There were other men; strange, savage-looking barbarians; swart, yellowish, misshapen, and squatly powerful. Some ran with flaming torches, thrust them into open doorways, and ran on, leaving flame and smoke to burst out behind in gushing blasts. Others staggered under heaped piles of loot, bedecked in grisly fashion with pendant ornaments and mincing bracelets; others shouted and sang in wild, vinous accents, and others ran methodically and with deadly precision. Their short swords rose and fell—and came up dripping, bloody. A fleeing Roman soldier went crashing, cloven to the nape; an ancient bel-dame shrieked and stopped in bloody gurgle.
Pennypacker thus found himself in the Roman city of Aquileia, in the year 452 A. D., at the very moment that Attila's Huns had broken through the city walls!
Pennypacker screamed once and dashed for the controls. He did not want to remain in this terrible place! He did not want to travel in time any more! If only he could get back to safe-and-sane 1935, he would destroy the time machine; he would—
He groaned and cowered away. He had forgotten. The controls were locked on automatic reverse; he must wait, wait three hours. Three hours! Eternity in this scene of carnage and horror! He would go mad! He would be discovered and killed!
A piercing screech filtered through the glassy wall. He raised his head from his hands. A girl was running straight across the square, running swiftly over débris and the dead, her long white garment whipping backward with the wind of her flight. Her tawny hair was disordered; her eyes were wide with fear. Behind her clattered a Hun—squat, powerful, hairy, his thick brow a single straight gash, his nose curved like a vulture's, his skin tough and yellow.
There was brutal, avid desire in his slanted eyes, and he was gaining on the fleeing girl. Pennypacker jerked forward with an oath. The girl was running straight for the time machine; her eyes flared into hope.
Pennypacker yelled insanely, beat upon the locked, immobile controls. He was discovered! He would be killed! He did not want to die in this long-dead past.
The girl has reached the deceptive glass of the machine, was hammering with small, tender fists against the solid wall. The Hun leaped the intervening distance, caught at her shoulder. The hope in her eyes gave way to horror. She screamed in last despair as the hairy arms encircled her, swung her like a sack of meal over a squat, powerful shoulder.
The gaze of the Hun and that of the man of A. D. 1935 met. The Hun grinned brutally and turned to carry off his prey. The girl's hand fluttered feebly to Pennypacker in a final imploring gesture.
Something cracked within the man. Not knowing what he did, swearing horribly, his hand fought the slide control. The door sprang open. Still unknowing, the gun somehow in his hand, he raised it, shot. The bullet tore at the barbarian's leg. It sagged; he sat grotesquely down.
Pennypacker ran out of the machine to help the girl, but she forestalled him. She had flung clear; was up on her feet, and, without looking backward, without so much as a "Thank you," fled like a startled animal straight for the nearest building and disappeared into the portico.
Pennypacker stared after her in disgust, and even as he stared, a party of Huns dashed into the very structure the girl had thought to hide in. Pennypacker shrugged his shoulders.
"Serves her damn right," he muttered, and turned to go back into the machine.
Pennypacker did not know it, but he had interfered with the course of history and unwittingly sealed his own fate. The girl would have been his many-times-removed great-grandmother! Thus time revenges itself on those who pry into its secrets.
There was another surprise waiting for him. The barbarian Hun had managed to drag himself with his shattered leg into the machine, and as Pennypacker, still dazed, entered, he felt himself caught in a grip of iron.
He cried out with the pain of it, and struggled to free himself, but it was like the futile buzzing of a fly enmeshed in a spider's web. The hold on his leg gripped all the tighter. Pennypacker ceased struggling, and caught hold of a jutting control. The barbarian, because of his wounded leg, could not rise or draw him nearer for the finishing blow; and Pennypacker, holding grimly onto the control, could not free his captured leg.
A straining, heaving tug of war, and then, as if by mutual consent, both ceased pulling, to remain in a sort of status quo. Their eyes turned and met.
