by Earl
“You dumb ape!” he hissed in low, angered tones. “You nearly started a riot!”
“But I—I don’t know where we’re going!” insisted the flyer. “Nor does the chief pilot. He sent me out here. We don’t even remember starting this run, or flying this kind of ship before. The last I remember is flying mail to New Orleans!”
“What date and year was that?” asked Benton curiously.
“August 10th, 1939.”
“Okay,” returned the reporter. “Now go back to your compartment and look for your sailing papers. It’ll give the destination. All ships carry them.”
“Say, that’s right,” admitted the flyer sheepishly. “We were so mixed up over this, we didn’t—” He was already diving back to his fore cabin.
He reappeared a moment later. “Chicago!” he announced. “We came from Washington. We’re scheduled to land at the Cicero Airport in an hour.”
“All right, hop to it,” Benton nodded. “I don’t think you’ve forgotten how to fly a ship.”
“Chicago? Chicago?”
The passengers were looking dumbly at one another. None remembered how or why they had boarded an airliner flying from Washington to Chicago.
But relieved at the thought of reaching solid ground soon, with phones to use, they settled back quietly.
Benton pondered the phenomenon as objectively as he could.
Somehow, a year of memory had escaped all these people and himself, as though it had been ripped out of their minds. Amnesia? No, that medical term for a rather rare mental condition couldn’t cover this event. It was something a little more significant, more mysterious. Just what, would remain to be seen.
He had a queer thought. Had time slipped a cog, perhaps?
CHAPTER II
One Whole Year—Gone!
THE airliner came down smoothly on the concrete runway of the Cicero Airport, Chicago.
The passengers piled out and hurried for the phone booths within the station, to call up friends or relatives and orientate themselves. Benton paused at a newsstand and glanced at all the newspaper’s datelines before satisfied. They were all dated August 10th, 1940. All the magazines, too. No smallest doubt remained that it was actually that day and year.
His instincts of observation always on the alert, Benton noticed immediately that the station’s attendants all looked dazed, though they carried on their duties automatically.
The phenomenon had not been localized on the plane! All these people had also been afflicted! Benton was a little stunned. It was becoming a bigger thing every minute.
He had to wait in line to use a public phone. People came out of booths more bewildered than when they had gone in. There was a long delay before Benton, at last unhooking a phone, was connected with the office of the Times-Star. The phone service seemed partly disorganized. But finally Jim Woodley’s gruff voice growled in harried tones from the receiver.
“Hello, chief. This is Larry, back in Chicago.” Benton went on rapidly. “But what was I in Washington for? What was my assignment?”
“God only knows!” replied the editor wearily. “I don’t. I didn’t know you’d left. I can’t remember a thing.”
“Jeepers!” The reporter almost bit his tongue. “Has everybody in the country lost his memory?”
“Country?” echoed Woodley scornfully. “In the world! We’ve had cables from our men all over creation, including Shanghai. It’s a universal mass amnesia!”
Benton gasped. It took him about a minute to take that in, while the hairs on the back of his neck stood out. Then he spoke into the phone again.
“Well, I’m at your service, chief. What’ll I do?”
“Don’t ask me!” snapped Woodley. “For all I know, I fired you last year. If I did, I showed some sense. I’m half crazy trying to figure out what to print in tonight’s edition. If we use any fresh copy, assuming we get any, nobody will know what it’s all about. Nobody remembers a thing since August 10th, 1939 of last year. The world’s gone screwy. I think we’ll shut down the plant today at least. Come down to the office, Larry, and help us get organized. If I did fire you, you’re temporarily rehired.”
He hung up.
Turning from the phone, Benton stood for a moment in whirling thought.
The twelve-month amnesia had struck everywhere, all over Earth, like a lightning bolt. Like a frightful pandemic. This was the biggest thing of all time. His imagination shrank before the thought of what it would mean—the whole world plunged into temporary disorganization.
He met the first signs of it as he left the airport.
The driver of the taxi he hailed seemed unable for a moment to place the street of the address he gave. But finally he did, with a dazed gesture. Cruising along, Benton stared out at the world that had lost its memory for a year.
Everywhere, people were dazed. Those who had moved within the past year didn’t know where they now lived. Many found themselves in a city different from the one they last been in. Traffic was gnarled. Motorists had forgotten their destinations and slowed down to hesitant crawls.
Benton shook his head.
The first few hours wouldn’t be so bad. Things would carry along under their own momentum for a while. But soon the complex web of civilization would clog up. Schedules, machines and all the intricate movement of daily life would be thrown off balance. No one would remember what he had last been doing. If the phenomenon kept up, it would take days, perhaps weeks, for the world to get back toward normal. Benton could foresee that.
But what had caused this breathtaking event?
His reportorial instinct demanded a reason for it. But there he was stumped. All he knew was that in some manner a period of time was lost to the world’s collective memory. In a way, it was like a short-circuit of memory.
Or the thought struck him forcibly again—of time!
He instantly thought of a name—Dr. Paul Balstine. A scientist, he had last year announced a new theory of time. Benton had interviewed him at that time, since he was good copy, without absorbing much of the new concept. It had had something to do with time being a field of force, whatever that would mean. But he might be the man to explain this mystery.
