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His hope received a rude shock when he reached the great hallway on the lower floor. There was a fruit and confectionery stand here, and as Arthur arrived at the spot, he saw a surging mass of men about it. The keeper of the stand looked frightened, but was selling off his stock as fast as he could make change. Arthur forced his way to the counter.

“Here,” he said sharply to the keeper of the stand, “stop selling this stuff. It’s got to be held until we can dole it out where it’s needed.”

“I–I can’t help myself,” the keeper said. “They’re takin’ it anyway.”

“Get back there,” Arthur cried to the crowd. “Do you call this decent, trying to get more than your share of this stuff? You’ll get your portion to-morrow. It is going to be divided up.”

“Go to hell!” some one panted. “You c’n starve if you want to, but I’m goin’ to look out f’r myself.”

The men were not really starving, but had been put into a panic by the plain speeches of Arthur and his helpers, and were seizing what edibles they could lay hands upon in preparation for the hunger they had been warned to expect.

Arthur pushed against the mob, trying to thrust them away from the counter, but his very effort intensified their panic. There was a quick surge and a crash. The glass front of the showcase broke in.

In a flash of rage Arthur struck out viciously. The crowd paid not the slightest attention to him, however. Every man was too panic-stricken, and too intent on getting some of this food before it was all gone to bother with him.

Arthur was simply crushed back by the bodies of the forty or fifty men. In a moment he found himself alone amid the wreckage of the stand, with the keeper wringing his hands over the remnants of his goods.

Van Deventer ran down the stairs.

“What’s the matter?” he demanded as he saw Arthur nursing a bleeding hand cut on the broken glass of the showcase.

“Bolsheviki!” answered Arthur with a grim smile. “We woke up some of the crowd too successfully. They got panic-stricken and started to buy out this stuff here. I tried to stop them, and you see what happened. We’d better look to the restaurant, though I doubt if they’ll try anything else just now.”

He followed Van Deventer up to the restaurant floor. There were picked men before the door, but just as Arthur and the bank president appeared two or three white-faced men went up to the guards and started low-voiced conversations.

Arthur reached the spot in time to forestall bribery.

Arthur collared one man, Van Deventer another, and in a moment the two were sent reeling down the hallway.

“Some fools have got panic-stricken!” Van Deventer explained to the men before the doors in a casual voice, though he was breathing heavily from the unaccustomed exertion. “They’ve smashed up the fruit-stand on the ground floor and stolen the contents. It’s nothing but blue funk! Only, if any of them start to gather around here, hit them first and talk it over afterward. You’ll do that?”

“We will!” the men said heartily.

“Shall we use our guns?” asked another hopefully.

Van Deventer grinned.

“No,” he replied, “we haven’t any excuse for that yet. But you might shoot at the ceiling, if they get excited. They’re just frightened!”

He took Arthur’s arm, and the two walked toward the stairway again.

“Chamberlain,” he said happily, “tell me why I’ve never had as much fun as this before!”

Arthur smiled a bit wearily.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself!” he said. “I’m not. I’m going outside and walk around. I want to see if any cracks have appeared in the earth anywhere. It’s dark, and I’ll borrow a lantern down in the fire-room, but I want to find out if there are any more developments in the condition of the building.”

X.

Despite his preoccupation with his errand, which was to find if there were other signs of the continued activity of the strange forces that had lowered the tower through the Fourth Dimension into the dim and unrecorded years of aboriginal America, Arthur could not escape the fascination of the sight that met his eyes. A bright moon shone overhead and silvered the white sides of the tower, while the brightly-lighted windows of the offices within glittered like jewels set into the shining shaft.