The Other Side of Here

It was at this moment that he saw a tiny drugstore which defiantly remained open for business in spite of terror. He stopped before it and went in. He bought paper and envelopes, scribbled a message and signed his name.

Only fifteen minutes later, a soldier stopped the black car at a barrier across the road.

"No civilians allowed to go past here," he announced. "You'll have to turn around, Mac, and go back."

"I've got a letter for the commanding officer," said Waldron. "From the Mayor of Nutley to the officer in command along here. I don't know what it's about, but it's important."

The soldier hesitated. Waldron held out an envelope. The soldier looked at the address.

"I guess it's okay. But don't go too fast! Maybe a quarter-mile down this road there's a barrier with a red lantern on it. That's all there is to stop you from going right on into plague territory. And you don't want to go there, Mac! Besides, there's orders to shoot to kill if anybody goes into plague territory an' then tries to come back. See?"

"I see," said Waldron.

He drove on, Lucy's hand closed tightly on his sleeve. Presently he could see Newark. There was a thin, faint mist just barely visible above the tops of the buildings. Even drone planes had been prevented from getting any photographs of the streets near the center of the town.

Waldron saw a red lantern across the road. A few paces to the right a bonfire burned, its brightness emphasizing the deepening dusk. The car rolled up to the barrier. Soldiers ran to intercept him. shouting.

"Officer in command!" called Waldron. "Letter for him!"

"Here," said a young lieutenant, by the fire.

He came forward and took the letter from Steve's hand.

He went back to the fire to read it. The other soldiers, of course, relaxed. There seemed no need for vigilance. But Waldron had not stopped his motor. He put the car into low gear as if to turn around, suddenly shifted gears, sent it hurtling forward and hit the barrier with a crash. It toppled and he rolled across it. In seconds he was in the forbidden area. He flashed on his headlights and instantly flashed them off again. He had seen enough of the road and he drove like mad.

Behind him there was stunned astonishment. On instinct, every man looked to their officer for orders. And he stood staring at the sheet of paper in his hand with the look of a man regarding a snake. The blood had drained so completely from his face that he looked white even in the ruddy firelight.

He croaked unintelligibly. Then he dropped the paper into the flames. He brushed off his hands feverishly.

"That was Waldron!" he cried thickly. "He's gone back to the plague...."

He had not read the letter. Like most men receiving a letter on one sheet, he had glanced first at the signature, and the signature was enough. Steven Waldron! In frozen horror, he thought instantly that this might be the way in which the plague-spreader Waldron had created other plague-spots elsewhere. Germs, bacteria—in a letter that would scatter them when opened. The officer watched the fire devour the letter, hoping against hope that all plague-forming germs were being destroyed.

The letter, of course, had contained exact instructions for reviving persons who were victims of the plague. But it had been signed by Waldron. So it had not been read at all. And therefore some hundreds of thousands of people would remain stiff and motionless—to all intents and purposes, dead.

Meanwhile, Waldron and Lucy careered onward through increasing obscurity toward the city of silence and of seeming death. At a signal from Waldron, Lucy turned on the little high-frequency generators that had served their purpose before. Waldron drove without lights, and as he neared the city he slowed for more silent driving. Toward the last, the car crawled, while the sunset colors faded and died, and the obscurity of dusk became darkness.

Presently something crunched under a wheel. Waldron could make out the outlines of houses, but he had been unable to see the thing lying on the ground.

Sickened, he stopped. He made sure of the revolver. Then, taking Lucy's hand, he started cautiously for the center of the town on foot.

There is no darkness so deep as that of an unlighted town at night. Here, as the houses became solid masses about them, the darkness became more nightmarish because of the stars overhead. Later, nearer the center of the city, it became more nightmarish still because the stars gradually faded. A mist filled the streets around them.

Silence hung about them. There was no sound in the furry night. No dog, no cat, not even an insect stirred. There was a silence which was touched by sheer horror. The horror became greater when Lucy stumbled and went to her knees. She discovered that she had caught herself by putting her hand on the upturned, dew-wet, unyielding face of a man who lay with his face to the sky and did not stir.

She bit her lips to keep from crying out. She clung to Waldron's hand and stumbled on. Then he said: "Sh-h-h-h!"

From somewhere came a furtive vibration. Waldron led the way toward it. Presently, in the misty blackness, they detected shapes moving. Motors hummed quietly. A truck moved away. Another came, then another. Men were at work—hundreds of them. They worked feverishly at something unguessable. Then a faint light glowed to guide an approaching truck. They saw one of the men in this glimmering of illumination. His appearance was weird, incredible, utterly unhuman.