely his demonstration had shaken me—and I wanted one of us, at least, to retain some semblance of sanity. The hardwood floor was beginning to scorch, so I quickly called Fothergill' s attention to that.

The thing's burning your floor.'