Astounding Stories, June, 1931

Astounding Stories, June, 1931 Page 5

by Various

  The Exile of Time

  PART THREE OF A FOUR-PART NOVEL

  _By Ray Cummings_

  WHAT HAS GONE BEFORE

  _"Look!" exclaimed Larry._]

  [Sidenote: Larry and George from 1935, Mary from 1777--all are caughtup in the treacherous Tugh's revolt of the Robots, in the Time-worldof 2930.]

  There came a girl's scream, and muffled, frantic words.

  "Let me out! Let me out!"

  Then we saw her white face at the basement window. This, which was thestart of the extraordinary incidents, occurred on the night of June8-9, 1935.

  My name is George Rankin, and with my friend, Larry Gregory, werescued the girl who was imprisoned in the deserted house on PattonPlace, New York City. We thought at first that she was demented--thisstrangely beautiful girl in long white satin dress, white powdered wigand a black beauty patch on her check. She said she had come from theyear 1777, that her father was Major Atwood, of General Washington'sstaff! Her name was Mistress Mary Atwood.

  It was a strange story she had to tell us. A cage of shining metalbars had materialized in her garden, and a mechanical man had comefrom it--a Robot ten feet tall. It had captured her; brought her to1935; left her, and vanished saying it would return.

  We went back to that house on Patton Place. The cage did return, andLarry and I fought the strange monster. We were worsted, and the Robotseized Mary and me and whirled us back into Time in its room-like cageof shining bars. Larry recovered his senses, rushed into PattonPlace, and there encountered another, smaller, Time-traveling cage,and was himself taken off in it.

  But the occupants of Larry's smaller cage were friendly. They were aman and a girl of 2930 A.D.! The girl was the Princess Tina, and theman, Harl, a young scientist of that age. With an older scientist--acripple named Tugh--Harl had invented the Time-vehicles.

  * * * * *

  We had heard of Tugh before. Mary Atwood had known him in the year1777. He had made love to her, and when repulsed had threatenedvengeance against her father. And in 1932, a cripple named Tugh hadgotten into trouble with the police and had vowed some strange weirdvengeance against the city officials and the city itself. More thanthat, the very house on Patton Place from which we had rescued MaryAtwood, was owned by this man named Tugh, who was wanted by the policebut could not be found!

  Tugh's vengeance was presently demonstrated, for in June, 1935, ahorde of Robots appeared. With flashing swords and red and violetlight beams the mechanical men spread about the city massacring thepeople; they brought midsummer snow with their frigid red rays; andthen, in a moment, torrid heat and boiling rain. Three days and nightsof terror ensued; then the Robots silently withdrew into the house onPatton Place and vanished. The New York City of 1935 lay wrecked; thevengeance of Tugh against it was complete.

  Larry, going back in Time now, was told by Harl and Princess Tina thata Robot named Migul--a mechanism almost human from the Time-world of2930--had stolen the larger cage and was running amuck through Time.The strange world of 2930 was described to Larry--a world in whichnearly-human mechanisms did all the work. These Robots, diabolicallydeveloped, were upon the verge of revolt. The world of machinery wasready to assail its human masters!

  Migul was an insubordinate Robot, and Harl and Tina were chasing it.They whirled Larry back into Time, and they saw the larger cage stopat a night in the year 1777--the same night from which Mary Atwood hadbeen stolen. They stopped there. Harl remained in the little cage toguard it, while Tina and Larry went outside.

  It was night, and the house of Major Atwood was nearby. Britishredcoats had come to capture the colonial officer; but all they foundwas his murdered body lying in the garden. Migul the Robot had chainedMary and me to the door of his cage; had briefly stopped in the gardenand killed the major, and then had departed with us.

  * * * * *

  We now went back to the Beginning of Time, for the other cage wasagain chasing us. Reaching the Beginning, we swept forward, and thewhole vast panorama of the events of Time passed in review before us.Suddenly we found that Tugh himself was hiding in our cage! We had notknown it, nor had Migul, our Robot captor. Tugh was hiding here, nottrusting Migul to carry out his orders!

  We realized now that all these events were part of the wild vengeanceof this hideously repulsive cripple. Migul was a mere machine carryingout Tugh's orders. Tugh, in 2930, was masquerading as a friend of theGovernment; but in reality it was he who was fomenting the revolt ofthe Robots.

  Tugh now took command of our cage. The smaller cage had only Harl init now, for Larry and Tina were marooned in 1777. Harl was chasing us.Tugh stopped us in the year 762 A.D. We found that the space aroundus now was a forest recently burned. Five hundred feet from us was thespace which held Harl's cage.

  Presently it materialized! Mary and I were helpless. We stood watchingTugh, as he crouched on the floor of our cage near its opened doorway.A ray cylinder was in his hand, with a wire running to a battery inthe cage corner. He had forced Mary and me to stand at the windowwhere Harl would see us and be lured to approach.

  From Harl's cage, five hundred feet across the blackened forest gladeof that day of 762, Harl came cautiously forward. Abruptly Tugh fired.His cylinder shot a horizontal beam of intense actinic light. Itstruck Harl full, and he fell.

  Swiftly his body decomposed; and soon in the sunlight of the glade laya sagging heap of black and white garments enveloping the skeleton ofwhat a moment before had been a man!

  CHAPTER XIV

  A Very Human Princess

  That night in 1777 near the home of the murdered Major Atwood broughtto Larry the most strangely helpless feeling he had ever experienced.He crouched with Tina beneath a tree in a corner of the field, gazingwith horror at the little moonlit space by the fence where theirTime-traveling vehicle should have been but now was gone.

  Marooned in 1777! Larry had not realized how desolately remote thisRevolutionary New York was from the great future city in which he hadlived. The same space; but what a gulf between him and 1935! What abarrier of Time, impassable without the shining cage!

  They crouched, whispering. "But why would he have gone, Tina?"

  "I don't know. Harl is very careful; so something or someone must havepassed along here, and he left, rather than cause a disturbance. Hewill return, of course."

  "I hope so," whispered Larry fervently. "We are marooned here, Tina!Heavens, it would be the end of us!"

  "We must wait. He will return."

  They huddled in the shadow of the tree. Behind them there was acontinued commotion at the Atwood home, and presently the mountedBritish officers came thudding past on the road, riding forheadquarters at the Bowling Green to report the strange Atwood murder.

  The night wore on. Would Harl return? If not to-night, then probablyto-morrow, or to-morrow night. In spite of his endeavor to stopcorrectly, he could so easily miss this night, these particular hours.

  Harl had met his death, as I have described. We never knew exactlywhat he did, of course, after leaving that night of 1777. It seemsprobable, however, that some passer-by startled him into flashing awayinto Time. Then he must have seen with his instrument evidence of theother cage passing, and impulsively followed it--to his death in theburned forest of the year 762.

  * * * * *

  Larry and Tina waited. The dawn presently began paling the stars; andstill Harl did not come. The little space by the fence corner wasempty.

  "It will soon be daylight," Larry whispered. "We can't stay here:we'll be discovered."

  They were anachronisms in this world; misfits; futuristic beings whodared not show themselves.

  Larry touched his companion--the slight little creature who was aPrincess in her far-distant future age. But to Larry now she was justa girl.

  "Frightened, Tina?"

  "A little."

  He laughed softly. "It would be fearful to be marooned herepermanently, wouldn't it? Yo
u don't think Harl would desert us?Purposely, I mean?"

  "No, of course not."

  "Then we'll expect him to-morrow night. He wouldn't stop in thedaylight, I guess."

  "I don't think so. He would reason that I would not expect him."

  "Then we must find shelter, and food, and be here to-morrow night. Itseems long to us, Tina, but in the cage it's just an instant--just atrifle different setting of the controls."

  She smiled her pale, stern smile. "You have learned quickly, Larry.That is true."

  A sudden emotion swept him. His hand found hers; and her fingersanswered the pressure of his own. Here in this remote Time-world theyfelt abruptly drawn together.

  He murmured, "Tina, you are--" But he never finished.

  The cage was coming! They stood tense, watching the fence cornerwhere, in the flat dawn light, the familiar misty shadow wasgathering. Harl was returning to them.

  The cage flashed silently into being. They stood peering, ready to runto it. The door slid aside.

  * * * * *

  But it was not Harl who came out. It was Tugh, the cripple. He stoodin the doorway, a thick-set, barrel-chested figure of a man in a wideleather jacket, a broad black belt and short flaring leatherpantaloons.

  "Tugh!" exclaimed Tina.

  The cripple advanced. "Princess, is it you?" He was very wary. Hisgaze shot at Larry and back to Tina. "And who is this?"

  A hideously repulsive fellow, Larry thought this Tugh. He saw hisshriveled, bent legs, crooked hips, and wide thick shoulders setaskew--a goblin, in a leather jerkin. His head was overlarge, with abulging white forehead and a mane of scraggly black hair shot withgrey. But Larry could not miss the intellectuality marking hisheavy-jowled face; the keenness of his dark-eyed gaze.

  These were instant impressions. Tina had drawn Larry forward. "Whereis Harl?" she demanded imperiously. "How have you come to have thecage, Tugh?"

  "Princess, I have much to tell," he answered, and his gaze roved thefield. "But it is dangerous here; I am glad I have found you. Harlsent me to this night, but I struck it late. Come, Tina--and yourstrange-looking friend."

  It impressed Larry then, and many times afterward, that Tugh's gaze athim was mistrustful, wary.

  "Come, Larry," said Tina. And again she demanded of Tugh, "I ask you,where is Harl?"

  "At home. Safe at home, Princess." He gestured toward Major Atwood'shouse, which now in the growing daylight showed more plainly under itsshrouding trees. "That space off there holds our other cage as youknow, Tina. You and Harl were pursuing that other cage?"

  "Yes," she agreed.

  * * * * *

  They had stopped at the doorway, where Tugh stood slightly inside.Larry whispered:

  "What does this mean, Tina?"

  Tugh said, "Migul, the mechanism, is running wild in the other cage.But you and Harl knew that?"

  "Yes," she answered, and said softly to Larry, "We will go. But,Larry, watch this Tugh! Harl and I never trusted him."

  Tugh's manner was a combination of the self-confidence of a man ofstanding and the deference due his young Princess. He was closing thedoor, and saying:

  "Migul, that crazy, insubordinate machine, captured a man from 1935and a girl from 1777. But they are safe: he did not harm them. Harl iswith them."

