Project Gutenberg's The Chamber of Life, by Green Peyton Wertenbaker
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: The Chamber of Life
Author: Green Peyton Wertenbaker
Illustrator: Austin Briggs
Release Date: June 21, 2008 [EBook #25862]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CHAMBER OF LIFE ***
Produced by Robert Cicconetti, Annie McGuire and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+-------------------------------------------------------+
|This etext was produced from Amazing Stories July 1962,|
|a reprint from Amazing Stories October 1929. Extensive |
|research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. |
|copyright on this publication was renewed. |
+-------------------------------------------------------+
A Classic Reprint from AMAZING STORIES, October, 1929
Illustrated by BRIGGS
[Illustration]
The CHAMBER of LIFE
By G. PEYTON WERTENBAKER
_Copyright 1929 by E. P. Inc._
A Strange Awakening
My first sensation was one of sudden and intense cold--a chill that shot
through my body and engulfed it like a charge of electricity. For a
moment I was conscious of nothing else. Then I knew that I was sinking
in cold water, and that I was fighting instinctively against the need to
gasp and breathe fresh air. I kicked weakly and convulsively. I opened
my eyes, and squeezed them as the bright green water stung them. Then I
hung for an instant as if suspended over the depths, and began to rise.
It seemed hours before I shot up into the open air again, and was
drinking it deeply and thankfully into my tortured lungs. The sun
touched my head warmly like the hand of a benign god.
Floating gently, I lay there for a long while before I even looked about
me. There was a vague confusion in my head, as if I had just awakened
from a long sleep. Some memory seemed to be fading away, something I
could still feel but couldn't understand. Then it was gone, and I was
alone and empty, riding on the water.
I glanced about, puzzled. Only a few yards away rose the gray stone side
of the embankment, with its low parapet, and behind that the Drive.
The
|