Warren was also considering Weidekind's strange remarks, and now he broke the brief silence. "If you are engaged in communication with other planets, it might be wise for you to co-operate with the press. This is a very big story; you cannot hope to conceal it long."
Enderby looked at him for a moment, puzzled. "Communicating with other planets? Why. . . ." He let his voice trail off.
At this moment the guard Kenster returned to the room, a little cleaner, but still angry. "I got an idea, Chief," he said. "It would solve everything. Why don't you let me take these two pests, just drive them down the mountain and dump them and their car over the cliff. That way they get killed the way they almost got me killed; and we keep our secret and everything is okay again. Huh?"
"Yeah," put in Flat-Nose. "That's a good idea. Why not let us get it over with for you?"
Jack, the third guard, looked angry. He was a big husky man, as were the others, but evidently of a slightly less sanguinary nature. "Aw, don't listen to them," he said. "We can't do that. Especially with this neat chick here." He glanced at Marge appreciatively.
Marge looked at him. "Thanks, You've got some rough playmates."
But Warren didn't think it funny. Kenster and Flat-Nose actually had meant what they had said. Hastily he warned Enderby that if such a thing were to be tried, they could be sure it would be found out. Especially with as big a publisher as C. B. Carlyle behind them.
Enderby had seemed as shocked at the suggestion as the two reporters but he still appeared to be trying to find a way out. "Did you say C. B. Carlyle?" he asked.
Warren nodded. Enderby asked him about Carlyle's relationship to their project and seemed interested in learning that it had been the publisher personally who had sent Warren Alton after the story.
"Let me make a call to the Foundation headquarters in New York," said Enderby at last. "I think they may be able to straighten this out."
He went over to a desk at a far side of the room, and picked up the phone.
For a while there was silence. The guards drew off by themselves and talked in whispers, glancing every so often at the intruders. Warren took a notebook and pencil from his pocket and started hastily writing in it.
The door at the far end, from where the mysterious humming noise came, opened and several men came in, doffing white smocks. Weidekind was one of them. As they entered the general room, they had the appearance of men about to relax after a busy day.
Two dropped into easy chairs and glanced through newspapers and magazines. Weidekind came over to Warren, while another went to the record player and started hunting through the racked discs.
'I'm sorry I interrupted you," Weidekind said apologetically. "I wasn't aware you had business with the chief."
"That's all right," replied Warren. "It wasn't exactly business. . . . And I suppose your work came first." He went on to introduce himself and Marge.
Hans Weideiknd bowed slightly in acknowledgment. "Charmed," he said. "It isn't often we have the pleasure of a pretty young lady at our retreat up here. The only members of the fair sex around are rather oldish and stout."
Marge laughed. "Goodness!" she said. "Don't you ever get to town? Too busy watching the doings of our Martian friends?"
Weidekind raised his eyebrows. "Well, Martians isn't precisely the right word. However—" A dark-haired man in his thirties interrupted the scientist. "Introduce us, Hans," this one said.
The newcomer's name was Louis Marco. The man who had been about to start the record player until Enderby's signal at the telephone had halted him, turned out to be Roger Stanhope. The others now in the room were Leopold Steiner, balding and fortyish, wearing thick spectacles, and Carter Williams, younger, with light brown curly hair and a Middle-Western accent.
"You men look like engineers to me," said Warren. "Am I right, or are you just instructors in experimental farming?"
There was a general laugh. "We're not from State Agricultural, that's for sure," said Stanhope. "No, I guess we're engineers of a sort. Surprised you didn't hear of Steiner and Marco here, though. I thought you were up on things at People. Didn't you see the write-ups they got in your competitors' science departments a year ago?"
Warren thought back. He'd probably been away on some foreign assignment. But Marge said unexpectedly, "I think I noticed your pictures in People, too. I checked through the files a week ago. You had some theories about galaxies or something?"
Steiner beamed, but Warren carried the ball. "I thought you were astrophysicists. Is this an observatory, then?"
Before anyone could answer, Enderby hung up the phone and walked over to the group. "Be careful what you say, gentlemen, please. Mr. Alton, I believe you say your publisher is C. B. Carlyle?"
At Warren's nod, Enderby continued: "Will you please go over and telephone Mr. Carlyle from here? He will have instructions for you."
The reporter was surprised. He walked over to the desk, sat down, and picked up the phone. When he got the office operator, he gave her the number of Carlyle's direct wire. After a little wait, he heard his publisher's voice.
"Hello, Alton?" said Carlyle. "I see you got to the root of the story. Good work. However, I'm changing your instructions. It seems that the Lansing Foundation has a story several times bigger than the atom bomb. I don't know exactly what it is, but I've arranged with the directors at Lansing headquarters here to let you and your photographer stay on up there until they've completed their experiment. In exchange for our press silence until their job is finished, they'll allow you and Miss McElroy to become their official chroniclers. You two will remain on Thunderhook and help out. You are to write the popular version of their official report when it's done. Miss McElroy will help take the official pictures of the work as it's being done.
