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THEY OPENED THE PANDORA'S BOX OF ATOMIC TRAVEL
When George Randolph first caught sight of Orena, he was astounded byits gleaming perfection. Here were hills and valleys, lakes and streams,glowing with the light of the most precious of metals. And, moreastonishing than that, it was a world of _miniature_ perfection--aninfinitely tiny universe within a golden atom!
But for Randolph it was also a world aglow with danger. Somewhere in itstiny vastness were the friends he had to rescue. Captives of a madman,they had been reduced to native Orena size; to return to Earth theyneeded the growth capsules Randolph was bringing them. It was up toRandolph to find them--and quickly--for the longer they stayed tiny, thecloser they came to passing BEYOND THE VANISHING POINT!
CAST OF CHARACTERS
FRANZ POLTER He found a gold mine in a land where there was no gold.
DR. KENT His scientific studies could mean life or death to an entire universe!
GEORGE RANDOLPH He crossed the border into Canada, and found himself in another world.
ALAN KENT Twenty feet tall, or two inches high--which should he be?
GLORA She was only as large as a thumbnail, but she carried a gigantic secret.
BABS KENT Did she live in a golden cage or a magnificent palace?
BEYOND THE VANISHING POINT
by RAY CUMMINGS
ACE BOOKS, INC. 23 West 47th Street, New York 36, N. Y.
BEYOND THE VANISHING POINT Copyright (C), 1958, by Ace Books, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Printed in U.S.A.
CHAPTER I
It was shortly after noon of December 31, 1970, when the series of weirdand startling events began which took me into the tiny world of an atomof gold, beyond the vanishing point, beyond the range of even thehighest-powered electric-microscope. My name is George Randolph. I was,that momentous afternoon, assistant chemist for the Ajax InternationalDye Company, with main offices in New York City.
It was twelve-twenty when the local exchange call-sorter announcedAlan's connection from Quebec.
"Hello, George? Look here, you've got to come up here at once. ChateauFrontenac, Quebec. Will you come?"
I could see his face imaged in the little mirror on my desk; theanxiety, tenseness in his voice, was duplicated in his expression.
"Well--" I began.
"You must, George. Babs and I need you. See here...."
He tried at first to make it sound like an invitation for a New Year'sEve holiday. But I knew it was not that. Alan and Barbara were my bestfriends. They were twins, eighteen years old. I felt that Alan wouldalways be my best friend; but for Babs, my hopes, longings, went fardeeper, though as yet I had never brought myself to the point of tellingher so.
"I'd like to come, Alan. But--"
"You've got to George! I can't tell you everything over the public air.But I've seen _him_: He's diabolical. I know it now!"
_Him_! It could only mean, of all the world, one person!
"He's here!" he went on. "Near here. We saw him today! I didn't want totell you, but that's why we came. It seemed a long chance, but it's he,I'm positive!"
I was staring at the image of Alan's eyes; there was horror in them. Andhis voice too. "God, George, it's weird! Weird, I tell you. Hislooks--he--oh I can't tell you now! Only, come!"
* * * * *
I was busy at the office in spite of the holiday season, but I droppedeverything and went. By one o'clock that afternoon I was wheeling mylittle sport Midge from its cage on the roof of the Metropole building,and went into the air.
It was a cold gray afternoon with the feel of coming snow. I made a goodtwo hundred and fifty miles at first, taking the northboundthrough-traffic lane which today the meteorological conditions hadplaced at an altitude of 6,200 feet.
Flying is largely automatic. There was not enough traffic to bother me.The details of leaving the office so hastily had been too engrossing forthought of Alan and Babs. But now, in my little pit at the controls, mymind flung ahead. They had located him. That meant Franz Polter, forwhom we had been searching nearly four years. And my memory went backinto the past with vivid vision....
* * * * *
The Kents, four years ago, were living on Long Island. Alan and Babswere fourteen at the time, and I was seventeen. Even then Babs wassomething kind of special to me. I lived in a neighboring house thatsummer and saw them every day.
To my adolescent mind a thrilling mystery hung upon the Kent family. Themother was dead. Dr. Kent, father of Alan and Babs, maintained aluxurious home, with only a housekeeper and no other servant. Dr. Kentwas a retired chemist. He had, in his home, a laboratory in which he wasworking upon some mysterious problem. His children did not know what itwas, nor, of course, did I. And none of us had ever been in thelaboratory, except that when occasion offered we stole surreptitiouspeeps.
