Show COLINE philip I 1 in cp 07 avico THE STORY FROM THE BEGINNING david ransdall arrives arrive 8 at new york from south africa commiss commissioned ionea by lord rhonwin and professor bronson the astronomer to deliver a case containing photographic plates to dr cole Ilen hendron dron in now york tony drake calls at the Hen drons apartment ransdell arrives and eve hendron with whom tony la Is deeply in love introduces tony to ransdell newspapers publish a statement by hendron saying that professor bronson has discovered two planets that havo have been brought under the attraction of our sun the result ot of the inevitable collision must be the end of the earth the approaching bodies are referred to as bronson alpha and bronson beta bronson beta will pass but the other will hit the earth and demolish it to devise means of transferring to bronson beta la 18 what Is occupying the minds of the members of 0 the beag league u a ot of the last days CHAPTER III continued 6 tony went downtown he visited his office habit held him as it was holding most of the hundreds of millions of humans in the world this day habit and reaction what was threatened could not bel if cole hendron and his brother scientists refused there were plenty of other people to put out reassuring statements and the dwellers on oil the rim of the world regained much of their assurance the president of the united states pointed out that at worst the sixty scientists had merely suggested disturbances of importance and he predicted that if they occurred they would be less than was now feared professor copley copies known to tony as a friend of cole nen Ilen drons called at the office ive some things to sell he said and laid down upon tonys desk an envelope full of stock certificates im just back from peru he explained cheerfully where I 1 have been watching the progress of the bronson bodies Hen cendron drori tells me that you ton know the whole truth about them it Is the truth then asked tony exactly what do you think will happen to us what will happen retorted retort eI professor copley cheerfully enough if you tos toss s a walnut in front of an eighteen gun at the instant the shell comes out so I 1 say sell my stocks my family and my personal responsibilities consist of only my wife and myself therease there ther eare are many things we have desired to do which we ve hae baie sacrificed in exchange han me for a certain security in the future there being no future why not start doing what flat we want immediately it if now Is the day to fell your guess on that said tony will be ns as good as mine how flow in do you find that people are taking it in li ertic ally today they deny but they have had a terrible shock shock the first effect bound to be afterward behave according to their separate natures lint but now they react in denials because they cannot bear the shock all over the world 1 some are standing in the place de dopera in paris hour after hour I 1 hear silent for the most part incredulous numb these are the few that are too intelligent merely to deny and reject too stunned to substitute a sudden end of everything for the prospect of years ahead tor for which they scrimped and saved in berlin there are similar groups and imagine the reaction in red square my friend imagine being stalin tonight my friend what horror 1 what humor I 1 what merciless depths of tragedy I 1 imagine the haughty mussolini when he finds that the sebret he could not extort from his iron fouled men of learning Is the secret of fascists Fasci sms vanity vanity of vanities I 1 I 1 all to in the end Is vanity 1 dust diestl I 1 imagine our president trying to decry now this ali ah ifould r could weep put I 1 do not lot instead I 1 la laugh b I 1 laugh because few men but some some my friend everi even in the face of this colossal ignominy of fate go on and on through the tight night burning out their brains yet in the endeavor to guide their own destinies what a gesture cut but today what appalling shock and afterward what a scene when the world the fifteen hundred millions of human beings realize all of them that nothing can we save them and they cannot possibly save themselves what a scene I 1 I 1 hope to be spared for it meanwhile sell my stocks best prices you can obtain please for my cay wife and I 1 we have saved for a long time and denied ourselves too much later in the day tony was on his bis way to newark airport where a certain pilot for whom he be was to in inquire would fly him to tile the estate ID the adirondacks which had been turned over to cole beadron nen Ben dron CHAPTER IV ev ean awaited tony in a garden s surrounded u by krecl in the air was the scent of blossoms the fragrance of the forest songs of birds she was in white with her shoulders and arms bare her slender body sheathed close in silk all feminine she was too feminine indeed in her feeling for the task she set for