He found that he was trembling all over. He looked at his watch a dozen times, looked to see if it were actually running, then silently reprimanded himself for his impatience. He had estimated it would take a couple of hours or more for the large tanks to dissipate their contents; he had now but to wait.
When the hissing finally stopped, the silence came as a distinct shock, and the only sound in the room now was the body-shaking hammering of his own heart.
The gauge on the last tank, the one in use, showed a quarter full. He looked at his watch again. Eighteen minutes till nine.
He opened the valve wider and watched the gauge and his watch carefully, his body still trembling. A miscalculation now could well prove fatal. He manipulated the valve for several minutes, and the last of the gas finally hissed from the tank at exactly five minutes till nine. There was now only the oxygen within the shelter itself.
Halsey hurried to the vent fan and turned it back to normal. Then he tore open the collar of his pajamas and lay down on the floor near the door. Everything was going precisely to plan. In slightly less than five minutes, the time lock would click, the door would spring slightly ajar, and the neighbors would rush in — to discover Halsey on the floor, half unconscious and gasping for air, his wife smothered in bed. All due to some failure of the oxygen tanks.
Once again, time dragged in an endless manner. What if the time lock failed to open? What if...
No! No! He mustn’t permit himself to think of things like that! The time lock would open! He had tested it time and time again! In fact, his wife had insisted on a series of tests before she had consented to the experiment.
But what if he had released the oxygen too soon? What if the timing mechanism had slowed down? The neighbors would mill around outside, waiting. How long would they wait before deciding that something must have gone wrong? How long would it take them to force the steel door? Or would they, believing he had an extra supply of oxygen, wait a day or two before doing anything?
His nervous trembling increased. The air began to feel heavy and oppressive. His pajamas were damp all over his body, from perspiration.
His eyes never left the dial of the watch now. Three minutes. Two minutes. And, finally, one minute till nine; just 60 seconds.
He began to take deep tremulous breaths in an attempt to bring his quivering nerves under control, then stopped almost instantly as he realized that the deep breathing would deplete the oxygen rapidly. The thundering of his heart grew louder, and waves of pressure began to beat at his eardrums.
Forty seconds...
He was certain that his watch had stopped, that he was slowly and helplessly smothering. Panic laid hold of him, and he suddenly realized the awful terror that must have tortured his wife during her last few seconds of consciousness. He tried to shake the thought from his brain — not because of any sorrow for her, but to rid himself of the fear of having to experience the same horrible ordeal.
Twenty seconds...
Ten seconds...
He wanted to cry out, to leap to his feet, screaming. But his throat muscles were constricted, his body unresponsive to his fear-ridden brain.
Zero seconds...
He lay upon the floor in his own sweat, sobbing silently and convulsively.
Then it came! The great sledgehammer blow of steel against steel. He thought at first it was the neighbors trying to break down the door. Then he realized in sudden elation that it was merely the metallic click of the time lock shattering the silence. The steel door was ajar! It had swayed inward a scant half inch!
The neighbors should rush in now. It was part of the plan. They should rush in just in the nick of time to witness the frightful scene.
But there was no babble of voices beyond the door, not a scrape of a foot on the stone steps, not a sound.
Halsey grasped the edge of the door with his finger tips and pulled. The heavy door was adamant. His fingernails splintered and broke. Gasping, he clutched the edge with the fingers of both hands. It gave an inch. Sunlight and fresh air rushed through the opening. Even as his lungs gasped in the air eagerly, his eyes quickly told him that the stair well was empty.
Bewildered, he struggled to his feet, flung the door open, and staggered up the short flight of steps, his eyes squinting against the raw sunlight.
The voice of the siren reached him then. It began with a low moan, rose rapidly higher in pitch to split the skies, and reached out across the land with undulations of warning. He turned in its direction and saw the pall of smoke that cloaked Midville, a scant mile away across the lake. And even as he watched, a great column of flame spread upward from just beyond the town, its livid crest spreading rapidly outward.
Halsey’s brain warned him of the shock blast that came from atomic mushrooms to level everything in its path above the ground, and through no volition of his own he went spinning back down the stairs and into the comparative darkness of the shelter.
Something in the shadows clutched his feet to engulf them in a strong tangle of mesh. Something bit deeply into his ankle. As he bent to free himself, the knitted mesh tightened as if pulled by unseen hands, and Halsey stumbled backwards against the steel door.
The time lock clanged deafeningly in the small room — and echoed and echoed and echoed.
Outside, the siren continued to wail in desperation as the people of Midville watched the flames leap ever closer to the second large storage tank of gasoline. It was the largest fire the townspeople had witnessed for more than thirty years.
IQ-184
by Fletcher Flora
Children whose intelligence quotient is way above normal, often seem to have adult characteristics out of all proportion to their immature bodies, but in keeping with their brilliant minds. Monstrous, some call it.
Rena Holly was in the living room with the policeman when Charles Holly went downstairs to join them. Rena was sitting in a high-backed chair of polished walnut upholstered in dark red velvet. She was sitting there quietly, very erect, her knees together and her feet flat upon the floor and her.hands folded in her lap. Her face was pale and still, perfectly composed, and she was even now, even in the violation of her grief by police procedure, so incredibly lovely that Charles felt in his heart the familiar sweet anguish that was his normal response to her. Only her eyes moved ever so slightly in his direction when he entered the room.
“Charles,” she said, “this is Lieutenant Casey of the police. He is inquiring about Richard’s death.”
Lieutenant Casey arose from the chair in which he had been sitting opposite Rena. He was a stocky man with broad shoulders and a deep chest and thin gray hair brushed neatly across his skull from a low side part. His face was deeply lined and weathered looking, as if he spent much time in the wind and sun, and the hand he extended toward Charles had pads of callous on fingers and palm, although its touch was surprisingly gentle. He seemed awkward in his gray suit, which was actually of good cut and quality, and the impression he gave generally was one of regret, almost of apology, that he had been forced by his position to intrude.
“Good-afternoon, Lieutenant,” Charles said. “We’ve been expecting you.”
“Sorry,” Casey said. “It’s a routine matter, of course. I regret that I’m compelled to disturb you at this time.”
“Not at all. We must tell you whatever is necessary.” Charles sat down and placed his hands on his knees in an attitude of attention, while Casey resumed his place in the chair from which he had risen. “Please ask me anything you wish.”