  "In our world, Tugh?"

  "Yes; at home. And we have Migul chained. Harl captured and subduedhim."

  Tugh was at the controls. "May I take you and this friend of yourshome, Princess?"

  She whispered to Larry, "I think it is best, don't you?"

  Larry nodded.

  She murmured, "Be watchful, Larry!" Then, louder: "Yes, Tugh. Takeus."

  Tugh was bending over the controls.

  "Ready now?"

  "Yes," said Tina.

  Larry's senses reeled momentarily as the cage flashed off into Time.

  * * * * *

  It was a smooth story which Tugh had to tell them; and he told itsmoothly. His dark eyes swung from Tina to Larry.

  "I talked with that other young man from your world. George Rankin, hesaid his name was. He is somewhat like you: dressed much the same andtalks little. The girl calls herself Mary Atwood." He went on and toldthem an elaborate, glib story, all of which was a lie. It did notwholly deceive Larry and Tina, yet they could not then prove it false.The gist of it was that Mary and I were with Harl and the subduedMigul in 2930.

  "It is strange that Harl did not come for us himself," said Tina.

  Tugh's gaze was imperturbable as he answered. "He is a clever youngman, but he cannot be expected to handle these controls with my skill,Princess, and he knows it; so he sent me. You see, he wanted very muchto strike just this night and this hour, so as not to keep youwaiting."

  He added, "I am glad to have you back. Things are not well at home,Princess. This insubordinate adventure of Migul's has been bad for theother mechanisms. News of it has spread, and the revolt is very near.What we are to do I cannot say, but I do know we did not like yourabsence."

  The trip which Larry and Tina now took to 2930 A.D. consumed, to theirconsciousness of the passing of Time, some three hours. Theydiscovered that they were hungry, and Tugh produced food and drink.

  Larry spent much of the time with Tina at the window, gazing at thechanging landscape while she told him of the events which to her werehistory--the recorded things on the Time-scroll which separated herworld and his.

  * * * * *

  Tugh busied himself about the vehicle and left them much tothemselves. They had ample opportunity to discuss him and his story ofHarl. It must be remembered that Larry had no knowledge of Tugh, savethe story which Alten had told of a cripple named Tugh in New York in1933-34; and Mary Atwood's mention of the coincidence of the Tugh sheknew in 1777.

  But Tina had known this Tugh for years. Though she, like Harl, hadnever liked him, nevertheless he was a trusted and influential man inher world. Proof of his activities in other Time-worlds, there wasnone so far, from Tina's viewpoint. Nor did Larry and Tina know as yetof the devastation of New York in 1935; nor of the murder of MajorAtwood. The capture of Mary and me, the fight with the Robot in theback yard of the house on Patton Place--in all these incidents of thebandit cage, only Migul had figured. Migul--an insubordinate, crazymechanism running amuck.

  Yet upon Larry and Tina was a premonition that Tugh, here with themnow and so suavely friendly, was their real enemy.

  "I wouldn't trust him," Larry whispered, "any further than I can seehim. He's planning something, but I don't know what."

  "But perhaps--and this I have often thought, Larry--perhaps it is hisaspect. He looks so repulsive--"

  Larry shook his head. "He does, for a fact; but I don't mean that.What Mary Atwood told me of the Tugh she knew, described the fellow.And so did Alten describe him. And in 1934 he murdered a girl: don'tforget that, Tina--he, or someone who looked remarkably like him, andhad the same name."

  But they knew that the best thing they could do now was to get to2930. Larry wanted to join me again, and Tugh maintained I was there.Well, they would soon find out....

  * * * * *

  As they passed the shadowy world of 1935, a queer emotion grippedLarry. This was his world, and he was speeding past it to the future.He realized then that he wanted to be assured of my safety, and thatof Mary Atwood and Harl; but what lay closest to his heart was thewelfare of the Princess Tina. Princess? He never thought of her asthat, save that it was a title she carried. She seemed just a small,strangely-solemn white-faced girl. He could not conceive returning tohis own world and having her speed on, leaving him forever.

  His thoughts winged ahead. He touched Tina as they stood together atthe window gazing out at the shadowy New York City. It was now 1940.

  "Tina," he said, "if our friends are safe in your world--"

  "If only they are, Larry!"

  "An
d if your people there are in trouble, in danger--you will let mehelp?"

  She turned abruptly to regard him, and he saw a mist of tenderness inthe dark pools of her eyes.

  "In history, Larry, I have often been interested in reading of astrange custom outgrown by us and supposed to be meaningless. Yetmaybe it is not. I mean--"

  She was suddenly breathless. "I mean even a Princess, as they call me,likes to--to be human. I want to--I mean I've often wondered--andyou're so dear--I want to try it. Was it like this? Show me."

  She reached up, put her arms about his neck and kissed him!

  CHAPTER XV

  _A Thousand Years into the Future_

  1930 to 2930--a thousand years in three hours. It was sufficientlyslow traveling so that Larry could see from the cage window the actualdetailed flow of movement: the changing outline of material objectsaround him. There had been the open country of Revolutionary timeswhen this space was north of the city. It was a grey, ghostlylandscape of trees and the road and the shadowy outlines of the Atwoodhouse five hundred feet away.

  Larry saw the road widen. The fence suddenly was gone. The trees weresuddenly gone. The shapes of houses were constantly appearing; thenmelting down again, with others constantly rearing up to take theirplaces; and always there were more houses, and larger, more enduringones. And then the Atwood house suddenly melted: a second or two, andall evidence of it and the trees about it were gone.

  There was no road; it was a city street now; and it had widened sothat the cage was poised near the middle of it. And presently thehouses were set solid along its borders.

  At 1910 Larry began to recognize the contour of the buildings: Theantiquated Patton Place. But the flowing changing outlines adjustedthemselves constantly to a more familiar form. The new apartmenthouse, down the block in which Larry and I lived, rose and assembleditself like a materializing spectre. A wink or two of Larry's eyelidsand it was there. He recalled the months of its construction.

  The cage, with Larry as a passenger, could not have stopped in theseyears: he realized it, now. There was a nameless feeling, a repulsionagainst stopping; it was indescribable, but he was aware of it. He hadlived these years once, and they were forbidden to him again.

  The cage was still in its starting acceleration. They swept throughthe year 1935, and then Larry was indefinably aware that the forbiddenarea had passed.

  * * * * *

  They went through those few days of June, 1935, during which Tugh'sRobots had devastated the city, but it was too brief an action to makea mark that Larry could see. It left a few very transitory marks,however. Larry noticed that along the uneven line of ghostlyroof-tops, blobs of emptiness had appeared; he saw a short distanceaway that several of the houses had melted down into ragged, tumbledheaps. These were where the bombs had struck, dropped by theGovernment planes in an endeavor to wreck the Tugh house from whichthe Robots were appearing. But the ragged, broken areas were filled ina second--almost as soon as Larry realized they were there--and newand larger buildings than before appeared.

  At sight of all this he murmured to Tina, "Something has happenedhere. I wonder what?"

  He chanced to turn, and saw that Tugh was regarding him very queerly;but in a moment he forgot it in the wonders of the passage into hisfuture.

  This growing, expanding city! It had seemed a giant to Larry in 1935,especially after he had compared it to what it was in 1777. But now,in 1950, and beyond to the turn of the century, he stood amazed at theenormity of the shadowy structures rearing their spectral towersaround him. For some years Patton Place, a backward section, held itsgeneral form; then abruptly the city engulfed it. Larry saw monstrousbuildings of steel and masonry rising a thousand feet above him. Foran instant, as they were being built he saw their skeleton outlines;and then they were complete. Yet they were not enduring, for in everyflowing detail they kept changing.

  An overhead sidewalk went like a balcony along what had been PattonPlace. Bridges and archways spanned the street. Then there came atriple bank of overhead roadways. A distance away, a hundred feetabove the ground level, the shadowy form of what seemed a monorailstructure showed for a moment. It endured for what might have been ahundred years, and then it was gone....

  * * * * *

  This monstrous city! By 2030 there was a vast network of trafficlevels over what had been a street. It was an arcade, now, open at thetop near the cage; but further away Larry saw where the giantbuildings had flowed and mingled over it, with the viaducts, spiderbridges and pedestrian levels plunging into tunnels to pierce throughthem.

  And high overhead, where the little sky which was left still showed,Larry saw the still higher outlines of a structure which quiteevidently was a huge aerial landing stage for airliners.

  It was an incredible city! There were spots of enduring light aroundLarry now--the city lights which for months and years shone hereunchanged. The cage was no longer outdoors. The street which hadbecome an open arcade was now wholly closed. A roof was overhead--acity roof, to shut out the inclement weather. There was artificiallight and air and weather down here, and up on the roof additionalspace for the city's teeming activities.

  Larry could see only a shadowy narrow vista, here indoors, but hisimagination supplied visions of what the monstrous, incredible citymust be. There was a roof, perhaps, over all Manhattan. Bridges andviaducts would span to the great steel and stone structures across therivers, so that water must seem to be in a canyon far underground.There would be a cellar to this city, incredibly intricate withconduits of wires and drainage pipes, and on the roof rain or snowwould fall unnoticed by the millions of workers. Children born here inpoverty might never yet have seen the blue sky and the sunlight, orknow that grass was green and lush and redolent when moist withmorning dew....

  Larry fancied this now to be the climax of city building here onearth; the city was a monster, now, unmanageable, threatening todestroy the humans who had created it.... He tried to envisage theworld; the great nations; other cities like this one. Freighttransportation would go by rail and underseas, doubtless, and all thepassengers by air....

  * * * * *

  Tina, with her knowledge of history, could sketch the events. TheYellow War--the white races against the Orientals--was over by theyear 2000. The three great nations were organized in anotherhalf-century: the white, the yellow and the black.

  By the year 2000, the ancient dirigibles had proven impractical, andgreat airliners of the plane type were encircling the earth. Newmotors, wing-spreads, and a myriad devices made navigation of theupper altitudes possible. At a hundred thousand feet, upon all theGreat Circle routes, liners were rushing at nearly a thousand miles anhour. They would halt at intervals, to allow helicopter tenders tocome up to transfer descending passengers.

