The Devolutionist and The Emancipatrix | Page 9

wore either knickerbockers or some other form of short trousers;
so that the general effect was very youthful. She saw no men with beards, although
several wore their hair long, down to their shoulders, as though to compensate for those

women who chose to wear theirs short.
The surgeon seemed to have more leisure than most doctors. She stood for some minutes,
greeting perhaps a score of passers-by, all of whom seemed to be proud of the
acquaintance. Presently, however, the sidewalk became temporarily clear of pedestrians;
and then Billie heard the surgeon mutter something to herself, such as was past all
understanding at the time:
"The fools! The poor, ignorant cattle!"
And she turned and stepped to the middle of the street, where Billie had already marked a
large number of flying-machines. In fact, the space from curb to curb was practically
filled with them, all neatly parked.
Without exception they were ornithopters; that is, machines built on the bird-wing
principle, sustaining themselves by a flapping motion rather than by air-pressure due to a
propeller. Their size varied from one-seater affairs of very small size to craft large
enough to hold a score. Most were gaudily painted.
The surgeon's own machine was a two-seater, small but powerful in design. She stepped
up a short ladder into a comfortable cockpit, provided with a folding top, which at that
time was laid back out of the way. She proceeded to adjust various levers and
hand-wheels, glanced at certain dials, touched a button, and immediately the craft took
flight, its wings beating the air with a dull leathery rhythm which drowned out the faint
clanking of the machinery.
A moment later the flier was high above the street. To Billie's disappointment, the
surgeon did not glance down enough to tell the architect whether the street belonged to a
city of any size. Instead, her agent drove carefully through the traffic, which Billie would
have called dangerously dense. She remembered that she had seen nothing but aircraft in
that street; no automobiles at all.
And then the flier was rushing through the air at a lively rate. Billie caught quick
glimpses of innumerable machines, few of which were moving in the same direction as
the surgeon's.
A few minutes more elapsed, and then Billie was experiencing a much higher level, with
the machine flying at what must have been a tremendous velocity. Shortly it was all but
alone in the sky.
After a while the surgeon's eyes made out something far below, which puzzled Billie
exceedingly. It seemed to be a ship under full sail; only, so far as she could see the craft
was resting upon clouds, not air. It was still a long way ahead.
And then Billie was given a glance aloft, where she saw another craft, a small flapping
affair like the surgeon's. It was just rising on a long slant so as to cross above her course.
And at that very instant there came a sharp crack, followed by a splintering crash. The
surgeon's flier lurched heavily to one side.
Next second the woman was staring at her left wing. It was broken about the middle and
thrashing wildly. Another instant, and a part of the thing came loose, flew off, and struck
the surgeon on the top of her head. A muffled cry, and then blackness came.
And the next thing Billie saw was the emergency ward of Smith's great skycruiser, with
the surgeon, blinking as she recovered, looking up into the smiling face of her big blond
rescuer.

V

CAPELLA'S DAUGHTER

The first thing that met the doctor's gaze, when his mind entered that of his distant agent,
was a clock. It was a very ordinary sort of an instrument, such as one sees in schools and
offices; it had two hands, and a pendulum of the usual size and length.
However, this pendulum was swinging at a very rapid rate; nearly twice as fast, judged
the doctor, as that of his own chronometer. And its dial was divided into twenty-five
equal parts, instead of twelve, each of these parts being further divided into five equal
portions. At the moment, these two hands indicated what would have been called, on the
earth, about half past three.
Before the doctor could speculate on this, his unknown agent shifted his gaze to a
newspaper on a desk before him. Apparently he was thinking of something entirely
different; for he absently turned the pages, one by one, his subconscious mind taking it all
in.
And the doctor saw that the paper was called simply The Hourly Journal; that it was of
very nearly the size of most sheets; and that it consisted of about ten pages. The front and
back pages, only, contained news items; the remainder were packed