I recall Dr. Kent as a kindly, iron-gray haired gentleman. He was sternwith the discipline of his children; but he loved them, and wasindulgent in many ways. They loved him; and I, an orphan, began lookingupon him almost as a father. I was interested in chemistry. He knew it,and did his best to help and encourage me in my studies.
There came an afternoon in the summer of 1966, when arriving at the Kenthome, I ran upon a startling scene. The only other member of thehousehold was a young fellow of twenty-five, named Franz Polter. He wasa foreigner, born, I understood, in one of the Balkan Protectorates; hewas here, employed by Dr. Kent as laboratory assistant.
He had been with the Kents, at this time, two years. Alan and Babsdidn't like him, nor did I. He must have been a clever, skillfulchemist. No doubt he was. But he was, to us, repulsive. A hunchback,with a short, thick body; dangling arms that suggested a gorilla; barrelchest; a lump set askew on his left shoulder, and his massive headplanted down with almost no neck. His face was rugged in feature; a widemouth, a high-bridged heavy nose; and above the face a great shock ofwavy black hair. It was an intelligent face; in itself, not repulsive.
But I think we all three feared Franz Polter. There was always somethingsinister about him, that had nothing to do with his deformity.
When I came, that afternoon, Babs and Polter were under a tree on theKent lawn. Babs, at fourteen, with long black braids down her back,bare-legged and short-skirted in a summer sport costume, was standingagainst the tree with Polter facing her. They were about the sameheight. To my youthful imaginative mind rose the fleeting picture of ayoung girl in a forest menaced by a gorilla.
I came upon them suddenly. I heard Polter say:
"But I lof you. And you are almos' a woman. Some day you lof me."
He put out his thick hand and gripped her shoulder. She tried to twistaway. She was frightened, but she laughed.
"You--you're crazy!"
He was suddenly holding her in his arms, and she was fighting him. Idashed forward. Babs was always a spunky sort of girl. In spite of herfear now, she kept on struggling, and she shouted:
"You--let me go, you--you hunchback!"
He did let her go; but in a frenzy of rage he hauled back his hand andstruck her in the face. I was upon him the next second. I had him downon the lawn, punching him; but though at seventeen I was a reasonablyhusky lad, the hunchback with his thick, hairy gorilla arms proved muchstronger. He heaved me off. The commotion had brought Alan and withoutwaiting to find out what the trouble was, he jumped on Polter. Betweenus, I think we would have beaten him pretty badly. But the housekeepersummoned Dr. Kent and the fight
was over.
Polter left for good within an hour. He did not speak to any of us. ButI saw him as he put his luggage into the taxi which Dr. Kent hadsummoned. I was standing silently nearby with Babs and Alan. The look heflung us as he drove away carried an unmistakable menace--the promise ofvengeance. And I think now that in his warped and twisted mind he wastelling himself that he would some day make Babs regret that she hadrepulsed his love.
What happened that night none of us ever knew. Dr. Kent worked late inhis laboratory; he was there when Alan and Babs and the housekeeper wentto bed. He had written a note to Alan; it was found on his desk in acorner of the laboratory next morning, addressed in care of the familylawyer to be given Alan in the event of his death. It said very little.Described a tiny fragment of gold quartz rock the size of a walnut whichwould be found under the giant microscope in the laboratory; and toldAlan to give it to the American Scientific Society to be guarded andwatched very carefully.
This note was found, but Dr. Kent had vanished! There had been amidnight marauder. The laboratory was on the lower floor of the house.Through one of its open windows, so the police said, an intruder hadentered. There was evidence of a struggle, but it must have been short,because neither Babs, Alan, the housekeeper, nor any of the neighborshad heard anything. And the fragment of golden quartz was gone!
The police investigation came to nothing. Polter was found in New York.He withstood the police questions. There was nothing except suspicionupon which he could be held, and he was finally released. Immediatelythereafter, he disappeared.
Neither Alan, Babs nor I saw Polter again. Dr. Kent had never been heardfrom to this day, four years later when I flew to join the twins inQuebec. And now Alan told me that Polter was up there! We had neverceased to believe that Dr. Kent was alive, and that Polter was themidnight marauder. As we grew older, we began to search for Polter. Itseemed to us, that if we could once get our hands on him, we could dragfrom him the truth which the police had failed to get.
The call of a traffic director in mid-Vermont brought me back from thesememories. My buzzer was clanging; a peremptory halting signal day-beamcame darting up at me from below. It caught me and clung. I shouted downat it.