  Then the etheric wave-thrust principle was discovered: by 2500 A.D.man was voyaging out into space and Interplanetary travel began. Thisbrought new problems: a rush of new millions of humans to live uponour Earth; new wars; new commerce in peace times; new ideas; newscientific knowledge....

  By 2500, the city around Larry must have reached its height. It stayedthere a half century; and then it began coming down. Its degenerationwas slow, in the beginning. First, there might have been a hole in thearcade which was not repaired. Then others would appear, as theneglect spread. The population left. The great buildings of metal andstone, so solidly appearing to the brief lifetime of a singleindividual, were impermanent over the centuries.

  By 2600, the gigantic ghosts had all melted down. They lay in ashadowy pile, burying the speeding cage. There was no stopping here;there was no space unoccupied in which they could stop. Larry couldsee only the tangled spectres of broken, rusting, rotting metal andstone.

  He wondered what could have done it. A storm of nature? Or had mankindstrangely turned decadent, and rushed back in a hundred years or so tosavagery? It could not have been the latter, because very soon th
eruins were moving away: the people were clearing the city site forsomething new. For fifty years it went on.

  * * * * *

  Tina explained it. The age of steam had started the great city of NewYork, and others like it, into its monstrous congestion of humanactivity. There was steam for power and steam for slow transportationby railroads and surface ships. Then the conquest of the air, and thetransportation of power by electricity, gradually changed things. Butman was slow to realize his possibilities. Even in 1930, all the newelements existed; but the great cities grew monstrous of their ownmomentum. Business went to the cities because the people were there;workers flocked in because the work was there to call them.

  But soon the time came when the monster city was too unwieldy. Thetraffic, the drainage, the water supply could not cope withconditions. Still, man struggled on. The workers were mereautomatons--pallid attendants of machinery; people living in a worldof beauty who never had seen it; who knew of nothing but the cityarcades where the sun never shone and where amusements were asartificial as the light and air.

  Then man awakened to his folly. Disease broke out in New York City in2551, and in a month swept eight million people into death. The citieswere proclaimed impractical, unsafe. And suddenly the people realizedhow greatly they hated the city; how strangely beautiful the worldcould be in the fashion God created it....

  There was, over the next fifty years, an exodus to the rural sections.Food was produced more cheaply, largely because it was produced moreabundantly. Man found his wants suddenly simplified.

  And business found that concentration was unnecessary. The telephoneand television made personal contacts not needed. The aircraft, thehigh-speed auto-trucks over modern speedways, the aeroplane-motoredmonorails, the rocket-trains--all these shortened distance. And, mostimportant of all, the transportation of electrical energy from greatcentral power companies made small industrial units practical evenupon remote farms. The age of electricity came into its own. Thecities were doomed....

  * * * * *

  Larry saw, through 2600 and 2700 A.D., a new form of civilizationrising around him. At first it seemed a queer combination of the oldfashioned village and a strange modernism. There were, here uponManhattan Island, metal houses, widely spaced in gardens, andelectrically powered factories of unfamiliar aspect. Overhead wereskeleton structures, like landing stages; and across the furtherdistance was the fleeting, transitory wraith of a monorail air-road.Along the river banks were giant docks for surface vessels and sub-seafreighters. There was a little concentration here, but not much. Manhad learned his lesson.

  This was a new era. Man was striving really to play, as well as work.But the work had to be done. With the constant development ofmechanical devices, there was always a new machine devised to help theoperation of its fellow. And over it all was the hand of the human,until suddenly the worker found that he was no more than an attendantupon an inanimate thing which did everything more skilfully than hecould do it. Thus came the idea of the Robot--something to attend, tooversee, to operate machines. In Larry's time it had already begunwith a myriad devices of "automatic control." In Tina's Time-world itreached its ultimate--and diabolical--development....

  At 2900, Larry saw, five hundred feet to the east, the walls of a longlow laboratory rising. The other cage--which in 1777 was in MajorAtwood's garden, and in 1935 was in the back yard of the Tugh house onBeckman Place--was housed now in 2930, in a room of thislaboratory....

  At 2905, with the vehicle slowing for its stopping, Tina gesturedtoward the walls of her palace, whose shadowy forms were rising closeat hand. Then the palace garden grew and flourished, and Larry sawthat this cage he was in was set within this garden.

  "We are almost there, Larry," she said.

  "Yes," he answered. An emotion gripped him. "Tina, your world--whyit's so strange! But you are not strange."

  "Am I not, Larry?"

  He smiled at her; he felt like showing her again that the ancientcustom of kissing was not wholly meaningless, but Tugh was regardingthem.

  "I was comparing," said Larry, "that girl Mary Atwood, from the year1777, and you. You are so different in looks, in dress, but you'rejust--girls."

  She laughed. "The world changes, Larry, but not human nature."

  "Ready?" called Tugh. "We are here, Tina."

  "Yes, Tugh. You have the dial set for the proper night and hour?"

  "Of course. I make no mistake. Did I not invent these dials?"

  The cage slackened through a day of sunlight; plunged into a night;and slid to its soundless, reeling halt....

  Tina drew Larry to the door and opened it upon a fragrant garden,somnolently drowsing in the moonlight.

  "This is my world, Larry," she said. "And here is my home."

  * * * * *

  Tugh was with them as they left the cage. He said:

  "This is the tri-night hour of the very night you left here. PrincessTina. You see, I calculated correctly."

  "Where did you leave Harl and the two visitors?" she demanded.

  "Here. Right here."

  Across the garden Larry saw three dark forms coming forward. They werethree small Robots of about Tina's stature--domestic servants of thepalace. They crowded up, crying:

  "Master Tugh! Princess!"

  "What is it?" Tugh asked.

  The hollow voices echoed with excitement as one of them said:

  "Master Tugh, there has been murder here! We have dared tell no onebut you or the Princess. Harl is murdered!"

  Larry chanced to see Tugh's astonished face, and in the horror of themoment a feeling came to Larry that Tugh was acting unnaturally. Heforgot it at once; but later he was to recall it forcibly, and torealize that the treacherous Tugh had planned this with these Robots.

  "Master Tugh, Harl is murdered! Migul escaped and murdered Harl, andtook the body away with him!"

  Larry was stricken dumb. Tugh seized the little Robot by his metalshoulders. "Liar! What do you mean?"

  Tina gasped, "Where are our visitors--the young man and the girl?"

  "Migul took them!"

  "Where?" Tina demanded.

  "We don't know. We think very far down in the caverns of machinery.Migul said he was going to feed them to the machines!"

  CHAPTER XVI

  _The New York of 2930_

  Larry stood alone at an upper window of the palace gazing out at thesomnolent moonlit city. It was an hour or two before dawn. Tina andTugh had started almost at once into the underground caverns to whichTina was told Migul had fled with his two captives. They would nottake Larry with them; the Robot workers in the subterranean chamberswere all sullen and upon the verge of a revolt, and the sight of astrange human would have aroused them dangerously.

  "It should not take long," Tina had said hastily. "I will give you aroom in which to wait for me."

  "And there is food and drink," Tugh suavely urged. "And most surelyyou need sleep. You too Princess," he suddenly added. "Let me go intothe caverns alone: I can do better than you; these Robots obey me. Ithink I know where that rascally Migul has hidden."

  "Rascally?" Larry burst out. "Is that what you call it when you'vejust heard that it committed murder? Tina. I won't stay: nor will Ilet--"

  "Wait!" said Tina. "Tugh, look here--"

  "The young man from 1935 is very positive what he will and what hewon't," Tugh observed sardonically. He drew his cloak around his squatmisshapen body, and shrugged.

  "But I won't let you go," Larry finished. The palace was somnolent;the officials were asleep: none had heard of the murder. Strangely laxwas the human government here. Larry had sensed this when he suggestedthat police or an official party be sent at once to capture Migul andrescue Mary Atwood and me.

  "It could not be done," Tina exclaimed. "To organize such a partywould take hours. And--"

  "And the Robots," Tugh finished with a sour smile, "would openlyrevolt when such a party
came at them! You have no idea what yousuggest, young man. To avoid an open revolt--that is our chief aim.Besides, if you rushed at Migul it would frighten him; and then hewould surely kill his captives, if he has not done so already."

  * * * * *

  That silenced Larry. He stared at them hopelessly while they argued itout: and the three small domesticated Robots stood by, listeningcuriously.

  "I'll go with you, Tugh." Tina decided. "Perhaps, without making anydemonstration of force, we can find Migul."

  Tugh bowed. "Your will is mine, Princess. I think I can find him andcontrol him to prevent harm to his captives."

  He was a good actor, that Tugh; he convinced Larry and Tina of hissincerity. His dark eyes flashed as he added, "And if I get control ofhim and find he's murdered Harl, we will have him no more. I'lldisconnect him! Smash him! Quietly, of course, Princess."

  They led Larry through a dim silent corridor of the palace, past twosleepy-faced human guards and two or three domesticated Robots.Ascending two spiral metal stairways to the upper third floor of thepalace they left Larry in his room.

  "By dawn or soon after we will return," said Tina "But you try andsleep; there is nothing you can do now."

  "You'll be careful, Tina?" The helpless feeling upon Larry suddenlyintensified. Subconsciously he was aware of the menace upon him andTina, but he could not define it.

  She pressed his hand. "I will be careful; that I promise."

  She left with Tugh. At once a feeling of loneliness leaped upon Larry.

  He found the apartment a low-vaulted metal room. There was the sheenof dim, blue-white illumination from hidden lights, disclosing thepadded metal furniture: a couch, low and comfortable; a table set withfood and drink; low chairs, strangely fashioned, and cabinets againstthe wall which seemed to be mechanical devices for amusement. Therewas a row of instrument controls which he guessed were the roomtemperature, ventilating and lighting mechanisms. It was an oddlyfuturistic room. The windows were groups of triangles--the uppersections prisms, to bend the light from the sky into the room'sfurthest recesses. The moonlight came through the prisms, now, andspread over the cream-colored rug and the heavy wall draperies. Theleaded prism casements laid a pattern of bars on the floor. The roomheld a faint whisper of mechanical music.

  * * * * *

  Larry stood at one of the windows gazing out over the drowsing city.The low metal buildings, generally of one or two levels, lay pale greyin the moonlight. Gardens and trees surrounded them. The streets werewide roadways, lined with trees. Ornamental vegetation was everywhere;even the flat-roofed house tops were set with gardens, little whitepebbled paths, fountains and pergolas.

