Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 245, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 October 1913 — Page 2

SYNOPSIS. , Professor Desmond of the Peak observatory causes a great sensation throughout the country by announcing that what appears to be a satellite la approaching at terrific speed. Destruction of the earth is feared. Panic prevails Everywhere. The satellite barely misses .the earth. The atmospheric disturbance knocks people unconscious, but does no damage.

CHAPTER lll—Continued. Selection was made and the seven chosen ones departed in several different directions with assurances that they would hasten back as soon as they had observed conditions abroad In the respective portions of the town to which they had assigned themselves. Blind chance decreed that Alan, Clay and Professor Desmond should remain. Judge Fulton as master of the house remained with them. They gathered themselves into a close group. ‘‘Your theory now, professor?” they asked as their fellows disappeared. Desmond, tall and gaunt, rugged without uncouthness, passed his hand slowly over a forehead lined by long years of study and thought. “My friends,” he began hesitatingly, *>e have not only witnessed but are living to tell of a miracle so astonishing that human history contains nothing which even approaches it. You will understand perfectly that any attempted explanation upon my part will be but my individual theory, and that it may be entirely disproved in the light of subsequent developments. That being borne in mind, I think upon your part yfau will readily concede that while my prophecy as to our destruction went astray, yet our escape was by a hair’s breadth of a few score miles. And while I did not calculate with entire accuracy, I did calculate even closer than you could have wished.” “And our being missed—how can that be accounted for if the earth was the object of attack? How can the attracted object miss the magnet and pass on .as this body seems to have done?”

“It cannot. And that is the very thing that proves to u/s that the earth wae not the magnet in this case, and It was the error on my part which tends to explain the miss. The body •which passed us was and undoubtedly ait this moment Is bound for some other point in space many million miles beyond us, perhaps for some vast body or group of bodies of which we have no knowledge, perhaps for one of the huge suns we can see. Or, again, possibly like some of the comets it has an orbit of well nigh incalculable extent, and like a comet passes a certain point every so many years. In any event it took small notice of us — no more in fact than had we been a soap bubble. We merely happened to be in its path.”

“But why did not the earth divert this much smaller body to itself when they were in such close contact?” “That may be accounted for by assnming that because of the entirely different natures of their compositions they did not happen to attract each other, as for example glass ignores the lodestone while iron does not. And because of the terrific speed of the traveler it shot through our sphere of influence by sheer momentum, as an iron ball may be thrown or shot past a magnet which would divert and retain it had not its momentum carried it by. Some comets which pass very close in their circuit around the sun are only kept from falling into it by their awful momentum, the speed of come of them at that period of their flight being over a million miles an hour. These are the possible solutions which occur to me at this time. However, I am free to admit that my reasoning faculties have been considerably disturbed, and tomorrow I nday entirely reverse my opinion of tonight."

"IMd it touch us at all?” ~I think not —except atmospherically.” “Why the vibrations, the winds, the terrible air pressure and the vacuum in which we all so nearly perished?” "More speculation. The earth undoubtedly sensed the approach of the mysterious stranger and evidenced it to the extent of quivers of apprehension. The other physical manifestations were probably electrical, magnetic and ethereal, while the pressure and vacuum were caused by actual physical contact.” "But did you not say there was no physical contact?” "Except the physical contact of Cheir buffeting atmospheres, supposing that the visitor carried (tti own atmosphere along with it, or the contact of itp solid body itself with our atmosphere in oase it had none of its own. The result would have been practically the same in either case. Now for the sake of the argument let us assuM the earth to be a ball as,, large as an apple, and our friend of a few moments ago to be a much smaller hall—say the size of a pea. For the purpose of the illustration we will also suppose the larger ball which represents the earth to be moving but elowly. Now you throw the smaller bail past the larger one so closely that.

it just skims It but with a distance the thickness of a piece of paper between them. You will readily urftlerstand that for an instant there is considerable air commotion on a small scale in that fraction of a second and fraction of an Inch when the balls are so close together—first a rush of wind as the small ball approaches and forces the air ahead of it, next a compression of air at the closest point between them, and third the suction which all rapidly moving bodies create behind them and which is a partial vacuum. This is illustrated by the fact that a cannon ball may snatch one’s breath away without hitting him. It was so with us but upon a much vaster scale. First we had our violent winds, then the compression when the visiting body was hurtling directly over our heads, and lastly the vacuum as it rushed away dt&gging the air after it. The gale which followed that was caused by the air rushing back to place in the restoration of normal atmospheric equilibrium. As soon as that was restored the wind ceased.” “And the awful roar?”

