by Ray Cummings
CHAPTER X
To Babs and me the ride in the golden cage strapped to Polter's chest ashe made his escape outward into largeness was an experience awesome andfrightening almost beyond description. We heard the alarm in the palaceon the island. Polter rushed to Dr. Kent's laboratory door, looked in,and in a moment banged it shut. Babs and I saw very little. We knew onlythat something terrible had happened; we could see only a blur withformless things in the void beneath our bars; and there were thechoking fumes of chemicals surging at us.
Polter rushed through the castle corridor. We heard rumbling distantshouts.
"The drug is loose! The drug is loose! Monsters! Death for everyone!"
The room swayed with horrible dizzying lurches as Polter ran. We clungto the lattice bars, our legs and arms entwined. There were moments whenPolter leaped, or suddenly stooped, and our reeling senses all butfaded.
"Babs! Don't let go! Don't lose consciousness!"
If she should be limp, here in this lurching room, her body to be flungback and forth across its confines--that would be death in a moment. Ididn't think I could hold her, but I managed to get an arm about herwaist.
"Babs, are you all right?"
"I'm--all right, George. I can stand it. We're--he is enlarging."
"Yes."
I saw water far beneath us, lashed into a turmoil of foam with Polter'swading steps. There was a brief swaying vista of a toy city; starlightoverhead; a lurching swaying miniature of landscape as Polter ran forthe towering cliffs. Then he climbed and scrambled into thetunnel-mouth. Had he turned at that instant doubtless he would have seenthe rising distant figures of Glora, Alan and Dr. Kent. But evidently hedidn't see them. Nor did we.
Polter spoke only very occasionally to Babs. "Hold tightly!" It was arumbling voice from above us. He made no move to touch the cage, exceptthat a few times the great blur of his hand came up to adjust its angle.
The lurching and jolting was less violent in the tunnel. Polter's frenzyto escape was subsiding into calmness. He traversed the tunnel with amethodical stride. We were aware of him climbing over the noisomelitter of the dead giant's body which blocked the tunnel's further end.We heard his astonished exclamations. But evidently he did not suspectwhat had happened, thinking only that the stupid messenger hadmiscalculated his growth and had been crushed.
We emerged into a less dim area. Polter did not stop at the fallengiant. Nothing mattered now to him, quite evidently, save his own exitwith Babs from this atomic realm. His movements seemed calm, yethurried.
We realized now how different an outward journey was from the tripcoming in. This was all only an inch of golden quartz! The stages upwardwere frequently only a matter of growth in size; the distances in thisvast desert realm of golden rock always were shrinking. Polter manytimes stood almost motionless until the closing, dwindling walls madehim scramble upward into the greater space above.
It may have been an hour, or less. Babs and I, from our smallerviewpoint, with the landscape so frequently blurred by distance andPolter's movements, seldom recognized where we were. But I realizedgoing out was far easier in every way than coming in. Easier todetermine the route, since usually the diminishing caverns and gulliesmade the upward step obvious.... We knew when Polter scrambled up theincline ramp.
It seemed impossible for us to plan anything. Would Polter make theentire trip without a stop? It seemed so. We had no drugs, and our cagewas barred beyond possibility of our getting out. But even if we had hadthe drugs, or had our door been open, there was no escape. An abyss ofdistance was always yawning beyond our lattice--the sheer precipice ofPolter's body from his chest to the ground.
"Babs, we must make him stop. It he sits down to rest you might get himto take you out. I must reach his drugs."
"Yes. I'll try it, George."
Polter was momentarily standing motionless as though gazing around him,judging what to do next. His size seemed stationary. Beyond our bars wecould see the distant circular walls as though this were some giantcrater-pit in which Polter was standing. Then I thought I recognizedit--the round, nearly vertical pit into which Alan had plunged his handand arm. Above us then was a gully, blind at one end. And above that,the outer surface, the summit of the fragment of golden quartz.
"Babs, I know where we are! If he takes you out, keep his attention.I'll try and get one of his black vials. Make him hold you near theground. If I see you there, in position where you can jump, I'll startlehim. Babs it's desperately dangerous but I can't think of anything else.Jump. Get away from him. I'll keep his attention on me. Then I'll joinyou if I can--with the drug."
Polter was moving. We had no time to say more.
"I'll try it, George." For just an instant she clung to me with her softarms about my neck. Our love was sweeping us in this desperate moment,and it seemed that above us was a remote Earth world holding the promiseof all our dreams. Or were we cross-starred, doomed like the realm ofthe atom? Was this swift embrace now marking the end of everything forus?
Babs called, "Dr. Polter?"
We could feel his movements stopping.
"Yes? You are all right, Babs?"