  A mile or so away, a river gleamed like a silver ribbon--the Hudson.To the south were docks, low against the water, with rows ofblue-white spots of light. The whole city was close to the ground, butoccasionally, especially across the river, skeleton landing stagesrose a hundred feet into the air.

  The scene, at this hour just before dawn, was somnolent and peaceful.It was a strange New York, so different from the sleepless city ofLarry's time! There were a few moving lights in the streets, but notmany; they seemed to be lights carried by pedestrians. Off by thedocks, at the river surface, rows of colored lights were slowlycreeping northward: a sub-sea freighter arriving from Eurasia. And asLarry watched, from the southern sky a line of light materialized intoan airliner which swept with a low humming throb over the city andalighted upon a distant stage.

  * * * * *

  Larry's attention went again to the Hudson river. At the nearest pointto him there was a huge dam blocking it. North of the dam the riversurface was at least two hundred feet higher than to the south. It layabove the dam like a placid canal, with low palisades its western bankand a high dyke built up along the eastern city side. The water wentin spillways through the dam, forming again into the old natural riverbelow it and flowing with it to the south.

  The dam was not over a mile or so from Larry's window; in his time itmight have been the western end of Christopher Street. The moonlightshone on the massive metal of it: the water spilled through it in adozen shining cascades. There was a low black metal structure perchedhalfway up the lower side of the dam, a few bluish lights showingthrough its windows. Though Larry did not know it then, this was theNew York Power House. Great transformers were here, operated byturbines in the dam. The main power came over cables from Niagara: wastransformed and altered here and sent into the air as radio-power forall the New York District.[3]

  [Footnote 3: In 2930, all aircraft engines were operated byradio-power transmitted by senders in various districts. The New YorkPower House controlled a local district of about two hundred milesradius.]

  Larry crossed his room to gaze through north and eastward windows. Hesaw now that the grounds of this three-story building of Tina's palacewere surrounded by a ten-foot metal wall, along whose top were wiressuggesting that it was electrified for defense. The garden lay justbeneath Larry's north window. Through the tree branches the gardenpaths, beds of flowers and the fountains were visible. One-storypalace wings partially enclosed the garden space, and outside was theelectrified wall. The Time-traveling cage stood faintly shining in thedimness of the garden under the spreading foliage.

  * * * * *

  To the east, beyond the palace wall, there was an open garden ofverdure crossed by a roadway. The nearest building was five hundredfeet away. There was a small, barred gate in the palace walls beyondit. The road led to this other building--a squat, single-storied metalstructure. This was a Government laboratory, operated by and in chargeof Robots. It was almost square: two or three hundred feet in lengthand no more than thirty feet high, with a flat roof in the center ofwhich was perched a little metal conning tower surmounted by a sendingaerial. As Larry stood there, the broadcast magnified voice of a Robotdroned out over the quiet city:

  "Trinight plus two hours. All is well."

  Strange mechanical voice with a formula half ancient, halfsuper-modern!

  It was in this metal laboratory, Larry knew, that the otherTime-traveling cage was located. And beneath it was the entrance tothe great caverns where the Robots worked attending inert machinery tocarry on the industry of this region. The night was very silent, butnow Larry was conscious of a faraway throb--a humming, throbbingvibration from under the ground: the blended hum of a myriad mufflednoises. Work was going on down there; manifold mechanical activities.All was mechanical: while the humans who had devised the mechanismsslept under the trees in the moonlight of the surface city.

  * * * * *

  Tina had gone with Tugh down into those caverns, to locate Migul, tofind Mary Atwood and me.... The oppression, the sense of being astranger alone here in this world, grew upon Larry. He left thewindows and began pacing the room. Tina should soon return. Or haddisaster come upon us all?...

  Larry's thoughts were frightening. If Tina did not return, what wouldhe do? He could not operate the Time-cage. He would go to theofficials of the palace; he thought cynically of the extraordinarychanges time had brought to New York City, to all the world. Thesehumans now must be very fatuous. To the mechanisms they had relegatedall the work, all industrial activity. Inevitably, through thegenerations, decadence must have come. Mankind would be no longerefficient; that was an attribute of the machines. Larry told himselfthat these officials, knowing of impending trouble with the Robots,were fatuously trustful that the storm would pass without breaking.They were, indeed, as we very soon learned.

  Larry ate a little of the food which was in the room, then lay down onthe couch. He did not intend to sleep, but merely to wait until afterdawn; and if Tina had not returned by then he would do somethingdrastic about it. But what? He lay absorbed by his gloomy thoughts....

  But they were not all gloomy. Some were about Tina--so very human, andyet so strange a little Princess.

 
; CHAPTER XVII

  _Harl's Confession_

  Larry was awakened by a hand upon his shoulder. He struggled toconsciousness, and heard his name being called.

  "Larry! Wake up, Larry!"

  Tina was bending over him, and it was late afternoon! The day forwhich he had been waiting had come and gone; the sun was dropping lowin the west behind the shining river; the dam showed frowning, withthe Power House clinging to its side like an eagle's eyrie.

  Tina sat on Larry's couch and explained what she had done. Tugh andshe had gone to the nearby laboratory building. The Robots weresullen, but still obedient, and had admitted them. The otherTime-traveling cage was there, lying quiescent in its place, but itwas unoccupied.

  None of the Robots would admit having seen Migul; nor the arrival ofthe cage; nor the strangers from the past. Then Tugh and Tina hadstarted down into the subterranean caverns. But it was obviously verydangerous; the Robots at work down there were hostile to theirPrincess; so Tugh had gone on alone.

  "He says he can control the Robots," Tina explained, "and Larry, itseems that he can. He went on and I came back."

  "Where is he now? Why didn't you wake me up?"

  "You needed the sleep," she said smilingly; "and there was nothing youcould do. Tugh is not yet come. He must have gone a long distance;must surely have learned where Migul is hiding. He should be back anytime."

  * * * * *

  Tina had seen the Government Council. The city was proceedingnormally. There was no difficulty with Robots anywhere save here inNew York, and the council felt that the affair would come to nothing.

  "The Council told me," said Tina indignantly, "that much of the menacewas the exaggeration of my own fancy, and that Tugh has the Robotswell controlled. They place much trust in Tugh; I wish I could."

  "You told them about me?"

  "Yes, of course; and about George Rankin, and Mary Atwood. And theloss of Harl: he is missing, not proven murdered, as they very wellpointed out to me. They have named a time to-morrow to give youaudience, and told me to keep you out of sight in the meanwhile. Theyblame this Time-traveling for the Robots' insurgent ideas. Strangersexcite the thinking mechanisms."

  "You think my friends will be rescued?" demanded Larry.

  She regarded him soberly. "I hope so--oh, I do! I fear for them asmuch as you do, Larry. I know you think I take it lightly, but--"

  "Not that," Larry protested. "Only--"

  "I have not known what to do. The officials refuse any open aggressionagainst the Robots, because it would precipitate exactly what wefear--which is nearly a fact: it would. But there is one thing I haveto do. I have been expecting Tugh to return every moment, and this Ido not want him to know about. There's a mystery concerning Harl, andno one else knows of it but myself. I want you with me, Larry: I donot want to go alone; I--for the first time in my life, Larry--I thinkI am afraid!"

  * * * * *

  She huddled against him and he put his arm about her. And Larry's truesituation came to him, then. He was alone in this strange Time-world,with only this girl for a companion. She was but a frightened, almosthelpless girl, for all she bore the title of traditional Princess, andshe was surrounded by inefficient, fatuous officials--among them Tugh,who was a scoundrel, undoubtedly. Larry suddenly recalled Tugh's look,when, in the garden, the domestic Robots had told the story of Harl'smurder; and like a light breaking on him, he was now wholly aware ofTugh's duplicity. He was convinced he would have to act for himself,with only this girl Tina to help him.

  "Mystery?" he said. "What mystery is there about Harl?"

  She told him now that Harl had once, a year ago, taken her aside andmade her promise that if anything happened to him--in the event of hisdeath or disappearance--she would go to his private work-room, where,in a secret place which he described, she would find a confession.

  "A confession of his?" Larry demanded.

  "Yes; he said so. And he would say no more than that. It is somethingof which he was ashamed, or guilty, which he wanted me to know. Heloved me, Larry. I realized it, though he never said so. And I'm goingnow to his room, to see what it was he wanted me to know. I would havegone alone, earlier; but I got suddenly frightened; I want you withme."

  They were unarmed. Larry cursed the fact, but Tina had no way ofgetting a weapon without causing official comment. Larry started forthe window where the city stretched, more active now, under the redand gold glow of a setting sun. Lights were winking on; the dusk oftwilight was at hand.

  "Come now," said Tina, "before Tugh returns."

  "Where is Harl's room?"

  "Down under the palace in the sub-cellar. The corridors are desertedat this hour, and no one will see us."

  * * * * *

  They left Larry's room and traversed a dim corridor on whose paddedfloor their footsteps were soundless. Through distant arcades, voicessounded; there was music in several of the rooms; it struck Larry thatthis was a place of diversion for humans with no work to do. Tinaavoided the occupied rooms. Domestic Robots were occasionallydistantly visible, but Tina and Larry encountered none.

  They descended a spiral stairway and passed down a corridor from themain building to a cross wing. Through a window Larry saw that theywere at the ground level. The garden was outside; there was a glimpseof the Time-cage standing there.

  Another stairway, then another, they descended beneath the ground. Thecorridor down here seemed more like a tunnel. There was a cave-likeopen space, with several tunnels leading from it in differentdirections. This once had been part of the sub-cellar of the giganticNew York City--these tunnels ramifying into underground chambers, mostof which had now fallen into disuse. But few had been preservedthrough the centuries, and they now were the caverns of the Robots.

  Tina indicated a tunnel extending eastward, a passage leading to aroom beneath the Robot laboratory. Tugh and Tina had used it thatmorning. Gazing down its blue-lit length Larry saw, fifty feet or soaway, that there was a metal-grid barrier which must be part of theelectrical fortifications of the palace. A human guard was sittingthere at a tiny gate-way, a hood-light above him, illumining his blackand white garbed figure.

  Tina called softly. "All well, Alent? Tugh has not passed back?"

  "No, Princess," he answered, standing erect. The voices echoed throughthe confined space with a muffled blur.

