The Runaway Skyscraper

  X.

  Despite his preoccupation with his errand, which was to find ifthere were other signs of the continued activity of the strangeforces that had lowered the tower through the Fourth Dimensioninto the dim and unrecorded years of aboriginal America, Arthurcould not escape the fascination of the sight that met his eyes. Abright moon shone overhead and silvered the white sides of the tower,while the brightly-lighted windows of the offices within glitteredlike jewels set into the shining shaft.

  From his position on the ground he looked into the dimness of theforest on all sides. Black obscurity had gathered beneath the darkmasses of moonlit foliage. The tiny birch-bark teepees of the nowdeserted Indian village glowed palely. Above, the stars lookedcalmly down at the accusing finger of the tower pointing upward,as if in reproach at their indifference to the savagery that reignedover the whole earth.

  Like a fairy tower of jewels the building rose. Alone among awilderness of trees and streams it towered in a strange beauty:moonlit to silver, lighted from within to a mass of brilliant gems,it stood serenely still.

  Arthur, carrying his futile lantern about its base, felt his owninsignificance as never before. He wondered what the Indians mustthink. He knew there must be hundreds of eyes fixed upon the strangesight--fixed in awe-stricken terror or superstitious reverence uponthis unearthly visitor to their hunting grounds.

  A tiny figure, dwarfed by the building whose base he skirted,Arthur moved slowly about the vast pile. The earth seemed not tohave been affected by the vast weight of the tower.

  Arthur knew, however, that long concrete piles reached far down tobedrock. It was these piles that had sunk into the Fourth Dimension,carrying the building with them.

  Arthur had followed the plans with great interest when theMetropolitan was constructed. It was an engineering feat, and inthe engineering periodicals, whose study was a part of Arthur'sbusiness, great space had been given to the building and the methodsof its construction.

  While examining the earth carefully he went over his theory of thecause for the catastrophe. The whole structure must have sunk atthe same time, or it, too, would have disintegrated, as the otherbuildings had appeared to disintegrate. Mentally, Arthur likenedthe submergence of the tower in the oceans of time to an elevatorsinking past the different floors of an office building. All aboutthe building the other sky-scrapers of New York had seemed tovanish. In an elevator, the floors one passes seem to rise upward.

  Carrying out the analogy to its logical end, Arthur reasoned that thebuilding itself had no more cause to disintegrate, as the buildingsit passed seemed to disintegrate, than the elevator in the officebuilding would have cause to rise because its surroundings seemedto rise.

  Within the building, he knew, there were strange stirrings ofemotions. Queer currents of panic were running about, throwingthe people to and fro as leaves are thrown about by a current ofwind. Yet, underneath all those undercurrents of fear, was a rapidlygrowing resolution, strengthened by an increasing knowledge of theneed to work.

  Men were busy even then shifting all possible comfortable furnitureto a single story for the women in the building to occupy. Themen would sleep on the floor for the present. Beds of boughs couldbe improvised on the morrow. At sunrise on the following morningmany men would go to the streams to fish, guarded by other men. Allwould be frightened, no doubt, but there would be a grim resolutionunderneath the fear. Other men would wander about to hunt.

  There was little likelihood of Indians approaching for some days, atleast, but when they did come Arthur meant to avoid hostilities byall possible means. The Indians would be fearful of their strangevisitors, and it should not be difficult to convince them thatfriendliness was safest, even if they displayed unfriendly desires.

  The pressing problem was food. There were two thousand people inthe building, soft-bodied and city-bred. They were unaccustomedto hardship, and could not endure what more primitive people wouldhardly have noticed.

  They must be fed, but first they must be taught to feedthemselves. The fishermen would help, but Arthur could only hopethat they would prove equal to the occasion. He did not know whatto expect from them. From the hunters he expected but little. TheIndians were wary hunters, and game would be shy if not scarce.

  The great cloud of birds he had seen at sunset was a hopefulsign. Arthur vaguely remembered stories of great flocks ofwood-pigeons which had been exterminated, as the buffalo wasexterminated. As he considered the remembrance became more clear.

  They had flown in huge flocks which nearly darkened the sky. As lateas the forties of the nineteenth century they had been an importantarticle of food, and had glutted the market at certain seasons ofthe year.

  Estelle had said the birds he had seen at sunset werepigeons. Perhaps this was one of the great flocks. If it were reallyso, the food problem would be much lessened, provided a way could befound to secure them. The ammunition in the tower was very limited,and a shell could not be found for every bird that was needed,nor even for every three or four. Great traps must be devised, orbird-lime might possibly be produced. Arthur made a mental noteto ask Estelle if she knew anything of bird-lime.

  A vague, humming roar, altering in pitch, came to his ears. Helistened for some time before he identified it as the sound of thewind playing upon the irregular surfaces of the tower. In the citythe sound was drowned by the multitude of other noises, but hereArthur could hear it plainly.

  He listened a moment, and became surprised at the number ofnight noises he could hear. In New York he had closed his ears toincidental sounds from sheer self-protection. Somewhere he heardthe ripple of a little spring. As the idea of a spring came intohis mind, he remembered Estelle's description of the deep-tonedroar she had heard.

  He put his hand on the cold stone of the building. There was stilla vibrant quivering of the rock. It was weaker than before, butwas still noticeable.

  He drew back from the rock and looked up into the sky. It seemedto blaze with stars, far more stars than Arthur had ever seen inthe city, and more than he had dreamed existed.

  As he looked, however, a cloud seemed to film a portion of theheavens. The stars still showed through it, but they twinkled ina peculiar fashion that Arthur could not understand.

  He watched in growing perplexity. The cloud moved very swiftly. Thinas it seemed to be, it should have been silvery from the moonlight,but the sky was noticeably darker where it moved. It advanced towardthe tower and seemed to obscure the upper portion. A confused motionbecame visible among its parts. Wisps of it whirled away from thebrilliantly lighted tower, and then returned swiftly toward it.

  Arthur heard a faint tinkle, then a musical scraping, which becamelouder. A faint scream sounded, then another. The tinkle developedinto the sound made by breaking glass, and the scraping sound becamethat of the broken fragments as they rubbed against the sides ofthe tower in their fall.

  The scream came again. It was the frightened cry of a woman. Asoft body struck the earth not ten feet from where Arthur stood,then another, and another.