WEBVTT - CZM Book Club: The Comet, by W.E.B. Du Bois 0:00:01.680 --> 0:00:10.000 Cool Zone Media book Club book Club book Club, book 0:00:10.080 --> 0:00:15.000 Club book Club. Hello and welcome to Cooleson Media book Club, 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:17.479 the only book club where you don't have to do 0:00:17.560 --> 0:00:20.480 the reading because I do it for you. I'm your host, 0:00:20.560 --> 0:00:24.280 Margaret Giljoy, and every week I bring you usually stories, 0:00:24.880 --> 0:00:27.280 and this week I'm bringing you a story by someone 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:29.880 that I didn't even realize wrote fiction, but someone that 0:00:29.920 --> 0:00:34.240 I've referenced a lot in my historian research. Historical research, 0:00:34.320 --> 0:00:37.720 I'm not really a historian, but in the history podcast 0:00:37.720 --> 0:00:41.080 that I run, because I'm going back to a story 0:00:41.120 --> 0:00:45.839 from nineteen twenty written by the civil rights leader, Harvard 0:00:45.880 --> 0:00:52.520 trained sociologist and prolific author W. E. B. Dubois. Basically, 0:00:53.200 --> 0:00:56.040 if you've heard me reference on cool people who did 0:00:56.120 --> 0:01:00.320 cool stuff, the idea that the Civil War was one 0:01:00.760 --> 0:01:04.800 by the general strike of enslaved people in the US South, 0:01:04.800 --> 0:01:08.800 and how that crippled the Confederate economy. I'm referencing W. E. B. 0:01:08.959 --> 0:01:12.440 Du Bois, and he's written a lot, but that's the 0:01:12.480 --> 0:01:17.240 most influential on my understanding of history. W. E. B. 0:01:17.400 --> 0:01:20.760 Du Bois was born in eighteen sixty eight, and he 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:24.120 is primarily known as a nonfiction writer. Most notably The 0:01:24.120 --> 0:01:29.160 Souls of Black Folk and Black Reconstruction in America. But 0:01:29.200 --> 0:01:32.200 he also left us some fiction that explored ideas he 0:01:32.200 --> 0:01:35.959 couldn't articulate with his nonfiction work, And it's actually good fiction. 0:01:36.280 --> 0:01:39.480 Just to be clear. Sometimes when nonfiction writers are like, 0:01:39.560 --> 0:01:44.720 I'm a writer, story, they're not nailing it. But yeah, no, 0:01:45.000 --> 0:01:49.200 the stories, it's very good. Dubois was one of the 0:01:49.240 --> 0:01:53.200 founders of the NAACP and was a longtime editor of 0:01:53.200 --> 0:01:56.400 its newspaper, which is called The Crisis, which is a 0:01:56.440 --> 0:01:59.919 fantastic name for a paper. Politically, he was a Panaic 0:02:00.000 --> 0:02:03.440 Africanist and sympathetic to socialism, and found capitalism to be 0:02:03.480 --> 0:02:07.400 the root cause of fascism, though pragmatism and personal conflicts 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:11.560 with socialist organizers often led him back to electoral politics. 0:02:12.919 --> 0:02:17.280 This story, The Comet, is a pillar of early twentieth 0:02:17.280 --> 0:02:20.520 century Black science fiction, and a lot of critics look 0:02:20.600 --> 0:02:25.320 back on it as an early example of afrofuturism. Dubois 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:29.160 was a lifelong atheist, but was deeply interested in religious 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:33.079 metaphor apocalyptic language and the way that systems bigger than 0:02:33.120 --> 0:02:36.760 us filter down into everyday lives. And you'll see that 0:02:36.960 --> 0:02:40.560 on full display in this story. And just as a note, 0:02:40.560 --> 0:02:42.480 this was written by a black author nineteen twenty talking 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:44.320 about people at the time, and some people are going 0:02:44.360 --> 0:02:46.960 to use the N word to describe a character in 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:50.320 the story. I am not going to read the N word, 0:02:50.400 --> 0:02:56.000 but instead I'm going to introduce a bleep okay, without 0:02:56.080 --> 0:02:58.720 further ado, because that's the ado. The ado is done 0:02:59.280 --> 0:03:04.680 without any more of that ado. Here is the Comet 0:03:05.200 --> 0:03:11.560 by W. E. B. Du Bois. He stood a moment 0:03:11.720 --> 0:03:14.560 on the steps of the bank, watching the human river 0:03:14.800 --> 0:03:20.239 that swirled down