crimson with the reflected light of the setting was crushing him was due to the swift
sun; the lower half, the hazy green of the
acceleration of their fall toward the moon.
distant horizon. It struck Courtland that this
He managed to turn his head to one side and
semi-circle of green was perhaps his last saw the outline of the Professor’s body lying vision of the earth.
where he had fallen.
Suddenly the upper edge of the green
“Hello, Professor! We seem to have
was cut by a tiny dot of gleaming silver. It was started. Are you all right?”
the moon, keeping her tryst with her would-be
There was no answer. Courtland
explorers. They would wait until the horizon
struggled to pull himself along the floor but
bisected the disk. Slowly the Face of Isis was
finally gave up the attempt in exhaustion. He
unveiled to the gaze of her modern felt no pain, but his entire body seemed worshipers.
paralyzed.
Sixty seconds more. The Professor
The interior of the chariot was dark,
turned and met Courtland in a long handclasp.
save that a faint light filtered through the
Then the two men grasped the handles. The
portholes on one side. Courtland determined
Professor’s left hand rested on the switch that he would make one mighty effort to raise which would release the acid and start them
himself to the level of the nearest opening.
on their flight. Courtland’s eyes were on the
Bracing his muscles, he succeeded in getting
swinging chronometer and he counted off the
to his hands and knees. For a few seconds he
seconds aloud.
maintained this position. It was as though he
“Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One.
were Atlas struggling to uphold the world on
GO!”
his shoulders. His brain swam with agony.
There was a slight hissing as the
Then his straining muscles gave way,
The Face of Isis
23
and he was hurled forward once more into
So their high hopes had ended in
unconsciousness.
failure. The magic powder in the golden
casket was nothing but a huge fiasco, a
WHEN he came to himself for the second
practical joke brought to its conclusion after
time, it was to hear the Professor giving voice three thousand years, on the first of April!
to a most choice and unscholastic assortment
And yet the powder must have possessed
of profanity. The little man was stamping up
some strange properties, after all. Something and down the floor of the chariot, cursing
must have occurred when the acid mingled
everything and everyone from Osrah the High
with it in the trays. What was it that had
Priest to the entire cosmic universe.
hurled them into unconsciousness? What was
Courtland sat up and stared at the it that had produced Courtland’s extraordinary Professor in amazement. The mysterious paralysis? What had uprooted those great trees paralysis had departed and so had the and flung them down upon the chariot?
darkness. The little room was flooded with
To these questions and many others
sunlight and lurid with expletives.
like them, they could find no answer.
“Why, Professor, what on earth’s the
Afterwards, when an analysis of the residue in
matter?” stammered Courtland, “have we the trays revealed nothing more mysterious missed the moon or something?”
than magnesium sulphate, they were no nearer
“Matter? You may well ask what on
a solution than before. The white, crystalline
earth’s the matter!” raved the Professor, contents of the trays might serve mankind in furiously. “Everything on earth’s the matter!
homely ways, but as an aid to the conquest of
Missed the moon? No, we haven’t missed the
the universe, were valueless.
moon ! We’ve never had a chance to miss the
Professor Wadsworth, crushed and
confounded thing! We’ve never started!”
crestfallen, buried himself in his studies of the
“Never
started!” yelled Courtland, Mexican Settlement. Courtland returned to jumping to his feet and rushing to the Boston and devoted himself to business. A porthole.
year later Courtland received a heavy express
He looked out, not on the empty abyss
package, which on being opened, was found to
of interplanetary space or the barren wastes of contain the golden casket. In the casket was a
a frozen lunar landscape, but on the gracious
thick manuscript and this letter:
verdure of a New Hampshire hillside. The sun
shone, the birds sang, the wind stirred My dear Courtland: amongst the leaves as it had done on the day
To you, my favorite pupil and
before. The chariot still rested on its rails at companion in adventure, I am sending the
the summit of the hill! Everything was manuscript of my book, “A History of the unchanged.
