The girl nodded, her eyes bright.
Silence fell upon the room. Finally Carter lifted the helmet from his head, set it back on the metal bench.
“Did you—did the Ghosts know anything about it?” asked the girl.
Her uncle nodded. “Ann,” he said, “your father will be returned. No mortal man could get him back into his normal dimensions, but the Ghosts can. They have ways of doing things. Warping of world lines and twisting of inter-dimensional co-ordinates.”
“You really mean that?” Ann asked. “This isn’t just another of your practical jokes?”
The golden beard grinned broadly and then sobered. “Child,” he said, “I don’t joke about things like this. They are too important.”
He looked about the room, as if expecting something, someone.
“Your father will be here any moment now,” he declared.
“Here!” exclaimed Ann. “Here, in this room—”
Her voice broke off suddenly. The room had suddenly filled with Ghosts, and in their midst stood a man, a man with stooped shoulders and heavy-lensed glasses and lines of puzzlement upon his face. Like a puff of wind the Ghosts were gone and the man stood alone.
Ann flew at him. “Father,” she cried. “You’re back again, father.”
She went into his arms and the man, looking over her shoulder, suddenly saw the man with the beard.
“Yes, Ann,” he said, “I am back again.”
His face hardened as Carter took a step toward them.
“You here,” he snapped. “I might have known. Where there’s anything afoot you’re always around.”
Laughter gurgled in the throat of the bearded giant. “So you went adventuring in the dimensions, did you?” he asked, mockery in his voice. “You always wanted to do that, John. The great John Smith, only man to ever go outside the four dimensional continuum.”
His laughter seemed to rock the room.
“I suppose you got me out,” said Smith, “so you could gloat over me.”
The men stood, eyes locked, and Kent sensed between them an antagonism that was almost past understanding.
“I won’t thank you for it,” said Smith.
“Why, John, I never expected you to,” chortled Carter. “I knew you’d hate me for it. I didn’t do it for you. I did it for your little girl. She came from Landing City across hundreds of miles of deserts and canals to help you. She came down into Mad-Man’s. She’s the one I did it for. For her and the two brave men who came with her.”
For the first time, apparently, Smith noticed Kent and Charley.
“I do thank you,” he said, “for whatever you have done.”
“Shucks,” said Charley, “it wasn’t nothin’. Nothin’ at all. I always wanted to see Mad-Man’s. Nobody ever came down here and came out sane. Most of them that came down didn’t come out at all.”
“If it hadn’t been for my Ghosts neither would you,” Carter reminded him.
“Father,” pleaded Ann, “you mustn’t be like this. Uncle brought you back. He was the only man who could have. If it hadn’t been for him, you would still be out in the extra-dimension.”
“What was it like, John?” asked Carter. “Dark and nothing to see?”
“As a matter of fact,” said Smith, “that is exactly what it was.”
“That’s what you thought,” jeered Carter. “Because you had no sense of perception to see or hear or make any contacts or associations in that world. Did you actually think your pitiful little human senses would serve you in a place like that?”
“What do you know about it?” snarled Smith.
“The Ghosts,” said Carter. “You must not forget. The Ghosts tell me everything.”
Carter looked around the room. “And now,” he said, “I fear that you must go.” He looked at Ann. “I did what you wanted me to do, didn’t I?”
She nodded. “You are turning us out?” she asked.
“Call it that if you wish,” said Carter. “I have work to do. A great deal of work to do. One of the reasons I came to Mad-Man’s was to be alone.”
“Now look here, mister,” said Carter bluntly. “It’s a long pull up Mad-Man’s. A longer pull back to our igloo. You aren’t turning us out without a chance to rest, are you?”
“He’s crazy,” said Smith. “He’s always been crazy. He’s sane only half of the time. Don’t pay any attention to him.”
Carter paid Smith no attention. He addressed Charley. “You won’t have to walk back,” he said. “My rocket ship is out there. Take it.” He chuckled. “You needn’t bother bringing it back. I’ll give it to you.”
“But, uncle,” cried Ann. “What about yourself?”
“Don’t worry about me,” Carter told her. “I won’t need it. The Ghosts can take me any place I want to go upon a moment’s notice. I’ve outgrown your silly rocket ships. I’ve outgrown a lot of things.”
He swept his arm about the room, pointed at the globe of brilliant fire that hung suspended between floor and ceiling.
“Pure energy,” he said. “In there atoms are being created. Millions of horsepower are being generated. An efficient, a continual source of power. Enclosed in a sphere of force waves, the only thing that would stand the pressure and temperature inside the sphere.”
He ceased speaking, looking around.
“That’s only one of the things I’ve learned,” he said. “Only one of the things. The Ghosts are my teachers, but given time I will be their master.”
There was a wild light of fanaticism in his eyes.
“Why, man,” said Kent, “you will be hailed as the greatest scientist the world has ever known.”
The man’s eyes seemed to flame. “No, I won’t,” he said, “because I’m not going to tell the world. Why should I tell the world? What has mankind ever done for me?” His laughter bellowed and reverberated in the domed room. “Find out for yourselves,” he shouted. “Go and find out for yourselves. It will take you a million years.”
His voice calmed. “The Ghosts are almost immortal,” he said. “Not quite—almost. Before I am through with this, I will be immortal. There is a way. I almost have it now. I will become a Ghost—a super-Ghost—a creature of pure force. And when that happens, the Ghosts and I will forsake this worn-out world. We will go out into the void and build a new world, a perfect world. We will live through all eternity and watch and laugh at the foolish strugglings of little people. Little people like mankind.”
The four of them stared at him.
“You don’t mean this, Howard,” protested Smith. “You can’t mean it.”
The wild light was gone from Carter’s eyes. His voice boomed with mockery. “You don’t think so, John?” he asked.
He reached into his shirt front, pulled out something that shone in the light of the radium bulbs. It was a key, attached to a string hung around his neck. He pulled the loop over his head, handed the key to Kent.
“The key to the rocket ship,” he said. “The fuel tanks are nearly full. You fly her at a 30-degree angle out of here to miss the cliffs.”
Kent took the key, turned it awkwardly in his hands.
Carter bowed ceremoniously to them, still with that old trace of mockery. “I hope you have a fine trip,” he said.
Slowly they turned away, heading for the door.
Carter called after them.
“And you might tell anyone you see not to try to come into Mad-Man’s. Tell them something unpleasant might happen.”
Charley turned around. “Mister,” he said, “I think you’re batty as a bed-bug.”
“Charley,” declared Carter, “you aren’t the first one to say that to me. And maybe … well, sometimes, I think, maybe you are right.”
The sturdy rocket ship blasted its way across the red deserts. Far below, the criss-crossing of the canals, more deeply red, were etched like fiery lines.