She sighed and gave a little shrug.
“You’re a queer fellow, Melvin. But geniuses usually are, of course, so I must make allowances.”
She turned away from the table, and for a fleeting moment the frown returned as a faint, half-formed suspicion crossed her mind. But she banished the thought as quickly as it came, turned to face him again.
“When do we start?” she asked.
* * * *
The building of the Elements Controller was a slow and arduous task for Lalia and Melvin, since the time they spent on it was always dependent on their freedom from official duties. But gradually, by unremitting devotion to their labours, they progressed.
The girl found her own part in the work limited to the assembly of various electronic components with which she was familiar, though their functions in Melvin’s complicated apparatus she comprehended but dimly. The more intricate construction Melvin insisted on doing himself, usually when she was unable to be present. Noticing this, and his continued reluctance to discuss any but the most innocuous details with her, she more than once found herself considering if the Elements Controller was all it seemed to be, from what she had been able to grasp of its underlying principles. But each time she dismissed the suspicion as imaginary.
The summer passed as they went on working in a deserted wing of the great Institute, where Melvin had seen to it that no curious technician could pry without his knowledge, and they could proceed without interference or interruption. Autumn came, and winter, and still they worked almost every night under the shadowless glare of cold-light globes.
More and more, as they made headway, Melvin was consumed by an obvious impatience for the day when the machine would be complete. By the spring they had begun the final assembly of its several parts, and with the return of summer it was built—a great, glittering mass of crystalline bars, vacuum tubes, transformers, and radial fans. In all it covered a hundred square feet of floor space and stood eight feet high, connected by numbered cables to a master switchboard.
“Finished at last!” Melvin breathed, as he completed his final inspection of its more delicate intricacies. “The hand that operates that switchboard will wield power greater than any amount of money can give. What do you say, Lalia?”
The girl appraised the massive machine critically as she stood aside, hands thrust in the pockets of her work-worn smock.
“You speak of power,” she said. “I’ve noticed, though, that you don’t seem to have made any provision for power with which to run this machine. You have meters on the switchboard going up to millions of volts, yet I see no sign of any contacts for power cables. Odd, isn’t it? Or is the question out of order?”
Melvin smiled patronisingly. “I have taken that into account, believe me. I shall produce all the power I need myself, by a special process. When I make the first test tomorrow, you will see for yourself. Naturally, I don’t want to excite suspicion by putting a sudden load on the city’s power resources.”
He paused, glanced at the electric clock. “There’s time enough to have a little celebration over at my place, if you’d care?”
* * * *
Twenty minutes later they were settling down to a meal produced by the kitchen automat, when the doorbell buzzed. Melvin got up, and went out into the hall. Lalia waited expectantly, heard the sound of voices that were curiously similar; then Melvin came back into the room followed by a man who was the exact double of himself—except that he was smiling.
“Lalia, this is my brother Levison. You’ve met before, of course, but it’s a long way back.”
“So this is Lalia the woman!” Levison took her hand warmly. “Just as beautiful as I’d imagined from Melvin’s letters. Well, I am glad to see you—it’s been a long time.”
“And I, too,” she responded. “We’ve often talked about you, but you never seem to come to the city.”
“Too much to do elsewhere. Besides, city life doesn’t attract me—” He broke off. “I hope I haven’t interrupted a little tête-à-tête?”
“As a matter of fact, you have,” Melvin told him, “but you must stay and have supper with us and tell us what you’ve been doing.”
“That’s just what I came to see you about, Melvin,” said Levison, as he sat down. “I felt I couldn’t put it off any longer—I’ve been itching to tell you all along. You see, Lalia, I’ve lived out at Paradise Acres alone since Mother died, and I’ve nobody to talk to when I’ve something big to say.”
“Well, we’re listening,” Melvin encouraged. “What’s happened?”
“To put it briefly, I’ve found a way to amplify thought.”
Melvin stared at him fixedly for a moment. “You’ve—what?”
