The face of Avery was white as wax; his eyes glared savagely from dark hollows.
"A rat!" he protested. "You have killed a rat ... and you say—you say—" He raised one trembling hand to his lips to hold them from forming the unspeakable words.
"A rat," said the Professor—"or a man ... or a million men."
"We will control it."
"All men will have it—the best and the worst ... and there is no defence."
"It will free the world—"
"It will destroy it."
"No!"—and the white-faced man was shouting now—"you don't understand—you can't see—"
The lean figure of the scientist straightened to its full height. His eyes met those of the younger man, silent now before him, but Avery knew the eyes never saw him; they were looking far off, following the wings of thought. In the stillness the man's words came harsh and commanding—
"Do you see the cities," he said, "crumbling to ruins under the cold stars? The fields? They are rank with wild growth, torn and gullied by the waters; a desolate land where animals prowl. And the people—the people!—wandering bands, lower, as the years drag on, than the beasts themselves; the children dying, forgotten, in the forgotten lands; a people to whom the progress of our civilization is one with the ages past, for whom there is again the slow, toiling road toward the light.