Broadway. Few noticed him, few ever noticed him, 0:03:20.480 --> 0:03:25.560 save in a way that stung. He was outside the world. Nothing, 0:03:25.800 --> 0:03:29.320 as he said bitterly, bits of the words of the 0:03:29.360 --> 0:03:34.640 walkers came to him. The comment, oh, the comment. Everyone 0:03:34.760 --> 0:03:37.760 was talking of it. Even the President, as he entered, 0:03:37.800 --> 0:03:44.160 smiled patronizingly at him and asked, well, Jim, are you scared. No, 0:03:44.880 --> 0:03:48.200 said the messenger shortly, I thought. We journeyed through the 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:53.000 comet's tail once broke in. The junior clerk affably, Oh, 0:03:53.080 --> 0:03:56.640 that was Haley's, said the President. This is a new comment. 0:03:56.800 --> 0:04:00.600 Quite a stranger, they say, wonderful, wonderful. Well, I saw 0:04:00.600 --> 0:04:04.200 it last night. Oh, by the way, Jim, turning around 0:04:04.240 --> 0:04:07.040 again to the messenger, I want you to go down 0:04:07.120 --> 0:04:12.680 into the lower vaults today. The messenger followed the President silently. 0:04:13.680 --> 0:04:15.960 Of course they wanted him to go down to the 0:04:16.000 --> 0:04:19.479 lower vaults. It was too dangerous for more valuable men. 0:04:20.120 --> 0:04:25.000 He smiled grimly and listened. Everything of value has been 0:04:25.040 --> 0:04:27.800 moved out since the water began to seep in, said 0:04:27.800 --> 0:04:31.440 the President. But we missed two volumes of old records. 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:35.400 Suppose you nose around down there. It isn't very pleasant. 0:04:35.440 --> 0:04:41.360 I suppose not very said the messenger as he walked out. Well, Jim, 0:04:41.440 --> 0:04:43.400 the tale of the new comet hits us at noon 0:04:43.480 --> 0:04:46.200 this time, said the vault clerk as he passed over 0:04:46.240 --> 0:04:49.760 the keys. But the messenger passed silently down the stairs. 0:04:50.839 --> 0:04:54.719 Down he went beneath Broadway, where the dim light filtered 0:04:54.760 --> 0:04:59.080 through the feet of hurrying men, Down to the dark basement, beneath, 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:04.840 down into the blackness and silence, beneath that lowest cavern. Here, 0:05:04.880 --> 0:05:07.400 with his dark lantern, he groped in the bowels of 0:05:07.400 --> 0:05:12.320 the earth, under the world. He drew a long breath 0:05:12.320 --> 0:05:16.159 as he threw back the last great iron door and 0:05:16.320 --> 0:05:21.640 stepped into the fetid slime within. Here at last was peace, 0:05:22.320 --> 0:05:27.120 and he groped moodily forward. A great rat leaped past him, 0:05:27.480 --> 0:05:31.919 and cobwebs crept across his face. He felt carefully around 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:35.400 the room, shelf by shelf, on the muddied floor, and 0:05:35.520 --> 0:05:39.599 in crevice and corner. Nothing. Then he went back to 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:43.479 the far end, where somehow the wall felt different. He 0:05:43.640 --> 0:05:49.400 sounded and pushed and pried. Nothing. He started away, then 0:05:49.480 --> 0:05:53.000 something brought him back. He was sounding and working again, 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:57.320 when suddenly the whole black wall swung as on mighty hinges, 0:05:57.880 --> 0:06:03.080 and blackness yawned beyond. He peered in. It was evidently 0:06:03.120 --> 0:06:06.640 a secret vault, some hiding place of the old Bank vault, 0:06:06.760 --> 0:06:12.040 unknown in newer times. He entered hesitatingly. It was a long, 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:16.120 narrow room with shelves, and at the far end an 0:06:16.160 --> 0:06:20.320 old iron chest. On a high shelf lay the two 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:24.839 missing volumes of records and others. He put them carefully 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:29.520 aside and stepped to the chest. It was old, strong, 0:06:30.040 --> 0:06:33.880 and rusty. He looked at the vast and old fashioned 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:37.720 lock and flashed its light on the hinges. They were 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:41.600 deeply encrusted with rust. Looking about he found a bit 0:06:41.680 --> 