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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cabb510 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #63838 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/63838) diff --git a/old/63838-0.txt b/old/63838-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index d811171..0000000 --- a/old/63838-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,926 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Time Trap, by Frank Belknap Long - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world 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.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this ebook. - -Title: Time Trap - -Author: Frank Belknap Long - -Release Date: December 05, 2020 [EBook #63838] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TIME TRAP *** - - - - - TIME TRAP - - By FRANK BELKNAP LONG - - Somebody waited for old Charley Grimes, - plodding across that darkside Luna - crater--somebody who couldn't exist. - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Planet Stories Winter 1948. - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - -Charley Grimes was a big man who had been everywhere in the Solar -System and collected trophies which were as strange and shining as the -stories he liked to tell. - -His face was as gaunt as the jungle mask and, when he lit a pipe and -smoked it, you watched to see where the smoke would drift. It wasn't -hard to picture it drifting over the mountains of the moon or across -the flat red plains of Mars. - -We were sitting around a campfire in the Rockies just as our ancestors -must have sat five hundred years in the past. We were swapping yarns to -get Charley started, and watching the sun sink to rest on clouds shaped -like wild mustangs when the talk drifted to the dark side of the moon. - -You know what it's like on the dark side. The brittle stars shine down -and the great craters loom up, but when you're flying low in a rocket -ship about all you can see through the viewpane is a circle of radiance -spotlighting a desolation as bleak as the Siberian Steppes. - -You miss so many things you don't dare even think about the earth. -If you're an escapist you cover your bunk with pictures of the lush -Venusian jungles and pretend you're somewhere else. But if you're a -realist you go outside and come to grips with the bleakness in one way -or another. - -Charley was a realist. - -"So I went wandering off just to see what I could find!" Charley said. - -We watched him get up, throw another log on the fire and draw his -Indian blanket around himself--so tightly he looked like a great -swathed mummy swaying in the glare. - -"Nothing tremendous ever happens when you go exploring with all the -trimmings!" Charley went on. "You've got to be devil-may-care about it. -So I just made sure my helmet was screwed on tight and went striding -away from the ship like a clockwork orang-outang! - -"If you've been on the dark side you know that there's a sensation of -bitter cold at all times--even when you're bundled up and in motion. -You keep looking back and wishing you hadn't--and before you can count -the stars in a square foot of sky you're at the bottom of a valley with -glacial sides and the desolation is so awful you want to sit down on -the nearest rock and never get up!" - -Charley sat down, crossed his long legs and took a deep, slow puff on -his pipe. - -"I shouted--just to hear the echoes come rolling back. You can talk to -yourself that way and get comfort out of it, because what you'll hear -will be the giant in yourself. The valley was so big a soaring eagle -would have burst its lungs trying to fly out of it. - -"But don't get the idea I climbed down over an icy slope on a rope. I -simply sat down and let myself slide. Smooth? There wasn't a crevice or -a projection until I reached the bottom and picked myself up." - -Charley nodded. "I had to lift off my helmet for a minute, to shake off -the ice. That's when I shouted and heard the echoes come rolling back. - -"I'd clamped the helmet back on, and was adjusting my oxygen intake -when I happened to glance down at my big, square feet." - -Charley chuckled. - -"I've got outsized feet even when I'm as bare as a baby. But I was -wearing heavy moon-shoes, and the prints I'd left in the snow were -eight inches across! - -"There was a straight line of prints, as big and square as my own, -leading out across the valley--prints I couldn't possibly have made. -I'd stumbled around a bit, of course. But I hadn't budged two yards -from the base of the slope. - -"The oddest thing about that single trail of prints was the fact that -it started right where I was standing! - -"An icy wind seemed to blow through me. On the moon you don't slide -down a steep slope and land right where someone else has been standing. -Not if you're in your right mind, you don't. The moon isn't that -thickly populated. - -"I was badly shaken, I can tell you! But I didn't sit down and brood -over it. When you go into a huddle with yourself on the moon you're apt -to wind up looking like an ice-carved