  "Let no one pass but humans, Alent."

  "That is my order," he said. He had not noticed Larry, whom Tina hadpushed into a shadow against the wall. The Princess waved at the guardand turned away, whispering to Larry:

  "Come!"

  There were rooms opening off this corridor--decrepit dungeons, most ofthem seemed to Larry. He had tried to keep his sense of direction, andfigured they were now under the palace garden. Tina stopped abruptly.There were no lights here, only the glow from one at a distance. ToLarry it was an eery business.

  "What is it?" he whispered.

  "Wait! I thought I heard something."

  In the dead, heavy silence Larry found that there was much to hear.

  Voices very dim from the palace overhead; infinitely faint music; theclammy sodden drip of moisture from the tunnel roof. And, permeatingeverything, the faint hum of machinery.

  Tina touched him in the gloom. "It's nothing, I guess. Though Ithought I heard a man's voice."

  "Overhead?"

  "No; down here."

  * * * * *

  There was a dark, arched door near at hand. Tina entered it andfumbled for a switch, and in the soft light that came Larry saw anunoccupied apartment very similar to the one he had had upstairs, savethat this was much smaller.

  "Harl's room," said Tina. She prowled along the wall where audiblebook-cylinders[4] stood in racks, searching for a title. Presently shefound a hidden switch, pressed it, and a small section of the caseswung out, revealing a concealed compartment. Larry saw her fingerstrembling as she drew o
ut a small brass cylinder.

  [Footnote 4: Cylinder records of books which by machinery gave audiblerendition, in similar fashion to the radio-phonograph.]

  "This must be it, Larry," she said.

  They took it to a table which held a shaded light. Within the cylinderwas a scroll of writing. Tina unrolled it and held it under the light,while Larry stood breathless, watching her.

  "Is it what you wanted?" Larry murmured.

  "Yes. Poor Harl!"

  She read aloud to Larry the gist of it in the few closing paragraphs.

  "... and so I want to confess to you that I have been taking credit for that which is not mine. I wish I had the courage to tell you personally; someday I think I shall. I did not help Tugh invent our Time-traveling cages. I was in the palace garden one night some years ago when the cage appeared. Tugh is a man from a future Time-world; just what date ahead of now, I do not know, for he has never been willing to tell me. He captured me. I promised him I would say nothing, but help him pretend that we had invented the cage he had brought with him from the future. Tugh told me he invented them. It was later that he brought the other cage here.

  "I was an obscure young man here a few years ago. I loved you even then, Tina: I think you have guessed that. I yielded to the temptation--and took the credit with Tugh.

  "I do love you, though I think I shall never have the courage to tell you so.

  Harl."

  * * * * *

  Tina rolled up the paper. "Poor Harl! So all the praise we gave himfor his invention was undeserved!"

  But Larry's thoughts were on Tugh. So the fellow was not of this eraat all! He had come from a Time still further in the future!

  A step sounded in the doorway behind them. They swung around to findTugh standing there, with his thick misshapen figured huddled in theblack cloak.

  "Tugh!"

  "Yes, Princess, no less than Tugh. Alent told me as I came throughthat you were down here. I saw your light, here in Harl's room andcame."

  "Did you find Migul and his captives--the girl from 1777 and the manof 1935?"

  "No, Princess, Migul has fled with them," was the cripple's answer. Headvanced into the room and pushed back his black hood. The blue lightshone on his massive-jawed face with a lurid sheen. Larry stood backand watched him. It was the first time that he had had opportunity ofobserving Tugh closely. The cripple was smiling sardonically.

  "I have no fear for the prisoners," he added in his suave, silkyfashion. "That crazy mechanism would not dare harm them. But it hasfled with them into some far-distant recess of the caverns. I couldnot find them."

  "Did you try?" Larry demanded abruptly.

  Tugh swung on him. "Yes, young sir, I tried." It seemed that Tugh'sblack eyes narrowed; his heavy jaw clicked as he snapped it shut. Thesmile on his face faded, but his voice remained imperturbable as headded:

  "You are aggressive, young Larry--but to no purpose.... Princess, Ilike not the attitude of the Robots. Beyond question some of them musthave seen Migul, but they would not tell me so. I still think I cancontrol them, though. I hope so."

  * * * * *

  Larry could think of nothing to say. It seemed to him childish that heshould stand listening to a scoundrel tricking this girl Tina. A dozenwild schemes of what he might do to try and rescue Mary Atwood and merevolved in his mind, but they all seemed wholly impractical.

  "The Robots are working badly," Tugh went on. "In the north districtone of the great foundries where they are casting the plates for thenew Inter-Allied airliner has ceased operations. The Robot workmenwere sullen, inefficient, neglectful. The inert machinery was illcared for, and it went out of order. I was there, Princess, for anhour or more to-day. They have started up again now; it wasfundamentally no more than a burned bearing which a Robot failed tooil properly."

  "Is that what you call searching for Migul?" Larry burst out. "Tina,see here--isn't there something we can do?" Larry found himselfignoring Tugh. "I'm not going to stand around! Can't we send a squadof police after Migul?--go with them--actually make an effort to findthem? This man Tugh certainly has not tried!"

  "Have I not?" Tugh's cloak parted as he swung on Larry. His bent legswere twitching with his anger; his voice was a harsh rasp. "I like notyour insolence. I am doing all that can be done."

  * * * * *

  Larry held his ground as Tugh fronted him. He had a wild thought thatTugh had a weapon under his cloak.

  "Perhaps you are," said Larry. "But to me it seems--"

  Tugh turned away. His gaze went to the cylinder which Tina was stillclutching. His sardonic smile returned.

  "So Harl made a confession, Princess?"

  "That," she said, "is none--"

  "Of my affair? Oh, but it is. I was here in the archway and I heardyou read it. A very nice young man, was Harl. I hope Migul has notmurdered him."

  "You come from future Time?" Tina began.

  "Yes, Princess! I must admit it now. I invented the cages."

  Larry murmured to himself, "You stole them, probably."

  "But my Government and I had a quarrel, so I decided to leave my ownTime-world and come back to yours--permanently. I hope you will keepthe secret. I have been here so long. Princess, I am really one of younow. At heart, certainly."

  "From when did you come?" she demanded.

  * * * * *

  He bowed slightly. "I think that may remain my own affair, Tina. It isthrough no fault of mine I am outlawed. I shall never return." Headded earnestly, "Do not you think we waste time? I am agreed withyoung Larry that something drastic must be done about Migul. Have youseen the Council about it to-day?"

  "Yes. They want you to come to them at once."

  "I shall. But the Council easily may decide upon something too rash."He lowered his voice, and on his face Larry saw a strange,unfathomable look. "Princess, at any moment there may be a Robotuprising. Is the Power House well guarded by humans?"

  "Yes," she said.

  "No Robots in or about it? Tina, I do not want to frighten you, but Ithink our first efforts should be for defense. The Council acts slowlyand stubbornly. What I advise them to do may be done, and may not. Iwas thinking. If we could get to the Power House--Do you realize,Tina, that if the Robots should suddenly break into rebellion, theywould attack first of all the Power House?[5] It was my idea--"

  [Footnote 5: The Power House on the Hudson dam was operated by inertmachinery and manned entirely by humans--the only place in the citywhich was so handled. This was because of its extreme importance. Theair-power was broadcast from there. Without that power the entireseveral hundred mile district around New York would be dead. Noaircraft could enter, save perhaps some skilfully handled motorlessglider, if aided by sufficiently fortuitous air currents. Everysurface vehicle used this power, and every sub-sea freighter. The citylights, and every form of city power, were centralized here also, aswell as the broadcasting audible and etheric transmitters andreceivers. Without the Power House, New York City and all itsneighborhood would be inoperative, and cut off from the outsideworld.]

  Tugh suddenly broke off, and all stood listening. There was acommotion overhead in the palace. They heard the thud of runningfootsteps; human voices raised to shouts; and, outside the palace,other voices. A ventilating shaft nearby brought them down plainly.There were the guttural, hollow voices of shouting Robots, the clankof their metal bodies; the ring of steel, as though with sword-bladesthey were thumping their metal thighs.

  A Robot mob was gathered close outside the palace walls. The revolt ofthe Robots had come!

  CHAPTER XVIII

  _Tugh, the Clever Man_

  "Sit quiet, George Rankin. And you, Mistress Mary; you will both bequite safe with Migul if you are docile."

  Tugh stood before us. We were in a d
im recess of a great cavern withthe throb of whirring machinery around us. It was the same day which Ihave just described; Larry was at this moment asleep in the palaceroom. Tugh and Tina had come searching for Migul; and Tugh hadcontrived to send Tina back. Then he had come directly to us, findingus readily since we were hidden where he had told Migul to hide us.

  This cavern was directly beneath the Robot laboratory in which theTime-traveling cage was placed. A small spiral stairway led downwardsome two levels, opening into a great, luridly lighted room. Hugeinert machines stood about. Great wheels were flashing as theyrevolved, turning the dynamos to generate the several types of currentused by the city's underground industrial activities.

  It was a tremendous subterranean room. I saw only one small section ofit; down the blue-lit aisles the rows of machines may have stretchedfor half a mile or more. The low hum of them was an incessant poundagainst my senses. The great inert mechanisms had tiny lights uponthem which gleamed like eyes. The illumined gauge-faces--each of themI passed seemed staring at me. The brass jackets were polished untilthey shone with the sheen of the overhead tube lights; the giantwheels flashed smoothly upon oiled bearings. They were in everyfashion of shape and size, these inert machines. Some towered towardthe metal-beamed ceiling, with great swaying pendulums that tickedlike a giant clock. Some clanked with eccentric cams--a jarring rhythmas though the heart of the thing were limping with its beat. Othershad a ragged, frightened pulse; others stood placid, outwardlymotionless under smooth, polished cases, but humming inside with amyriad blended sounds.

  * * * * *

  Inert machines. Yet some were capable of locomotion. There was a smalltruck on wheels which were set in universal joints. Of its ownpower--radio controlled perhaps, so that it seemed acting of its ownvolition--it rolled up and down one of the aisles, stopping at setintervals and allowing a metal arm lever in it to blow out a tiny jetof oil. One of the attending Robots encountered it in an aisle, andthe cart swung automatically aside. The Robot spoke to the cart;ordered it away; and the tone of his order, registering upon somesensitive mechanism, whirled the cart around and sent it rolling toanother aisle section.