0:06:44.719 of iron and began to pry. The rust had eaten 0:06:44.760 --> 0:06:49.480 a hundred years, and it had gone deep slowly wearily, 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:53.160 the old lid lifted, and with a last low groan, 0:06:53.360 --> 0:06:56.479 lay bare its treasure, and he saw the dull sheen 0:06:56.560 --> 0:07:04.320 of gold. Boom, A low, grinding, reverberating crash struck upon 0:07:04.360 --> 0:07:08.680 his ear. He started up and looked about. All was 0:07:08.760 --> 0:07:12.480 black and still. He groped for his light and swung 0:07:12.520 --> 0:07:16.760 it about him. Then he knew the great stone door 0:07:16.920 --> 0:07:20.840 had swung to He forgot the gold and looked death 0:07:20.960 --> 0:07:24.240 squarely in the face. Then, with a sigh, he went 0:07:24.360 --> 0:07:29.000 methodically to work. The cold sweat stood on his forehead, 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:34.040 but he searched, pounded, pushed, and worked until after what 0:07:34.240 --> 0:07:39.680 seemed endless hours, his hand struck a cold bit of metal, 0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:43.560 and the great door swung again, harshly on its hinges, 0:07:44.160 --> 0:07:49.880 and then, striking against something soft and heavy, stopped. He 0:07:49.920 --> 0:07:54.720 had just roomed squeeze through. There lay the body of 0:07:54.720 --> 0:07:59.160 the vault Clerk, cold and stiff. He stared at it 0:07:59.400 --> 0:08:04.360 and then felt sick and nauseated. The air seemed unaccountably foul, 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:09.320 with a strong peculiar odor. He stepped forward, clutched at 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:14.400 the air and fell fainting across the corpse. He awoke 0:08:14.440 --> 0:08:17.600 with a sense of horror, leaped from the body, and 0:08:17.720 --> 0:08:22.160 groped up the stairs, calling to the guard. The watchman 0:08:22.240 --> 0:08:26.400 sat as if asleep, with the gate swinging free, with 0:08:26.520 --> 0:08:30.280 one glance at him. The messenger hurried up to the subvault. 0:08:31.080 --> 0:08:34.360 In vain, he called to the guards. His voice echoed 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:39.680 and re echoed weirdly. Up into the great basement, he rushed. Here, 0:08:39.800 --> 0:08:43.560 another guard lay prostrate on his face, cold and still. 0:08:44.679 --> 0:08:48.560 A fear arose in the messenger's heart. He dashed up 0:08:48.600 --> 0:08:52.359 to the cellar floor. Up into the bank, the stillness 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:56.760 of death lay everywhere, and everywhere bowed, bent and stretched, 0:08:56.880 --> 0:09:01.320 the silent forms of men. The messenger paused and glanced about. 0:09:02.000 --> 0:09:04.640 He was not a man easily moved, but the sight 0:09:05.040 --> 0:09:10.280 was appalling robbery and murder. He whispered slowly to himself 0:09:10.320 --> 0:09:13.600 as he saw the twisted, oozing mouth of the President, 0:09:13.640 --> 0:09:17.200 where he lay half buried on his desk. Then a 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:20.800 new thought seized him. If they found him here alone, 0:09:21.240 --> 0:09:24.000 with all this money and all these dead men, what 0:09:24.040 --> 0:09:28.119 would his life be worth? He glanced about, tiptoed cautiously 0:09:28.160 --> 0:09:32.120 to a side door, and again looked behind. Quietly, he 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:36.280 turned the latch and stepped out into Wall Street. How 0:09:36.360 --> 0:09:39.679 silent the street was not, A soul was stirring, and 0:09:39.760 --> 0:09:44.520 yet it was high noon Wall Street Broadway. He glanced 0:09:44.559 --> 0:09:47.680 almost wildly up and down, then across the street, and 0:09:47.760 --> 0:09:51.120 as he looked, a sickening horror froze in his limbs. 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:55.319 With a choking cry of utter fright. He lunged, leaned 0:09:55.400 --> 0:09:59.000 giddily against the cold building, and stared helplessly at the sight. 