第29章

The reapers were slowly trooping back to their work.The nurse-girl slapped one of her charges and then began to push the perambulator up the hill.Everyone had unconcernedly taken up the thread at the very point where they had dropped it.

I rushed downstairs, but the hall door was open, and I heard the voices of my companions, loud in astonishment and congratulation, in the yard.How we all shook hands and laughed as we came together, and how Mrs.Challenger kissed us all in her emotion, before she finally threw herself into the bear-hug of her husband.

"But they could not have been asleep!" cried Lord John."Dash it all, Challenger, you don't mean to believe that those folk were asleep with their staring eyes and stiff limbs and that awful death grin on their faces!""It can only have been the condition that is called catalepsy,"said Challenger."It has been a rare phenomenon in the past and has constantly been mistaken for death.While it endures, the temperature falls, the respiration disappears, the heartbeat is indistinguishable--in fact, it IS death, save that it is evanescent.Even the most comprehensive mind"--here he closed his eyes and simpered--"could hardly conceive a universal outbreak of it in this fashion.""You may label it catalepsy," remarked Summerlee, "but, after all, that is only a name, and we know as little of the result as we do of the poison which has caused it.The most we can say is that the vitiated ether has produced a temporary death."Austin was seated all in a heap on the step of the car.It was his coughing which I had heard from above.He had been holding his head in silence, but now he was muttering to himself and running his eyes over the car.

"Young fat-head!" he grumbled."Can't leave things alone!""What's the matter, Austin?"

"Lubricators left running, sir.Someone has been fooling with the car.I expect it's that young garden boy, sir."Lord John looked guilty.

"I don't know what's amiss with me," continued Austin, staggering to his feet."I expect I came over queer when I was hosing her down.I seem to remember flopping over by the step.But I'll swear I never left those lubricator taps on."In a condensed narrative the astonished Austin was told what had happened to himself and the world.The mystery of the dripping lubricators was also explained to him.He listened with an air of deep distrust when told how an amateur had driven his car and with absorbed interest to the few sentences in which our experiences of the sleeping city were recorded.I can remember his comment when the story was concluded.

"Was you outside the Bank of England, sir?""Yes, Austin."

"With all them millions inside and everybody asleep?""That was so."

"And I not there!" he groaned, and turned dismally once more to the hosing of his car.

There was a sudden grinding of wheels upon gravel.The old cab had actually pulled up at Challenger's door.I saw the young occupant step out from it.An instant later the maid, who looked as tousled and bewildered as if she had that instant been aroused from the deepest sleep, appeared with a card upon a tray.

Challenger snorted ferociously as he looked at it, and his thick black hair seemed to bristle up in his wrath.

"A pressman!" he growled.Then with a deprecating smile: "After all, it is natural that the whole world should hasten to know what I think of such an episode.""That can hardly be his errand," said Summerlee, "for he was on the road in his cab before ever the crisis came."I looked at the card: "James Baxter, London Correspondent, New York Monitor.""You'll see him?" said I.

"Not I."

"Oh, George! You should be kinder and more considerate to others.Surely you have learned something from what we have undergone."He tut-tutted and shook his big, obstinate head.

"A poisonous breed! Eh, Malone? The worst weed in modern civilization, the ready tool of the quack and the hindrance of the self-respecting man! When did they ever say a good word for me?""When did you ever say a good word to them?" I answered."Come, sir, this is a stranger who has made a journey to see you.I am sure that you won't be rude to him.""Well, well," he grumbled, "you come with me and do the talking.

I protest in advance against any such outrageous invasion of my private life." Muttering and mumbling, he came rolling after me like an angry and rather ill-conditioned mastiff.

The dapper young American pulled out his notebook and plunged instantly into his subject.

"I came down, sir," said he, "because our people in America would very much like to hear more about this danger which is, in your opinion, pressing upon the world.""I know of no danger which is now pressing upon the world,"Challenger answered gruffly.

The pressman looked at him in mild surprise.

"I meant, sir, the chances that the world might run into a belt of poisonous ether.""I do not now apprehend any such danger," said Challenger.

The pressman looked even more perplexed.

"You are Professor Challenger, are you not?" he asked.

"Yes, sir; that is my name."

"I cannot understand, then, how you can say that there is no such danger.I am alluding to your own letter, published above your name in the London Times of this morning."It was Challenger's turn to look surprised.

"This morning?" said he."No London Times was published this morning.""Surely, sir," said the American in mild remonstrance, "you must admit that the London Times is a daily paper." He drew out a copy from his inside pocket."Here is the letter to which Irefer."

Challenger chuckled and rubbed his hands.

"I begin to understand," said he."So you read this letter this morning?""Yes, sir."

"And came at once to interview me?"

"Yes, sir."