Part 5 (1/2)

He was pulling me away from the rent in the ceiling, away from the door that had joined our time and s.p.a.ce to the time and s.p.a.ce of a world and scene five years ago.

As we emerged from the attic and started blinkingly down the steps, Stoddard almost ran ahead of me.

”We must hurry,” he said again and again.

”To where?” I demanded bewilderedly. ”Hadn't we better do something about th--”

”Exactly,” Stoddard panted. ”We're really going to do something about that phenomenon in the belfry. We're going to the first place in two where we can buy two rifles, quick!”

”Rifles?” I gasped, still not getting it.

”For that little moustached swine up there,” Stoddard said, pointing toward the attic. ”If a stone can cross that gray barrier, so can bullets. We are both going to draw bead on Adolf Hitler in the year of 1938, and thus avert this h.e.l.l he's spread since then. With two of us firing, we can't miss.”

And then, of course, I got it. It was incredible, impossible. But that gray screen covering the rent in the attic ceiling upstairs wasn't impossible. I'd seen it. Neither was the room behind it, the room where the belfry was supposed to be, but where Adolf Hitler's inner sanctum was instead. I'd seen that, too. So was it impossible that we'd be able to eliminate the chief cause of the world's trouble by shooting accurately back across time and s.p.a.ce?

At that moment I didn't think so!

Our mad clattering dash down the attic steps, and then down to the first floor brought Mrs. Stoddard up from the bas.e.m.e.nt. She looked frightenedly from her husband to me, then back to him again.

”What's wrong?” she quavered.

”Nothing,” Stoddard said, pus.h.i.+ng her gently but quickly aside as we dashed for the door.

”But, George!” Mrs. Stoddard shrilled behind us. We heard her footsteps hurrying toward the door, even as we were out of it.

”My car,” I yelled. ”It's right in front. I know the closest place where we can get the guns!”

Stoddard and I piled into the car like a pair of high school kids when the last bell rings. Then I was gunning the motor, while out of the corner of my eye I could see Stoddard's wife running down the front steps shouting shrilly after us.

We jumped from the curb like a plane from a catapult, doing fifty by my quick s.h.i.+ft to second gear. Then we were tearing the quiet streets of Mayfair's second subdivision apart with the noise of a blasting horn and a snarling motor.

It was ten minutes later when I screeched to a stop in front of the sports and gun store I'd remembered existed in Mayfair's first subdivision. The clerk was amazed at the wild speed with which we raced in, grabbed the guns, threw the money on the counter, and dashed out.

We must have looked like something out of a gangster movie as we raced back to Stoddard's place.

I was doing the driving, and Stoddard had clambered in beside me, both rifles, and several cartridge packages in his hands. He was rocking back and forth in mad impatience, as if by rocking he could increase our speed. The expression on his face was positively bloodthirsty.

And then we heard the sirens behind us. Shrill, coming up like comet wails in spite of our own speed.

”Oh, G.o.d!” Stoddard groaned. ”Police!”

I squinted up into my rear vision mirror. We were less than two blocks from the Stoddard house, now, and the thought of being overhauled by police at the juncture was sickening, unbearable even to contemplate.

And then I saw the reason for the sirens. Saw them in the rear vision mirror. Two fire engines, one a hook and ladder outfit, the other a hose truck!

”It's all right,” I yelped. ”It's only two fire trucks!”

”Thank G.o.d!” Stoddard gasped.

We were a block from his place now, with only one corner left to turn before we'd see the mad architectural monstrosity he called him home; before we'd see the crazy belfry which held the salvation of the world in its screwballish, queer-angled lines.