0:10:00.240 --> 0:10:04.000 In the great stone doorway. A hundred men and women 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:08.360 and children lay, crushed and twisted and jammed forced into 0:10:08.400 --> 0:10:12.679 that great, gaping doorway, like refuse in a can, as 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:16.240 if in one wild frantic rush to safety, they had 0:10:16.320 --> 0:10:21.320 rushed and ground themselves to death. Slowly the messenger crept 0:10:21.320 --> 0:10:25.680 along the walls, wetting his parched mouth and trying to comprehend, 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:29.400 stilling the tremor in his limbs and the rising terror 0:10:29.440 --> 0:10:33.640 in his heart. He met a business man, silk hatted 0:10:33.679 --> 0:10:38.320 and frock coated, who had crept too along that smooth wall, 0:10:38.800 --> 0:10:42.360 and stood now stone dead, with wonder written on his lips. 0:10:43.679 --> 0:10:47.000 The messenger turned his eyes hastily away and sought the curb. 0:10:48.000 --> 0:10:51.959 A woman leaned wearily against the sign post, her head 0:10:52.080 --> 0:10:57.040 bowed motionless on her lace and silken bosom. Before her 0:10:57.080 --> 0:11:01.240 stood a street car, silent and within. But the messenger 0:11:01.280 --> 0:11:05.000 but glanced and hurried on. A grimy newsboy sat in 0:11:05.040 --> 0:11:08.960 the gutter with the last edition in his uplifted hand. 0:11:09.960 --> 0:11:14.640 Danger screamed its black headlines, warnings wired around the world. 0:11:14.679 --> 0:11:18.959 The comet's tail sweeps past us at noon, Deadly gases expected, 0:11:19.280 --> 0:11:24.320 Close doors and windows, seek the cellar. The messenger read 0:11:24.440 --> 0:11:28.280 and staggered on far out from a window above a 0:11:28.320 --> 0:11:31.880 girl lay with gasping face and sleevelets on her arms. 0:11:33.080 --> 0:11:36.160 On a store step sat a little, sweet faced girl, 0:11:36.280 --> 0:11:39.680 looking upward toward the skies, and in the carriage by 0:11:39.760 --> 0:11:44.360 her lay. But the messenger looked no longer. The cords 0:11:44.400 --> 0:11:47.600 gave way. The terror burst in his veins, and with 0:11:47.720 --> 0:11:52.400 one great gasping cry, he sprang desperately forward and ran 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:56.640 ran as only the frightened run, shrieking and fighting the air, 0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:00.120 until with one last wail of pain, he sank on 0:12:00.160 --> 0:12:04.200 the grass of Madison Square and lay prone and still. 0:12:05.640 --> 0:12:08.440 When he rose, he gave no glance at all. To 0:12:08.520 --> 0:12:11.880 the still and silent forms on the benches, but going 0:12:11.960 --> 0:12:15.440 to a fountain, bathed his face. Then, hiding himself in 0:12:15.480 --> 0:12:18.800 a corner away from the drama of death, he quietly 0:12:18.880 --> 0:12:22.880 gripped himself and thought, the thing through the comet had 0:12:22.920 --> 0:12:27.400 swept the earth, and this was the end. Was everybody dead? 0:12:28.200 --> 0:12:31.560 He must search and see. He knew that he must 0:12:31.559 --> 0:12:35.320 steady himself and keep calm, or he would go insane. 0:12:35.360 --> 0:12:38.600 First he must go to a restaurant. He walked up 0:12:38.640 --> 0:12:42.599 Fifth Avenue to a famous hostelry and entered its gorgeous, 0:12:42.960 --> 0:12:47.280 ghost haunted halls. He beat back the nausea, and, seizing 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:50.480 a tray from dead hands, hurried into the streets and 0:12:50.640 --> 0:12:56.959 ate ravenously, hiding to keep out the sights. Yesterday they 0:12:56.960 --> 0:13:00.000 would not have served me, he whispered as he forced 0:13:00.120 --> 0:13:05.599 the food down. Then he started up the street, looking, peering, telephoning, 0:13:05.720 --> 0:13:11.319 ringing alarms, silent, silent. All was nobody, nobody. He dared 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:15.800 not think the thought, and hurried on. Suddenly he stopped still. 0:13:16.520 --> 0:13:20.400 He had forgotten, My god, how could he have forgotten? 0:13:20.800 --> 0:13:24.240 He must rush to the subway. Then he almost laughed, No, 0:13:24.440 --> 0:13:27.200 a car, if he could find a Ford. He saw 0:13:27.280 --> 0:13:30.560 one gently, he lifted off its burden and took his 0:13:30.720 --> 0:13:34.760 place on the seat. He tested the throttle. There was gas. 0:13:35.320 --> 0:13:39.439 He glided off, shivering, and drove up the street. Everywhere 0:13:39.480 --> 0:13:43.520 stood leaned, lounged, and lay the dead in grim and 0:13:43.559 --> 0:13:49.079 awful silence. On he ran past an automobile wrecked and overturned, 0:13:49.600 --> 0:13:52.880 passed another filled with a gay party whose smiles yet 0:13:52.960 --> 0:13:57.200 lingered on their death. Struck lips on past crowds and 0:13:57.280 --> 0:14:02.440 groups of cars, pausing by dead policeman at forty second Street. 