herself would she succeed better belter at it it if she had garbed herself like a nun an airplane droned dronek in the twilight sky and dropped to its cleared and clipped landing field eve arose froni from the bench beside tile the little pool she trembled impatient she circled the pool and sat down again here he came at last and alone as she hoped nello hello tony she tried to make it cool eve my dear we say even that no dont kiss me or hold me so P why I 1 know your father said not to its discipline of the league of the last days hut but why Is it why must they ask it and why must you obey there now tony ill try to explain to you lets sit here side by side but not your arm around me I 1 want it so much I 1 cant have st it why dont you see were in a very solemn time tony I 1 spent a lot of today doing a queer thing for roe me I 1 got to reading the book of daniel again espell especially illy feast daniel you may remember interpreted the writ ing on the wall mene ilene mene ilene Up harsin god hath num bared thy kingdom and finished it thou art weighed in the balance find and art found wanting and in that night was the king of the Chal Clial deans slain it is something very like that which Is happening to us now tony only the finger instead of writing again on the wall this time has taken to writing in the sky over our leads heads the F inger finger of god tony hns has traced two little streaks in the sky two objects moving toward us where nothing ought to move and tile message of one of them Is perfectly plain thou art weighed in the bal ance and found wanting that one says to us on this world god hatli hath numbered thy kingdom and finished it put but what does the other streak say that Is vie die strange one tony that Is the afterthought of god the chance ue ile Is sending remember member Ke how the old testa ment showed god to us stern and merciless god saw that the wick edness of man in ID the earth was great it said and it repented the lord that he had made man on the earth and the lord said I 1 will destroy man whom I 1 have created from the face of 0 the earth both man and beast and creeping things and the fowls of the air tor for it re rc me that I 1 have made them and then god thought it over and softened a little and ne he warned noah to build the ark to save himself and some of the beasts so that they could start all over again well tony it seemed to me the second streak in the sky says that god Is doing the same thing over once more lie ile changed III ills nature since genesis not dot in that short time why should ue he it seemed to me tony he looked us as nil ail over again and got disgusted evolution you know has been going on upon this world for maybe five hundred million years and I 1 guess god thought that it if all wed reached in all that time was what we have now hed wipe us out for ever so ne ile started that streak toward us to meet us and destroy us utterly cronson bronson alpha alalia but before lie he sent it too far on its way maybe ile he thought it all over again and decided to send bend bronson beta along too you see after all god had been working on the world for ove five hun dred millions of years and that roust must be an appreciable time even to god so I 1 think ile he said tit til wipe them out but ill give some of them a chance if good enough to take the chance and transfer to the other world im sending them may be worth another trial and ill save five hundred millions of years for well start on tile the other world tony where here we left off here 1 I see that tony sat said in that to forbid ray my loving you now my taking you in my arms ray MY 1 I wish we could conyl then iby not no reason not it we were surely to die here tony nith fill all the rest of the world but acry renson reason not to it if we go on the space ship 1 I dont see that dont you do you suppose tony that the second streak in the sky the streak we call bronson li ronson beta which will come close to this world and possibly receive us safe before bronson alpha wipes out all the rest do you suppose tony that it was sent just for you and me 1 I dont suppose it was sent at all objected tony impatiently 1 I dont L IM believe aleve in ID a god who plans and repents and wipes out worlds ile he made 1 I 1 do A row few months ago I 1 have believed in him but since this has happened I 1 do what Is coming Is altogether too precise and exact to be unplanned by intelligence telli gence somewhere or to be purposeless po seless and if the big one is sent to wipe out the world I 1 dont believe the other Is sent just to let me go on loving you and you go on loving me what Is your idea then its sent to save perhaps some of the results of five hundred million years of life on this world but not you and me tony why riot not what are we eve smiled faintly were some of the results of course As such we may go on the space ship put but if we ge we cease