by Philip Wylie
“‘We had landed on the water from the north. We anchored near shore and quickly made our way to land. We exercised certain precautions, however. All of us were armed. Lots were drawn to determine whether Ransdell or Vanderbilt would remain on guard beside the ship. I was useless in that capacity, as I would be unable to fly it in case of emergency. It was agreed that the lone guard was to take off instantly upon the approach of any persons whatever. Our ship was our only refuge, our salvation, our life-insurance.
“‘Vanderbilt was elected to remain. Ransdell and I started off at once toward the city. The pool on which we lay was approximately a mile in diameter and some two hundred feet below the level of the city. We started across the weird water-bottom. Mud, weeds, wrecks, débris, puddles, cracks, cliffs and steep ascents impeded our progress. But we reached the edge of what had been a lake, without mishap. The angle of our ascent had concealed the city during the latter part of our climb.
“‘Our first close view was had as we scrambled to the top of a sea-wall. The streets of the metropolis stretched before us—empty. The silence of the grave, of the tomb. Chicago was a dead city.
“‘We stood on the top of the wall for a few minutes. We strained our ears and eyes. There was nothing. No light in the staring windows. No plume of steam on the lofty buildings. We started forward together. Unconsciously, we had both drawn our revolvers.
“‘Behind us and to the right was the Navy Pier, which I remember as the Municipal Pier. Directly ahead of us were the skyscrapers of the northern business district. We observed them from this closer point only after we had been reassured by the silence of the city, and had slipped our revolvers back into our pockets. Large sections of brick and stonework had been shaken from the sides of the buildings, leaving yawning holes which looked as if caused by shell-fire. The great windows had been shaken into the street, and wherever we went, we found the sidewalks literally buried in broken glass. A still more amazing phenomenon was noticeable from our position on the lake shore: the skyscrapers were visibly out of plumb. We made no measurements of this angulation, but I imagine some of the towers were off center by several feet, perhaps by as much as fifteen or twenty feet. No doubt the earthquakes in the vicinity had been relatively light, but the wavelike rise and fall of the land had been sufficient to tilt these great edifices, much as if they had been sticks standing perpendicularly in soft mud.
“‘Ransdell and I commented on the strangeness of the spectacle, and then together we moved forward into the business district. We had crossed the railroad tracks before we found any bodies; but on the other side they appeared here and there—most of them lying underneath the cascades of glass, horribly mangled and now in a state of decomposition.
“‘It was Ransdell who turned to me and in his monosyllabic, taciturn way said: “No rats. Noticed it?”
“‘I was stricken by a double feeling of horror, first in the realization that upon such a ghastly scene the armies of rats should be marching, and second by the meaning of Ransdell’s words—that if there were no rats, there must be some dreadful mystery to explain their absence.
“‘We walked over the rubble and glass in the streets. Here and there it was necessary to circumvent an enormous pile of débris which had cascaded from the side of one of the buildings. It was immediately manifest that the people who had left Chicago had taken with them every object upon which they could lay their hands, every possession which they coveted, every article for which they thought they might find use. The stores were like open bazaars; their glass windows had been broken in by marauders or burst out by the quakes, and their contents had been ravaged.
“‘We continued to notice that the dead on the street did not represent even a tithe of the metropolitan population, and I expressed the opinion that the passing of the Bronson Bodies must have caused a mighty exodus.
“‘Ransdell’s reply was a shrug, and abruptly my mind was discharged upon a new course. “You think they’re all upstairs?” I asked.
“‘He nodded. A block farther along, we came to an open fissure. It was not a large fissure in comparison with the gigantic openings in the earth which we had seen hitherto, but it appeared to go deep into the earth, and a thin veil of steam escaped from it. As we approached it, the wind blew toward us a wisp of this exuding gas, and instantly we were thrown into fits of coughing. Our lungs burned, our eyes stung and our senses were partially confounded, so that with one accord we snatched each other’s arms and ran uncertainly from the place.
