us ether.

"If a magnifying glass of sufficient size and strength could be placed
over us we could see ourselves as sieves--our space lattice, as it is
called. And all that is necessary to break down the lattice, to shake
us into nothingness, is some agent that will set our atoms vibrating
at such a rate that at last they escape the unseen cords and fly off.

"The green ray of Yolara is such an agent. It set up in the dwarf
that incredibly rapid rhythm that you saw and--shook him not to
atoms--but to electrons!"

"They had a gun on the West Front--a seventy-five," said O'Keefe,
"that broke the eardrums of everybody who fired it, no matter what
protection they used. It looked like all the other seventy-fives--but
there was something about its sound that did it. They had to recast
it."

"It's practically the same thing," I replied. "By some freak its
vibratory qualities had that effect. The deep whistle of the sunken
Lusitania would, for instance, make the Singer Building shake to its
foundations; while the Olympic did not affect the Singer at all but
made the Woolworth shiver all through. In each case they stimulated
the atomic vibration of the particular building--"

I paused, aware all at once of an intense drowsiness. O'Keefe,
yawning, reached down to unfasten his puttees.

"Lord, I'm sleepy!" he exclaimed. "Can't understand it--what you
say--most--interesting--Lord!" he yawned again; straightened. "What
made Reddy take such a shine to the Russian?" he asked.

"Thanaroa," I answered, fighting to keep my eyes open.

"What?"

"When Lugur spoke that name I saw Marakinoff signal him. Thanaroa is,
I suspect, the original form of the name of Tangaroa, the greatest god
of the Polynesians. There's a secret cult to him in the islands.
Marakinoff may belong to it--he knows it anyway. Lugur recognized the
signal and despite his surprise answered it."

"So he gave him the high sign, eh?" mused Larry. "How could they both
know it?"

"The cult is a very ancient one. Undoubtedly it had its origin in the
dim beginnings before these people migrated here," I replied. "It's a
link--one--of the few links between up there and the lost past--"

"Trouble then," mumbled Larry. "Hell brewing! I smell it--Say, Doc,
is this sleepiness natural? Wonder where my--gas mask--is--" he
added, half incoherently.

But I myself was struggling desperately against the drugged slumber
pressing down upon me.

"Lakla!" I heard O'Kee