0:14:02.480 --> 0:14:05.240 He had to detour to Park Avenue to avoid the 0:14:05.280 --> 0:14:09.040 dead congestion. He came back on Fifth Avenue at fifty 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:12.079 seventh and flew past the plaza and by the park 0:14:12.120 --> 0:14:15.720 with its hushed babies and silent throng, until as he 0:14:15.800 --> 0:14:19.160 was rushing past seventy second Street, he heard a sharp 0:14:19.360 --> 0:14:23.640 cry and saw a living form leaning wildly out an 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:28.160 upper window. He gasped. The human voice sounded in his 0:14:28.280 --> 0:14:32.200 ears like the voice of God. And do you know 0:14:32.280 --> 0:14:36.000 what else is in your ear right now? Like the 0:14:36.120 --> 0:14:39.960 voice of God. I'm sure as fuck is in sports gambling, 0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:41.760 but it might be the rest of these goods and 0:14:42.120 --> 0:15:01.080 services and we're back. Hello, Hello, Hell in God's name, 0:15:01.240 --> 0:15:03.920 wailed the woman. There's a dead girl in here, and 0:15:04.000 --> 0:15:07.400 a man, and see yonder, dead men lying in the street, 0:15:07.480 --> 0:15:10.120 and dead horses. For the love of God, go and 0:15:10.160 --> 0:15:14.800 bring the officers. And the words trailed off into hysterical tears. 0:15:16.520 --> 0:15:19.600 He wheeled the car in a sudden circle, running over 0:15:19.640 --> 0:15:22.680 the still body of a child and leaping on the curb. 0:15:23.280 --> 0:15:25.520 Then he rushed up the steps and tried the door, 0:15:25.560 --> 0:15:28.880 and rang violently. There was a long pause, but at 0:15:28.960 --> 0:15:32.840 last the heavy door swung back. They stared a moment 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:36.240 in silence. She had not noticed before, but he was 0:15:36.280 --> 0:15:40.160 a Negro. He had not thought of her as white. 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:43.720 She was a woman of perhaps twenty five, rarely beautiful, 0:15:43.720 --> 0:15:48.400 and richly gowned, with darkly golden hair and jewels. Yesterday, 0:15:48.440 --> 0:15:51.320 he thought with bitterness, she would scarcely have looked at 0:15:51.360 --> 0:15:55.040 him twice. He would have been dirt beneath her silken feet. 0:15:55.800 --> 0:15:58.600 She stared at him. Of all the sorts of men 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:01.160 she had pictured as coming to a rescue, she had 0:16:01.200 --> 0:16:04.040 not dreamed of one like him, not that he was 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:07.120 not human, but he dwelt in a world so far 0:16:07.160 --> 0:16:10.920 from her, so infinitely far that he seldom even entered 0:16:10.920 --> 0:16:14.520 her thought. Yet as she looked at him curiously, he 0:16:14.560 --> 0:16:19.200 seemed quite commonplace and usual. He was a tall, dark 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:23.480 workingman of the better classes, with a sensitive face trained 0:16:23.480 --> 0:16:27.440 to stolidity, and a poor man's clothes and hands. His 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:30.240 face was soft and slow in his manner, at once 0:16:30.440 --> 0:16:34.440 cold and nervous, like fires long banked but not out. 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:39.840 So a moment each paused and gaged the other. Then 0:16:40.000 --> 0:16:42.960 the thought of the dead world without rushed in, and 0:16:43.040 --> 0:16:47.280 they started toward each other. What has happened, she cried, 0:16:47.760 --> 0:16:51.160 Tell me nothing stirs, all is silence. I see the 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:54.240 dead strown before my window, is winnowed by the breath 0:16:54.280 --> 0:16:57.880 of God. And see she dragged him through the great 0:16:57.960 --> 0:17:01.920 silken hangings to wear the sheen of mahogany and silver. 0:17:02.400 --> 0:17:06.679 A little French maid lay stretched in quiet, everlasting sleep, 0:17:07.240 --> 0:17:10.280 and near her a butler lay prone in his livery. 