to be ourselves dont you see 1 I dont persisted tony stubbornly 1 I mean when we arrive on that strange empty world it if we do we cant possibly arrive as tony drake and eve hendron to continue a love and a marriage started here now ilow insane that would be insane yes suppose one space ship got ot across with say thirty in its brew crew we land and be begin in to live thirty alone on an empty world as large as this ills what on that world would we be individuals paired and set off each from the others as here no we become bits of biology bearing within us seeds far more important than ourselves far more important than our prejudices and loves and hates we cannot then of ourselves only to preserve ourselves while we establish our kind exactly what do you mean by that ive eye 1 I mean that marriage on eronson beta it if we reach it cannot possibly be what it Is here especially it if only a few a very few of us reach it it will be all important then it will be essential to take whatever action the circumstances may require to establish the race then have to submit tei t the discipline ills his arms hungered for her and his lips ached for hers but lie he turned away inside the house lie he found her father cole clendron Ilen dron glad to see you tony were going ahead with our plans I 1 suppose you knew I 1 had been counting on you for what tony asked for one of my crew youve the health and the mind and the nerve I 1 think its going to take more courage in the end than staying here on the world for we will all leave we will shoot ourselves up into tho the sky while alle the world still seems safe we leave of course before the end and the end of the world will never be really believed till it comes so I 1 need men of your steadiness and quality can I 1 count on you tony looked him over you can count on me mr Ilen clendron dron good I 1 can guess that eve has acquainted you with some features of the discipline of the league I 1 will tell you in proper time of others nothing will be asked of you which will not be actually reasonable and necessary but now I 1 should advise you to learn the simple primary processes by which life Is maintained you will have I 1 might say approximately two years to prepare before affairs here become so acute with the approach of the planets on their first passage no record could picture a thousandth part of the changes that came in those two years no single aspect of human enterprise was left undisturbed it was now non more than a year be 9 11 21 x f aca aa 10 VIA A 0 As such we may go on it e space ship you tou mean said tony savagely remembering tile the remarks at breakfast it if that flier dier from South africa ransdell also made the passage on that space ship and we all live I 1 may have to give you up to him when circumstances seem to require it 1 I dont know tony we cant possibly describe it now DOW we cant imagine the circumstances when were starting all over again hut ent one thing ne ie can know we must not fix relations between us here which may only give trouble relations like love and marriage I 1 they might not do at all over there youre mad eve your fathers been talking to you of course he has but theres only sanity in what he says ile he has thought so much more about it he can look so calmly beyond the end of 0 the world to what may be next nest that that lie he wont have us carry into the next world sentiments and attachments that may only bring us trouble and cause quarrels or rivalry and death how flow frightful to fight and kill each other I 1 on that empty world orld I 1 so we have I 1 to start freeing ourselves from such things here I 1 ill be no freer pretending I 1 I 1 flent want you ton more than thad anything i else what sort of thing does docs your I 1 father see tor for us on bronson I 1 peta beta 0 she evaded him kiy why bother 1 about it tony when theres ten tell thousand chances to one well never get there but well try for it wont we 1 I certainly will if youre going to fore the first serious physical manifestations fe were expected so a statement that hendron signed merely read it Is still impossible to forecast the entire effect of the approach of the bronson bodies unquestionably they viii ft disturb us greatly we may anticipate as a minimum the following phenomena tides which will destroy or render uninhabitable all inland cities within five hundred or more feet of sei sea level we have hane no terrestrial precedent for such tides the existing sixty foot r rise ls e n and n d f fall a 1 1 in th the e B bay ay of fundy w will ll 11 1 c certainly er ta 1 B I 1 y be t brinins afi 1 in comparison the tides we anticipate will be perhaps several hundreds of feet high and will sweep overland with a violence difficult to anticipate the second manifestation which will be simultaneous bill ill consist of volcanic activity and earthquakes of unprecedented extent and violence TO BE |