replica of Rodin's Thinker. - -"I simply shaded my helmet with my palm, to cut down the starshine, -and stared across the valley. The valley was about a mile wide, and as -smooth as a skating rink over most of its surface. But about halfway -across a big mound of blue-gray sandstone broke the monotony by looming -up on the frozen plain like an African termite's nest. - - * * * * * - -"Maybe you've seen some pictures of those big nests in travel books. -They were usually photographed with seven-foot natives standing beside -'em, to make you realize what insects could accomplish. Old travel -books, of course, because Africa is just one big stone highway now. - -"Those nests were huge, weren't they? If my memory doesn't betray -me--some of those nests were twelve feet tall. - -"Uh ... Uh. But this mound would have dwarfed twenty termite nests in -a valley of giants--all tumbled together and piled up in a skyward -direction. - -"As near as I could make out the footprints ran right up to the base of -the mound, and stopped there. - -"Well ... you can be sure I didn't just stand in my own prints goggling -up at the stars. I followed that impossible trail--straight out into -the valley as fast as I could clump. - -"It took me about ten minutes to reach the mound. Once or twice I -stumbled and almost went sprawling. But whenever I felt the plain -slipping out from under me I shot a quick glance at the mound and its -sheer massiveness steadied me. - -"Close up it had a corrugated, hoary look, as if it had bubbled up out -of the ground when the moon had a molten crust and been fused into a -mound by fire and earthquake. - -"But when I halted directly in front of it I saw that it wasn't as -solid as it looked. It was riddled with little dark holes, as though a -woodpecker had spent at least a month making a wreck of it. And at its -base there was a wide, dark, tunnel-like opening. - -"Another man might have thought of a hundred excuses for not crawling -through that tunnel on his hands and knees. But when my curiosity is -aroused I'm a very special kind of idiot. - -"The tunnel was about twenty feet in length. I crawled along through -the darkness with my atomic blaster slapping against my hip, my heart -hammering against my ribs. - -"When the smothering feeling you get in tunnels began to wear thin I -knew that it would be safe for me to stand up. You can feel a stone -wall arching above you without touching it, and I knew suddenly that I -was in the clear. - -"When I got to my feet and stared about me I could see the dark end of -the tunnel and what appeared to be stone walls hemming me in. The walls -arched away into shadows, and were faintly luminous. - -"I've spent as many hours underground as there are seeds in a -watermelon--so I can take a cave interior in my stride. But the mound -wasn't just hollow and cavelike and filled with wavering shadows. It -was--occupied! - -"He was sitting on a projecting ledge in deep shadows. But the wall -behind him glowed, and I could see him clearly. He was wearing a -space-suit exactly like my own, but it was all shriveled up over him. - -"Take a little monkey--a lemur or a spectral tarsier will do--and put -him inside a cumbersome space-suit, and let his bright eyes shine out -through the viewpane. Do that--and you'll have as clear a picture of -him as I could give you if I rambled on for ten minutes. - -"I couldn't see the little fellow's face through the pane. It was all -a shadowy blue. But I could see his bright eyes, and I could tell he -was little by the way the suit overlapped, and bulged out in the wrong -places. - -"You know how a kid of eight or ten looks when he puts on a man's suit -on Hallowe'en? But this wasn't Hallowe'en, and he wasn't trying to -scare anyone! - -"He was too scared himself. He was shaking all over and when he saw me -his eyes got even brighter, and he started to get up. He was trembling -so I had to help him to his feet. - -"I steadied him with one arm and lifted off the helmet with my free -hand. As you know, you can stay outside a suit on the moon without -getting frost-bitten for about half a minute. - -"When his face came into view and his eyes looked straight into -mine I was so startled that fifteen seconds were lost right at the -start--before a single word could be exchanged between us. But at least -I had a chance to get a good look at him. - -"If you saw yourself as a boy of ten, suddenly, without warning, would -you recognize yourself? Maybe some men would. If you looked at yourself -a lot in a mirror when you were growing up--or kept photographs of -yourself, carefully preserved in an old album, you might not have any -trouble. Right off you might hear yourself muttering, 'Why, that's -_me_!' - -"But I had trouble. The kid's face was just enough like my own to give -me a start. But I couldn't really place it--couldn't remember where I -had seen it before. - -"Then the kid spoke. 