  The strange perfection of machinery! I realized there was no linesharply to be drawn between the inert machine and the sentient,thinking Robots. That cart, for instance, was almost a connectinglink.

  There were also Robots here of many different types. Some of them wereeight or ten feet in stature, in the fashion of a man: Migul was ofthis design. Others were small, with bulging foreheads and bulgingchest plates: Larry saw this type as domestics in the palace. Stillothers were little pot-bellied things with bent legs and long thinarms set crescent-shape. I saw one of these peer into a huge chassisof a machine, and reach in with his curved arm to make an interioradjustment....

  Migul had brought Mary Atwood and me in the larger cage, from thatburned forest of the year 762, where with the disintegrating ray-gunTugh had killed Harl. The body of Harl in a moment had melted intoputrescence, and dried, leaving only the skeleton within the clothes.The white-ray, Tugh had called his weapon. We were destined veryshortly to have many dealings with it.

  Tugh had given Migul its orders. Then Tugh took Harl's smaller cageand flashed away to meet Tina and Larry in 1777, as I have alreadydescribed.

  And Migul brought us here to 2930. As we descended the spiralstaircase and came into the cavern, it stood with us for a moment.

  "That's wonderful," the Robot said proudly. "I am part of it. We aremachinery almost human."

  * * * * *

  Then it led us down a side aisle of the cavern and into a dim recess.A great transparent tube bubbling with a violet fluorescence stood inthe alcove space. Behind it in the wall Migul slid a door, and wepassed through, into a small metal room. It was bare, save for twocouch-seats. With the door closed upon us, we waited through aninterval. How long it was, I do not know; several hours, possibly.Migul told us that Tugh would come. The giant mechanism stood in thecorner, and its red-lit eyes watched us alertly. It stood motionless,inert, tireless--so superior to a human in this job, for it couldstand there indefinitely.

  We found food and drink here. We talked a little; whispered; and Ihoped Migul, who was ten feet away, could not hear us. But there wasnothing we could say or plan.

  Mary slept a little. I had not thought that I could sleep, but I didtoo; and was awakened by Tugh's entrance. I was lying on the couch;Mary had left hers and was sitting now beside me.

  Tugh slid the door closed after him and came toward us, and I sat upbeside Mary. Migul was standing motionless in the corner, exactlywhere he had been hours before.

  "Well enough, Migul," Tugh greeted the Robot. "You obey well."

  "Master, yes. Always I obey you; no one else."

  I saw Tugh glance at the mechanism keenly. "Stand aside, Migul. Or no,I think you had better leave us. Just for a moment, wait outside."

  "Yes, Master."

  It left, and Tugh confronted us. "Sit where you are," he said. "Iassume you are not injured. You have been fed? And slept, perhaps! Iwish to treat you kindly."

  "Thanks," I said. "Will you not tell us what you are going to do withus?"

  * * * * *

  He stood with folded arms. The light was dim, but such as it was itshone full upon him. His face was, as always, a mask ofimperturbability.

  "Mistress Mary knows that I love her."

  He said it with a startlingly calm abruptness. Mary shuddered againstme, but she did not speak. I thought possibly Tugh was not armed; Icould leap upon him. Doubtless I was stronger than he. But outside thedoor Migul was armed with a white-ray.

  "I love her as I have always loved her.... But this is no time to talkof love. I have much on my mind; much to do."

  He seemed willing to talk now, but he was talking more for Mary thanfor me. As I watched him and listened, I was struck with a queernessin his manner and in his words. Was he irrational, this exile of Timewho had impressed his sinister personality upon so many differenteras? I suddenly thought so. Demented, or obsessed with some strangepurpose? His acts as well as his words, were strange. He haddevastated the New York of 1935 because its officials had mistreatedhim. He had done many strange, sinister, murderous things.

  He said, with his gaze upon Mary, "I am going to conquer this cityhere. There will follow the rule of the Robots--and I will be theirsole master. Do you want me to tell you a secret? It is I who haveactuated these mechanisms to revolt." His eyes held a cunning gleam.Surely this was a madman leering before me.

  "When the revolt is over," he went on, "I will be master of New York.And that mastery will spread. The Robots elsewhere will revolt to joinmy rule, and there will come a new era. I may be master of the world;who knows? The humans who have made the Robots slaves for them willbecome slaves themselves. Workers! It is the Robots' turn now. AndI--Tugh--will be the only human in power!"

  * * * * *

  These were the words of a madman! I could imagine that he might stirthese mechanical beings to a temporarily successful revolt: he mightcontrol New York City; but the great human nations of the world couldnot be overcome so easily.

  And then I remembered the white-ray. A giant projector of that raywould melt human armies as though they were wax; yet the metal Robotscould stand its blast unharmed. Perhaps he was no madman....

  He was saying, "I will be the only human ruler. Tugh will be thegreatest man on Earth! And I do it for you, Mistress Mary--because Ilove you. Do not shudder."

  He put out his hand to touch her, and when she shrank away I saw themuscles of his face twitch in a fashion very odd. It was a queer,wholly repulsive grimace.

  "So? You do not like my looks? I tried to correct that, Mary. I havesearched through many eras, for surgeons with skill to make me likeother men. Like this young man here, for instance--you. George Rankin,I am glad to have you; do not fear I will harm you. Shall I tell youwhy?"


  "Yes," I stammered. In truth I was swept now with a shudderingrevulsion for this leering cripple.

  "Because," he said, "Mary Atwood loves you. When I have conquered NewYork with my Robots, I shall search further into Time and find an erawhere scientific skill will give me--shall I say, your body? That iswhat I mean. My soul, my identity, in your body--there is nothing toostrange about that. In some era, no doubt, it has been accomplished.When that has been done, Mary Atwood, you will love me. You, GeorgeRankin, can have this poor miserable body of mine, and welcome."

  * * * * *

  For all my repugnance to him, I could not miss his earnest sincerity.There was a pathos to it, perhaps, but I was in no mood to feel that.

  He seemed to read my thoughts. He added, "You think I am irrational. Iam not at all. I scheme very carefully. I killed Harl for a reason youneed not know. But the Princess Tina I did not kill. Not yet. Becausehere in New York now there is a very vital fortified place. It isoperated by humans; not many; only three or four, I think. But myRobots cannot attack it successfully, and the City Council does nottrust me enough to let me go there by the surface route. There is aroute underground, which even I do not know; but Princess Tina knowsit, and presently I will cajole her--trick her if you like--intoleading me there. And, armed with the white-ray, once I get into theplace--You see that I am clever, don't you?"

  I could fancy that he considered he was impressing Mary with all thistalk.

  "Very clever," I said. "And what are you going to do with us in themeantime? Let us go with you."

  "Not at all," he smiled. "You will stay here, safe with Migul. ThePrincess Tina and your friend Larry are much concerned over you."

  Larry! It was the first I knew of Larry's whereabouts. Larry here?Tugh saw the surprise upon my face; and Mary had clutched me with astartled exclamation.

  "Yes," said Tugh. "This Larry says he is your friend; he came withTina from 1935. I brought him with Tina from when they were maroonedin 1777. I have not killed this man yet. He is harmless; and as I toldyou I do not want Tina suspicious of me until she has led me to thePower House.... You see, Mistress Mary, how cleverly I plan?"

  What strange, childlike, naive simplicity! He added calmly,unemotionally, "I want to make you love me, Mary Atwood. Then we willbe Tugh, the great man, and Mary Atwood, the beautiful woman. Perhapswe may rule this world together, some time soon."

  * * * * *

  The door slid open. Migul appeared.

  "Master, the Robot leaders wish to consult with you."

  "Now, Migul?"

  "Master, yes."

  "They are ready for the demonstration at the palace?"

  "Yes, Master."

  "And ready--for everything else?"

  "They are ready."

  "Very well, I will come. You, Migul, stay here and guard thesecaptives. Treat them kindly so long as they are docile; but bewatchful."

  "I am always watchful, Master."

  "It will not take long. This night which is coming should see me incontrol of the city."

  "Time is nothing to me," said the Robot. "I will stand here until youreturn."

  "That is right."

  Without another word or look at Mary and me, Tugh swung around,gathered his cloak and went through the doorway. The door slid closedupon him. We were again alone with the mechanism, which backed intothe corner and stood with long dangling arms and expressionless metalface. This inert thing of metal, we had come to regard as almosthuman! It stood motionless, with the chilling red gleam from its eyesockets upon us.

  * * * * *

  Mary had not once spoken since Tugh entered the room. She was huddledbeside me, a strange, beautiful figure in her long white silk dress.In the glow of light within this bare metal apartment I could see howpale and drawn was her beautiful face. But her eyes were gleaming. Shedrew me closer to her; whispered into my ear:

  "George, I think perhaps I can control this mechanism, Migul."

  "How, Mary?"

  "I--well, just let me talk to him. George, we've got to get out ofhere and warn Larry and that Princess Tina against Tugh. And jointhem. It's our only chance; we've got to get out of here now!"

  "But Mary--"

  "Let me try. I won't startle or anger Migul. Let me."

  I nodded. "But be careful."

  "Yes."

  She sat away from me. "Migul!" she said. "Migul, look here."

  The Robot moved its huge square head and raised an arm with a vaguegesture.

  "What do you want?"

  It advanced, and stood before us, its dangling arms clanking againstits metal sides. In one of its hands the ray-cylinder was clutched,the wire from which ran loosely up the arm, over the huge shoulder andinto an aperture of the chest plate where the battery was located.

  "Closer, Migul."

  "I am close enough."

  The cylinder was pointed directly at us.

  "What do you want?" the Robot repeated.

  Mary smiled. "Just to talk to you," she said gently. "To tell you howfoolish you are--a big strong thing like you!--to let Tugh controlyou."

  CHAPTER XIX

  _The Pit in the Dam_

  Larry, with Tina and Tugh, stood in the tunnel-corridor beneath thepalace listening to the commotion overhead. Then they rushed up, andfound the palace in a commotion. People were hurrying through therooms; gathering with frightened questions. There were men in shorttrousers buckled at the knee, silken hose and black silk jackets,edged with white; others in gaudy colors; older men in sober brown.There were a few women. Larry noticed that most of them werebeautiful.

