Chapter 8: From a Drop of Water

I lay concealed, and Babs stood at the lattice of our cage room. I was aware that Polter had entered some vast apartment of this giant palace. A brighter light was outside; I heard voices--Polter’s and another man’s. I could see the distant monster shape of one. He was at first so far away that all his outline was visible. A seated man, in a huge white room. I thought there were great shelves with enormous bottles. The spread of table tops passed under our cage as Polter walked by them. They held a litter of apparatus, and there was the smell of chemicals in the air. It seemed that this was a laboratory.

The man stood up to greet Polter. I had a glimpse of his head and shoulders level with us. He wore a white linen coat, open, soft collar and black tie. He seemed an old man, queerly old, with snow-white hair...

I had an instant of whirling, confused impressions. Something was familiar about his face. It was seamed and wrinkled with lines of age and care. There were gentle blue eyes.

Then all I could see was the vast spread of his white shirt and coat, a black splotch of his tie outside our bars as Polter faced him.

Babs gave a low cry. “Why--why--dear God--”

And then I knew! And Polter’s words were not needed, though I heard their rumble.

“I am back again, Kent. Are you still rebellious? You haf still determined to compound no more of our drugs? You would rather I killed you? Then see what I haf here. This little cage, someone--”

It was Dr. Kent, a prisoner here all these years!

Babs turned her white face toward me. “George, it’s father! He’s alive! Here!”

“Quiet, Babs! Don’t let them know I’m here. Remember!”

The old man recognized her. “Babs!” It was an agonized cry. The blur of him was gone as he sank down into his chair.

Polter continued standing. I could envisage his sardonic grin. Babs was calling:

“Father, dear! Father!”

From over us came Polter’s rumble. “She iss glad to see you, Kent. I haf her here, safe. You always knew I would nefer be satisfied until I had my little Babs? Well, now I haf her. Can you hear me?”

A sudden desperate calmness fell on Babs. She called evenly, “Yes, I hear you. Father, do not anger him. Do not rebel; do what he commands. Dr. Polter, will you let me be with my father? After all these years, let me be with him, just for a little while. In his size--normal.”

“Hah! My Babs iss scheming.”

“No! I want to talk to him, after so long. These years when I thought he was dead.”

“Scheming. You think, my little Babs, that he has the drugs? I am not so much a fool. He makes them. He can do that, and the last secret reactions only he can perform. He iss stubborn. Never would he tell me that one reaction. But he makes no drugs complete, only when I am here.”

“No, Dr. Polter! I want only to be with him.”

The old man’s broken voice floated up to us. “You will not harm her, Polter?”

“No. Fear nothing. But you no longer rebel?”

“I will do what you tell me.” The tones carried hopeless resignation, years of being beaten down, rebelling--but now this last blow vanquished him. Then he spoke again, with a sudden strange fire.

“Even for the life of my daughter, I will not make your drugs, Polter, if you mean to harm our Earth.”

The golden cage room swooped as Polter sat down. “Hah! Now we bargain. What do you care what I do to your world? You never will see it again. I can lie to you. My plans--”

“I do care.”

“Well, I will tell you, Kent. I am good natured now. Why should I not be, with my dear little Babs? I tell you. I am done with the Earth world. It iss so much nicer here. My friends, they haf a good time always. We like this little atom realm. I am going out once more. I must hide the little piece of golden quartz so no harm will come to it.”

Polter was evidently in a high good humor. His voice fell to an intimate tone of comradeship; but still I could not mistake the irony of it.

“You listen to me, Kent. There was a time, years ago, when we were good friends. You liked your young assistant, the hunchback Polter. Iss it not so? Then why should we quarrel now? I am gifing up the Earth world. I wanted of it only the little Babs ... You look at me so strange! You do not speak.”

“There is nothing to say,” retorted Dr. Kent wearily.

“Then you listen. I haf much gold above, in Quebec. You know that. So very simple to take it out of our atom, grow large with it, to what we call up there the size of a hundred feet. I haf a place, a room, secluded from prying eyes under a dome-roof. I become very tall, holding a piece of gold. It is large when I am a hundred feet tall. So I haf collected much gold. They think I own a mine. I haf a smelter and my gold quartz I make into ingots, refined to the standard purity. So simple, and I am a rich man.

“But gold does not bring happiness, my friend Kent.” He chuckled ironically at his use of the platitude. “There is more in life than the ownership of gold. You ask my plans. I haf Babs, now. I am gifing up our Earth world. The mysterious man they know as Frank Rascor will vanish. I will hide our little fragment of quartz. No one up there will even try to find it. Then I come down here, with Babs, and we will haf so nice a little government and rule this world. No more of the drugs then will be needed, Kent. When you die, let the secret die with you.”