After Worlds Collide (When Worlds Collide 2)

Ten men chosen more or less arbitrarily by Tony himself composed the Committee of the Central Authority—four from the survivors of the hundred who had come from Hendron’s camp, six from Ransdell’s greater group; and these, of course, included Ransdell himself.

Such was the Central Authority improvised by Tony and accepted by his followers to deal with the strange and immediate emergencies arising from the occupation of this great empty city by five hundred people ignorant of it.

The searching-parties, as they returned or sent back couriers with reports, appeared before this committee.

Jack Taylor, haggard and hungry, made the first report.

“I’m back only to suggest a better search organization,” Taylor said excitedly. “I took a truck and toured the widest streets at the lower levels; and some of them at the upper levels. At every corner my driver and I stopped, and yelled for Von Beitz. We didn’t see a sign of life or get any reply.”

“Did you see any evidence of recent—occupation?” Higgins, of the Authority, asked.

“Nothing.”

Kyto brought food for Taylor, and he talked as he ate. “I’ve been over miles of streets, and covered only a little of the central section. The city’s too damned big. If five hundred people had moved into New York when it was emptied—and nobody else was there except maybe three or four people, or a dozen who wanted to keep in hiding—what chance would the five hundred have of finding the dozen?”

“Of course there may be no dozen, or even four or five hiding people to find,” Tony responded. “We can’t be sure that Von Beitz fails to return because he was captured. He might have fallen when exploring somewhere; or something might have toppled on him; or he might have got himself locked in a building.”

Taylor shrugged. “In that case, he’d be harder to find than the dozen who, we think, are hiding from us.”

“You feel surer, I see,” Tony observed, “that some people, unknown to us, are here hiding from us.”

“Yes, I do.”

“But without any further proof of it?”

Jack Taylor nodded. “I tell you, there are people here. I can feel it.?

?

Duquesne came in. He had returned from a search in another section of the city.

“Rien!” he made his report explosively. “Nozzing. Except—perhaps I saw a face peering from a window—very high! It was gone—pouf! I entered the building. I climbed to the room where the window was. Again—rien! Only—as I stood there—I said: ‘Duquesne, people have been in this room not long ago.’ With the sixth sensation, I smell it.” He was excited; but he could add nothing more positive to the account.

He also began to eat, and soon reported himself ready to go out for more investigation.

Ransdell quietly arose. “I’d like to go out again too. You don’t need us, Tony,” he continued, speaking for the rest of the committee as well as for himself. “It’s nice of you to pretend we’re necessary; but we know we’re not—though we’ll be glad to try to be useful when you really want us. We’ll all obey you as we would have obeyed Hendron.”

“You’re going to join the search?” Tony asked.

Ransdell shook his head. “There’s enough of us searching now. I want to join Maltby and Williamson and their men, who are working on the Bronson Beta machines and techniques.”

Duquesne gestured emphatically, unable to speak for a moment because of the food crammed in his mouth.

“They are mad—mad—all but mad, our technicians! I have seen them!” he presently exclaimed. “It is the problem of the charging the batteries of the Bronson Betans that eludes them—those marvelous, amazing batteries which first we saw in the vehicle wrecked beside the road; and one of which Lady Cynthia herself operated in the vehicle that carried her to us.

“To operate the vehicle, once the charged battery is installed—that is nothing. But the secret of putting power into the battery!

“The Midianites have discovered it, my friends; but they have guarded it so that Lady Cynthia could not even suspect what it is. But if they conquered it, so may we! Ransdell is right,” Duquesne ended his declamation. “That secret is far more important than further search. I too will join our technicians!”

Tony found himself alone in the great council-chamber. Now and then some one else arrived to report; but all reports, which had to do with the search for Von Beitz and for the unknown people who might have captured him, were negative. The couriers returned to their exploring squads; and the others scattered in their wondering examination of the marvels of the city.

There proved to be eight gates to this city, and four great central highways which met and crossed in the Place before the Hall of the Sciences, in which Hendron lay, and before also the splendid structure housing the council-chamber.

From right to left, before the Hall, ran a wide roadway, and another equally splendid cut across it at right angles, while obliquely, so that seen from above they must have made a pattern like the Cross of St. George, were two other highways only slightly less majestic. Each of these roads ran straight to the edge of the city, where the huge transparent dome joined the ground; at the eight points where these four roads penetrated were the gates; and at each of these gates stood a squad on watch.

High toward the top of the dome, on towers attained by arduous climbing, others of the men whom Hendron had brought from earth stood on watch, scanning the sky.

Tony strode out into the sunlight of the wide square, and he halted and lifted his head in awe.