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Show when world's!' fft I BHl By EDWIN BALMER I LULLEIb and PHILIP WYLIE 5 Cprtffht by Edwin Balmer A Philip Wylie 8 WNU Service gation as long as we will need it." "Now show us the 'Ark.'" Eve's father came out from the hnngnr to net as their guide. From the hysterical white glare of the Bronson Bodies Eve and Tony were taken into a mighty chamber which rose seemingly to the sky itself, where 'the brilliance was even greater. A hundred things inside that chamber might have attracted at-tracted 'their attention Us floodlighting flood-lighting system, or tne tremendous bracing of its metal walls; hut their eyes were only for the object in its center. The Ark on that late July evening the focal point, the dream and hope of all those whom Hendron had gathered together stood upright on a gigantic con- SYNOPSIS Iavid Ransdell, aviator, has been commissioned at Capetown to deliver de-liver a consignment oC photographic platen to Dr. Cole Hendron, in New York. Tony Drtike calls at the Hen-dronfl' Hen-dronfl' apartment. Rnnsdell arrives and fivo Hendron, with whom Tony Is deeply In love, introduces Tony ttt ltansdell. Newnpapors .publish a statement made by Hendron, saying that Professor Bronson has discovered discov-ered two planets, which are ap-iproaohtnp ap-iproaohtnp the earth. The result of ihe inevitable collision must be the end of this world. The approaching bodies are referred to as Bronson Alpha and Bronson Beta. To devise means of transferring to Bronson Beta is what is occupying; the minds of the members of the League of the I.ast Days. Eve outlines to Tony the idea of the Space Ship, which Hendron ha-s in contemplation. Tony rou ikJ-s up su i fable mon and women to build the ship. Hendron has not been nble to find a metal or an alloy al-loy wiifch will withstand the heat and pressure of atomic enerfry to be used in propelling? the Spaceship. The tides rush through the streets of New York. crete block in a cradle of steel beams. Its length was one hundred and thirty-five feet. It was sixty-two sixty-two feet In diameter, and its shape was cylindrical. Stream-lining was unnecessary for travel In the outer reaches of space, where there was no air to set lip resistance. The metal which composed it was a special spe-cial alloy eighteen inches in thickness, thick-ness, electroplated on the outside with an alloy which shone like chromium. After Tony had looked at It for a i long time, he said. "It is bv far the ! he able to propel this thing for mora than ft few minutes. I " Kve looked at her father. MDnd, you've got to so to bed. And don't worry so. AVe'll find the alloy aU right. "We've done everything else.'1 Hendron nodded; and Tony, looking at him, realized for the first time how much the scientist had aged recently. Tony escorted Eve to the women's wom-en's dormitory. Eve bade him good night, then went inside. Tony walked with slow strides to the top of a neighboring hill. Hendron's village looked on the northern side like a university campus, and on the southern side like a heart of a manufacturing man-ufacturing district. All around .it stretched the Michigan wilderness. The ground had been chosen partly becnuso of the age and firmness of its geological base, and partly because be-cause of its isolation. Tony's mind ran unevenly and irresolutely. "All these people," he thought, "these brilliant, temperamental tempera-mental men and women, have subsided sub-sided and made themselves like soldiers sol-diers in Hendron's service amazing amaz-ing man Only a hundred people " Fears assailed him: "Suppose they don't complete the Ark successfully, suc-cessfully, and she never leaves the ground? Then all these people would have given their lives for nothing. Suppose it leaves the earth and fails falls back for hundreds of miles, gaining speed all the way, so that when it hit the atmosphere it would turn red-hot and burn Itself It-self up just like a meteor." Tony thought of the tides that would rie that night and on following fol-lowing nights; and faintly, like the palpitation of a steamer's deck, the earth shook beneath his feet as If in answer to bis meditation. And Tony realized that the heart of tha earth was straining toward ita celestial companions. On the iiighb of the twenty-fifth, tides unprecedented in the world's history swept every seacoast. There were earthquakes of varying magnitude mag-nitude all over the world. In the day that followed, volcanoes opened up, and islands sank beneath the sea; and on the night of the twenty-sixth the greater of the Bronson Bodies came within its minimum distance from the earth on this their first approach. No complete record was ever made of the devastation. Eliot James, who made some tabulation of it in the succeeding months, could never believe all Hint he saw and heard, but it must have been true. The eastern coast of the United States sustained a tidal wave seven hundred and fifty feet in height, which came In from the sea In relentless re-lentless terraces and inundated the land to the very foot of the Appalachians. Ap-palachians. Its westward rush destroyed de-stroyed every building, every hovel, every skyscraper, every city, from Rnngor in Maine to Key West in Florida. The tide looped Into the Gulf of Mexico, rolled up the Mississippi Mis-sissippi valley. It roared around South America, turning the Amazon basin into a vast inland sea which stretched from what had been the east coast to the Andes mountains on the west coast. The speed of this tide was beyond calculation. CHAPTER VI Continued . 