“Thought I’d surprise you,” Levison laughed. “I’ve done a lot of experimenting in the past few years, but it never amounted to much until now. So far, I’ve only got the idea worked out, but I know I’m on the right track. It goes deep into the science of vibrations—the sort of stuff you love, Melvin.”
Melvin nodded slowly, a blank look on his face. His meal lay neglected before him. Levison went on talking in between his eating.
“I don’t have to tell you that the brain gives off minute vibrations. The Harvard Institute of Science found that out long ago and even measured the length of a thought wave, which is about the same as ultra-short radio waves. Of recent years the British Telepathy Association have substantiated the fact, and have proved that these tiny vibrations can pass from brain to brain, if there exists what might be called a telepathic sympathy between them. The brain can both transmit and receive these minute impulses, but they are so weak that they are undetectable except in cases of deliberate telepathic transmission under the right conditions. For that reason we use speech or actions to convey our thoughts. The centre of thought remains sealed—nobody can really tell what another person is thinking.”
“You mean you’ve broken the seal—made it possible for thoughts to be read?” Melvin asked eagerly.
“No, not that,” Levison replied gravely. “I might be able to do even that, but personal thoughts were never intended to become public property. That kind of probing might wreck civilization—”
“But, man, think of the power it would give anyone possessing such a secret! Power to read the minds of rulers, to divine your enemy’s plans—” Melvin was passionately interested, now.
Levison sighed heavily. “Same old Melvin! If you conquered the universe, you still wouldn’t be satisfied. This craving for power runs deep in your blood, doesn’t it? If you don’t—” He glanced at Lalia, checked himself. “But to get back to my invention.
“I set myself to find a way to amplify thought, to devise a machine capable of intensifying the normal thought impulses of the brain a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand times if need be These amplified thoughts, if properly directed, might then overwhelm and influence the minds of every living being within an area, depending only on the amount of power used.”
“A kind of mass hypnosis?” Lalia suggested.
“You might call it that, but what I have in mind is rather different. The actual amplifying of thought does not present much difficulty, since it is identical with the principle of the amplification of radio impulses. The trouble was to find a way of intercepting and directing thought waves, which emanate from the brain in concentric circles of gradually diminishing intensity, like the ripples from a stone thrown into a pond.
“The solution lies in an insulated helmet—and an insulator of the short waves of thought took some finding. But I managed it; and this helmet will prevent the thought waves radiating away in circles. Instead, they are trapped and directed by an electro-magnetic beam in front of the helmet. This beam strikes directly on a magnetic plate, which in turn absorbs the vibrations and passes them on through a step-up transformer into the amplifier, whence they are radiated from the transmitting antenna with vastly increased power.
“Of course,” he elaborated, “what I call the helmet is act
ually a big inverted dome and will be a permanent fixture of the apparatus. The operator will sit underneath it with the brain area of the head inside it. You understand?”
Melvin nodded, his brow lined with deep furrows, grey eyes fixed immovably on his brother’s flushed face. Then, as though with an effort, he resumed his eating while Lalia watched him curiously. Suddenly he put the inevitable question:
“And what do you propose to do with this machine? You said you had some special use for it in mind.”
Levison was silent for a moment. When he answered it was in a quiet, serious tone.
“I am going to try to destroy all the evil, disease, and disharmony in the world.”
With a start Melvin straightened up, laid down his knife and fork. His twisted features, as he stared at his brother, reflected a mixture of surprise, impatience, and utter incredulity.
“But—but what a fantastic idea! Do you really mean what you’re saying?”
“I do,” Levison assured him without looking up.
“But such a thing isn’t reasonable!” Melvin protested heatedly. “I don’t doubt your ability to build this machine and use it to amplify thought as you say you can. But the object! Why get such sanctimonious ideas, when you have it in your power to control the world if you go about it in the right way? You could force millions of people to do as you wished! You’ve a glorious chance to attain a position of supreme power!”
Levison sat back in his chair and calmly returned his brother’s glare.