“It could hardly be expected that the passage of a large body through space at an Inconceivable velocity would be attended by absolute silence when it comes in close contact with another body. You know the sound that a bullet makes in passing through the air. Very well. Now that bullet might not make a sound that the human ear could hear in passing through anything as intangible as space, but you must remember that this body of which we speak is hundreds of miles in diameter and that whilst a modern bullet travels with a velocity of only two thousand miles an hour, this small world may well be going two hundred thousand miles an hour—one hundred times as fast. Therefore, no matter how thin the ether of space may be we might well expect sound to accompany an object of that size traveling at that enormous speed.” “You spoke, professor, of the visitor’s having an atmosphere. Would it be possible in the event such is the case that it is inhabited by human beings?” “I would scarcely think so. In the first place its size would hardly seem to justify such a thing, yet- were its other conditions favorable its area is sufficient to support a population of several millions, that is judging its conditions to be similar to those upon favored places on this earth. But it may be safely assumed that if it does possess a human population—and by human I mean reasoning and speaking creatures, they would in all probability be vastly different from us physically, and therefore in the nature of things, mentally. But as to what these differences might consist of no one can have any conception.” He started as though surprised, leaned forward and rubbed his finger across Alan’s bosom. A black streak instantly appeared in the wake, of the finger. “Were you not dressed in black when you arrived here this evening?" he demanded crisply. “And you, too, doctor —and you?” They looked at each other in wonderment. From head to foot they were gray, as gray as had ashes been filtered over them through a sieve, while by the glow of the lanterns and brighter electric lights the ground seemed to be carpeted with a sooty snow. In their absorbed listening they had not noticed the phenomenon, but now as'they lifted their faces upward they were conscious of the falling of a soft, ’impalpable substance, fine as flour, sinking as gently ( as thistle down. Desmond brushed a spoonful of it into his palm, scanned it, rubbed it between his fingers, smelled of it, even tasted it, then shook his head. “Undoubtedly organic dust brushed from the visitor by atmospheric friction,” he muttered. He suddenly bent over with another sharp exclamation of surprise. “Hello! What’s this?” A small twig had come twirling down to his feet and he picked it up and turned it over slowly as they crowded around him. “Any of you ever seen anything like this?” he demanded at length as he passed it from hand to hand. Critically they scanned it. The twig was length and size of a lead pencil and' ansg end was a leaf black as Jet, perfectly round and about the size of a silver dollar. Upon the leaf and extending from rim to rim was stamped in glittering white a strange cabalistic design. Doris leaning forward for a better view gasped sharply and cfutched at the ornament below her throat. Removing it with a quick motion she laid it beside the leaf, while from all sides arose expressions of amassment For In size, In color, in design, in all respects save that her trinket was of jade and diamonds whilst the leaf was all vegetable they were identical. “A most marvelous coincidence,” muttered Desmond dreamily, his eyes half closed. /‘lnexplicable. The plot is thickening fast Dust falls. Vegetation descends. What if after all—my Ood, what’s thatT”

He turned his face quickly upward, every eye following, every ear alert.

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, INB.

The Flying Man

by Harry Irving Greene

V \ Tlie La£h of " ° ** Barbara of the

<;»pt)»slit, 191 a , by Harry Irving Grce

From above came first & strange cry unlike any sound they had ever heard before from the throat of man, fowl or beast, quavering yet sharp and insistent, bearing the notes of both appeal and threat as though the thing that uttered it knew not what his next aet should be and in his indecision uttered the double note. And while those below were still staring open mouthed and speechless before the oncoming of this new mystery, there came a rush as of mighty wings, a fanning of the air that swept their faces, while from out of the darkness there settled before them a monstrous shape that rooted them in their tracks and caused every hair upon their heads to prick and puffl. Manlike of head and limbs, yet manlike in such a way as no mortal eye had ever seen before, with huge bulging eyes, a cavernous mouth hung with loosely flapping lips, thin arms and legs that seemed to be made of cords instead of flesh and muscle and his reddish body loosely hung about by a strange skin, he was more the fantastic apparition of a delirium than any creature known to man since the grotesque flying shapes of prehistoric ages. And more marvelous than all else, attached to his shoulders by huge brachial muscles that ran downward to his hips were a great pair of batlike wings with a spread of full thirty feet, and with these now fully extended he crouched before them in the attitude of a bird just alighting. Slowly he scanned them, his great eyes glowing luminously in the dusk, his broad mouth working fantastically and his head craned forward as though trying to read in their faces what manner of they were, and whether his *next movement should be one of friendship, antagonism or flight. Then his eyes settled upon Doris, who now paralyzed by a terror infinitely greater thap had possessed her at the approach of the hostile world, could only stare at the monster like one chained to the spot. Then slowly he raised one long arm until its index finger pointed at the ornament which she held in her hand, and with a strange croaking sound and a curious birdlike hop he came straight towards her.