'I--I thought you were Pops! But you're not! He's -older! Where am I? How did I get here?' - - * * * * * - -"The voice did something to me. You get a chance to hear yourself -talking a lot when you're knee-high to a grasshopper. And I had no kids -of my own! But my own father had looked enough like me to be my twin -brother, and if this kid thought I was his dad-- - -"It hit me between the eyes--and like a voice screaming at me through a -blur of spinning suns! - -"I was staring at myself as I had been long ago--and no tracks made by -a dead man in a bog could have been more nerve-shattering. - -"He wasn't even a poor little kid in a desperate plight, because you -can't feel paternal about yourself! He was a tormented ghost out of the -past, and for an instant I had an impulse to blame him and rail at him -for returning to torture me. - -"But I'm not a cruel man, deep down, and that crazy impulse passed -quickly. He was a poor little lost cuss, even if he _was_ myself, and -all my sympathy went out to him. - -"I even forgot for a moment how insane the whole thing was. He was -gasping for breath, so I put the helmet back on, and gave the oxygen -tube a double twist to straighten it out. But an instant before the -helmet descended over his mouth he managed to stammer, 'I was up in the -attic playing--' - -"Playing 'Pirate's den!' I had spent the happiest years of my boyhood -in the attic, pretending I was Captain Kidd, or climbing out on the -tree that arched over our house when the December snows weighed it -down, and making myself out to be in the crow's nest of an arctic -windjammer! - -"As I swayed there beside myself my mind followed crazy-paved paths -in all directions. Great chunks of the past seemed to float before -me--like icebergs nine-tenths submerged. - -"But all the while the sanest part of my mind was seeking an -explanation that would one-tenth explain it! I gripped my own boy-self -by the shoulder to make sure he'd stay solid until the man he'd become -could get a mental toe-hold on the problem. - -"If you can persuade a man to mount a stepladder and plant himself -firmly on the air you've taken your first brave step into the unknown. -The poor devil may or may not fall. But at least you've made a start in -the right direction. - -"It isn't too hard to believe that certain things can happen to Time -on the wrong side of yesterday--or tomorrow! Time--the physicists tell -us--never stops flowing. It's like a melting candle or silk before it -hardens on the loom--all crinkled up and sparkling like a dew-drenched -spider web. - -"If Time melts in a back-of-yesterday dimension what's to stop a man -from dissolving with it, and running in a thin trickle back to his -yesterdays? You were a boy once and you could be a boy again--without -ceasing to be a man. - -"Put it this way. On the dark side of the moon there was a valley of -shadows. A big, blundering fool went stumbling into it, and landed in -a heap. Before he could pick himself up a part of himself dissolved -in some unimaginable backwash of time, and he became a boy again. His -boy-self split off from him, and went stumbling off over the plain in a -suit five sizes too large for him. - -"It's not as impossible as it sounds. The boy you were still exists in -Time, and he could emerge from the past to stand beside you in a vortex -of dissolving Time. Was there something in the valley that could change -the flow of time, reverse it, and twist it around like butter in a -churn? - -"The answer was right there in the cave with me. But I couldn't see -it because _another_ space-suited figure was making my brain whirl. -He'd come clumping into the cave bent nearly double, and now he was -shuffling toward me as though I'd committed some horrible crime I could -never hope to atone for. - -"Through the pane of his helmet his eyes burned accusingly into mine. -But it wasn't until he halted directly in front of me and lifted the -helmet from his head that I knew what my crime was and why he found it -hard to forgive me. - -"I had committed the crime of living beyond my alloted span! The man -facing me was old ... old. His face was still my face, but if ever I -had been young and handsome and a target for the wiles of a pretty -woman I was so no longer! - -"He seemed to realize that I could hardly bear to look upon myself as I -would be, for he spoke sharply, quickly, without attempting to explain -his presence, or even to prepare me for what he had to say by working -up to it like a story-teller with a great load of unimaginable horror -on his mind. - -"'It's a monstrous beast of prey!' he croaked. 'It can dissolve Time -and re-shape Time in a hundred horrible ways!' - -"He quirked his head at me. 'You know more than that lad but I know -more than you--for I have lived through this moment before! Once long -ago I stood in this cave and warned you! You are at the crossroads of -a branching future! If you take the right turn now you will live to -become me. But, if you take the wrong turn--' - -"He straightened, and pointed with his gloved forefinger into the -shadows behind me. 'It is there--at your back! When you turn you will -see the shining web which it uses to dissolve Time! All over this -valley the creature has thrown a Time-dissolving web of force!' - - * * * * * - -"His voice rose warningly. 