“I am only too aware of the vast potentialities for good or evil that lie in such an instrument,” he said deliberately. “And I hope I have a full sense of the responsibility it places in me to ensure that it is used only for good. I intend to work according to the scientific thesis that good or evil, illness or health, beauty or ugliness, are all conditions of thought as expressed through ourselves. Remember how Jeans put it long ago, in his Mysterious Universe? ‘All that we see are thoughts expressed. The rest is remote inference’.”
With a gesture of annoyance, Melvin rose abruptly from the table. Ignoring Lalia’s appealing look, he rapped out:
“Yes, yes, I grant you all that. But you could bend men to your will—for good, if you like. Think of the good you could do once you’d established yourself as top dog. Why, you could hold the world in the hollow of your hand!”
Levison laughed. “But I don’t want the world. Only the chance to make things a little better. No man can hope to do more than that. Dictatorship brings its own downfall, and I’d do more harm than good that way.”
“You two certainly are very different in your outlook,” said Lalia, rising. “But you mustn’t quarrel about it. Personally, I can see something in both points of view.”
She took Melvin’s hand in hers, drew him towards a soft settee, beckoned his brother to sit down beside her.
“Sorry,” Levison apologised, “but I must go—lots of work still to do. I really came along to ask Mel to come over and see my designs for the apparatus. He may have some ideas for further improvements or spot some flaw I’ve overlooked. If you could come too, Lalia, I’m sure you’d be interested. How about tomorrow night?”
“I’d like to come very much. How about you, Mel?”
He seemed too immersed in his own thoughts to reply for several seconds. Finally he nodded. “All right, Levison. We’ll be along about eight.”
“Good! Well, until tomorrow, then.”
The girl took it upon herself to see him to the door. On the step he paused, turned to look down into her bright blue eyes.
“Tell me, Lalia, how do you two get along?”
She hesitated, averted her gaze for a moment, considering. “He’s a little difficult at times,” she admitted, a faint smile trembling on her lips. “If only he wasn’t quite so ambitious....”
“I think he’s already got as much as any man deserves,” he said gently. “I’m sure he’ll find that out, in time.”
She watched him go on his way, closed the door slowly, and turned to see Melvin standing in the doorway of the dining room, a cynical smirk on his face.
“What a pity,” he observed, “that such a brilliant mind should have such a strange kink.”
* * * *
The normal routine of the following day was so heavy for Melvin and Lalia that they had no opportunity to make a test of the Elements Controller. In the evening they drove out to Paradise Acres, where Melvin drew the car up at the gate of a little bungalow surrounded by trim flowerbeds.
Here on the verge of the unspoiled countryside, away from the endless throb of the city’s heart, Lalia found an atmosphere of quiet contentment such as she scarcely knew existed, it was so long since she had been able to relax in such a setting. Though he tried not to reveal it, even Melvin seemed to find in the comfortable home an air of peace and well-being which to Levison was obviously the ideal state of existence.
After supper he led them out to a small but well-equipped workshop at the rear of the bungalow, where they inspected several pieces of apparatus in various stages of assembly, the purpose of which he explained to them. Melvin listened attentively, asking questions only when he seemed not to grasp some particular point he wanted to absorb, and then very cautiously, almost apologetically.
At length, finding it difficult to convey an exact impression, Levison went to a drawer, took out a sheaf of small diagrams and spread them out on a workbench.
“Here, look them over carefully and see what you think of them. They explain the whole process from start to finish.”
Melvin glanced at his brother strangely before he moved to the bench. He stood there for a moment, his back to the drawings, before he asked:
“Are you sure, Levison, that you’re not being too trusting with your secrets? I want to help you, of course, but—”
Levison smiled, glanced through the skylight at the darkening summer sky, and switched on the light above the bench, flooding it with brilliance.
“What kind of man would I be if I couldn’t trust my own brother?” he countered, quietly. Then, leaving Melvin to his inspection, he turned to occupy Lalia with further discussion of his experiments.