Pennypacker was so shocked that he almost let go his hold. The features of the Hun—the straight black brow, the yellowish tinge, the nose—they all seemed strangely familiar, as though they were a caricature of some one he knew. The Hun, too, seemed greatly puzzled. He stared up with dark, savage eyes; the straight brow furrowed with unaccustomed thought.
Then, almost simultaneously, their free hands stole around the nape of their necks and scratched gently at the longish noses.
The characteristic, unconscious gesture of Pennypacker that used to infuriate Sam Corey most unreasonably. Duplicated, back in time, at the sack of Aquileia, by a Hun, an unspeakable savage, a deformed creature stemming from the Asiatic steppes, following the scourge of God, scum of humanity!
Pennypacker let go his hold in the surprise of it, dropped to the floor within easy reach of the fierce barbarian. But the Hun, though still gripping his leg, made no other move. He sat there, his wounded leg stiff in front of him, staring at the modern man.
He opened his mouth; thick, barbarous speech spewed forth. Pennypacker, beyond fear, shook his head and said nothing. The Hun tried again. This time more haltingly, with frequent stops as he fumbled for the words and with mutilated intonations. But Pennypacker, who was somewhat of a scholar, caught the drift. The Hun was addressing him in ancient Latin.
"You—do that," the savage warrior mouthed. "That old trick—my family. Father do it; great father; way back. Who you? Were you from? How—"
Pennypacker stared down at the distorted, bestial features in front of him. He shuddered. That strange familiarity—it resolved itself into a weird caricature of his own face. That trick gesture—his own father and great-grandfather, according to tradition, had been addicted to it.
It was impossible; a nightmare come to plague him!
He winked his eyes violently; hoping to awake, to find himself in bed back in 1935. But no; the scenes of slaughter and lust continued around him; the ancestral Hun gave him back feature for feature; the grip on his leg had not relaxed.
Then he went mad; stark, raving mad.
"Go away," he shrieked, "vision out of hell! I disown you. I defy you. You never fathered me! I come of Norman stock! You devil, you!"
He struck futilely at the grinning visage, a stinging, glancing blow. The Hun's puzzled grin gave way to a scowl of utter ferocity. The beast, the Oriental savage, came to the fore with a rush. He had been struck, insulted. It called for blood, the warm, satisfying gush of blood from gaping wounds. The terrifying battle cry of the Huns ripped out of his throat, filled the machine with its ululations.
"Ula-ula-ula-loo-loo!"
His right arm whipped around, caught Pennypacker by the throat. The scientist felt himself strangling; his hands plucked unavailingly at the steely grip; red, hate-filled eyes stared into his; hot breath was on his cheek.
He tried to cry out, and could not. The hands were constricting. Everything was a red haze. His arms dropped limply. The right hand contacted with something hard. A last gush of consciousness. That must be the gun. His fingers clutched, raised it.
Something told him he must not fire; the consequences would be infinitely incalculable; but he was dying, anyway. There was no mercy in the Hun. The red haze deepened. His hand moved in reflex action. The muzzle tilted; the finger compressed. There was a shattering roar; the barbarian shook violently, stared in hurt surprise, and slowly collapsed.
Pennypacker felt the death-dealing grip loosen, felt rather than saw the sprawl of the Hun. Then—suddenly—darkness, vague, illimitable—
Men were running to the machine with great shouts. Huns with weapons in their hands. The vibratium walls cleared, turned milky-white,
and faded. The automatic reverse had gone into action. The three-hour limit was up!
James Mann, bookkeeper, shouted under the nose of his astounded boss: "My ancestors—"
He staggered, held himself painfully. Then—
The boss said: "My God!" and fell back into a chair.
He rubbed his eyes, tried to control the trembling of his limbs.
He stared around the office with bloodshot, haggard eyes.
It was empty!
James Mann had vanished, as though he had never been!
That was it—as though he had never been.
The boss raised himself, fighting back insanity. He ran around, peering under desks and chairs. No use!
"Mann!" he cried, his voice a semishriek. "Come back! I know it's a joke! You're hiding some place. I'll raise your salary! I'll do anything!"
No answer, for the very good reason that James Mann never existed on this earth.
"Oh, my God!" mouthed the boss, and fell on the floor in a fit. There they found him, his other employees. Shrieking and gibbering—mad!
