, however, as I had no
means of telling whether the mechanism of the virator had done what was
expected of it, or not. Almos' life depended upon the accurate working
of this mechanism after I had gone, and I was anxious to learn of his
safety. He would also want to learn of my safe arrival before preparing
himself for another undertaking of the kind; to see each other was
therefore necessary. Almos would undoubtedly have warned me of this, had
not the cessation of wave contact prevented him from giving me
instructions.

It was late in the afternoon when a feeling of intense hunger reminded
me that I had not tasted food for twenty-four hours. I contented myself,
however, with a light meal at a neighboring cafe, knowing the danger of
eating heavily at this time. To my great surprise, I found that this
small amount of food was evidently all my system required. Not only was
my hunger appeased, but, while returning to my rooms, I was conscious of
a strength and vigor which were entirely new to me, and which I now
remembered I had first experienced upon awakening. Could it be that the
super-radium current, possessing the wonderful regenerating rays that
had brought perpetual life to the people of Mars, was gradually working
this change in my body over a distance of millions of miles? Impossible
as this seemed there was no other way of accounting for the remarkable
change which had taken place in my body.

The intense excitement I experienced at the thought of possessing
perpetual life, health, and youth was but momentary, and I reached my
laboratory with a full realization of the enormous responsibilities
which my discovery was placing upon me. I could no longer keep it
secret; each day that I withheld the knowledge of these rays from my
fellow beings, hundreds, nay thousands, of lives would be laid to my
account. The knowledge had not been given to me that I should guard it
selfishly. The hope that, even though I could never call Zarlah my own,
I might often spend a few happy hours with her in her Martian paradise
was now shattered forever. I must stifle my love or commit a crime
against every living soul on Earth; and as I paced my room in agony,
with my hands pressed to my temples to ease their throbbing, a great cry
of anguish from the multitude in Death's grasp rang through my brain. My
heart was torn asunder by two great conflicting emotions, Love and Duty,
and in this torture of mind and body I moved restlessly back a