CHAPTER IV. The Battle on the Lawn. The deathlike hush that had fallen upon them was pierced by a scream, so sharp and terror filled that it stabbed the night air like a vocal dagger, such a scream as a woman might utter in finding herself in the clutches of a fiend. Yet it was not Doris who

He Struck Lightning Blows as an Eagle Strikes.

uttered it, but some woman who Btood close beside her. Shrill and piercing, it cut to their very marrow, yet so uncanny had been the night and so brief the interval between the hurtling passage of the monster of the skies that had so nearly snuffed out their lives and the appearance of this grotesque thing from another world, that their overstrung* nerves were still all aqulver and beneath the woman’s wild cry they swerved and leaped backward as a horse swerves and backs beneath a slashing whip cut, wild eyed and quivering. In a solid bnnch they huddled against the front of the Fulton home, the men thrusting the women behind them as they turned, unarmed but desperate, to combat as best they could this monstrous flying thing that had been brushed from a world gone forever into space, and who now cast among them in all likelihood possessed of Satanic malice as well as of superhuman means of transporting himself. March caught in the press and for a moment rendered helpless, forced his way to the front rank Just in time to see that Doris, still rooted to the spot, stood alone before the advancing one. With an inarticulate cry he launched

himself forward and thrußt aside the clawlike hand that was descending upon her. ‘‘Get out,” he cried, as though he were speaking to one who spoke hia language. “Clear out.” The hand remained poised in the airland from the distance of a yard March gazed into the face of the newcomer. And in that instant of suspense and tension the features of the Flying Man became photographed upon his memory as vpon a fsensitized plate. His forehead was broad and of good height, indicating a brain equivalent in volume at least to an ordinary man’s. His huge eyes were filmy but luminous within, his nose beaklike, his mouth enormous and studded with magnificent, even teeth save for the long canines. His ears were those of an average human being, his hqad covered by thinly scattered and exceedingly coarse brown hair. Taken all in all it was the face of a human being of a species different from any of this world, yet of one who as Desmond had defined it was “a reasoning, speaking and who possessed tremendous possibilities for destructiveness and yet who was not wholly depraved or vicious. And now as he faced him in determined opposition to his.desire to reach the girl, and yet opposing him without- gesture of threat or violence, March fancied he saw/the first fierce glare that had greeted his opposition fade into a look of half appeal. With a final command of his hand for the intruder to remain where he was, Alan began hustling Doris towards the steps leading into, the house. But scarcely had he gone a yard wheh the winged one was again clutching at her over her protector’s shoulder, not angrily as it appeared, but more as an insistent child keeps reaching for a coveted bauble, or a man grasps for some elusive object which he greatly desires to possess. Steadily March warded off the attacks with patient determination to frustrate them at all cost but with no attempt at retaliation, while as steadily the other pursued with no attempt to injure either of his quarry. It was thrust and parry, thrust and parry like a pair of fencers, and with the lower rise of the porch beneath his feet and but a dozen more steps between them and safety behind the stout doors, Alan’s hope arose and he whispered a word of encouragement to the automatically moving girl. And then at the very threshold pacific escape the armistice was suddenly shattered.