“‘“Gas,” Ransdell said, gasping.
“‘No other words were necessary to interpret the frightful fate of Chicago; nothing could better demonstrate how profound was the disturbance under the earth’s crust. For in this region noted for its freedom from seismic shocks and remote from the recognized volcanic region, it was evident that deadly, suffocating gases such as previously had found the surface only through volcanoes, here had seeped up and blotted out the population. When the Bronson Bodies were nearest the earth and the stresses began to break the crust—when, doubtless, part of the population in that great interior metropolis were madly fleeing and another part was grimly holding on—there were discharged somewhere in the vicinity deadly gases of the sort which suffocated the people about Mt. Pelée and La Soufrière. Only this emission of gas—whether through cracks in the crust or through some true new crater yet to be discovered—was incomparably greater. Like those gases, largely hydrochloric, it was heavier than air; and apparently it lay like a choking cloud on the ground. When those who escaped the first suffocating currents—and apparently they were in the majority—climbed to upper floors to escape, they were followed by the rising vapors. That frightful theory explained why there were so few dead on the street, why no one had returned to the silent city, and above all, why there were no rats.
“‘We would have liked to climb up the staircases of some of the buildings to test the accuracy of our concepts so far as it might concern the numbers who had remained in the city, to be smothered by gas, but darkness was approaching.
“‘We were sure of Vanderbilt’s safety, for we had heard no shot. It was odd to think that we could expect to hear such a shot at a distance of more than a mile when we were standing in a place where recently the machine-gun fire of gangsters had been almost inaudible in the roaring daylight. Moreover, our single experience with the potency of the gas even in dilution warned us that a deeper penetration of the metropolitan area was more than dangerous.
“‘We found Vanderbilt sitting upon a stone on the shore beside the plane. We pushed out to it in the collapsible boat; and while we ate supper, we told him what we had seen.
“‘His comment perhaps is suitable for closing this record of the great city of Chicago: “Sitting alone, I realized what you were investigating; and for the first time, gentlemen, I understand what the end of the world would mean. I have never come so close to losing my nerve. It was awful.”’”
Hendron looked up from the book. “I think, my friends, we will all find ourselves in agreement with Mr. James and Mr. Vanderbilt.” He turned a few pages, and their whisper was audible in the silence of his audience. “I am now skipping a portion of Mr. James’ record. It covers their investigation of the Great Lakes and describes with care the geological uplifting of that basin. From Chicago they flew to Detroit. In Detroit they found a different form of desolation. The waters of Lake Huron had poured through the city and the surrounding district, completely depopulating it and largely destroying it. They were able to land their plane on a large boulevard, a section of which was unbroken, and they refueled in the vicinity. They were disturbed by no one, and they saw no one. Cleveland had suffered a similar fate. Then they continued their flight to Pittsburgh. I read from Mr. James’ record:
“‘Like God leading the children of Israel, Pittsburgh remains in my memory as a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night. My astonishment may be imagined when I say that, as we approached the city after our visit to the ravaged metropol
ises of Ohio, we saw smoke arising against the sky. Presently the lichen-like area of buildings began to clarify in the morning haze. Vanderbilt dampered the motors and we dropped toward the Monongahela River, which was full to the brim of the levees and threatened to inundate the city. Earthquakes had half wrecked its structures. They lay broken and battered on “The Point” which lies between the two rivers. Smoke and steam emerged from a rent in Mt. Washington. The bridges were all down. I noticed that one of them had fallen directly upon a river steamer in which human beings had evidently sought to escape.
“‘Our ship came to rest, and we taxied cautiously toward one of the submerged bridges—every landing on water was dangerous, because of the likelihood of unsuspected snags, and we always exercised the maximum of care. From the top of the pontoon I threw a rope over one of the girders, and we made fast, the perceptible current keeping us clear. We went ashore by way of the taut rope.