16 Tonight, when the huge Bronson Alpha and Bronson Beta with Its visible cities of its own dead were on this side of the world aain, the tide might rise over this hill. What matter? His mother lay where she would have chosen. A short time now, and all this world would end. TUy take yon away," Tony was Baying to the old minister and his wife and the older sexton. "We're flying west tonight to the central plntean. We'll manage somehow to take you with us." "Not mo," said the old sexton. 'Do not take me from the will of the Lord!" Nor would the minister and his wife be moved. They would journey jour-ney today, when the water receded, into the higher hills: but that was all they would do. The airplane settled to earth on the high ground between Lake Michigan Mich-igan and Iake Superior, just as the Bronson Bod'ies, appallingly large, rose over the eastern horizon. Nearly a thousand people came from the great cantonment to greet Tony and Hendron's daughter. The scientist had given up his New Mexico Mex-ico venture entirely, and brought his congregation of human beings all to his Michigan retreat. Hendron had prepared admirably for the days which he had known The. Ark the Focal Point, the Dream and Hope of All Those Whom Hendron Had Gathered Together Stood Upright on a Gigantic Concrete Elock in a Cradle Cra-dle of Steel Beams. most spectacular object mankind has ever achieved." Hendron glanced at him and continued con-tinued his exposition. "A second shell, much smaller, goes inside; and between the inner shell and its outer guard are several layers of insulation material. Inside the shell will be engines which generate the current, which In turn releases the blast of atomic energy, store-chambers for everything to be carried, i the mechanisms of control, the aeration plant, the heating units and the quarters for passengers." Tony tore his eyes from the sight. "IIow many will she carry?" he asked quietly. Hendron hesitated; (hen he said, "For a trip of the duration I contemplate, con-template, she would be nble to take about one hundred people." Tony's voice was still quieter. "Then you have nine hundred idealists ideal-ists in your camp here." The older man smiled. "Unless I am greatly mistaken, I have a thousand." "They all know about the ship?" "Something about it. Nearly half of them have been working on it, or on apparatus connected with It." 'T see. How long a trip do you contemplate?" Hendron took the young man's breath. "Ninety hours. That is, provided," and his voice began to shake "provided we can find proper prop-er materials with which to line our blast tubes. Otherwise we wouldn't would he ahead of his hand-picked community. There were two prodigious pro-digious dining halls, two buildings not unlike apartment houses in which men and women were domiciled. domi-ciled. In addition there was a building resembling a hangar set on end, which towered above the surrounding forests more than a hundred feet. At Its side was the landing field, space for the sheltering shelter-ing of the planes, and opposite the landing field a long row of shops which terminated in an iron works. It was to the machine shops and foundry that Eliot James took his companions. , "The crew here," he said to Eve, "has already finished part of the construction of the Ark which your father is planning. If wo wanted to, we could build a battleship here ; in the laboratories anything that has been done could be repeated ; and a great many things have been nccomplished that have never been done before. By tomorrow night I presume that the entireNew York equipment will have been reinstalled rein-stalled here." Tony whistled. "It's amazing. Genius, sheer genius! How about food?" Eliot James smiled. "There is enough food for the entire congre- L . ( Kvery river became a channel for it. It spilled over Asia. It inundated inundat-ed the great plain of China. Jt descended de-scended from the Arctic regions and removed much of France, England and Germany, all of Holland and the great Soviet empire, from the list of nations. Arctic water hundreds hun-dreds of feet deep flowed into the Caspian sea and hurled the last of its august inertia upon the Caucasus. Cau-casus. Western Asia and Arabia, southern south-ern India, Africa and much of Australia Aus-tralia remained dry land. More than half the population of the world died In the tides that rose and subsided during the proximity of the Bronson Bodies. But those who by design or through necident found themselves on land that remained re-mained dry were not necessarily spared. ITO BE CONTINUED. ' : . : |