"What's the matter?" I gave my name and number and all the details inone breath. Above everything I had no wish to be halted now. "What's thematter? I haven't done anything wrong."
"The hell you haven't," the director roared. "Come down to threethousand. That lane's barred."
I dove obediently and his beam followed me. "Once more, like that, youngfellow--" But he went busy with somebody else and I didn't hear the endof his threat.
I crossed into Maine in mid-afternoon. It was already twilight. The skywas solid lead and the landscape all up through here was gray-white withsnow in the gathering darkness. I passed the City of Jackman, crossingfull over it to take no chances of annoying the border officials; and afew miles further, I dropped to the glaring lights of InternationalInspection Field. The formalities were soon finished. I was ready totake-off when Alan rushed at me.
"George! I thought I could connect here." He gripped me. He waswild-eyed, incoherent. He waved his taxiplane away. "I'm going with you,George. I'm almost out of my mind. I can't--I don't know what's happenedto her. She's gone, now--"
"Who's gone? Babs?"
"Yes." He pushed me into my plane and climbed in after me. "Don't talk.Get us up! I'll tell you then. I shouldn't have left."
When we were up in the air, I swung on him. "What are you talking about?Babs gone?"
I could feel myself shuddering with a nameless horror.
"I don't know what I'm talking about, George. I'm about crazy. TheQuebec police think I am, anyway. I've been raising hell with them foran hour. Babs is gone! I can't find her. I don't know where she is."
He finally calmed down enough to tell me what happened. Shortly afterhis radiophone to me in New York, he had missed Babs. They had had lunchin the huge hotel and then walked on the Dufferin Terrace--the famouspromenade outside looking down over the Lower City, the great sweep ofthe St. Lawrence River and the gray-white distant Laurentian mountains.
"I was to meet her inside. I went in ahead of her. But she didn't come.I went back to the Terrace but she was gone. She wasn't in our rooms.Nor the library, the lobby--anywhere."
But it was afternoon, in the public place of a civilized city. In thedaylight of the Dufferin Terrace, beside the long ice toboggan slide,under the gaze of skaters on the ice-rink and several hundred holidaymerrymakers, a young girl could hardly be murdered, or kidnapped,without attracting attention! The Quebec police thought the youngAmerican unduly excited about his sister, who was missing only an hour.They would do what they could, if by dark she had not rejoined him. Theysuggested that doubtless the young lady had gone shopping.
"Maybe she did," I agreed. But in my heart, I felt differently. "She'llbe waiting for us in the Hotel when we get there, Alan."
"But I'm telling you we saw Polter this morning. He lives here--notthirty miles from Quebec. We saw him on the Terrace after breakfast.Recognized him immediately of course."
"Did he see you?"
"I don't know. He was lost in the crowd in a minute. But I asked ayoung French fellow if he knew him. He did know him, as Frank Rascor.That must be the name he wears now. He's a famous man up here--wellknown, immensely rich. I didn't know if he saw us or not. What a fool Iwas to leave Babs alone, even for a minute."
We were speeding over a white-clad valley with a little frozen riverwinding down its middle. Night had almost come. The leaden sky was lowabove us. It began snowing. The lights of the small villages along theriver were barely visible.
"Can you land us, Alan?"
"Yes, surely. At the Municipal Field just beyond the Citadel. We can getto the Hotel in five minutes."
* * * * *
It was a flight of only half an hour. During it, Alan told me aboutPolter. The hunchback, known now as Frank Rascor, owned a mine in theLaurentians, some thirty miles from Quebec City--a fabulously productivemine of gold. It was an anomaly that gold should be produced in thisregion. No vein of gold-bearing rock had been found, except the one onPolter's property. Alan had seen a newspaper account of the strangenessof it; and on a hunch had come to Quebec, being intrigued by thedescription of the mine owner. He had seen Frank Rascor on the DufferinTerrace, and recognized him as Polter.
Again my thoughts went back into the past. Had Polter stolen thatmissing fragment of golden quartz the size of a walnut which had beenbeneath Dr. Kent's microscope? We always thought so. Dr. Kent had somesecret, some great problem upon which he was working. Polter, hisassistant, had evidently known, or partially known, its details. Andnow, four years later, Polter was immensely rich, with a "gold mine" inmountains where there was no other evidence of gold!
I seemed to see some connection. Alan, I knew, was groping with a dimidea, so strange he hardly dared voice it.
"I tell you, it's weird, George. The sight of him. Polter--heavens, onecouldn't mistake that build--and his face, his features, just the sameas when we knew him."
"Then what's so weird?" I demanded.
