A Conference
It was still night when our plane slanted out of the darkness into the blazing landing-field lights. A powerful car awaited us, and as it sped with reckless speed across the city which was as aroused, excited, and horror-stricken as New York, we could distinguish now and then the great dome of the Capitol, gleaming white in the light of dawn.
In a short time we were inside the Capitol, and were ushered into a small panelled room where a dozen or more men seated around a table awaited us.
I recognized at once the strong face of President Rogers, at the table's end, and perceived, also, the well-known features of the Secretaries of War and of the Navy. Beside them were the ambassadors of Great Britain, Germany, France, and a half-dozen other great powers, while secretaries and aides hovered in the background. It was the group, representative of the world's governments, that the President had gathered together at once after the Chicago cataclysm, and he had summoned Dr. Howard to meet with it.
He greeted my superior and myself courteously; but the strain that he was under showed as clearly in his face, as it did in the others about the table. At once he plunged toward the point.
"Dr. Howard, some days ago you gave to the press a suggested explanation of the Mannlertown and Finland cataclysms which was, despite your scientific eminence, too startling to be accepted by the world or by your fellow-scientists. That explanation has now been shown by this catastrophe that has riven Chicago to have been irrefutably true. We must accept, unprecedented as the situation is, the fact that vessels of some sort from outer space are actually trawling the earth's surface from above its atmosphere, that trawl having been seen at Chicago by thousands, as it was seen in Finland. You alone among scientists have comprehended the nature of this menace. We have called you here to suggest some method of meeting it."
Dr. Howard was silent and thoughtful for a moment, gazing from one to another of the anxious faces at the table, then the President spoke again.
"You must be well aware of what the result of continued catastrophes of this sort will be. Already the wildest panic has gripped the section around Chicago, and the rest of the country. The whole world in fact is trembling upon the brink of a similar panic. The very uncertainty of these disasters encourages panic. None can say that the next blow will not be in his city and cut away his home and his life. All are aware now that your theory is correct, and that adds to the horror. For if a vessel or vessels with alien beings of some sort in it actually hover far above, none can say what greater horrors it may still loose upon us. We must strike back in some way, must drive these beings, whatever their nature, from the earth. Would there be any chance of doing so with dirigibles or planes, in your opinion?"
"Not a chance, sir," Dr. Howard replied at once. "The rarity of the atmosphere at its surface makes even an attempt impossible, for no ship of ours could ever reach the surface of the atmosphere."