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The Radiant Shell
by
“A little complicated, but hardly miraculous. It has a cellulose base, and there is in it a small per cent of powdered crystal–but the rest I’ll keep locked in my brain alone till my country has need of it.”
The glimpses of teeth and tongue and throat ceased. In spite of himself, the Secretary started as an unseen hand touched his shoulder.
“Now,”–there was ringing resolution in the deep voice–“for the Arvanian Embassy. Please drive me there–and be as quick as you can about it. I can’t last very long with this film sealing most of the pores of my body.”
* * * * *
The Secretary started for the laboratory door. Beside him sounded the patter of bare feet. He opened the door and walked into the hallway. Behind him, apparently of itself, the door clicked shut; and the footsteps again sounded beside him.
The Secretary walked to the curb where his limousine waited. His chauffeur jumped out and opened the door. The Secretary paused a moment, one foot on the running board, to draw a cigar from his pocket and light it. During that moment the car pressed down on that side, and as suddenly rocked back up again.
The chauffeur stared wide-eyed at his employer.
“Did you do that, sir?” he asked.
“Do what?” said the Secretary.
“Push down on the running board with your foot.”
“Of course not,” said the Secretary, his eyebrows raising. “You could have seen my leg move if I had. But why do you ask?”
“It felt like somebody got into this car,” mumbled the man.
“Did you see anybody get in?” said the Secretary with a shrug. And, shaking his head, with a fuddled look in his eyes, the chauffeur turned away and got into the driver’s seat.
The Secretary glanced at the rear seat. On the far side, the cushion was heavily depressed. He sat on the near side, feeling his knee strike another, unseen knee.
“Drive to the Bulgarian Embassy,” he told his man.
Up Sixteenth Street the car swung, past the various embassies which looked more like palatial private villas than offices of foreign nations. Toward the end of the line, a smaller building than most of the others, was the Arvanian Embassy. Next to it was the Bulgarian.
* * * * *
The car stopped in front of the Bulgarian Embassy, and the Secretary got out. Again he paused, while the chauffeur held the door open, to hold a match to his cigar. Again the car sagged down on that side, and slowly swayed up again.
“Hey–” said the chauffeur. But meeting the Secretary’s calmly inquiring gaze, he stopped. Scratching his head, he went back to the wheel, while the Secretary walked toward the building entrance.
Behind him, moving on soundless bare feet along the sidewalk, Thorn Winter hastened, cloaked in invisibility, toward the Arvanian Embassy–and the plans that spelled America’s destruction if they remained in Arvanian hands.
The embassy building was a three-storied oblong house of white stone topping a terrace that started its climb from the sidewalk of Sixteenth Street. The doors at the head of the wide stone staircase were of bronze; and they were closed, and, Thorn surmised, efficiently barred. The windows at front and sides were also closed, in spite of the warmth of the sunny spring afternoon.
Beside the building, leading up in a short steep hill, was the driveway. Up this Thorn started. The front of the house was hopelessly barred; but at the rear entrance there might be a chance.
Up the driveway, then, he walked, a little startled at the fact that he cast no shadow–feeling as a ghost might feel. The pavement was hot to his thinly filmed feet. A little dubious as to the effect of heat on the vital shell that hid him, he stepped off into the cool grass beside the drive; and came soon to the rear of the embassy.