doors."

"It is a fine place," said Greg. "I can smell the pines."

The laboratory perched on a ledge of rugged rock, nearly 7,000 feet
above sea level. Before them the land swept down in jagged ruggedness
to a valley far below, where a stream flashed in the noonday sun. Beyond
climbed pine-clad slopes and far in the distance gleamed shimmering
spires of snow-capped peaks.

From his leather jacket Russ hauled forth his pipe and tobacco, lighted
up.

"It was this way," he said. Leaning back comfortably he outlined the
first experiment. Manning listened intently.

"Now comes the funny part," Russ added. "I had hopes before, but I
believe this is what put me on the right track. I took a metal rod, a
welding rod, you know. I pushed it into that solidified force field, if
that is what you'd call it ... although that doesn't describe it. The
rod went in. Took a lot of pushing, but it went in. And though the field
seemed entirely transparent, you couldn't see the rod, even after I had
pushed enough of it in so it should have come out the other side. It was
as if it hadn't entered the sphere of force at all. As if I were just
telescoping the rod and its density were increasing as I pushed, like
pushing it back into itself, but that, of course, wouldn't have been
possible."

He paused and puffed at his pipe, his eyes fixed on the snowy peaks far
in the purple distance. Manning waited.

"Finally the rod came out," Russ went on. "Mind you, it came out, even
after I would have sworn, if I had relied alone upon my eyes, that it
hadn't entered the sphere at all. _But it came out ninety degrees
removed from its point of entry!_"

"Wait a second," said Manning. "This doesn't check. Did you do it more
than once?"

"I did it a dozen times and the results were the same each time. But you
haven't heard the half of it. When I pulled that rod out--yes, I could
pull it out--it was a good two inches shorter than when I had pushed it
in. I couldn't believe that part of it. It was even harder to believe
than that the rod should come out ninety degrees from its point of
entry. I measured the rods after that and made sure. Kept an accurate
record. Every single one of them lost approximately two inches by being
shoved into the sphere. Every single one of them repeated the phenomenon
of curving within the sphere to come out somewhere else than where I had
inserted them."

* * * * *

"Any explanation of i