0:17:11.320 --> 0:17:14.600 The tears streamed down the woman's cheeks, and she clung 0:17:14.640 --> 0:17:17.920 to his arm, until the perfume of her breath swept 0:17:17.920 --> 0:17:20.919 his face, and he felt the tremors racing through her body. 0:17:22.000 --> 0:17:24.320 I had been shut up in my dark room, developing 0:17:24.400 --> 0:17:27.320 pictures of the comet, which I took last night. When 0:17:27.359 --> 0:17:32.200 I came out, I saw the dead. What has happened? 0:17:32.480 --> 0:17:38.679 She cried again. He answered slowly, something comet or devil 0:17:39.240 --> 0:17:44.240 swept across the earth this morning. And many are dead, many, 0:17:45.040 --> 0:17:48.119 very many. I have searched, and I have seen no 0:17:48.200 --> 0:17:52.520 other living soul but you. She gasped, Oh. And they 0:17:52.560 --> 0:17:59.120 stared at each other. My father, she whispered, where is he? 0:17:59.119 --> 0:18:02.639 He started for the office. Where is it in the 0:18:02.680 --> 0:18:06.720 Metropolitan Tower? Leave a note for him here and come. 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:12.280 Then he stopped. No, he said firmly. First we must 0:18:12.320 --> 0:18:18.439 go to Harlem. Harlem, she cried. Then she understood. She 0:18:18.560 --> 0:18:23.040 tapped her foot at first impatiently. She looked back and shuddered. 0:18:23.520 --> 0:18:27.439 Then she came resolutely down the steps. There's a swifter 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:30.600 car in the garage in the court, She said, I 0:18:30.680 --> 0:18:33.560 don't know how to drive it. He said, I do, 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:38.240 she answered. In ten minutes, they were flying to Harlem 0:18:38.280 --> 0:18:43.120 on the wind. The stoots rose and raced like an airplane. 0:18:43.280 --> 0:18:45.679 They took the turn at one hundred and tenth Street 0:18:45.720 --> 0:18:48.960 on two wheels and slipped with a shriek into one 0:18:49.000 --> 0:18:53.919 thirty fifth. He was gone but a moment. Then he returned, 0:18:54.320 --> 0:18:58.280 and his face was gray. She did not look, but said, 0:18:59.040 --> 0:19:05.800 you have lost somebody. I have lost everybody, he said, simply, 0:19:06.680 --> 0:19:11.359 unless he ran back and was gone several minutes hours 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:15.879 They seemed to her everybody, he said, and he walked 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:18.800 slowly back, with something film like in his hand, which 0:19:18.840 --> 0:19:23.160 he stuffed into his pocket. I'm afraid I was selfish, 0:19:23.240 --> 0:19:26.600 he said. But already the car was moving toward the park. 0:19:26.680 --> 0:19:29.879 Among the dark and lined dead of Harlem, the brown 0:19:30.000 --> 0:19:34.240 still faces, the knotted hands, the homely garments, and the silence, 0:19:34.680 --> 0:19:38.760 the wild and haunting silence. Out of the park and 0:19:38.800 --> 0:19:42.480 down Fifth Avenue, they whirled in and out among the dead. 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:46.119 They slipped and quivered, needing no sound of bell or horn, 0:19:46.720 --> 0:19:51.960 until the great square Metropolitan Tower hove in sight. Gently, 0:19:52.040 --> 0:19:55.959 he laid the dead elevator boy aside. The car shot upward. 0:19:56.560 --> 0:19:59.760 The door of the office stood open. On the threshold 0:19:59.800 --> 0:20:04.240 lay the stenographer, and staring at her sat the dead clerk. 0:20:05.000 --> 0:20:07.679 The inner office was empty, but a note lay on 0:20:07.720 --> 0:20:13.840 the desk, folded and addressed, but unsent, Dear daughter, I've 0:20:13.880 --> 0:20:17.360 gone for a hundred mile spin in Fred's new Mercedes. 0:20:17.880 --> 0:20:21.480 Shall not be back before dinner. I'll bring Fred with me. 0:20:22.640 --> 0:20:27.760 J B H. Come, she cried nervously. We must search 0:20:27.800 --> 0:20:33.199 the city, up and down, over and across back again. 