From out of the front row where he had stood with the other men staring at the strange spectacle before them, Tolliver now stepped with a revolver gleaming in his hand. He threw it up, aimed quickly and fired, and at the crash of the weapon the Flying Man reeled with a pathetic, animal like cry and a convulsive clutching at his side. Again the weapon spoke and again the creature quivered and screamed, while Alan saw leap into his eyes in place of the mild luminosity that had abode there a glare so ghoulish that it froze his blood as though the other had suddenly been transformed into a man eating tiger. One glance showed him that his pursuer’s gaze was not now fixed upon Doris but upon 1 Tolliver, and taking advantage of the opportunity he hustled her up the stepß with a rush and thrust hejT behind the stout door. From without there burst forth a wild medley, of shrieks, yells, deep bellowed croaks and the sound of heavy blows, and releasing the girl he went flying down the steps to the aid of his companions. Tolliver was lying upon his back white and motionless, the Flying Man, his face now hideously distorted, leaping about and over the prostrate one as with amazing strength and agility he alternately attacked and defended himself 'from the rushes of the five men who assailed him from every side with a cyclone of kicks and blows. His wings now closely folded somewhat like a fan projected not over a yard on either side of him, but with them he struck lightning blows as an eagle strikes when battling close in with its enemy. Doctor Raymond, a heavy and powerful man, launching himself fairly upon the other threw an arm about his neck with the purpose to pull him down, only the next second to be hurled bodily Into space by his enemy whoße limbs though thin seemed to possess the iron tendons and strength of the forelegs of & horse. Professor Desmond attempting to rush in received a blow across the forehead from a jointed wing tbat cut It open as by a spade, and fell unconscious upon his back with a broad scar gaping wide, the mark of which is plainly to be

seen upon his brow today. March arriving with a rush at this moment saw an opportunity to launch himself bodily upon the other’s back and did so, encircling the throat with one arm and belaboring his foe as best he could with hie powerful list But each time his knuckles landed they seemSd to be fulling upon a stone wall.

Judge Fulton, Edwards and King still remained upon their feet. Of these the first named was corpulent, short of wind and incapable of doing more than running about and feinting in order to divert his foe’s attention, but this he was doing to the best of his ability. Edwards, strong and active, was seeking an opportunity to close in, his pocket knife held open in his hand; while King, who had evidently been partially stunned by a blow, was stumbling about the lawn as though in search of some weapon, a stone or a club. In his position upon the other’s back and between the wings March had a tremendous advantage, yet despite his strength and immunity from attack found that he could do little more than hamper the creature’s movements. Edwards seeing the foe thus encountered rushed headlong in with his knife ready for a sweeping thrust, and March, keenly alive to the opportunity, threw all his strength into a backward surge in an attempt to overbalance the one he held in order that the blade might find .its mark. But the one beneath him reared ana leaped aside as a horse might beneath its rider, and the next instant March found himself arising half stunned from the grass several yards distant. Edwards lay inert where he had been felled by a, tremendous blow or kick delivered with such lightning quickness that none but the one who delivered it ever knew from where it came. As for the lriying Man, he now stood crouching in the center of the battlefleld with his wings half spread and his huge eyes glowing like those of an enormous beetle. He was moaning and the blood was running profusely froiq his side where Tolliver’s bullet had raked him across the ribs. Some of the women had fled beneath the trees or gone screaming down the street in search of assistapce, but others still remained huddled against the steps in wild eyed horror and incapable of movement. With a bop that covered at least ten feet the creature was close before them, scanning them, peering Into their faces and seeming to be bewildered as they collapsed before him without having been struck a blow. Then turning about he saw Tolliver, whom he appeared to have momentarily forgotten, as the latter was attempting to rise, and with a malevolent scream leaped upon him. That he purposed some terrible act against this man who had beep .the first to assail and wound him, none who saw his face and attitude ever questioned. But Alan getting upon his feet at that instant and stumbling forward empty handed with the desperate resolve to do his utmost to defend his rival, felt his foot fall upon a hard object. Stooping he grasped Clay’s revolver. He cocked it as he straightened himself up. v. Warned by the sharp click of the upraised hammer the Flying Man leaped off his victim and from his lips burst a wild scream that unmistakably denoted that he had learned to fear this fire spitting thing which had stung him so keenly. With a leap aside of inconceivable quickness he landed upon the steps of the porch, the blood now streaming down his leg and leaving its dark mark wherever he stepped. Alan sighted quickly and pulled the trigger. The hammer fell with a metallic clack upon an imperfect cartridge and no explosion followed. Once more he cocked it, but as he raised his arm his antagonist leaped like a great frog into the air, the huge wings flew out as released springs uncoil, beat downward with a power so tremendous that tlie blast from them swept the watchers as a gale, beat again and upward between the trees the body of the Flying Man shot into the murk like- a mammoth prehistoric bat, disappearing in a flash. But a moment later his scream came back to them, malicious and exultant.