Already visioning a scoop, Benton made a mental note to see the scientist at the earliest opportunity.
Only two things mattered, to Larry Benton, even on the eve of this sweeping upset of the normal. One was his newspaper. Benton was newspaperman to the core, and already looked upon the event as a story—a great, unprecedented story. His blood began to race a little with the thought of busy days ahead, chronicling this tremendous, stirring drama on the broad stage of life.
The other thing, his only concession to the personal, was—Alicia Deane.
THE taxi came to a halt, with squealing brakes, before the rooming house in which Benton lived, in a bachelor apartment. Telling the driver to wait, the reporter carried his bag to the second floor. He couldn’t find his key, but surprisingly, the door was open.
Furthermore, the room was occupied by another man who stared at the intrusion!
Benton mumbled an apology and found out from the housekeeper that he had moved from there a few weeks before! Her records gave a forwarding address that he next visited. But he had no key for the new apartment, and the landlady didn’t know him from Adam!
Cursing softly, Benton headed for the offices of the Times-Star. He would have to register at a hotel for the day, till he could get himself straightened out. But on the way he suddenly thought again of Alicia Deane, and decided to stop off at her aunt’s place, with whom she lived.
She met him at the door, as attractive as ever, he thought, with her golden hair, oval face, and tall graceful figure.
“Larry!” she exclaimed. He wasn’t sure if her tones were glad or just surprised. “Come in. I’m so confused.”
“So is everybody,” vouched Benton, following her to the parlor. “It’s all over the world.”
“All over the world!” echoed the girl, her
eyes widening. “What does it mean?”
Benton shook his head.
“I don’t know. I just came back from Washington, but I haven’t the least idea what I was there for. It seems to be a mass amnesia.”
“I found myself out shopping, when it happened, two hours ago,” Alicia said, her tones mystified. “I couldn’t remember when I had gone out, or what I wanted to buy. At first I thought it was just myself, but then I saw other people stop, and look bewildered. A woman ahead of me screamed and fainted. Two cars ran into one another, in the street. It was like a nightmare for a moment.” She shuddered. “It still is!”
Benton wanted to get up and comfort her. She looked so frightened and in need of it.
“I hurried home,” she continued. “Aunt was half hysterical. She’s in her room now, in bed from the shock. And just a few minutes ago I noticed I don’t live here anymore! None of my clothes are here. I must have moved in the past year. I’m so confused I can’t think straight. The last I can remember is the evening of August 10th, 1939—”
Benton looked at her quickly, and realized she must be thinking of the same thing. In this very room, on that evening, they had quarreled. It stood out freshly in their minds, as the last common memory they had. “It was something silly,” murmured Benton, as though to shove the matter aside.
“You were trying to choose my company for me,” the girl said, her eyes flashing. “You objected to the fact that I had dates with other men!”
“Well, I still think—” began Benton angrily, then grinned. “Good Lord, Alicia, no use carrying on the quarrel now. We must have made up, after August 10th, 1939!”
“Maybe we didn’t!” retorted the girl coldly.
“Well, anyway, let’s call it quits now,” he pursued.
“I can’t forget some of the things you said,” she responded, more icily still.
“But Alicia—”
“Oh, get out!” She was suddenly crying, and ran from the room.
BENTON, feeling rather bleak, arose and left. He tried to feel angry with her, but couldn’t. He put it down as jumpy nerves on her part, occasioned by the recent upsetting event. When she was calmer sometime, he’d straighten things out with her—he hoped.
A half hour later he registered at a hotel near the Times-Star office. The harried clerk didn’t know which rooms were vacant till he had looked up the records, item by item. In the dining room, where Benton went after a shower, a waitress wasn’t sure if they had any baked beans left and had to inquire in the kitchen.
The common knowledge of three hours before was a complete blank, in all minds. Benton reflected it would be amusing if it weren’t so serious.
Jim Woodley, chief editor of the Times-Star, greeted him surily. Hair rumpled, fat face sweaty, his usual composure was gone.
“I’m at the verge of a nervous breakdown!” he moaned, rumpling his hair further. “I can’t put out an evening edition. Half the press crew left, and the next shift didn’t show up. Forgot they work here, I guess. First time the Times-Star has missed an edition in 26 years!”
His face looked genuinely pained. It was hard to see such a tradition broken.
“But we’ll get out a morning edition,” he promised grimly, “if I have to run the presses myself!”
“Count on me for any help, chief,” offered Benton earnestly. “But what was I in Washington for? Any idea yet?”
“Yes. I looked in the files, after you called. You were there to cover the National Anti-Crime Conference. The president was ready to put the army and navy on the job. It seems there’s been a big crime wave, beside which the Prohibition Era was Sunday school.”
He groaned dismally. “Another big story ruined, since the public doesn’t remember a thing about it. I only got it out of the back files, myself. Well, anyway”—he sighed—“it stops the crime wave itself.”
“I wonder,” remarked Benton.
He turned to snap on the small desk radio. Only two of Chicago’s stations were on the air. The rest had shut down. The two operating were serving alternate organ music and flashes. Obviously, they had been forced to shelve their scheduled programs, what with scripts and rehearsals forgotten.
