THE PEOPLE OF THE COMET
I found him just where I thought I would—in the observatory, or, to be exact, just coming out and entering his study. He greeted me kindly. Certainly he did not look like a man with an aberration; there was just a bit of humor in his eyes—and laughter. On this night he was human, loyable—my old professor. Nevertheless he carried his thumb erect, as if he were holding on its end—an object.
At first he spoke of trivialities and kept the conversation down to the ground. He seemed to realize the offense he had committed; and he seemed desirous of avoiding any mention that would throw him into his weakness. Once or twice he glanced at his thumb, and at length he placed his hand upon the table—thumb erect.
It behooved me to be deliberate. After all, I thought, though a scalpel draws blood and is ruthless, it is necessary. I would be a psychological surgeon. So I plunged heedlessly into a discussion of comets.
It was as I thought. For an instant there was a look of helplessness in the old man’s eyes—a sort of wistfulness that might have been akin to fear—or then, it might have been a silent dread of offending. He seemed helpless—and, without ado, out came the microscope.
This was just what I wanted. I would know the why, and I was going to have it, I was the younger and the stronger. Without ceremony, I stepped forward and tore the lens from his fingers.
It was almost pitiful to see the old man; he looked up at mo, startled, pleading almost afraid; finally he spoke:
“Doctor. I want my microscope!”
The tone of his voice was so soft and insinuating that I came near complying. It was only by effort that I hung on.
“Professor,” I said, "I shall return it to you after a while. But first you must answer my question.”
“Your question?”
“Just this. What has a thumb got to do with a comet?”
He was startled. He half rose in his chair; the look in his eyes turned to joy.
“Then you, too, have seen it?” he asked. “It is a fact—and it is so—I would have sworn it. It is a fact.”
He sat down. His gray eyes did not move; they seemed to be looking straight through me and out into the mysteries of the night and the stars.
“What is a fact?”
“That there is a relation between a thumb and a comet."
“Come, come,” I spoke. "This is getting us nowhere. That is just the question that I asked. I want you to tell me why you hold the lense to your thumb and what you have discovered—what it has to do with a comet.”
His eyes shifted; he held the digit up before him; he examined it carefully before he answered:
“Would you believe me if I were to tell you?”
“Why not?”
“Because, if what I have discovered is true, I have gone farther than all our telescopes can go in a million years. There is a secret in my thumb; and if you will listen I shall tell you.”
CHAPTER TWO
DO YOU recall the eighteenth of last month? Let me ask you—did you feel an earthquake?”
“No. There was none—to my knowledge.’”
He stopped and studied,
“That is the strange part of it. You say there was none, and so do the others. And yet I know there was. Or rather I should say there was a disturbance. I was alone in this building when it happened. The strange part is that none of the instruments have recorded it.”
“How would you account for that?"
“At first I couldn’t. But after a bit of reasoning I have been able to get about it. You know that there is a whole Jot that we have not charted.”
“What?”
“What I mean is this—that our knowledge of the heavens is but a few years old—since the days of the Chaldeans, plus what we have been able to pick up from our knowledge of the stars, and our computations. A thing might happen now that has never occurred since the dawn of history—and it might come suddenly—unsuspected.”
“But nothing has happened.”
“Oh yes, there has.”
“What?”
“Just what I am about to tell you. I am not sure of my ground yet, so I am going to ask you to hold the secret. Afterward we shall publish it to the world.”
He stepped to the window. The moon was shining through. He studied a moment, as if he would pluck the secret from the stars; then he turned to me.
“It is so,” he said. "And I am convinced; but as yet I hardly dare propound it to science. Do you know, Doctor, I am a bit sorry for astronomy. No! Do not interrupt me. What I mean is this—that we astronomers, humble as we hold ourselves, are a bit too exalted. We behold and speculate on vast distances; and, because we do, we unconsciously accept, as it were, a sort of psychological Ptolomaic theory. That is, we, as men, weigh up the Universe with ourselves, mere men, as the center; we measure distance with our intelligence—and we strive for solution. After all, our sidereal system is a very small thing.”
“Small!”
“Yes, indeed; if there is truth in what I am about to tell you. I know that there is; but it came so suddenly, and was so overpowering, that it has taken me all these days to grasp it.”
“And you found it in your thumb!"
He held up his hand. "Wait. I shall come to that in time. Let me tell my story.
“It was on the eighteenth of last month. If you stop and think you will recall that it was a warm night, and that it was unusually sultry; so much so that I had the windows open, and for comfort, had stripped to my shirt sleeves. I had just stepped out of the observatory and had entered this very room. I was writing an article for the Astronomical Review, a sort of layman’s article that was intended, by the editors, for general distribution. Inasmuch as it was for the common reader, I was writing in a sort of analogous style, using comparisons, that the most uninitiated might understand. It was on comets and their probable use in the sidereal mechanism; for, as you know, I have always held our sidereal system as a composite, integral thing. When I came out of the observatory I sat down to my manuscript.
“But first I went to the window. It was a sultry night; very much so. So much so, in fact, that I experienced a slight difficulty in breathing. I looked out of the window and endeavored to get a bit of fresh air. I am not as young as I once was, and I have had several such attacks, especially in sultry weather. But on this night it was pronounced, and peculiar. I might say that there was something wrong with the air—a peculiar odor, heavy, and inert,—like the breath of a snake. And it was charged.
“I noticed this because I happened to touch or move my hand over a piece of silk by the window; and I was surprised by the resultant flicker of electricity that it evoked—I had never noticed it before. My heart seemed heavy, pregnant, expectant; and I felt a sudden flutter pulsing through my veins—like a palpitation. It was unusual, weird, intuitive. Again I looked out of the window.
“Now my sight is poor; and I blamed it, at the moment, on my defective vision. For, at the moment, the whole mountain was lighted by a rain of million pointed