'It is as intelligent as we are, but it -moves with glacial slowness. An inch in an hour--a foot in a day! When -it dissolves Time it nourishes itself by drawing the energy-whirl into -itself, and spinning it out again in another form, like an immense, -living shuttlecock. A spider--' - -"He looked at me with a haggard intensity of appeal. 'It will try to -hold you with the web--to hold you in complete helplessness until you -become a hundred lads and a hundred men. You'll be an infant, a boy of -five, a lad of twenty, and a man older than myself. But every time you -split up in the folds of the web you'll lose a part of your substance. - -"'You'll cease to be a man with a past and a future. You'll become a -mere hollow shell--no more substantial than I am, and I am little more -than a wraith. You'll be drained, and you'll vanish like a puff of -smoke. You'll be devoured and swallowed up!' - -"He was struggling for breath and the veins on his forehead had begun -to swell. 'You've got to blast it down before the web dazzles and -confuses you! You'll have to face it to blast, but if you fight it with -your mind--' - -"Suddenly the helmet was back on his head and he was turning from me. -He moved straight toward the lad and put a palsied hand on the shoulder -of that younger me. - -"Then, slowly, they both turned to face me, and I could see their -eyes inside their helmets, trained upon me in desperate appeal. At -least--there was appeal in the eyes of the old one. The lad may have -been merely terrified, and confused. - -"He couldn't have been more terrified than I was as the shadows -lengthened about me, and a coldness crept into my bones. - -"I knew I'd have to come to grips with the web. I knew, too, that -if it was behind me I'd be safer facing it. When there's something -unspeakable at your back, you can die so many deaths just waiting for -it to make its presence known that all the courage and decision goes -out of you. - -"Panic smote me as I turned, hip and thigh like a flat sword. But all I -could see for an instant was a faint, moving radiance blending with the -shadows, a kind of nebulous flowing in the darkness on the far side of -the cave. - -"My hand must have closed on my blaster, for I could feel the bite of -cold metal against my palm. But there was something about the light -that my will could not withstand. My arms seemed to freeze as I stared -at it, and terrifying thoughts rushed into my brain. - -[Illustration: _My arms seemed to freeze!_] - -"At first I experienced only a feeling of almost unbearable oppression. -Then something in the glow seemed to reach out toward me and there was -no sound in the cave but the beating of my heart. - -"A ghastly something seemed to be watching me with a kind of fiendish -triumph, as though the soul of a devil lurked in the depth of the light -which could send out vampire tendrils, filmed with writhing menace. - -"I couldn't tear my eyes from the glow and the longer I stared the -worse it got. - -"The light seemed filled with an evil purpose. It writhed and changed -shape as I stared at it, seeming to sweep out through the walls of the -cave and back again with a pulsing greediness. - -"Then, gradually, it ceased to blend with the shadows. It became -stationary and transparent, hanging suspended in the murky air like a -gigantic burning glass. - -"As though in a dream-delirium I became slowly aware that a picture -was forming within it. A valley swept into view, walled with high, -saw-toothed mountain ranges. - -"Deep in the weaving radiance I could see a tiny, plodding figure -coming toward me across the valley. - -"For an instant I thought I was looking at the far-off image of a human -figure plodding over the plain. A figure clad in a heavy space-suit, -moving awkwardly--as I had moved. - -"Nearer it came and nearer, its reflection floating on ahead of it, -bobbing about like a little ship. - -"And then, suddenly, I saw that it was _skimming_ the plain. It was -balancing itself on flapping wings, sweeping across the plain without -actually touching it, but so slowly that it appeared to be advancing -with the plodding, awkward gait of a man. - -"It swerved abruptly as I stared, made a full turn, and soared into the -air. It flew straight toward me, its wings beating the air as though it -were struggling against a furious uprush of wind. - -"There was a sloping wall of light-dappled rock at the edge of the -radiance, and for an instant the winged shape disappeared behind it. I -didn't see it descend. - -"I saw only a shadow forming behind the rock, and swirling out from -it. It came into view again abruptly, dragging its wings behind it, -hobbling toward me over the ice. - - * * * * * - -"My spine congealed. The thing that had crossed the valley was a -monstrous bird of prey. It was wearing a space-suit, but no helmet, and -I could see its vulture-like head bobbing about in the glow. - -"It seemed to be in pain. It had halted at the edge of the glow, as -if fearful of what lay beyond it, and suddenly as I stared it began -furiously to pluck and tear at its breast with its taloned foreclaws. - -"So