Egyptian Migration in the Fifth and Sixth
No, not quite everything, for the clump
of trees which had surrounded and hidden the
out result of my investigations and studies, I
interplanetary vessel, was levelled to the beg that you will publish. I have placed a sum ground as though by a mighty hurricane. The
at your disposal sufficient to cover the cost of chariot was almost buried by a tangled mass
publication. Should any profits accrue from
of trunks and branches. It was only due to the
the sale of the book, you will place the same at staunch construction of laminated steel and
the disposal of the Peabody Museum for the
asbestos that the two adventurers had not been
purpose of improving the Egyptian and
crushed to death by the falling timber.
Mexican collections. May I impose upon your
Amazing Stories
24
friendship to do me this last favor?
wood ashes and sea-weed.”
I am sailing for Mexico tomorrow.
With the Doctor’s words came a flood
While there, I hope to find traces of the of enlightenment. I realized the cause of our landing of that expedition which, I firmly failure, and the reasons for the extraordinary believe, set sail from the Moroccan coast, phenomena which accompanied it. As you are ninety generations ago, leaving behind the fully aware, acids and alkalis are directly body of the High Priest to guard the temple
opposite in their chemical reactions.
whence their leader had departed on his ill-
Presuming that the powder in the casket
advised attempt to set his all-conquering foot
acquired antigravitational properties by the
upon the Face of Isis.
addition of an alkali, what would take place as Do I still believe the truth of the the result of adding an acid?
inscription on the casket, you ask? Yes, most
Why, the area covered by the powder
emphatically I do! My clear boy, I have a
would become tremendously permeable to
confession of weakness to make. Only two
gravity, just as the presence of a piece of iron months after our miserable failure, I increases the pe
rmeability of a magnetic field.
discovered the explanation of what took place.
In simple words, the force of gravity would be
It was I, I alone in my self-satisfied ignorance, many times multiplied. Our weight, increased
who was responsible for casting away the from its normal value to, perhaps, half a ton or greatest opportunity ever vouchsafed to man.
more, crushed us to the floor and rendered us
But what is the use of crying over spilt milk?
helpless. The trees which stretched their
As I was saying, two months after we
branches above the chariot were unable to
parted, I was visiting Dr. John Plattmore in
resist the strain of their own weight and came
New York. Dr. Plattmore, as you know, is the
greatest living authority on Egyptian from the ground.
hieroglyphics. One evening, while we were
You will ask, my dear Courtland, why
discussing the probable extent of chemical
an analysis of the residue failed to reveal the knowledge in the Fifth Dynasty, I happened to
presence of any strange substance. I have no
mention solvents and particularly sulphuric doubt that the original powder was a acid.
compound of magnesium with some unknown
“But, my dear Professor,” exclaimed
element. The latter, which should have been
Plattmore, “the inorganic acids are a rendered opaque to gravity under the action of comparatively modern discovery. It is quite
an alkali, passed off in gas by combination
certain that nothing was known of them at the
with the hydrogen of the acid. So long as the
period we are discussing.”
gas remained in the trays our weight was
I drew the symbols which I had read as
enormously increased, but during our period
“sulphuric acid,” in translating the inscription of unconsciousness, this gas leaked away and
on the casket and asked the Doctor how he
its effect was destroyed.
would interpret them.
I should have told you this long ago,
“Literally, of course, they mean ‘The
but in my fallen pride, I was ashamed to admit
fleshburner’ or ‘that which destroys the flesh,’
that our failure was due to my unwillingness
but there is no doubt that they refer to one of to consult a higher authority than myself.
the caustic alkalies; the hydroxides of either
Forgive me if you can, but believe me, my
potassium or sodium. The Egyptian priests
dear Courtland, your old friend and fellow
must have been familiar with, these substances
student,
and the methods of extracting them from
The Face of Isis
25
MYRON
B.
WADSWORTH.