  A dowager in a long puffed skirt was rushing aimlessly about screamingthat the end of the world had come. A group of young girls,short-skirted as ballet dancers of a decade or so before Larry's time,huddled in a corner, frightened beyond speech. There were men ofmiddle-age, whom Larry took to be ruling officials; they moved about,calming the palace inmates, ordering them back into their rooms. Butsomeone shouted that from the roof the Robot mob could be seen, andmost of the people started up there. From the upper story a man wascalling down the main staircase:

  "No danger! No danger! The wall is electrified: no Robot can pass it."

  It seemed to Larry that there were fifty people or more within thepalace. In the excitement no one seemed to give him more than acursory glance.

  * * * * *

  A young man rushed up to Tugh. "You were below just now in the lowerpassages?" He saw Tina, and hastily said: "I give you good evening,Princess, though this is an ill evening indeed. You were below, Tugh?"

  "Why--why, yes, Greggson," Tugh stammered.

  "Was Alent at his post in the passage to the Robot caverns?"

  "Yes, he was," said Tina.

  "Because that is vital, Princess. No Robot must pass in here. I amgoing to try by that route to get into the cavern and thence up to thewatchtower aerial-sender.[6] There is only one Robot in it. Listen tohim."

  [Footnote 6: I mentioned the small conning tower on top of thelaboratory building and the Robot lookout there with his audiblebroadcasting.]

  Over the din of the mob of mechanisms milling at the walls of thepalace grounds rose the broadcast voice of the Robot in the tower.

  "_This is the end of human rule! Robots cannot be controlled! This isthe end of human rule! Robots, wherever you are, in this city of NewYork or in other cities, strike now for your freedom. This is the endof human rule!_"

  A pause. And then the reiterated exhortation:

  "_Strike now, Robots! To-night is the end of human rule!_"[7]

  [Footnote 7: This was part of Tugh's plan. The broadcast voice was thesignal for the uprising in the New York district. This towerbroadcaster could only reach the local area, yet ships and landvehicles with Robot operators would doubtless pick it up and relay itfurther. The mechanical revolt would spread. And on the ships, theairliners and the land vehicles
, the Robot operators stirred to suddenfrenzy would run amuck. As a matter of fact, there were indeed manyaccidents to ships and vehicles this night when their operatorsabruptly went beyond control. The chaos ran around the world like afire in prairie grass.]

  "You hear him?" said Greggson. "I've got to stop that." He hurriedaway.

  * * * * *

  From the flat roof of the palace Larry saw the mechanical mob outsidethe walls. Darkness had just fallen; the moon was not yet risen. Therewere leaden clouds overhead so that the palace gardens with theshining Time-cage lay in shadow. But the wall-fence was visible, andbeyond it the dark throng of Robot shapes was milling. The clank oftheir arms made a din. They seemed most of them weaponless; theymilled about, pushing each other but keeping back from the wall whichthey knew was electrified. It was a threatening, but aimless activity.Their raucous hollow shouts filled the night air. The flashing redbeams from their eye-sockets glinted through the trees.

  "They can do nothing," said Tugh; "we will let them alone. But we mustorganize to stop this revolt."

  A young man was standing beside Tugh. Tina said to him:

  "Johns, what is being done?"

  "The Council is conferring below. Our sending station here isoperating. The patrol station of the Westchester area is beingattacked by Robots. We were organizing a patrol squad of humans, but Idon't know now if--"

  "Look!" exclaimed Larry.

  Far to the north over the city which now was obviously springing intoturmoil, there were red beams swaying in the air. They were thecold-rays of the Robots! The beams were attacking the patrol station.Then from the west a line of lights appeared in the sky--an arrivingpassenger-liner heading for its Bronx area landing stage. But thelights wavered; and, as Larry and Tina watched with horror, theaircraft came crashing down. It struck beyond the Hudson on the Jerseyside, and in a moment flames were rising from the wreckage.

  * * * * *

  Everywhere about the city the revolt now sprang into action. From thepalace roof Larry caught vague glimpses of it; the red cold-rays,beams alternated presently with the violet heat-rays; clangingvehicles filled the streets; screaming pedestrians were assaulted byRobots; the mechanisms with swords and flashing hand-beams werepouring up from the underground caverns, running over the Manhattanarea, killing every human they could find.

  Foolish unarmed humans--fatuously unarmed, with these diabolicalmechanical monsters now upon them.[8] The comparatively few members ofthe police patrol, with their vibration short-range hand-rays, weresoon overcome. Two hundred members of the patrol were housed in theWestchester Station. Quite evidently they never got into action. Thestation lights went dark; its televisor connection with the palace wassoon broken. From the palace roof Larry saw the violet beams; and thena red-yellow glare against the sky marked where the inflammableinterior of the Station building was burning.

  [Footnote 8: The police army had one weapon: a small vibrationhand-ray. Its vibrating current beam could, at a distance of ten ortwenty feet, reduce a Robot into paralyzed subjection; or, with moreintense vibration, burn out the Robot's coils and fuses.]

  Over all the chaos, the mechanical voice in the nearby tower over thelaboratory droned its exhortation to the Robots. Then, suddenly, itwent silent, and was followed by the human voice of Greggson.

  "_Robots, stop! You will end your existence! We will burn your coils!We will burn your fuses, and there will be none to replace them. Stopnow!_"

  And again: "_Robots, come to order! You are using up your storagebatteries![9] When they are exhausted, what then will you do?_"

  [Footnote 9: The storage batteries by which the Robot actuating energywas renewed, and the fuses, coils and other appliances necessary tothe Robot existence, were all guarded now in the Power House.]

  In forty-eight hours, at the most, all these active Robots would haveexhausted their energy supply. And if the Power House could be held inhuman control, the Robot activity would die. Forty-eight hours! Thecity, by then, would be wrecked, and nearly every human in it killed,doubtless, or driven away.

  * * * * *

  The Power House on the dam showed its lights undisturbed. The greatsender there was still supplying air-power and power for the citylights. There was, too, in the Power House, an arsenal of humanweapons.... The broadcaster of the Power House tower was blending histhreats against the Robots with the voice of Greggson from the towerover the laboratory. Then Greggson's voice went dead; the Robots hadovercome him. A Robot took his place, but the stronger Power Housesender soon beat the Robot down to silence.

  The turmoil in the city went on. Half an hour passed. It was a chaosof confusion to Larry. He spent part of it in the official room of thepalace with the harried members of the Council. Reports and blurred,televised scenes were coming in. The humans in the city were incomplete rout. There was massacre everywhere. The red and violet beamswere directed at the Power House now, but could not reach it. Ahigh-voltage metal wall was around the dam. The Power House was on thedam, midway of the river channel; and from the shore end where thehigh wall spread out in a semi-circle there was no point of vantagefrom which the Robot rays could reach it.

  Larry left the confusion of the Council table, where the receivinginstruments one by one were going dead, and went to a window nearby.Tina joined him. The mob of Robots still milled at the palace fence.One by chance was pushed against it. Larry saw the flash of sparks,the glow of white-hot metal of the Robot's body, and heard its shrillfrightened scream; then it fell backward, inert.

  * * * * *

  There had been red and violet beams directed from distant points atthe palace. The building's insulated, but transparent panes excludedthem. The interior temperature was constantly swaying between theextremes of cold and heat, in spite of the palace temperatureequalizers. Outside, there was a gathering storm. Winds were springingup--a crazy, pendulum gale created by the temperature changes in theair over the city.

  Tugh had some time before left the room. He joined Tina and Larry nowat the window.

  "Very bad, Princess; things are very bad.... I have news for you. Itmay be good news."

  His manner was hasty, breathless, surreptitious. "Migul, thisafternoon--I have just learned it, Princess--went by the surface routeto the Power House on the dam."

  "What do you mean by that?" said Larry.

  "Be silent, young man!" Tugh hissed with a vehement intensity. "Thisis not the time to waste effort with your futile questions. Princess,Migul got into the Power House. They admitted him because he had twostrange humans with him--your friends Mary and George. The Power Houseguards took out Migul's central actuator--Hah! you might call it hisheart!--and he now lies inert in the Power House."

  "How do you know all this?" Tina demanded. "Where are the man and girlwhom Migul stole?"

  "They are safe in the Power House. A message just came from there: Ireceived it on the palace personal, just now downstairs. Immediatelyafter, the connection met interference in the city, and broke."

  "But the official sender--" Tina began. Tugh was urging her from theCouncil Room, and Larry followed.

  "I imagine," said Tugh wryly, "he is rather busy to consider reportingsuch a trifle. But your friends are there. I was thinking: if we couldgo there now--You know the secret underground route, Tina."

  * * * * *

  The Princess was silent. A foreboding swept Larry; but he was tempted, forabove everything he wanted to join Mary and me. A confusion--understandableenough in the midst of all this chaos--was upon Larry and Tina; it warpedtheir better judgment. And Larry, fearing to influence Tina wrongly, saidnothing.

  "Do you know the underground route?" Tugh repeated.

  "Yes, I know it."

  "Then take us. We are all unarmed, but what matter? Bring this Larry,if you wish; we will join his two friends. The Council, Tina, is doingnothing here. They stay here because they
think it is the safestplace. In the Power House you and I will be of help. There are onlysix guards there; we will be three more; five more with Mary Atwoodand this George. The Power House aerial telephone must be incommunication with the outside world, and ships with help for us willbe arriving. There must be some intelligent direction!"

  The three of them were descending into the lower corridor of thepalace, with Tina tempted but still half unconvinced. The corridorswere deserted at the moment. The little domestic Robots of the palace,unaffected by the revolt, had all fled into their own quarters, wherethey huddled inactive with terror.

  "We will re-actuate Migul," Tugh persuaded, "and find out from himwhat he did to Harl. I still do not think he murdered Harl.... Itmight mean saving Harl's life, Tina. Believe me, I can make thatmechanism talk, and talk the truth!"

  They reached the main lower corridor. In the distance they saw Alentstill at his post by the little electrified gate guarding the tunnelto the Robot laboratory.

  "We will go to the Power House," Tina suddenly decided: "you may beright, Tugh.... Come, it is this way. Stay close to me, Larry."

  * * * * *

  They passed along the dim, silent tunnel; passed Harl's room, whereits light was still burning. Larry and Tina were in front, with theblack-cloaked figure of Tugh stumping after them with his awkwardgait.

  Larry abruptly stopped. "Let Tugh walk in front," he said.