"His age." There was a queer solemn hush in Alan's voice. "George, whenwe knew Polter, he was about twenty-five, wasn't he? Well, that was fouryears ago. But he isn't twenty-nine now. I swear it is the same man, buthe isn't around thirty. Don't ask me what I'm talking about. I don'tknow. But he isn't thirty. He's nearer fifty! Unnatural! Weird! I feltit, and so did Babs, just that brief look we had of him."
I didn't answer. My attention was on managing the plane. The lights ofLevis were under us. Beyond the City cliffs, the St. Lawrence lay in itsdeep valley; the Quebec lights, the light-dotted ramparts with theTerrace and the great fortresslike Hotel showed across the river.
"Better take the stick, Alan. I don't know where the field is. And don'tyou worry about Babs. She'll be back by now."
* * * * *
But she
was not. We went to the two connecting rooms in the tower of theHotel which Alan and Babs had engaged. We inquired with half a dozenphone calls. No one had seen or heard from her. The Quebec police weresending a man up to talk with Alan.
"Well, we won't be here," Alan called to me. He was standing by thewindow in Babs' room; he was trembling too much to use the phone. I hungup the receiver and went though the connecting door to join him.
Babs' room! It sent a pang through me. A few of her garments were lyingaround. A negligee was laid out on the large bed. A velvet boudoirdoll--she had always loved them--stood on the dresser. Upon this Hotelroom, in one day, she had impressed her personality. Her perfume was inthe air. And now she was gone.
"We won't be here," Alan was repeating. He gripped me at the window."Look." In his hand was an ugly-looking, smokeless, soundless automaticof the Essen type. "And I've got another one for you. Brought them withme."
His face was white and drawn, but his hands had steadied. The tremblewas gone out of his voice.
"I'm going after him, George! Now! Understand that? Now? His place isonly thirty miles from here, out there in the mountains. You can see itin the daylight--a wall around his property and a stone castle which hebuilt in the middle of it. A gold mine? Hell!"
There was nothing to be seen now out of the window but the snow-filleddarkness, the blurred lights of Lower Quebec and the line of dock lightsfive hundred feet below us.
"Will you fly me, George?"
"Of course."
I was the one trembling now; the cool feel of the automatic which Alanthrust into my hand seemed suddenly to crystallize Babs' peril. I washere in her room, with the scent of her perfume around me, and thisdeadly weapon was needed! But the trembling was gone in a moment.
"Yes, of course, Alan. No use talking to the police. I gave them all theinformation--a description of her, what you said she was wearing. Nosense dragging Polter's name into it, with nothing tangible to go on.The police won't ransack the castle of a rich man just because you can'tfind your sister. Come on. You can tell me what this place is like as wego."
* * * * *
Bundled in our flying suits we hurried from the Hotel, climbed theCitadel slope and in ten minutes were in the air. The wind sucked at us.The snow now was falling with thick, huge flakes. Directed by Alan, Iheaded out over this ice-filled St. Lawrence, past the frozen Iled'Orleans, toward Polter's mysterious mountain castle.
Suddenly Alan burst out, "I know what father's secret was! I can pieceit together now, from little things that were meaningless when I was akid. He invented the electro-microscope. You know that. The infinitelysmall fascinated him. I remember he once said that if we could see farenough down into smallness, we would come upon human life!"
Alan's low, tense voice was more vehement than I had ever heard itbefore. "It's clear to me now, George. That little fragment of goldenquartz which he wanted me to be so careful of contained a world withhuman inhabitants! Father knew it, or suspected it. And I think thechemical problem on which he was working aimed for some drug. I know itwas a drug they were compounding, Polter said so once, a radioactivedrug; I remember listening at the door. A drug, George, capable ofmaking a human being infinitely small!"
I did not answer when momentarily Alan paused. So strange a thing. Mymind whirled with it; struggled to encompass it. And like themeaningless individual pieces of a puzzle, dropping so easily into placewhen the key piece is fitted, I saw Polter stealing that fragment ofgold; abducting Dr. Kent--perhaps because Polter himself was not fullyacquainted with the secret. And now, Polter up here with a fabulouslyrich "gold mine." And Babs, abducted by him, to be taken--where?
It set me shuddering.
"That's what it was," Alan reiterated. "And Polter, here now with whathe calls a 'mine.' It isn't a mine, it's a laboratory! He's got fathertoo, hidden God knows where! And now Babs. We've got to get them,George! The police can't help us! It's just you and me, to fight thisthing. And it's diabolical!"