She laughed--a ripple of silvery laughter--but there was tragic fear inher eyes as she gazed at me. "Yes, Dr. Polter, but breathless. Almostdead, but not quite. What happened? I want to come out and talk to you."
"Not now, little bird."
"But I want to." To me it was a miracle that she could call so lightlyand hold that note of lugubrious laughter in her voice. "I'm hungry.Didn't you think of that? And frightened. Take me out."
He was sitting down! "You remind me that I am tired, Babs. And hungry,also. I haf a little food. You shall come out for just a short time."
"Thank you. Take me carefully."
Our tilted cage was near the ground as he seated himself. But it wasstill too far for me to jump.
I murmured, "Babs it's not close enough to the ground."
"Wait, George, I'll fix that. You hide! If he looks in he'll see you."
I scrambled back to my hiding place. Polter's huge fingers were fumblingat our bars. The little door sprang open.
"Come, Babs."
He held the cupped bowl of his hand to the doorway. "Come out."
"No!" she called. "It is too far down!"
"Come. That iss foolish."
"No! I'm afraid. Put the cage on the ground."
"Babs!" His finger and thumb came reaching in to seize her, but sheavoided them.
"Dr. Polter! Don't! You'll crush me!"
"Then come out on my hand."
He seemed annoyed. I had scrambled back to the doorway; I knew hecouldn't see me so long as the cage remained strapped to his shirtfront.
I whispered, "I can make it, Babs!"
Polter was apparently on one elbow now, half turned to one side. Fromour cage, the sloping gleaming white surface of his stiff glossy shirtbosom went down a steep incline. His belt was down there, and theoutward bulging curve of his lap--a spreading surface where I could landlike a scuttling insect, unobserved, if only Babs could hold hisattention.
I whispered vehemently, "Try it! Go out! Leave me--keep talking to him!"
She called instantly, "All right, then. Bring your hand! Closer!Carefully! It seems so high up here!"
She swung herself into his palm, and flung her arms about the greatpillar of his crooked finger. The bowl of his hand moved slowly away. Iheard her faint voice, and his overhead rumble.
I chanced it! I didn't know his exact position or which way he waslooking.
Again I heard Bab's voice. "Careful, Dr. Polter. Don't let me fall!"
"Yes, little bird."
I let myself down from the tilted doorway, hung by my hand and dropped.I struck the ramp-like yielding surface of his shirt bosom. I slid,tumbling, scrambling, and landed softly in the huge folds of his trouserfabric. I was unhurt. The width of his belt, high as my body, was nearme. I shrank against it. I found I could cling to its upper edge.
My hold cam
e just in time. He shifted and sat up. I was lifted with aswoop of movement. When it steadied I saw above me the top of his knee.His left leg was crooked, the foot drawn close to him. Babs was perchedup there on the knee summit. His right leg was outstretched. I was atthe right side of his belt. I could dart off along that curving expanseof his leg and leap to the ground. If he would hold this position! Oneof the pouches of his belt was near me. The vial in it was black. Theenlarging drug! I moved toward it.
But Babs was too high to jump from that summit of his crooked knee! Ithink she saw me at his belt. I heard her voice.
"I cannot eat up here. It is too high. Oh, please be careful how youmove! I am so dizzy, so frightened! You move with such great jerks!"
He had what seemed a huge surface of bread and meat. He was breaking offcrumbs to put before her. I reached the pouch of his belt. The vial wasas long as my body. I tugged to try and lift it out.
All the giant contours of Polter's body shifted as he cautiously moved.I clung. I saw that Babs was being held gently between his thumb andforefinger. He lowered her to the ground, and she stood beside the breadand the meat he had placed there.
And she had the courage to laugh! "Why this--this is an enormoussandwich! You will have to break it."
He was leaning over her, half turned on his side. The vial came free. Ishoved it; but I could not control its weight. I pushed desperately. Itslid over the round brink of his right hip, and fell behind him. I heardthe tinkling thud of it down on the rocks.
There was no alarm. I could not chance leaping from his hip. I scurriedalong the convex top of his outstretched leg, and beyond his knee Ijumped.
I landed safely. I could see the black vial back across the broken rocksurface, with the bulge of Polter's hip above it. I ran back and reachedthe vial, tugged at its huge stopper. The cork began to yield under mypanting, desperate efforts. In a moment I would have a pellet of theenlarging drug; make away with it and startle Polter so that Babs mightdart off and escape.
The huge stopper of the vial was larger than my head. It came suddenlyout. I flung it away, plunged in my hand, and seized an enormous roundpellet.
Then abruptly the alarm came, and I had not caused it! Polter ripped outa startled, rumbling curse and sat upright. Under the curve of his legI saw Babs had been momentarily neglected. She was running.
Across the boulder-strewn plain, two tiny men had appeared. Polter hadseen them.
They were the enlarging figures of Dr. Kent and Alan!