"How long? I gather from Jim Enderby—he won the Nobel Prize in physics seven years ago, remember?—that their work may have several months to go. Stick with it. It may be the biggest story of our lifetime. Give them a hand if they want you to—I understand they can use some help.
"Do I know what it is about? No, but I trust Jim Enderby. You'll know soon enough. I'll see that your pay checks are mailed to you regularly. Only thing I know about it is the name—Project Microcosm. Whatever that means—but it'll be an exclusive under your by-line for People, if and when. Okay? Put Enderby on and 111 confirm it."
Warren handed the receiver to Enderby, stood up and walked slowly back, aware of the questioning eyes of Marge and the scientists on him. Project Microcosm? Now what could that signify?
CHAPTER FIVE
"WELL, DR. ENDERBY," Warren said, "it appears that you've acquired two new members of your staff, according to C. B. Carlyle. I hope you can put us up without inconveniencing anyone?"
Dr. Enderby nodded, reached out his hand, and Warren shook it solemnly. "Good. We can use you, as a matter of fact. We are really horribly understaffed."
Marge stood up and looked around. "I hope I'm not the only girl in the party."
Enderby laughed. "Oh no, Miss McElroy. We have at least two ladies on our staff—our capable cook and our housekeeper. So youTl not be entirely on your own. . . . Now, I believe it's time for lunch."
As he said the last, a large, cheerful appearing middle-aged woman, came in and began setting a long table before the fireplace. Apparently she was the cook. A thin, aging man assisted her. In a short while all the company, including the three guards, were seated and enjoying lunch. Nobody made any reference to the nature of their work, and the conversation was light and casual. Warren noted with amusement that already Marge was the target of Jack's and Ken-ster's eyes. She would have no trouble adjusting.
As they were drinking coffee, he broached the subject. What, he wanted to know, was Project Microcosm.
As Enderby paused to form an answer, Kenster spoke up. "I think it's a mistake to allow them in on this. They haven't been passed by security and we aren't supposed to take any chances. I think you are forgetting that this work would be of extrem
e value to foreign spies. We absolutely should take no chances, none at all. How do we know for sure these people are what they claim?"
Louis Marco nodded. "With all due respect, I think we ought to consider that carefully. There are some things of very grave consequence here . . ."
Enderby waved a hand impatiently. "I grant the danger, but let me say that I have faith in the Lansing directors and also in Mr. Carlyle, the publisher. And let me say further that it is at present far better for us to keep an eye on our new additions rather than to let them go, or let them be lodged in jail."
Warren had been taking this in with some trepidation. Before there were further objections to Enderby's stand, Warren rose and said, "If we are going to be initiated, perhaps you would have the time to show us the layout. We still don't know what is going on here."
Enderby nodded. "Yes, I was planning on taking you a-round." He turned to the others. "Who is on duty at the observatory now?"
Steiner said, "Rendell. I'm going to relieve him shortly."
Enderby rose, and Warren and Marge with him. They followed him out the side door and found themselves on the grounds facing the series of concrete structures behind the main lodge. As diey walked Enderby outlined the project.
"You will find much of what is doing here very unusual. Inside that hemispherical dome is probably the strangest sight in all of man's existence—and yet it is entirely man-made. I wonder if you remember Dr. Steiner's work at all? It made some scientific headlines a few years ago."
Warren nodded. "I was wondering why his name seemed familiar. It seems to me that he was prominent in the atomic energy laboratories at Hanford, and then later advanced some unique theories regarding atomic forces. Hadn't heard anything about him lately."
"Yes, that's the man. In a sense Project Microcosm is Steiner's own concept. He presented it to the Lansing Foundation, and we took it up."
As they talked they arrived at a squat cement building. "This houses our atomic pile. It was a necessary adjunct to supply the kind of power we needed to work our project. Don't try to go inside without letting them know. It's well shielded, but you shouldn't take chances."
Behind the building housing the pile were three long buildings; one the dormitory, one a place where files and records were kept, another housing calculating machines and special research rooms. They did not go into these buildings, but simply had them pointed out. As they walked Enderby seemed to be taking them around the hemispherical dome, as if to keep that until the last.
As they arrived finally before its door, Enderby stopped. "Inside here is Project Microcosm itself. It is, as you will see, just what its name implies."
They went in. Inside they found themselves on a balcony that circled the interior of the dome. It seemed larger viewed from within than from the outside. For inside it was a true sphere, the latter half extending into the ground as deep as the top half was raised above the ground. The balcony circled the inside of the shell.
They looked over the rail. And for minutes Marge and
Warren simply stared, their minds numb with amazement.
They were looking into what seemed the sky itself. They looked down and outward and what they saw was a sphere of dense black dotted with brilliantly gleaming points of intense light. They saw a slow swirl of seeming white dust forming a long curving pattern that dissected the main half of the black mass, cutting through the center.
The black mass was not solid; rather it gave the impression of being utterly empty, and yet sprinkled with a myriad infinitesimal sparks, shining and cutting through it. There was the effect of motion, as if each spark was moving and as if the central spiral misty mass was slowly in revolution, each glittering facet of it alive and fighting against the eye-paining blackness—which was not so much blackness as a simple lack of existence there.