0:20:33.920 --> 0:20:38.320 On went that ghostly search. Everywhere was silence and death, 0:20:38.840 --> 0:20:43.119 death and silence. They hunted from Madison Square to Spute 0:20:43.119 --> 0:20:47.439 and deval. They rushed across the Williamsburg Bridge. They swept 0:20:47.520 --> 0:20:51.320 over Brooklyn from the Battery and Morningside Heights. They scanned 0:20:51.320 --> 0:20:57.360 the river, silence, silence everywhere, and no human sign. Haggard 0:20:57.359 --> 0:21:00.760 and bedraggled, they puffed a third time, so slowly down 0:21:00.800 --> 0:21:05.760 Broadway under the broiling sun, and at last stopped. He 0:21:05.880 --> 0:21:09.439 sniffed the air, an odor, a smell, and with a 0:21:09.440 --> 0:21:13.440 shifting breeze, a sickening stench filled their nostrils and brought 0:21:13.480 --> 0:21:17.639 its awful warning. The girl settled back helplessly in her seat. 0:21:19.640 --> 0:21:23.160 What can we do, she cried. It was his turn 0:21:23.240 --> 0:21:25.280 now to take the lead, and he did it quickly, 0:21:26.640 --> 0:21:31.480 the long distance telephone, the telegraph and the cable, night rockets, 0:21:31.520 --> 0:21:36.320 and then flight. She looked at him now with strength 0:21:36.359 --> 0:21:40.080 and confidence. He did not look like men as she 0:21:40.119 --> 0:21:43.639 had always pictured men, but he acted like one, and 0:21:43.720 --> 0:21:46.720 she was content. In fifteen minutes. They were at the 0:21:46.720 --> 0:21:50.199 Central Telephone Exchange. As they came to the door, he 0:21:50.200 --> 0:21:53.360 stepped quickly before her and pressed her gently back as 0:21:53.359 --> 0:21:56.480 he closed it. She heard him moving to and fro, 0:21:57.000 --> 0:22:00.800 and knew his burdens, the poor little bird turdans he bore. 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:04.760 When she entered, he was alone in the room. The 0:22:04.800 --> 0:22:10.080 grim switchboard flashed its metallic face and cryptic sphinx like immobility. 0:22:11.400 --> 0:22:15.159 She seated herself on a stool and donned the bright earpiece. 0:22:15.880 --> 0:22:18.479 She looked at the mouthpiece. She had never looked at 0:22:18.480 --> 0:22:22.400 one so closely before. It was wide and black, pimpled 0:22:22.400 --> 0:22:28.200 with usage, inert, dead, most sarcastic in its unfeeling curves. 0:22:28.920 --> 0:22:31.520 It looked she beat back the thought, but it looked 0:22:32.240 --> 0:22:36.040 it persisted in looking like. She turned her head and 0:22:36.080 --> 0:22:40.439 found herself alone. One moment she was terrified. Then she 0:22:40.600 --> 0:22:44.679 thanked him silently for his delicacy and turned resolutely with 0:22:44.720 --> 0:22:50.200 a quick intaking of breath. Hello, she cried in low tones. 0:22:50.760 --> 0:22:53.640 She was calling to the world. The world must answer. 0:22:53.960 --> 0:22:58.880 Would the world answer? Was the world? Silence? She had 0:22:58.880 --> 0:23:05.399 spoken too low? Hello, she cried, full voiced. She listened silence. 0:23:06.000 --> 0:23:14.320 Her heart beat quickly she cried, in clear, distinct loud tones, Hello, Hello, Hello, 0:23:14.840 --> 0:23:18.840 What was that worrying? Surely no, was it the click 0:23:18.840 --> 0:23:22.480 of a receiver. She bent close. She moved the pegs 0:23:22.480 --> 0:23:25.600 in the holes and called and called into Her voice 0:23:25.680 --> 0:23:29.840 rose almost to a shriek, and her heart hammered. It 0:23:29.960 --> 0:23:32.520 was as if she had heard the last flicker of creation, 0:23:33.359 --> 0:23:38.400 and the evil was silence. Her voice dropped to a sob. 0:23:39.080 --> 0:23:42.960 She sat stupidly staring into the black and sarcastic mouthpiece, 0:23:43.680 --> 0:23:48.560 and the thought came again. Hope lay dead within her. Yes, 0:23:48.680 --> 0:23:52.399 the cable and the rockets remained, but the world. She 0:23:52.440 --> 0:23:55.280 could not frame the thought or say the word. 0:23:56.080 --> 0:23:56.800 It was too. 0:23:56.760 --> 0:24:00.560 Mighty, too terrible. She turned toward the door with a 0:24:00.560 --> 0:24:03.119 new fear in her heart. For the first time, she 0:24:03.160 --> 0:24:05.280 seemed to realize that she was alone in the world, 0:24:05.280 --> 0:24:08.240 with a stranger, with something more than a stranger, with 0:24:08.320 --> 0:24:13.199 a man alien in blood and culture unknown, perhaps unknowable. 0:24:13.920 --> 0:24:17.520 It was awful. She must escape, She must fly, He 0:24:17.600 --> 0:24:21.680 must not see her again. Who knew what awful thoughts? 