For some time Melvin pored over the drawings, examining each in turn. Finally he fixed his attention on one of them, and stood motionless above it for a full minute before he straightened up.
“Looks all right to me, Levison,” he announced. “I can’t see any reason why it shouldn’t work out, though you can’t tell for certain until you’ve made a more comprehensive test than you’ve been able to do so far. You say your experiments to date have confirmed all your theories?”
“Absolutely,” Levison declared, gathering up the drawings and returning them to the drawer. “As I was saying last night, I believe that thought rather than mere matter is the true basis of our universe; that matter is the medium through which thought expresses itself. In the case of human beings and other organisms which we call living entities, the body is the medium. Whatever our mind wills, the body must obey; and disease and all evil conditions and motives, if not the expression of our own thoughts, are due to the influence of other thought vibrations more powerful than ours, which are always present. I believe that my Amplifier, by enlarging the power of thoughts which will produce only the best possible conditions, will overcome those which result in undesirable states of being and exert a considerable influence for good.”
There was the slightest suggestion of a sneer in Melvin’s smile. “And if the operator willed otherwise?”
Levison waved the question impatiently aside as though it was not worthy of consideration.
“It will be some time before I complete the apparatus,” he observed. “But I’ve made quite good progress in the last few months. Of course, I’ll let you know how things turn out. Shall we go back into the house now? I’m sure Lalia’s had enough of this.”
They sat and talked of other things, recalling their childhood days as they relaxed once more in the bungalow. Lalia had e
xpected Melvin to tell his brother of his own work on the Elements Controller which had been his ruling passion for so long, but he did not so much as hint at it. She marvelled at the contrasting characters of these twin brothers, one so ingenuously frank with his inmost thoughts, the other so cautious and secretive. But she found herself excusing Melvin his reticence on the score of his natural affection for his brother despite his lack of sympathy with Levinson’s idealism. Perhaps he did not want to overshadow his yet uncertain researches with his own accomplishments.
At the same time she seemed to sense in Melvin’s attitude towards his brother something which suggested an infinite respect for his attainments, and something almost of envy, as though what he had already achieved was worth more than the finished, if untested, product of his own devising. Though his assessment of its value was very different from Levison’s.
He was silent as they drove homeward, gazing steadfastly ahead through the windscreen at the myriad lights of London spread out before them like an array of jewels. Full of her thoughts, Lalia lay back in her seat beside Melvin and did not attempt to draw him out. Not until they were engulfed in the city’s effulgence, its floodlit buildings rearing up on either side of them, did he reveal his feelings. They were much as she suspected.
“Brother Levison seems to have something in that Thought Amplifier of his. If only he weren’t such a fool as to think he can reform the world by gentle persuasion! What it wants is force. Think what a power such an instrument would be in the hands of one man—one master!”
“You, for instance?” She could not resist the sally.
He shot a quick glance at her but did not reply. He said no more until he took his leave of her when they drew up at her flat in the centre of the city, and then it was only a perfunctory, “Goodnight. See you tomorrow.” Almost before she had closed the car door he was on his way again.
As soon as he arrived at his own home he went down to his private laboratory in the basement, and removed the jewelled collar-pin he had been wearing all the evening. Switching on a red lamp, he laid the pin carefully down on a bench, produced a delicate instrument from his pocket, and with it unscrewed the massive diamond from its gold setting. It was evident now that this was no ordinary jewel, or even an ordinary imitation. The centremost, biggest facet was, in fact, a finely graded minimising lens with a minute iris-diaphragm behind it, actuated by the pressure of light-wave photons. The flood of radiance above the bench in Levison’s workshop, when he had turned towards it, had been just what he required to make the shutter open and close two hundred times faster than a blinking eyelid. And his brother had switched it on for him, leaving him only to take up a position that would ensure a correct focussing of the tiny camera upon the drawings spread out on the bench. Just in case there were a few details he could not memorize exactly....
Last Conflict Page 2