Herr Hellwig was in splendid fettle. He played upon the hundred thousand Blue Shirts as though they were a many-stopped organ.
"Blah! Blah! War!" he shouted. "War against the enemy! I call on Vercingetorix, our ancestor; Odin, Thor, all the gods of Valhalla—"
The Blue Shirts flamed, upended sun-bright swords, crashed out:
"War! Heil Hellwig!"
And stopped as though paralyzed.
A hundred thousand stared, a hundred thousand moaned, a hundred thousand—no—ninety thousand, broke into epic, panic flight.
Their leader, calling on his ancestors, on his ancient gods, had vanished, gone as though he had never been.
The gods had revenged themselves!
With Henry Cabot it was much simpler.
His wife choked on a fish-wife epithet, most unbecoming in an Adams and a Daughter of the American Revolution, and evaporated.
Henry Cabot rubbed his eyes unbelievingly, said something under his breath. He was in truth a Cabot, a Brahmin of Brahmins, schooled to self-repression, so he did not faint nor call wildly for help.
He took a step forward, stopped. No question about it; his wife had evaporated. He made a move toward the telephone to call the police, paused again, shrugged his shoulders. They would not believe him, of course.
A slow smile broke over his aristocratic countenance. He commenced humming the interrupted waltz, adjusted his necktie, went out to meet his chorus girl.
Emily closed her eyes, nestled forward for Paul's strong arms, and fell half across the bench. She picked herself up, opened her eyes, and screamed.
She was alone!
The red-faced policeman came on a lumbering run, swinging his stick. One look at the hysterical, shrieking girl and he blew a shrill blast on his whistle. A brother officer came racing; a crowd gathered with the facility that all New York crowds possess.
"Call the ambulance, Pete," No. 1 said. "Bellevue, psychopathic ward. It's a pity; she's got good looks."
He turned savagely on the crowd.
"G'wan, scram! What d'ye think this is—a circus?"
Max Bernstein let loose the killing blow, straight for the unprotected, sagging jaw of Hans Schilling, the champion. Within seconds there would be a new champion.
The Garden was bedlam. Expensive straws showered unnoticed on straining, blood-lustful humanity. The climax to the battle of the century. The announcers danced insanely before the microphones; their voices cracked and hoarse.
"Folks, it's coming, on its way! It's connecting! Max Bernstein's fist—Hold on! Wh-what's that? Where am I? Where are we? Oh, my God!"
The microphones went dead, forgotten. In a million homes, ears, thirstily waiting for the description of the final blow, strained in vain. Even the roar of the crowd went mute. Then—confused sounds, terrified, wailing, like animals in mortal agony.
Home-sitting fight fans shuddered, turned off their radios; rushed to phone broadcasting stations, clamoring for information, clogging all wires.
Hans Schilling, Nordic champion, and Max Bernstein, Jewish challenger, had both puffed out like wisps of smoke in mid-blow, in the very center of the ring, under the fierce, beating glare of the floodlights!
Sam Corey waited alertly in the laboratory, his eyes glued to the split-second clock; the platform where the time machine should reappear.
Three hours! Eternity!
Never did seconds drag more interminably. The machine had vanished according to schedule; the first half of the experiment was a success. Somewhere in time, in the dim past ages, the machine rested; somewhere in time, Emmet Pennypacker existed, no longer an entity in the year 1935.
What was happening to him? Sam Corey tried to visualize; could not concentrate; gave it up, and waited, every sense taut on the dragging clock.
A quarter to three! Pennypacker had started at twelve. Ten minutes, five minutes, one minute, fifteen seconds. Sam Corey sprang up. One second!
A vague opalescence, a shadowy mist gathering: a milky, coherent cloud, and the familiar shimmer of the vibratium-built time machine. It had returned on the dot, obedient to the automatic reverse.
Sam allowed his scientific feelings to overcome him. He gave an exultant whoop, dashed forward to the machine. He stopped, cried out in horror, jumped in through the open slide door, knelt at the motionless body within.