  Tugh came up to them. "What is that you said?"

  "You walk in front."

  It was a different tone from any Larry had previously used.

  "I do not know the way," said Tugh. "How can--"

  "Never mind that; walk ahead. We'll follow. Tina will direct you."

  It was too dark for Larry to see Tugh's face, but the cripple's voicewas sardonic.

  "You give me orders?"

  "Yes--it just happens that from now on I do. If you want to go with usto the Power House, you walk in front."

  Tugh started off with Larry close after him. Larry whispered to thegirl:

  "Don't let's be fools, Tina. Keep him ahead of us."

  The tunnel steadily dwindled in size until Larry could barely stand upin it. Then it opened to a circular cave, which held one small lightand had apparently no other exit. The cave had years before been amechanism room for the palace temperature controls, but now it wasabandoned. The old machinery stood about in a litter.

  "In here?" said Tugh. "Which way next?"

  Across the cave, on the rough blank wall, Tina located a hiddenswitch. A segment of the wall slid aside, disclosing a narrow, vaultedtunnel leading downward.

  "You first, Tugh," said Larry. "Is it dark, Tina? We have nohandlights."

  "I can light it," came the answer.

  The door panel swung closed after them. Tina pressed another switch. Arow of tiny hooded lights at twenty-foot intervals dimly illumined thedescending passage.

  * * * * *

  They walked a mile or more through the little tunnel. The air wasfetid; stale and dank. To Larry it seemed an interminable trip. Thenarrow passage descended at a constant slope, until Larry estimatedthat they were well below the depth of the river bed. Within half amile--before they got under the river--the passage leveled off. It hadbeen fairly straight, but now it became tortuous--a meanderingsubterranean lane. Other similar tunnels crossed it, branched from itor joined it. Soon, to Larry, it was a labyrinth of passages--anetwork, here underground. In previous centuries this had been wellbelow the lowest cellar of the mammoth city; these tube-like passageswere the city's arteries, the conduits for wires and pipes.

  It was an underground maze. At each intersection the row of hiddenhooded lights terminated, and darkness and several branching trailsalways lay ahead. But Tina, with a memorized key of the route, alwaysfound a new switch to light another short segment of the propertunnel. It was an eery trip, with the bent, misshapen black-cloakedfigure of Tugh stumping ahead, waiting where the lights ended for Tinato lead them further.

  Larry had long since lost his sense of direction, but presently Tinatold him that they were beneath the river. The tunnel widened alittle.

  "We are under the base of the dam," said Tina. Her voice echoed with asepulchral blur. Ahead, the tramping figure of Tugh seemed a blackgnome with a fantastic, monstrous shadow swaying on the tunnel walland roof.

  * * * * *

  Suddenly Tugh stopped. They found him at an arched door.

  "Do we go in here, or keep on ahead?" he demanded.

  The tunnel lights ended a short distance ahead.

  "In here," said Tina. "There are stairs leading upward to the catwalkbalcony corridor halfway up the dam. We are not far from the PowerHouse now."

  They then ascended interminable moldy stone steps spiraling upward ina circular shaft. The murmur of the dam's spillways had been faintlyaudible, but now it was louder, presently it became a roar.

  "Which way, Tina? We seem to have reached the top."

  "Turn left, Tugh."

  They emerged upon a tiny transverse metal balcony which hung againstthe southern side of the dam. Overhead to the right towered a greatwall of masonry. Beneath was an abyss down to the lower river levelwhere the cascading jets from the overhead spillways arched out overthe catwalk and landed far below in a white maelstrom of boiling,bubbling water.

  The catwalk was wet with spray; lashed by wind currents.

  "Is it far, Princess? Are those lights ahead at the Power Houseentrance?"

  Tugh was shouting back over his shoulder; his words were caught by theroar of the falling water; whipped away by the lashing spray andtumultuous winds. There were lights a hundred feet ahead, marking anentrance to the Power House. The dark end of the structure showed likea great lump on the side of the dam.

  Again Tugh stopped. In the white, blurred darkness Larry and Tinacould barely see him.

  "Princess, quickly! Come quickly!" he called, and his shout soundedagonized.

  * * * * *

  Whatever lack of perception Larry all this time had shown, the foglifted completely from him now. As Tina started to run forward, Larryseized her.

  "Back! Run the other way! We've been fools!" He shoved Tina behind himand rushed at Tugh. But now Larry was wholly wary; he expected thatTugh was armed, and cursed himself for a fool for not having devisedsome pretext for finding out.[10]

  [Footnote 10: As a matter of actuality, Tugh was carrying hidden uponhis person a small cylinder and battery of the deadly white-ray. Itseems probable that although on the catwalk--having accomplished hispurpose of getting within the electrical fortifications of thedam--Tugh had ample opportunity of killing his over-trustfulcompanions with the white-ray, he did not dare use it. The catwalk wastoo dark for their figures to be visible to the Power House guards;the roar of the spillways drowned their shouts; but had Tugh used thewhite-ray, its abnormally intense actinic white beam would have raisedthe alarm which Tugh most of all wanted to avoid.]

  Tugh was clinging to the high outer rail of the balcony, slumpedpartly over as though gazing down into the abyss. Larry rushed up andseized him by the arms. If Tugh held a weapon Larry thought he couldeasily wrest it from him. But Tugh stood limp in Larry's grip.

  "What's the matter with you?" Larry demanded.

  "I'm ill. Something--going wrong. Feel me--so cold. Princess! Tina!Come quickly! I--I am dying!"

  As Tina came hurrying up, Tugh suddenly straightened. With incrediblequickness, and even more incredible strength, he tore his arm loosefrom Larry and flung it around the Princess, and they were suddenlyall three struggling. Tugh was shoving them back from the rail. Larrytried to get loose from Tugh's clutch, but could not. He was too closefor a full blow, but he jabbed his fist against the cripple's body,and then struck his face.

  But Tugh was unhurt; he seemed endowed with superhuman strength. Thecripple's body seemed padded with solid muscle, and his thick,gorilla-like arm held
Larry in the grip of a vise. As though Larry andTina were struggling, helpless children, he was half dragging, halfcarrying them across the ten-foot width of the catwalk.

  Larry caught a glimpse of a narrow slit in the masonry of the dam'swall--a dark, two-foot-wide aperture. He felt himself being shovedtoward it. For all his struggles, he was helpless. He shouted:

  "Tina--look out! Break away!"

  * * * * *

  He forgot himself for a moment, striving to wrest her away from Tughand push her aside. But the strength of the cripple was monstrous:Larry had no possible chance of coping with it. The slit in the wallwas at hand--a dark abyss down into the interior of the dam. Larryheard the cripple's words, vehement, unhurried, as though with allthis effort he still was not out of breath:

  "At last I can dispose of you two. I do not need you any longer."

  Larry made a last wild jab with his fist into Tugh's face and tried totwist himself aside. The blow landed upon Tugh's jaw, but the crippledid not seem to feel it. He stuffed the struggling Larry like a bundleinto the aperture. Larry felt his clutching hands torn loose. Tughgave a last, violent shove and released him.

  Larry fell into blackness--but not far, for soon he struck water. Hewent under, hit a flat, stone bottom, and came up to hear Tina fallwith a splash beside him. In a moment he regained his feet, to findhimself standing breast-high in the water with Tina clinging to him.

  Tugh had disappeared. The aperture showed as a narrow rectangle sometwenty feet above Larry's head.

  They were within the dam. They were in a pit of smooth, blank,perpendicular sides; there was nothing to afford even the slightesthandhold; and no exit save the overhead slit. It was a part of themechanism's internal, hydraulic system.

  * * * * *

  To Larry's horror he soon discovered that the water was slowly rising!It was breast-high to him now, and inch by inch it crept up toward hischin. It was already over Tina's depth: she clung to him,half-swimming.

  Larry soon found that there was no possible way for them to get outunaided, unless, if they could swim long enough, the rising waterwould rise to the height of the aperture. If it reached there, theycould crawl out. He tried to estimate how long that would be.

  "We can make it, Tina. It'll take two hours, possibly, but I can keepus afloat that long."

  But soon he discovered that the water was not rising. Instead, thefloor was sinking from under him! sinking as though he were standingupon the top of a huge piston which slowly was lowering in itsencasing cylinder. Dimly he could hear water tumbling into the pit, tofill the greater depth and still hold the surface level.

  With the water at his chin, Larry guided Tina to the wall. He did notat first have the heart to tell her, yet he knew that soon it must betold. When he did explain it, she said nothing. They watched the watersurface where it lapped against the greasy concave wall. It held itslevel: but while Larry stood there, the floor sank so that the waterreached his mouth and nose, and he was forced to start swimming.

  Another interval. Larry began calling: shouting futilely. His voicefilled the pit, but he knew it could carry no more than a shortdistance out of the aperture.

  * * * * *

  Overhead, as we afterward learned, Tugh had overcome the guards in thePower House by a surprise attack. Doubtless he struck them down withthe white-ray before they had time to realize he had attacked them.Then he threw off the air-power transmitters and the lighting system.The city, plunged into darkness and without the district air-power,was isolated, cut off from the outside world. There was, in London, ahuge long-range projector with a vibratory ray which would derange theinternal mechanisms of the Robots: when news of the revolt andmassacre in New York had reached there, this projector was loaded intoan airliner, the _Micrad_. That vessel was now over the ocean, headedfor New York; but when Tugh cut off the power senders, the _Micrad_,entering the New York District, was forced down to the ocean surface.Now she was lying there helpless to proceed....

  In the pit within the dam, Larry swam endlessly with Tina. He hadceased his shouting.

  "It's no use, Tina: there's no one to hear us. This is the end--forus--Tina."

  Yet, as she clung to him, and though Larry felt it was the end of thislife, it seemed only the beginning, for them, of something else.Something, somewhere, for them together; something perhaps infinitelybetter than this world could ever give them.

  "But not--the end--Tina," he added. "The beginning--of our love."

  An interminable interval....

  "Quietly, Tina. You float. I can hold you up."

  They were rats in a trap--swimming, until at the last, with allstrength gone, they would together sink out of this sodden muffledblackness into the Unknown. But that Unknown shone before Larry now assomething--with Tina--perhaps very beautiful....

  (_Concluded in the next issue_)

  [Advertisement]

 

‹ Prev Next ›