41

VI. A TELEPATHIC TELEGRAM 51

VII. GUILTY! 62

VIII. THE WOKING MYSTERY 72

IX. CUI BONO? 81

X. FORCE--A REMEDY 93

XI. MORITURI TE SALUTANT 104

XII. "NO DEATH--SAVE IN LIFE" 111

XIII. MISS METFORD'S PLAN 123

XIV. ROCKINGHAM TO THE SHARKS 133

XV. "IF NOT TOO LATE" 146

XVI. L5000 TO DETAIN THE SHIP 160

XVII. "THIS EARTH SHALL DIE" 174

XVIII. THE FLIGHT 184

XIX. THE CATASTROPHE 197

XX. CONCLUSION 208

THE CRACK OF DOOM

CHAPTER I.

THE UNIVERSE A MISTAKE!

"The Universe is a mistake!"

Thus spake Herbert Brande, a passenger on the _Majestic_, making for
Queenstown Harbour, one evening early in the past year. Foolish as the
words may seem, they were partly influential in leading to my terrible
association with him, and all that is described in this book.

Brande was standing beside me on the starboard side of the vessel. We
had been discussing a current astronomical essay, as we watched the hazy
blue line of the Irish coast rise on the horizon. This conversation was
interrupted by Brande, who said, impatiently:

"Why tell us of stars distant so far from this insignificant little
world of ours--so insignificant that even its own inhabitants speak
disrespectfully of it--that it would take hundreds of years to telegraph
to some of them, thousands to others, and millions to the rest? Why
limit oneself to a mere million of years for a dramatic illustration,
when there is a star in space distant so far from us that if a telegram
left the earth for it this very night, and maintained for ever its
initial velocity, it would never reach that star?"

He said this without any apparent effort after rhetorical effect; but
the suddenness with which he had presented a very obvious truism in a
fresh light to me made the conception of the vastness of space
absolutely oppressive. In the hope of changing the subject I replied:

"Nothing is gained by dwelling on these scientific speculations. The
mind is only bewildered. The Universe is inexplicable."

"The Universe!" he exclaimed. "That is easily explained. The Universe is
a mistake!"

"The greatest mistake of the century, I suppo