Alan threw his useless firearm down with an Imprecation upon its falseness. And as he did so there burst through the door and came darting down the steps a figure with hair flying and eyes ablaze, bearing in her hand a naked, rusty cutlass which she thrust into March’s hand as her eyes flew about. "Where is be? Oh, where Is he?” she gasped. Alan pointed upward. "Gone —flapped away like a chicken hawk," he burst forth angrily, his desire for battle fully aroused and his disappointment acute that the Invader had escaped. The girl’s face darkened. Doris was of good old flighting stock as well as himself. Had not her great grandfather been a minute man? And had not her grandmother shot an Indian with her own hand when the savages attacked their prairie schooner way back In the '6os? And now Doris herself, warm hearted and Impulsive, was feeling for the first time In her life the fierce warlike strain of blood of her forbears coursing through her veins. Her small hands tightened. "As soon as you left me I regained possession of myself, and when I heard the shouts and blows I looked

out of the door. You were all fighting and striking and running and jumping and I wanted to help but did not know what to do. 1 knew I would only be in the way unless I had a weapon, so I went raging through the house trying to remember if we had any such things. Finally I thought of this old sword which my uncle—he was in ‘the Spanish-American war you know—brought back from one of the sunken battleships. Well, it was hanging over the fireplace in the room he used to have when he lived with us, and I got on a chair and finally managed to get it down and came runnfhg out here. But of course I was too late. If I could only have got one stroke.at him—” Her fierceness vanished in a flash at sight of the white face of the women who had so recently gazed into the eyes of the departed one from the distance of a foot, and she went scurrying up to the place where they had immediately fled after the flight. Then after a moment she came down again as rapidly as she had ascended and ran to her father, who was supporting Desmond. King had returned from his fruitless search for a weapon, Dr. Raymond had regained l)is feet and no one appeared to have been injured seriously. “Where is Clay?” she demanded. None knew. He had been seen to arise a moment before but in the rapid happening of events that followed all had lost sight of him. “Doris’ brow clouded. “Ran away! I don’t believe a word of it. He is not that kind,” she announced in reply to an insinuation. ’’T hope the poor fellow is not seriously hurt. Suppose we look about the place for him, for he cannot have gone far in so short a time.” She started off by the side of March.

“Do you think Clay ÜBed good judgment In shooting the creature when he was not attempting to harm us? Perhaps he was merely bewildered or trying in his way to be friendly,” she said. March became emphatic. “Indeed I do not: He was altogether too impulsive and raised the dickens by it. But of course we were all highly wrought up, aqd the appearance of the creature was not conducive to the quieting of one’s nerves. Yet I am convinced that he intended us no harm until he was wounded. But it was plain enough to be seen that either you personally or that ornament you wear appealed to him strangely. Its resemblance to the leaf is wonderful and perhaps excited him somewhat. He appeared to wish to detain you and try and communicate with you more than to do any injury as well as I could judge by his move> ments and the expression in his eyes. Had Clay restrained him Self we might have been able to establish some sort of an understanding with him which would eventually have led to our being able to communicate intelligibly with each other. For I am convinced that he is some sort of a human being who speaks some sort of a language. And try and imagine what a leap that would be for human knowledge! actual mouth-to-ear communication with a being from another celestial body. knows what might have come of it if he could tell us of his travels on that flying home of his. But as it is, I am afraid we have unleashed a fiend upon ourselves — a creature who with his wonderful gift of flight and imbued with the belief that our only desire is to do him harm can if he so desires wreak a terrible vengeance upon us. And that he now considers himself an outlaw with a price upon his head I have small doubt, and being afraid to again trust himself amongst us and with no possibility on his part of escape from this world, there is no telling what ’ crime or series of crimes he may attempt.” ,

“And suppose there should be more than one of them, a dozen, a hundred, a thousand!” she exclaimed in an awed voice. The man’s face grew very serjous. , "Then so much the worse for the world. For if they possess the intelligence and potential vindictiveness which I am afraid they do, a score of them could well nigh drive a nation frantic. They could bwoop down upon isolated places and equip themselves with guns and dynamite. They could destroy from above in the blackness of night They could retire to fastnesses whenever they desired to rest and plan new war. Until they were destroyed one by one they could lay tribute upon the land for our wealth, our stock, our goods, our munitions —in fact, anything we possess except our women and children. And those—" “And those!” she cried quickly. “And even those they could steal one by one as vultures steal chickens.” The girl shuddered. (TO BE CONTINUED.)

Greater Than Conquerors.

Ws cannot conquer fate and necessl- > ty. yet we can yield to them In suck a manner as to be greater than If we could. —Landor.-