“‘It was easy to perceive the cause of the smoke. A large area of Pittsburgh, or what remained of Pittsburgh, was in flames, and to our ears came clearly a not distant din. We had already guessed its identity in our descent. It was the din of battle. Rifles cracked incessantly; machine-guns clattered; and occasionally we heard the cough of a hand-grenade.
“‘It was not wise to proceed farther. Nevertheless, bent upon discovering the nature of the combat, I insisted on going forward while my companions returned to guard our precious ship. I had not invaded the city deeply before I saw evidence of the fighting. Bullets buzzed overhead. I took cover. Not far away, in a street that was a shambles, I saw men moving. They carried rifles which they fired frequently; and they wore, I perceived, the tattered remnants of the uniform of the National Guard.
“‘A squad of these men retreated toward me, and as they did so, I perceived their enemy. Far down the street a mass of people surged over the barricade-like ruins of a building. They were terrible to see, even at that distance. Half naked, savage, screaming, armed with every tool that might be used as a weapon—a mob of the most desperate sort. The retreating squad stopped, took aim and several of the approaching savages fell. In their united voices I detected the tones of women.
“As the guardsmen reached my vicinity, one of them clapped his hand to his arm, dropped his rifle and staggered away from his fellows to shelter. The squad was at that instant reënforced by a number of soldiers who carried a machine-gun. The mob was temporarily checked by its clatter.
“‘I made my way to the wounded man, and he gratefully accepted the ministrations I could offer from the small kit I carried in my pocket. His right arm had been pierced. It was from him that I was able to learn the story of Pittsburgh. Some day I hope I may expand his tale into a complete document, but since my time at the moment is short, and since we are now flying southward and writing is difficult, I will compress it.
“‘The man’s name was George Schultz. He had been a bank-clerk, married, the father of two children, and had joined the National Guard because it offered an opportunity for recreation. He told me rather pitifully that he had doubted the menace of the Bronson Bodies, and that he had compelled his wife to keep the children in their flat, against her better judgment. His wife had wished to take them to their aunt’s home in Kansas. On the night of the twenty-sixth, although frightened by the size of the Bronson Bodies, he had nonchalantly gone out to a drug-store for cigarettes, and the first tremor which struck Pittsburgh had shaken down his home on the heads of his family. He was not very clear about the next forty-eight hours.
“‘The mills at Pittsburgh had been working to the last moment. The Government deemed that the great steel city was in no danger from the tides, and had used it for manufacturing during the last days. Schultz described to me the horrible effect of the earthquakes in the steel-mills, as blast furnaces were upset and as ladles tipped their molten contents onto the mill floors. Hundreds perished in the artificial hell that existed in the steel mills; but tens of thousands died in the city proper. In many parts of the city area the effect of the earthquakes was rendered doubly more frightful by the collapse of the honeycomb of mine galleries underlying the surface. Blocks of buildings literally dropped out of sight in some places.
“‘After the quake, what was left of the administrative powers immediately organized the remnant of the police and National Guard. Food, water and medical attention were their first objectives, and policing only a secondary consideration. However, food ran low; medical supplies gave out; the populace rebelled.
“‘Three days before our arrival, a mob had armed itself, stormed one of the warehouses in which a commissary functioned, and captured it. Encouraged by that success, the mob had attempted to take over the distribution of the remaining food and supplies.
“‘I had appeared on the scene apparently after the mob and the forces of law and order had been fighting for three days; and it was not necessary for Schultz to explain to me that in a very short time the National Guardmen and police would be routed: their numbers were vastly inferior; their ammunition was being exhausted, and organized warfare was out of the question in that madman’s terrain.
“‘I abandoned Schultz to his comrades and made my way back to the river.
“‘We lost no time in taking off; and as we flew over Pittsburgh, we could see below us, moving antlike through the ruins, the savage mob, with scattered bands of guardsmen and police opposing it.’”
