Amazing Stories, Vol. 2, No. 2 — page 35: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

( THE MOON POOL The rosy wall dwindled in a flash to a point of light and disappeared! Wrapped in the clinging, impenetrable blackness we were racing, dropping, hurling at a frightful speed—where? And ever that awful humming of the rushing wind and the lightning cleaving of the tangible dark—so, it came to me oddly, must the newly re- leased soul race through the sheer blackness of outer space up to that Throne of Justice, where God sits high above all suns! I felt von Hetzdorp creep close to me; gripped . my nerve and flashed my pocket-light: saw Larry standing, peering, peering ahead, and Huldricksson, one strong arm around his shoulders, bracing him. And then the speed began to slacken. Millions of miles, it seemed: below the sound of the unearthly hurricane I heard Larry’s voice, thin and ghostlike, beneath its clamor. “Got it!” shrilled the voice. worry!” The wind died down to the roar, passed back into the whistling shriek and diminished to a steady whisper. In the comparative quiet O’Keefe’s tones now came in normal volume. “Some little shoot-the-chutes, what?” he shouted. “Say—if they had this at Coney Island or the Crys- tal Palace! Press all the way in these holes and she goes top-high. Diminish pressure—diminish speed. The curve of this—dashboard—here sends the wind ‘shooting up over our heads—like a wind- shield. What’s behind you?” I flashed the light back. The mechanism on which we were ended in another wall exactly similar to that over which O’Keefe crouched. “Well, we can’t fall out, anyway,” he laughed. “Wish to hell I knew where the brakes were! Look out!” We dropped dizzily down an abrupt, seemingly endless slope; fell—fell as into an abyss—then shot abruptly out of the blackness into a throbbing green radiance. O’Keefe’s fingers must have pressed down upon the controls, for we leaped forward almost with the speed of light. I caught a glimpse of luminous immensities on the verge of which we flew; of depths inconceivable, and flitting through the incredible spaces—gigantic shadows as of the wings of Israfel, which are so wide, say the Arabs, the world can cower under them like a nestling— and then—again the living blackness! “What was that?” This from Larry, with the nearest approach to awe that he had yet shown. “Trolldom!” croaked the voice of Olaf. “Gott!” This from von Hetzdorp. space! “Have you considered, Dr. Goodwin,” he went on after a pause, “a curious thing? We know, or, at least, is it not that nine out of ten astronomers be- lieve, that the moon was hurled out of this same region we now call the Pacific when the earth was yet like molasses; almost molten, I should say. And is it not curious that that which comes from the Moon Chamber needs the moon-rays to bring it forth; is it not? And is it not significant again that the stone depends upon the moon for operat- ing? Ja! And last—such a space in mother earth “Got it! Don’t “What a 139 as we just glimpsed, how else could it have been torn but by some gigantic birth—like that of the moon? Hein! I do not put forward these as statements of fact—no! But as suggestions a I started; there was so much that this might ex- plain—an unknown element that responded to the moon-rays in opening the moon door; the blue Pool with its weird radioactivity, and the force within it that reacted to the same light stream It was not inconceivable that a film had drawn over the world wound, a film of earth-flesh which drew itself over that colossal abyss after our planet had borne its satellite—that world womb did not close when her shining child sprang forth—it was possible; and all that we know of earth depth is four miles of her eight thousand. What is there at the heart of earth? What of that radiant unknown element upon the moon, mount Tycho? What of that element unknown to us as part of earth which is seen only in the corona of the sun at eclipse and that we call coronium? Yet the earth is child of the sun as the moon is earth’s daughter. And what of that other unknown element we find glowing green in the far-flung nebula— green as that we had just passed through—and that we call nebulium? Yet the sun is child of the nebulz as the earth is child of the sun and the moon is child of earth. And what miracles are there in coronium and nebulium which, as the child of nebula and sun, we inherit? Yes—and in Tycho’s enigma which came from earth heart? We were flashing down to earth heart ! what miracles were hidden there? And CHAPTER XII The End of the Journey ss S= Doc!” It was Larry’s voice flung back at me. “I was thinking about that frog. I think it was her pet. Damn me if I see any difference between a frog and a snake, and one of the nicest women I ever knew had two pet pythons that followed her around like kittens. Not such a devilish lot of choice between a frog and a snake—except on the side of the frog? What? Anyway, any pet that girl wants is hers, I don’t care if it’s a leaping twelve-toed lobster or a whale- bodied scorpion. Get me?” By which I knew that our remarks upon the frog woman were still bothering O’Keefe. “He thinks of foolish nothings like the foolish sailor!” grunted von Hetzdorp, acid contempt in his words. “What are their women to—this?” He Swept out a hand and as though at a signal the car poised itself for an instant, then dipped, literally dipped down into sheer space; skimmed forward in what was clearly curved flight, rose as upon a Sweeping up-grade—and then began swiftly to Slacken its fearful speed. Far ahead a point of light showed: grew stead- ily; we were within it—and softly all movement ceased. How acute had been the strain of our jour- ney I did not realize until I tried to stand—and sank back, leg-muscles too ejyak The car rested in a slit in teelce ebook S.com