Looking into it they had the impression of looking down into infinite depths, of being about to fall outwards into unending space. The glittering points of light hurt their eyes and tantalized them at the same time. They wanted to look away and they were afraid that if they did they would miss something wonderful.
After a few minutes Warren wrenched his eyes away, looked forcibly at Enderby standing next to him watching him with a half smile. He shook his head to clear it. "My God!" the reporter said. "What is it? It's marvelous—and it's frightening."
Marge looked up. She was pale and stunned. "It's like looking into the skies," she murmured. "It's like something you dream about when you're a child."
Enderby smiled. "It is like looking into the skies, because it is a sky. It's the microcosm, a real miniature universe. The bright lights are stars; yes, real stars on an infinitesimal scale, and the black is .the depths of space of another universe."
"Another universe?" muttered Warren, looking again.
"Yes, it's unmistakable. What a marvelous projection! What a fantastic planetarium!"
"No," said Enderby, "it's not a projection and not a planetarium. It's real. It's what it seems to be. It's a true universe."
Warren looked up again. "How can that be? A universe in a dome . . . ? No; it's delusion or illusion."
"No delusion," said the voice of Steiner, who had quietly joined them. "No delusion. Come over to the telescopes here and look for yourself."
Warren and Marge turned. Now they noticed that a-round the balcony at various points were grouped instruments—telescopes, spectroscopes, and many instruments whose uses were not at once apparent. As Steiner walked over to the nearest telescope, they followed him. At once they experienced a curious sensation. Walking in the vicinity of the microcosm was eerie. There was a feeling as if forces were dragging at them, as if invisible waves were flowing a-round them.
Warren wavered, and Enderby gasped. "Oh, I should have warned you. If you've a watch on you, it's ruined now. I simply forgot. Here at the project we never carry instruments like that on us. There are very powerful magnetic forces encircling this experiment; they are the means we use to control it."
They reached the telescope—a large refractor mounted on gimbals along the railing. Steiner glanced into it, stood aside. "Look into it, Mr. Alton. Look at anything. You will see. It's real."
Warren put his eye to the lens, adjusted the vision. He saw a field of black sky with stars sprinkled through it. But the stars were not twinkling and soft as seen through an astronomical telescope. They were hard and bright. He turned the dials and as he did so the view shifted Readily. Suddenly a bright object sprang into view. It was a star, closeup—and he could see the brilliant disc of flaming white and the flaring arms of the star's flaming corona as it hurled mighty columns of gas far from its surface.
He stared transfixed, until Marge nudged him and he reluctantly surrendered the telescope to her. "It looks like a star," said the reporter at last. "But it must be so tiny. How could it continue like that without burning out?"
Steiner shook his head. "It is not tiny, not at all. That star is, within its own universe, as large as our sun, probably larger. Those gas clouds, its corona, are thousands of miles high."
Warren stared at him. "Impossible. You are contradicting yourself. First you say it is not a projection or delusion, and is here. Then you say it is millions of times larger than this whole room—or maybe our whole world. It cannot be both."
"It cannot, and yet it is," said Steiner firmly. "This is a genuine universe we have here. It occupies a space of its own. It is not part of our own space. Within its own being, its size is as great as that of our entire galaxy; it stretches many hundreds of light years, yet to us, who are outside its space-time continuum, it seems small.
"But notice this. We cannot penetrate it. Watch." He took a pole from a niche in the wall, held it out, tried to poke it into the black pulsing sphere of the microcosm. It touched or seemed to touch the outside and stopped. "Here, take the pole, push," he shoved the end of it into Warren's hand.
Warren took it, pushed. It was like pushing against a wall of steel. So far could the
pole go, but the instant it touched the outermost edge of the micro-universe it stopped. Warren thrust with all his strength but it was ineffective.
"It would take more power to push that pole one-millionth of an inch into the microcosm than there is available in the entire world," said Steiner softly. "For the thing you see there is not in this universe at all."
Marge took her eye away from the scope. "I see it, so there's something there. It's got to be here, on earth. Who are you kidding?"
Steiner waved them to a low bench set along the inner wall of the building. "Sit down; 111 tell you how it came to be, and why it is what it is."
They walked back and sat down. Their eyes were fixed on the weird sight of the pulsing micro-universe. Steiner himself, who should have been so familiar with it, also kept his eyes on it. It was so awe-inspiring that, whatever it was, no one could look away from it for long.
"This all came out of an idea I had about ten years ago," began Dr. Steiner. "While I don't expect that you are too well acquainted with modern physics outside of what you have read in popularizations, you probably do know that as a result of our atomic energy studies we have been making tremendous advances in our knowledge of the structure of matter and of the universe."
"Of course," nodded Alton.
"Much of this was due to the invention and perfection of the cyclotron, a device which enables us to observe particles of matter at hitherto inconceivable speed and thus to bring out properties not suspected before. The cyclotron has undergone vast changes, the present bevatron, for instance, is capable of immense operations.
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