At three minutes after eight the physicist arrived, a spare grey man in powerful spectacles and a bad temper. He looked around irritably.
“To the devil with New York taxi drivers,” he remarked. “The one I hired didn’t know the way to the Babylon-Lido!”
The three officers transferred their mutual hostility to the civilian. But Senator Merrick tried to pour oil on troubled waters, as Nayland Smith said:
“If you will be good enough to follow me, gentleman, we will now proceed to the demonstration.”
They filed out and long the corridor to the penthouse door, which proved to be open. Brian’s curiosity rose to fever pitch. This was his first visit to Dr. Hessian’s hideaway. There was another door at the top of the stair which was opened by an expressionless Japanese who wore a white tunic.
He led them through a lobby crowded with oversized trunks and cases and into what was evidently the main room of the penthouse. Although french windows were opened, so that the light-studded panorama of Manhattan could be seen stretched out below the terrace, the air was heavy with some pungent chemical odour.
The Japanese, apparently Dr. Hessian’s assistant, closed the door as the last of the party came in.
“Here, gentlemen, as you see, we shall witness a demonstration of Dr. Hessian’s supreme achievement.”
All eyes became focussed on a long, narrow table in the middle of the room. It was entirely covered by a large-scale plan of Manhattan from the Battery to the Bronx. Roughly midway on the plan a miniature radio mast stood.
Three large metal balls of some dull metal that looked like lead were suspended above the table from the lofty ceiling. Hanging down lower than these was a small box.
Ten chairs were placed around, four on either side and one at each end.
“Your places are marked, gentlemen,” the Japanese receptionist told them in perfect English. “Writing materials are provided.”
They sorted themselves out, and Brian found himself beside Nayland Smith. Senator Merrick had been placed at one end of the long table.
“Stand by to make notes of anything worth remembering, Merrick,” Sir Denis rapped in his staccato fashion.
He seemed to be highly strung, or so Brian thought. Nor was he the only one. When everybody was seated, only two chairs remained vacant. That to the left of Dr. Jurgonsen and that facing Senator Merrick at the other end of the table. A hum of conversation arose, and Brian detected a theme of incredulity running through it.
“Looks like a new gambling game,” Admiral Druce growled. “Where do we put our chips?”
But silence fell suddenly when a strange figure appeared in an inner doorway. A tall man, stooping slightly, he, also, wore a white tunic, as well as tinted glasses, a small skull cap, and gloves which appeared to be made of black rubber.
“Gentlemen,” the Japanese assistant announced in his toneless English: “Dr. Otto Hessian.” Dr. Hessian rested one hand on the back of his chair and nodded. “Allow me, Doctor, to introduce your visitors.”
And beginning with Senator Merrick, as chairman of the committee, he named them one by one, finishing with “Mr. Brian Merrick Junior.”
Dr. Hessian nodded to all and then sat down. He put some typed pages before him, so that they partly hid the Bronx.
“If you please,” he began in a guttural voice and a very marked German accent, “of English I have not enough properly to explain myself. So these notes I have had translated from German more clear to make it—what I have to say.”
There was a faint murmur of sympathy. Evidently Dr. Hessian could see quite well through his dark glasses, for he now consulted his notes and went on, speaking better English but with no better accent:
“Sound vibrations, like all others of which we have knowledge, move neither straight up nor straight along, but, so—” One black-gloved hand described an arc. “They conform to the shape of the envelope in which the earth is enclosed: our atmosphere. Very well. There are sound vibrations, many of them inaudible to our ears, which can shatter a glass goblet. There are others, fortunately rare under normal conditions, which are even more destructive. Such a vibration I have succeeded in producing.”
He raised his head, looked around. But although one or two of his audience stirred restlessly, no one spoke.
“It is not only inaudible, but no receiver yet invented (except mine) can transmit it. So. It is as simple as this. Very well. Above my target area, in this case”—he laid a hand on the plan—”Manhattan, a plane flies at a given elevation. The antenna projecting above this plane carries a special receiver from which this vibration inaudible to human ears is cast upon the atmosphere. The plane, although in fact below the denser sound-belt, is immunized.”
Another voice broke in. “Dr. Hessian! Your words, so far, leave me more completely mystified than ever. What do you mean by ‘the denser sound-belt’?”
Dr. Hessian looked up from his notes, and stared at the questioner.
“It is Dr. Jurgonsen who speaks? I thought this. No doubt you speak also German? Be so good, Doctor, as you question to repeat in German.”
And then began a heated exchange in that language, which rose to a pitch of violence. At this point Senator Merrick banged his hand on the table.
“Gentlemen! In the first place, many of the committee don’t know what you’re talking about. In the second place, you are delaying the demonstration which we are here to see.”
Dr. Hessian nodded and looked down again at his notes.
“I am far from being satisfied,” Dr. Jurgonsen muttered.
“The demonstration will explain my words,” Hessian’s guttural voice continued. “My assistant will now lower the objects which you see suspended there.”
These “objects”, which had excited so much interest, were attached to hooks in the ceiling by slender metallic cords, the ends of which had small rings. These hung down over the table. The Japanese assistant lowered the one suspended above the Battery.
“Open please the container,” Dr. Hessian directed.
The halves of the dull metal ball opened on a hinge.
And the ball contained a large coconut!
Everybody laughed, except Dr. Jurgonsen. “Preposterous!”
he choked. But Dr. Hessian, quite unmoved, went on to explain:
“This nut, although out of proportion to the scale of the plan, represents an enemy dive bomber which has penetrated the air defences and will presently swoop down upon lower Manhattan to discharge its load of destruction. These containers are immunized against any sound vibration. Close and return, please.”
The metal ball was re-closed and hoisted back to its place.
“Each of these has a trigger on the top which releases the contents when a ball is raised to touch the ceiling,” the guttural voice explained. “And now, the guided missile which could destroy the whole city.”
A second metal ball, hanging over mid-town New York, was lowered. It was evidently very heavy. The Japanese, leaning over between Admiral Druce and General Rawlins, opened the container. In it, point downward, and carefully held in place by the Japanese, lay what looked like a miniature torpedo.
“Here is a scale model of the latest guided missile, with an atomic warhead—as it would reach our atmosphere with what I may term its outer garments discarded.”
Those further removed from the centre of the table stood up and eagerly grouped behind Admiral Druce and General Rawlins for a close view of the model.
“I completed it in Cairo,” Dr. Hessian told them. “Only externally is it true to type. It weighs nearly eight pounds and has a small charge of high explosive for the purpose of this demonstration. It is so weighted that it will fall nose downward. Close and return, please.”