Inside the machine all was darkness and silence. With a smooth and regular motion the cylinder thrust forth a piston which slowly rotated a heavy fly-wheel. That was all. Only the ventilator in the cellar window kept up a ceaseless rattle.
Perhaps it was the draught from the ventilator or something—but Mr. Bondy felt a peculiar breeze upon his brow, and an eerie sensation as though his hair were standing on end; and then it seemed as if he were being borne through boundless space; and then as though he were floating in the air without any sensation of his own weight. G. H. Bondy fell on his knees, lost in a bewildering, shining ecstasy. He felt as if he must shout and sing, he seemed to hear about him the rustle of unceasing and innumerable wings. And suddenly someone seized him violently by the hand and dragged him from the cellar. It was Marek, wearing over his head a mask or a helmet like a diver’s, and he hauled Bondy up the stairs.
Up in the room he pulled off his metal head-covering and wiped away the sweat that soaked his brow.
“Only just in time,” he gasped, showing tremendous agitation.
III
PANTHEISM
G. H. Bondy felt rather as though he were dreaming. Marek settled him in an easy chair with quite maternal solicitude, and made haste to bring some brandy.
“Here, drink this up quickly,” he jerked out hoarsely, offering him the glass with a trembling hand. “You came over queer down there too, didn’t you?”
“On the contrary,” Bondy answered unsteadily. “It was . . . it was beautiful, old chap! I felt as if I were flying, or something like that.”
“Yes, yes,” said Marek quickly. “That’s exactly what I mean. As though you were flying along, or rather soaring upward, wasn’t that it?”
“It was a feeling of perfect bliss,” said Mr. Bondy. “I think it’s what you’d call being transported. As if there was something down there . . . something . . .”
“Something—holy?” asked Marek hesitatingly.
“Perhaps. Yes, man alive, you’re right. I never go to church, Rudy, never in my life, but down in that cellar I felt as if I were in church. Tell me, man, what did I do down there?”
“You went on your knees,” Marek muttered with a bitter smile, and began striding up and down the room.
Bondy stroked his bald head in bewilderment.
“That’s extraordinary. But come, on my knees? Well, then, tell me what . . . what is there in the cellar that acts on one so queerly?”
“The Karburator,” growled Marek, gnawing his lips. His cheeks seemed even more sunken than before, and were as pale as death.
“But, confound it, man,” cried Bondy in amazement, “how can it be?”
The engineer only shrugged his shoulders, and with bent head went on pacing up and down the room.
G. H. Bondy’s eyes followed him with childish astonishment. “The man’s crazy,” he said to himself. “All the same, what the devil is it that comes over one in that cellar? That tormenting bliss, that tremendous security, that terror, that overwhelming feeling of devotion, or whatever you like to call it.” Mr. Bondy arose and poured himself out another dash of brandy.
“I say, Marek,” he said, “I’ve got it now.”
“Got what?” exclaimed Marek, halting.
“That business in the cellar. That queer psychical condition. It’s some form of poisoning, isn’t it? . . .”
Marek gave an angry laugh. “Oh, yes, of course, poisoning!”
“I thought so at once,” declared Bondy, his mind at rest in an instant. “That apparatus of yours produces something, ah . . . er . . . something like ozone, doesn’t it? Or more likely poisonous gas. And when anyone inhales it, it . . . er . . . poisons him or excites him somehow, isn’t that it? Why, of course, man, it’s nothing but poisonous gases; they’re probably given off somehow by the combustion of the coal in that . . . that Karburator of yours. Some sort of illuminating gas or paradise gas, or phosgene or something of the sort. That’s why you’ve put in the ventilator, and that’s why you wear a gas-mask when you go into the cellar, isn’t it? Just some confounded gases.”
“If only there were nothing but gases!” Marek burst out, shaking his fists threateningly. “Look here, Bondy, that’s why I must sell that Karburator! I simply can’t stand it—I can’t stand it . . . I can’t stand it,” he shouted, well-nigh weeping. “I never dreamed my Karburator would do anything like this . . . this . . . terrifying mischief! Just think, it’s been going on like that from the very beginning! And every one feels it who comes near the thing. You haven’t any notion even yet, Bondy. But our porter caught it properly.”
“Poor fellow!” said the astonished Bondy, full of sympathy. “And did he die of it?”
“No, but he got converted,” cried Marek in despair. “Bondy, you’re a man I can confide in. My invention, my Karburator, has one terrible defect. Nevertheless, you’re going to buy it or else take it from me as a gift. You will, Bondy—even if it spews forth demons. It doesn’t matter to you, Bondy, so long as you can get your millions out of it. And you’ll get them, man. It’s a stupendous thing, I tell you——; but I don’t want to have anything more to do with it. You haven’t such a sensitive conscience as I have, you know, Bondy. It’ll bring in millions, thousands of millions; but it will lay a frightful load upon your conscience. Make up your mind!”
“Oh, leave me alone,” Mr. Bondy protested. “If it gives off poisonous gases, the authorities will prohibit it, and there’s an end of it. You know the wretched state of affairs here. Now in America . . .”
“It isn’t poisonous gases,” Marek exclaimed. “It’s something a thousand times worse. Mark what I tell you, Bondy, it’s something beyond human reason, but there’s not a scrap of deception about it. Well, then, my Karburator actually does burn up matter, causes its utter combustion, so that not even a grain of dust remains. Or rather, it breaks it up, crushes it, splits it up into electrons, consumes it, grinds it—I don’t know how to express it—in short, uses it up completely. You have no idea what a colossal amount of energy is contained in the atoms. With half a hundredweight of coal in the Karburator you can sail right round the world in a steamship, you can light the whole city of Prague, you can supply power for the whole of a huge factory, or anything you like. A bit of coal the size of a nut will do the heating and the cooking for a whole family. And ultimately we shan’t even require coal; we can do our heating with the first pebble or handful of dirt we pick up in front of the house. Every scrap of matter has in it more energy than an enormous boiler; you’ve only to extract it. You’ve only to know how to secure total combustion! Well, Bondy, I can do it; my Karburator can do it. You’ll admit, Bondy, that it has been worth while toiling over it for twenty years.”
“Look here, Rudy,” Bondy began slowly, “it’s all very extraordinary—but I believe you, so to speak. On my soul, I do believe you. You know, when I stood in front of that Karburator of yours, I felt that I was in the presence of something overpoweringly great, something a man could not withstand. I can’t help it: I believe you. Down there in the cellar you have something uncanny, something that will overturn the whole world.”
