The Last New Yorkers | Page 4

my eyes and
rest, and then--then--"
"This?"
She nodded.
"Same here," said he. "What the deuce can have struck us? Us and
everybody--and everything? Talk about your problems! Lucky I'm sane
and sound, and--and--"
He did not finish, but fell once more to studying the incomprehensible
prospect.
Their view was towards the east, but over the river and the reaches of
what had once upon a time been Long Island City and Brooklyn, as
familiar a scene in the other days as could be possibly imagined. But
now how altered an aspect greeted them!
"It's surely all wiped out, all gone, gone into ruins," said Stern slowly
and carefully, weighing each word. "No hallucination about that." He
swept the sky-line with his eyes, that now peered keenly out from
beneath those bushy brows. Instinctively he brought his hand up to his
breast. He started with surprise.

"What's this?" he cried. "Why, I--I've got a full yard of whiskers. My
good Lord! Whiskers on me? And I used to say--"
He burst out laughing. At his beard he plucked with merriment that
jangled horribly on the girl's tense nerves. Suddenly he grew serious.
For the first time he seemed to take clear notice of his companion's
plight.
"Why, what a time it must have been!" cried he. "Here's some
calculation all cut out for me, all right. But--you can't go that way, Miss
Kendrick. It--it won't do, you know. Got to have something to put on.
Great Heavens what a situation!"
He tried to peel off his remnant of a coat, but at the merest touch it tore
to shreds and fell away. The girl restrained him.
"Never mind," said she, with quiet, modest dignity. "My hair protects
me very well for the present. If you and I are all that's left of the people
in the world, this is no time for trifles."
A moment he studied her. Then he nodded, and grew very grave.
"Forgive me," he whispered, laying a hand on her shoulder. Once more
he turned to the window and looked out.
"So then, it's all gone?" he queried, speaking as to himself. "Only a
skyscraper standing here or there? And the bridges and the islands--all
changed.
"Not a sign of life anywhere; not a sound; the forests growing thick
among the ruins? A dead world if--if all the world is like this part of it!
All dead, save you and me!"
In silence they stood there, striving to realize the full import of the
catastrophe. And Stern, deep down in his heart, caught some
glimmering insight of the future and was glad.

CHAPTER III
ON THE TOWER PLATFORM
Suddenly the girl started, rebelling against the evidence of her own
senses, striving again to force upon herself the belief that, after all, it
could not be so.
"No, no, no!" she cried. "This can't be true. It mustn't be. There's a
mistake somewhere. This simply must be all an illusion, a dream!
"If the whole world's dead, how does it happen we're alive? How do we
know it's dead? Can we see it all from here? Why, all we see is just a
little segment of things. Perhaps if we could know the truth, look
farther, and know--"
He shook his head.
"I guess you'll find it's real enough," he answered, "no matter how far
you look. But, just the same, it won't do any harm to extend our radius
of observation.
"Come, let's go on up to the top of the tower, up to the
observation-platform. The quicker we know all the available facts the
better. Now, if I only had a telescope--!"
He thought hard a moment, then turned and strode over to a heap of
friable disintegration that lay where once his instrument case had stood,
containing his surveying tools.
Down on his ragged knees he fell; his rotten shreds of clothing tore and
ripped at every movement, like so much water-soaked paper.
A strange, hairy, dust-covered figure, he knelt there. Quickly he
plunged his hands into the rubbish and began pawing it over and over
with eager haste.
"Ah!" he cried with triumph. "Thank Heaven, brass and lenses haven't

crumbled yet!"
Up he stood again. In his hand the girl saw a peculiar telescope.
"My 'level,' see?" he exclaimed, holding it up to view. "The wooden
tripod's long since gone. The fixtures that held it on won't bother me
much.
"Neither will the spirit-glass on top. The main thing is that the
telescope itself seems to be still intact. Now we'll see."
Speaking, he dusted off the eye-piece and the objective with a bit of rag
from his coat-sleeve.
Beatrice noted that the brass tubes were all eaten and pitted with
verdigris, but they still held firmly. And the lenses, when Stern had
finished cleaning them,