The space around me was bare, as far as sight could reach it, except that a group of Killers, probably the infirm and young, showed at the far end of the enclosure, but I knew that there might come a rush of them from round the side of the building at any moment, and very watchfully therefore I arranged the splinters with the glass in the midst of them. It was a very short time before a rising smoke changed into the uncoloured flame of a noonday fire, and, picking up two or three of the longer splinters by their outer ends, I went back into the hall. My companion did not turn as I approached, but told me, “There is something that has frightened the lizards. They have thrown themselves from the roof into the pit beneath us. If they have read your mind, your new way of fighting must be very terrible.” With the thought she looked round, and her mind waked to a swift insistent protest—“No! It is the Forbidden Thing!”—but at the same moment I had thrust the splinters into the pile I had prepared to receive them.
For a few seconds our minds fought strenuously. “Do not let it burn. We know little of the ways of the Dwellers, but all the world knows that. It is the one thing they will not endure.” “I am not bound to the Dwellers. To us it may be a weapon of safety.” “But I am; and to my Leaders it would be unforgivable.” “We can keep a watch for the Dwellers, and put it out if they approach.” “The mere knowledge that it had been lit might destroy us all.” “The responsibility is mine only.” “If I am with you I share it.” “It can be put out in a moment, if it be scattered on the stones.” “I know nothing of that; but I know that for many centuries it has not been seen on the surface of this continent—not since it was used in the great war, before the barrier had been planted.” “Do they use it under the surface for themselves? How are the tanks heated?” “I do not know; but I think that there may be other ways. Please put it out if you can do so. It threatens war to my nation.” “I think you fly from a shadow, and that it would save your life, not destroy; but, as you wish it, I will.”
I felt a resentment which I could hardly restrain at the folly of this objection, and the unexpected reception of my successful experiment. Apart from this, I had felt a real relief from the added security it would give us, for I knew that I was in no fit condition to face a second attack, if they should resolve to make it. But to such a plea only one answer was possible.
The swift exchange of thought was of a moment’s duration only, but already the dry wood was crackling, as I kicked it apart, and commenced to stamp upon it. And then a fresh fact met me. The hard cold stony smoothness of the floor, which looked less inflammable than asbestos, was more so than celluloid. As I tried to stamp them out the flames did not appear to bite into it, but played over its surface with a slight clear hissing noise. It was only for a second that the event was doubtful. Then I leapt back from the flames that were all around me. The next I was flying down the hall, with the flames licking their way as fast behind me.
A second sooner than myself my comrade had judged the issue, and was at the door before me, and held it open. But for that I do not think it possible that I could have escaped alive from that swift inferno.
As we turned to look back at the building we had left, a flame crept out of the right-hand window, and spread swiftly in all directions. As we gazed, my companion’s mind turned to me with unruffled gravity. “For your part, I know that you meant well, and I think that you did rightly. I see also that you have powers of which the limits are beyond my sight. But I think also that the world I have known is ended.”
Above that gravity, a dancing light of adventure crossed her eyes for a moment, and beneath was a fortitude which I knew would face what came without flinching.
I answered more hopefully, “The flames appear to move over the surface only. The building is of such material as will not burn at all in the world I come from. I think that it must be covered with some protecting varnish, which is inflammable. That will burn itself out very quickly, and it will be as though nothing had happened.”
“No,” she said, “the building burns,” and even with the thought the increasing heat drove us farther away, and the flames, which burned with a hissing sound, rose higher.
“In any case,” I continued, “the fault is mine, and if we meet the Dwellers, I will tell them.”
“The act was yours, but the cause was ours,” she answered—“and the Dwellers will soon be here, that is a very certain thing, and it is our part to decide how we shall meet them.”
By now the building rose a solid oblong of bright flame in a windless