It was minutes before he arose. When he did, he was a strangely aged, stooped man. Gone was the zest of youth, never to return. His lips were grim, taut; his eyes hard. Very deliberately he dragged the body out into the laboratory; very deliberately he searched around until he found what he wanted. It was a sledge hammer. Methodically he smashed into smithereens the time machine, the greatest invention that man had ever conceived.
At last, satisfied that no one part was intact or recognizable, he went to the phone and called the police—and the reporters.
It was a tragedy of colossal dimensions that struck an astounded world. A holocaust that left its impact on future generations, making it impossible for any scientist to dare meddle again with time.
Fifty thousand men, women and children vanished that fatal day; fifty thousand human beings of every race and clime; in savage Africa, in far-off Australia, in teeming China, in blue-eyed northern Europe, in dark-haired southern Europe, in the vast stretches of America, the melting pot of all races.
Gone, vanished, disappeared without a trace, as though they had never been!
That was it: they had never been, explained Sam Corey to the horde of clamoring reporters, while a bewildered world, mourning lost dear ones, surfeited with supernatural tragedy, groped for a coherent answer.
"You see," said Sam, after the awe-stricken men had thrown vain glances at the smashed machine, stared with sharp intakes of breath at the thing on the floor, "you can't play around with time. I warned Pennypacker, but he wouldn't listen. I helped him build the machine—it was his idea completely," he added hastily. He did not want the credit that rightly was his. The execrations of mankind would immortally follow the creator.
"To go into the future," resumed Sam, "yes, that might be possible: though even then there might be trouble. It's a delicate business. But into the past! The past is done, completely. The tale is told. 'The moving finger writes, and, having writ, moves on—' You know the rest."
The reporters looked at each other, nodded wisely, and scribbled. A good line: make note to look it up, where it came from, back at the copy desk.
Sam crossed his legs. He was beginning to enjoy himself.
"You go back into the past," he said, "and what happens? You intrude into a state of affairs that's already worked out: cause and effect. Your mere presence is sufficient to set up disturbances that should never have existed."
A reporter raised his head, looked with avid, fascinated eyes at the thing on the floor.
"But that," he muttered. "What is it?"
"I'm coming to that," Sam said del
iberately. "Pennypacker did more than intrude. He killed a man; a man who had lived and bred children, and who in turn bred children, and so on ad infinitum. Reason mathematically: figure the number of generations; the spread of offspring. Fifty thousand is conservative; I'm surprised half the world didn't go!
"The man died by an act that should never have happened. The consequences are simple. The children he must have had after his untimely decease, and I use the word untimely advisedly, were therefore never born. Accordingly, all his descendants whom we supposed alive to-day never were. They were illusions, figments of our imagination, and necessarily vanished into nothingness the moment their putative ancestor shuffled off his mortal coil."
"But this thing," persisted the stubborn reporter. "And where is Pennypacker?"
For the first time Sam Corey smiled. Years of bitterness under the selfish egotism of Pennypacker were now bearing pleasant fruit.
He got up, went to the body.
"This," he repeated. "Look at it; it's a Hun of Attila's time. Read Gibbon's description. Note something further. It's a caricature, I grant you, but a painfully accurate caricature of Emmet Pennypacker, the eminent scientist. This Hun was Pennypacker's direct progenitor. Pennypacker killed his own father, so to speak, and therefore never existed. Pennypacker, gentlemen, was a myth!"
Here this veracious chronicle should end, but there is just one further incident to be told, if only to season unmitigated horror with a little spice of grim humor—if only to point a moral.
Mrs. Murphy was waiting for the return of her lord and master; frightened, hard, and faintly triumphant, in bewildering succession. Little Tim clung to her ample Sunday-going black dress, whimpering.
It was evening. The papers were out already, screaming headlines about the world-wide tragedy and the incredible explanation. She hushed poor Tim with absent, stroking fingers, and waited.
Mr. Murphy walked elaborately through the door, more drunk than usual. The holocaust had caught him at work—riveting; a pal had vanished from his side. That meant drinks to drown the memory; more drinks to vanquish thought.
When The Future Dies Page 9