Again Hendron looked up from the notebook.
“That, my friends, ends the account of the fate of Pittsburgh.
“Mr. James’ diary next describes a hazardous flight across the Appalachians and their arrival at Washington, or rather the site of Washington: ‘It is not possible to describe our feelings when we actually flew over the site of Washington. We had passed the state in which emotions may be expressed by commonplace thought. We had reached a condition, in fact, where our senses rejected all feeling, and our brains made a record that might be useful in the future while it was insensible in the present. When I say that the ocean covered what had been the Capital of our nation, I mean it precisely. No spire, no pinnacle, no monument, no tower appeared above the blue water that rippled to the feet of the Appalachian chain. There was no trace of Chesapeake Bay, no sign of the Potomac River, no memory of the great works of architecture which had existed at the Capital. It was gone—gone into the grave of Atlantis; and over it was the inscrutable salt sea, stretching to the utmost reaches of the eye. The Eastern seaboard has dropped. We turned back after assuring ourselves that this condition obtained along the entire East Coast.’
“Mr. James,” Hendron said, “now describes their return across the mountains. He adds to our geographical knowledge by revealing that the whole Mississippi Basin, as well as the East Coast and Gulf States, has been submerged. Cincinnati is under water. The sea swells not only over Memphis but over St. Louis, where it becomes a wide estuary stretching in two great arms almost to Chicago and to Davenport.
“They next investigated the refuge area in the Middle West. Here they found indescribable chaos, and although order was being made out of it, although they were hospitably received by the President himself in Hutchinson, Kansas, which had become the temporary Capital of the United States, they found the migrated population in a sorry plight. Mr. James uses the President’s own words to describe that predicament. Again I refer to the diary.
“‘Following the directions we had been given, we flew to Hutchinson. For a number of reasons, Hutchinson had been chosen as the temporary Capital of the States refuge area. It is normally fifteen hundred feet above sea level. It is in the center of a rich grain, farm, poultry, dairy, live-stock and lumber region. It has large packing plants, grain elevators, creameries, flour-mills. It is served by three railroads, and hence is an excellent site for the accumulation of produce. Thither, in the weeks preceding the passage of the Bronson Bodies, the multitudes of the United States flocked.
“‘The speed of that migration accelerated greatly after the Bronson Bodies ha
d appeared above the southern horizon, and the most obtuse person could appreciate in their visible diameter the approach of something definite and fearful. It is estimated that more than eleven million people from the East Coast and three million from the West Coast actually reached the Mississippi Valley before the arrival of the Bodies. More than half of them were exterminated by the tide which rushed up the valley and which remained in the form of a gigantic bay in the new sunken area that now almost bisects the United States. We found Hutchinson a scene of prodigious military and civil activity—it resembled more than anything else an area behind the front lines in some titanic war.
“‘After presentation of our credentials and a considerable wait, we left our plane, which was put under a heavy guard, and drove in an automobile to the new “White House”—a ramshackle rehabilitation of a huge metal garage. Here we found the President and his Cabinet; and here sitting around a table, we listened to his words. The President was worn and thin. His hand trembled visibly as he smoked. We learned later that he had been living on a diet of beans and bacon. He looked at us with considerable interest and said: “I sent for you, because I wished to hear about Cole Hendron’s project. I know what he is planning to do, and I’m eager to learn if he thinks he will be successful.”
“‘We explained the situation to the President, and he was delighted to know that we had survived the crises of the Passing. He then continued gravely: “I believe that Hendron will be successful. You alone, perhaps, may carry away the hope of humanity and the records of this life on earth; and I will return to the tasks confronting me here with the solace offered by the knowledge that the enterprise could be in no—”’”
Here Hendron stopped, realizing that he was reading praise of himself to his colleagues. A subdued murmur of sympathetic amusement ran through the crowd of listeners, and the scientist read again from James’ journal.