The news flashes gave a panoramic picture of civilization tied in a knot that would take some time to unwind. Humanity had not realized before how much depended on what was carried in the mind. Memory linked each day to the one before—and yesterday was a blank. Confusion reared over the world like a brooding monster.
But, as Benton had half expected, a wave of crime was also reported, particularly robberies on a large scale. The criminal element was quick to take advantage of circumstances, while law and order lay more or less helpless. Police were barely able to cope with the other problems that had arisen in overwhelming number.
“Guess I was wrong,” Woodley grunted. “Benton—”
But the tall reporter was already out of earshot, striding out of the room.
HE went to the floor below, where the back copies of the Times-Star were kept on file. Starting with August 10th, 1939, he rapidly scanned the daily front-page headlines. No sense, he told himself, in not knowing what had been going on in the past year. It seemed like the events of another world, or like peering into a future that hadn’t really happened.
Some things startled him.
During the fall of 1939, war had nearly broken out again in Europe, but had been averted with another rearrangement of boundaries. A lone flyer had bettered Howard Hughes’ round-the-world record by five hours. Fall election results in America were interesting. Benton saw the names of officials who had taken office recently and wondered if they themselves knew it.
But in the main, the undercurrent of life had gone on the same. There were the usual divorces, labor disputes, political wranglings, murders, and such.
And then, suddenly, the story seemed unreal, beginning a few months before. The headlines were filled with an abrupt, devastating crime-wave, in Europe and America. Daring robberies and cold-blooded murders filled the news. It seemed that the underworld had erupted, in a few mad months, into a campaign of unparalleled depredation, as though at a signal.
Though the world remembered nothing of it, now, it must have been a miniature reign of terror. The Anti-Crime Conference, newly created, from which Benton had been returning that morning, indicated to what extent the nation had been alarmed.
As though at a signal!
That phrase had stuck in his mind. Benton jumped up suddenly and ran to Woodley’s office.
“Chief!” he exclaimed. “Maybe the crime-wave links up to this mass-amnesia!”
“What!” The editor was astonished. “Look,” continued the reporter, the words tumbling out. “For two months a gigantic crime-wave sweeps the civilized world. Then, just as government is about to step in and clean up, the year of forgetfulness comes. A year is stolen out of men’s minds. It’s a perfect cover-up, don’t you see? The machinery of law stops. Justice is suspended. Detectives, policemen, witnesses, have forgotten. There are records, yes, but it’ll take weeks or months to follow them up. By then, the criminals will have covered up their trails completely. At one stroke, the greatest crime-wave in history has become a complete success!”
Woodley was staring, open-mouthed. “What are you hinting at?” he demanded. “That some story-book master mind caused this amnesia?” He snorted. “That’s more preposterous than the amnesia itself.”
“You have to explain the incredible with the incredible,” insisted Benton. “If you call it coincidence, you’re stretching a point too. I believe human agency did it—a scientific criminal leader one jump ahead of other scientists. It fits too perfectly to be ignored. What do you think, chief?”
“I think you’re crazy,” returned Woodley flatly. He waved a hand in dismissal. “Roll up your sleeves and get to work here. I’m short-handed.”
“I’m going out, chief,” said Benton firmly, suddenly making up his mind, “to see if I can get any leads on my idea.”
“If you do, you’re fired!” he snapped.
“All right, I’m fired.”
Benton stalked out.
CHAPTER III
Dr. Balstine
OUTSIDE, Larry Benton thought himself a fool.
His idea was fantastic. Still, what was more fantastic than the mass amnesia? Yet that had happened. He set his lips. He’d follow his idea through. First of all, Dr. Balstine.
Finding no press-car available down below, Benton hailed a taxi. An hour later, after winning through numerous traffic snarls, he got out at the scientist’s suburban home, a plain little house set back among tall trees. There was a brick building in back that might be his laboratory, surrounded by a high board fence.
The scientist himself answered the door, a short plump person with amazingly bright little eyes. When Benton announced himself, Dr. Balstine shook his head.
“No interview,” he snapped nervously. “I couldn’t help you if I wanted to. I’ve lost my memory.” His voice shook a little. “Amnesia, I suppose. I’m waiting for it to go.”
“That’s what I came to talk to you about,” said Benton quickly. “Have you any theory to explain why everyone has the same symptom?”
The little man stared.
“Everyone!” he reiterated.
Benton nodded.
“Seems to be a world-wide condition. Four hours ago everyone lost the ability to remember anything beyond August 10th, 1939.” He glanced at the scientist curiously. “Didn’t you know?”
“No!” exploded Dr. Balstine. Relief had stolen into his face. “I thought it was just myself. I’ve been alone all that time, worrying myself sick. Come in and tell me about it.”
Excitement replaced the nervousness he had first betrayed.
Seated in the parlor, Benton explained what he knew. The scientist listened attentively, his eyes deeply thoughtful.
“It’s all a crazy mystery,” concluded the reporter. “It’s hard to understand how a year of memory can be wiped out in every mind on earth.”