0:24:22.359 --> 0:24:27.560 She gathered her silken skirts deftly about her young smooth limbs, listened, 0:24:27.600 --> 0:24:32.000 and glided into a side hall a moment, she shrank back. 0:24:32.440 --> 0:24:35.840 The hall lay filled with dead women. Then she leaped 0:24:35.880 --> 0:24:38.520 to the door and tore at it with bleeding fingers 0:24:38.600 --> 0:24:42.560 until it swung wide. She looked out. He was standing 0:24:42.600 --> 0:24:47.720 at the top of the alley, silhouetted, tall and black, motionless. 0:24:48.640 --> 0:24:51.840 Was he looking at her or away? She did not know, 0:24:52.640 --> 0:24:56.400 She did not care. She simply leaped and ran, ran 0:24:56.480 --> 0:24:59.720 until she found herself alone amid the dead and the tall, 0:25:00.040 --> 0:25:05.600 imparts of towering buildings. She stopped. She was alone, alone, 0:25:06.000 --> 0:25:09.159 alone on the streets, alone in the city, perhaps alone 0:25:09.200 --> 0:25:12.320 in the world. There crept in upon her the sense 0:25:12.359 --> 0:25:16.560 of deception, of creeping hands behind her back, of silent 0:25:16.680 --> 0:25:20.119 moving things she could not see, a voice hushed in 0:25:20.200 --> 0:25:25.880 fearsome conspiracy. She looked behind and sideways, started at strange sounds, 0:25:25.880 --> 0:25:30.320 and heard still stranger, until every nerve within her stood 0:25:30.359 --> 0:25:33.680 sharp and quivering, stretched a scream. At the barest touch. 0:25:34.200 --> 0:25:37.320 She whirled and flew back, whimpering like a child, until 0:25:37.359 --> 0:25:40.320 she found that narrow alley again, and the dark, silent 0:25:40.400 --> 0:25:45.200 figure silhouetted at the top. She stopped and rested. Then 0:25:45.240 --> 0:25:48.960 she walked silently toward him, looked at him, timidly, but 0:25:49.040 --> 0:25:51.200 he said nothing as he handed her into the car. 0:25:51.920 --> 0:25:56.960 Her voice coughed as she whispered, not that, and he 0:25:56.960 --> 0:26:03.639 answered slowly, no, not. And you, dear listener, are also 0:26:03.760 --> 0:26:07.000 never alone in this great and terrible world, for you 0:26:07.040 --> 0:26:12.040 will always have the accompaniment of these sweet, sweet deals 0:26:12.119 --> 0:26:15.119 on products and services waiting for you. 0:26:15.440 --> 0:26:29.560 Gently, here's ads, and we're back. 0:26:34.119 --> 0:26:36.919 They climbed into the car. She bent forward on the 0:26:36.920 --> 0:26:41.320 wheel and sobbed with great, dry, quivering sobs as they 0:26:41.400 --> 0:26:44.600 flew toward the cable office on the east side, leaving 0:26:44.640 --> 0:26:47.520 the world of wealth and prosperity for the world of 0:26:47.560 --> 0:26:51.120 poverty and work. In the world behind them were death 0:26:51.160 --> 0:26:55.520 and silence, grave and grim, almost cynical, but always decent. 0:26:56.480 --> 0:26:59.960 Here it was hideous. It clothed itself in every game, 0:27:00.040 --> 0:27:04.960 vastly form of terror, struggle, hate, and suffering. It lay 0:27:05.000 --> 0:27:09.520 wreathed in crime and squalor, greed and lust. Only in 0:27:09.600 --> 0:27:15.080 its dread and awful silence was it like death everywhere. Yet, 0:27:15.320 --> 0:27:18.959 as the two flying and alone, looked upon the horror 0:27:19.000 --> 0:27:23.560 of the world, slowly, gradually the sense of all enveloping 0:27:23.640 --> 0:27:26.959 death deserted them. They seemed to move in a world 0:27:27.080 --> 0:27:31.960 silent and asleep, not dead. They moved in quiet reverence, 0:27:32.600 --> 0:27:35.880 lest somehow they wake these sleeping forms who had at 0:27:35.960 --> 0:27:41.560 last found peace. They moved in some solemn, worldwide friedhoff, 0:27:42.320 --> 0:27:45.800 above which some mighty arm had waved its magic wand 0:27:46.680 --> 0:27:50.600 all nature slept until until and quick, with the same 0:27:50.680 --> 0:27:54.920 startling thought, they looked into each other's eyes, he Ashen 0:27:55.080 --> 0:28:00.440 and she crimson, with unspoken thought to both, the vision 0:28:00.520 --> 0:28:05.159 of a mighty beauty of vast unspoken things swelled in 0:28:05.240 --> 0:28:10.600 their songs, but they put it away. Great dark coils 0:28:10.640 --> 0:28:13.760 of wire came up from the earth and down from 0:28:13.800 --> 0:28:18.000 the sun, and entered this low lair of witchery. The 0:28:18.040 --> 0:28:22.120 gathered lightnings of the world centered here, binding with beams 0:28:22.160 --> 0:28:25.399 of light the ends of the earth. The doors gaped 0:28:25.440 --> 0:28:29.840