frenzied were the creature's exertions that the front of its -space-suit came away in shreds. The hideous creature had scales on its -breast instead of feathers, and a pulsing, lizardlike throat ... a -throat which turned red as it continued to inflict cruel injuries on -itself. - -"The impression I got was one of agonized despair, of a creature -trapped and cornered that could only escape by destroying itself. Again -and again it slashed at its flesh, twisting about in the glow, its eyes -brimming with agony. - -"Then, suddenly, it was no longer alone. A little bird-lizard shape -had materialized at its side and was going through the same grisly -pantomime. - -"As I blinked in stunned disbelief a third shape swam into view--and a -fourth. The eyes of the third shape were dull and opaque, like frosted -glass, and the fourth shape was so atrophied that the scales on its -breast seemed to overlap, squeezing out the flesh between them. - -"Then, abruptly, the first shape began to grow transparent. It -shriveled and glistened, and I could see its skeleton gleaming beneath -the glassy transparency of its dissolving flesh. - -"It vanished in a gush of gray light, so quickly that the air about it -had a sucked-in look. Swiftly, terribly, the other shapes converged -toward that swirling vacuum and were swallowed up, as though with their -passing Time had collapsed in upon itself. - -"That Time _had_ collapsed I knew! For I am no fool. Long ago the alien -inhabitant of another world had landed in that valley of all horror, -and the living shuttlecock had split it up into time fragments, the -better to destroy it. - -"It wanted me to know that--to realize that my time was short. So it -had brought back a scene out of the past to unnerve me, and sap my will! - -"Could I go on taking it? I hadn't much time to think about it--for the -web was filling with another picture. A living shuttlecock, the old one -had called it. So now it was weaving another picture for me on Time's -dissolving loom. - -"It was a picture so hideous I could hardly bring myself to believe in -it. It was a picture of still another me. But if the old one had seemed -palsied, wretched, at the end of his endurance--the face that stared -out at me from the radiance was a thousandfold more so! - -"It was a face that had lost itself in Time--a face that was all -sagging jowls and puckered brows, a toothless, yellowed caricature of a -face. - -"But it was my face still--_my_ face ravaged by a century's decay! - -"Looking at myself as I would be--I suddenly had no longer any desire -to live. A small, shrill voice shrieked within me that the monstrous, -living shuttlecock desired just that--that it was resorting to a -devilish subterfuge! - -"But I did not heed the voice. I just stood there, waiting to die, -hoping that the end would come quickly. - - * * * * * - -"The blast was deafening! The sudden crash of it made a muffled booming -in the thin air, and smashed against my eardrums like a trump of doom. -The flare was blinding. The awful brightness of it lit up the cave like -a hundred suns, and burned through my eyeballs into my brain. - -"When the smoke cleared all I could see at first was a shattered -something lying on the floor of the cave, all twisted and bent back on -itself like a smoking heap of shattered glass. - -"As I shook my big, dull head to clear it my boy-self lifted off his -helmet and returned his blaster to the holster on his hip. His face was -shining with triumph. The sweat was running off it and he was breathing -heavily. - -"But he spoke to me and his words were good to hear. - -"'We got him, pal!' - -"He didn't say 'it'--didn't refer to the monstrous creature as -something unspeakably alien. - -"No--why should he? To him it wasn't a horror in the valley of the -moon. It was something out of a nightmare and he knew he'd wake up safe -in his own little bed at home. - -"He was still thinking of me as his father--in a nightmare. We'd been -hunting jabberwocks together! - -"And that lad was still in me--a part of me! I tell you, it sobered me -and made me feel ashamed. - -"I was still feeling ashamed when both the boy and the old one -vanished. Perhaps melted back would be a better way of putting it. For -they did seem to dissolve and flow back, rush back, into me an instant -before I found myself standing alone again--in that valley that would -never grow old!" - -Charley had arisen and was standing by the fire. Suddenly he stooped -and threw another log into the flames. - -Far to the west the lights of the biggest spaceport on Earth blinked -through the purple haze, and every time a ship took off, bound for the -great outer planets, the desert would light up for miles. - -But that light couldn't hold a candle to the one that blazed in -Charley's eyes. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TIME TRAP *** - -***** This file should be named 63838-0.txt or 63838-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/8/3/63838/ - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - diff --git a/old/63838-0.zip b/old/63838-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index fa425e9..0000000 --- a/old/63838-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63838-h.zip b/old/63838-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 6be770c..0000000 --- a/old/63838-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63838-h/63838-h.htm b/old/63838-h/63838-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index ad05aff..0000000 --- a/old/63838-h/63838-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1018 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=us-ascii" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Time Trap, by Frank Belknap Long. - </title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33.5%; - margin-right: 33.5%; - clear: both; -} - -hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} -hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -.caption p -{ - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0; - margin: 0.25em 0; -} - -div.titlepage { - text-align: center; - page-break-before: always; - page-break-after: always; -} - -div.titlepage p { - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0em; - font-weight: bold; - line-height: 1.5; - margin-top: 3em; -} - - - </style> - </head> -<body> -<pre style='margin-bottom:6em;'>The Project Gutenberg EBook of Time Trap, by Frank Belknap Long - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world 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.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this ebook. - -Title: Time Trap - -Author: Frank Belknap Long - -Release Date: December 05, 2020 [EBook #63838] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TIME TRAP *** -</pre> -<div class="titlepage"> - -<h1>TIME TRAP</h1> - -<h2>By FRANK BELKNAP LONG</h2> - -<p>Somebody waited for old Charley Grimes,<br /> -plodding across that darkside Luna<br /> -crater—somebody who couldn't exist.</p> - -<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br /> -Planet Stories Winter 1948.<br /> -Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> -the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> - -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>Charley Grimes was a big man who had been everywhere in the Solar -System and collected trophies which were as strange and shining as the -stories he liked to tell.</p> - -<p>His face was as gaunt as the jungle mask and, when he lit a pipe and -smoked it, you watched to see where the smoke would drift. It wasn't -hard to picture it drifting over the mountains of the moon or across -the flat red plains of Mars.</p> - -<p>We were sitting around a campfire in the Rockies just as our ancestors -must have sat five hundred years in the past. We were swapping yarns to -get Charley started, and watching the sun sink to rest on clouds shaped -like wild mustangs when the talk drifted to the dark side of the moon.</p> - -<p>You know what it's like on the dark side. The brittle stars shine down -and the great craters loom up, but when you're flying low in a rocket -ship about all you can see through the viewpane is a circle of radiance -spotlighting a desolation as bleak as the Siberian Steppes.</p> - -<p>You miss so many things you don't dare even think about the earth. -If you're an escapist you cover your bunk with pictures of the lush -Venusian jungles and pretend you're somewhere else. But if you're a -realist you go outside and come to grips with the bleakness in one way -or another.</p> - -<p>Charley was a realist.</p> - -<p>"So I went wandering off just to see what I could find!" Charley said.</p> - -<p>We watched him get up, throw another log on the fire and draw his -Indian blanket around himself—so tightly he looked like a great -swathed mummy swaying in the glare.</p> - -<p>"Nothing tremendous ever happens when you go exploring with all the -trimmings!" Charley went on. "You've got to be devil-may-care about it. -So I just made sure my helmet was screwed on tight and went striding -away from the ship like a clockwork orang-outang!</p> - -<p>"If you've been on the dark side you know that there's a sensation of -bitter cold at all times—even when you're bundled up and in motion. -You keep looking back and wishing you hadn't—and before you can count -the stars in a square foot of sky you're at the bottom of a valley with -glacial sides and the desolation is so awful you want to sit down on -the nearest rock and never get up!"</p> - -<p>Charley sat down, crossed his long legs and took a deep, slow puff on -his pipe.</p> - -<p>"I shouted—just to hear the echoes come rolling back. You can talk to -yourself that way and get comfort out of it, because what you'll hear -will be the giant in yourself. The valley was so big a soaring eagle -would have burst its lungs trying to fly out of it.</p> - -<p>"But don't get the idea I climbed down over an icy slope on a rope. I -simply sat down and let myself slide. Smooth? There wasn't a crevice or -a projection until I reached the bottom and picked myself up."</p> - -<p>Charley nodded. "I had to lift off my helmet for a minute, to shake off -the ice. That's when I shouted and heard the echoes come rolling back.</p> - -<p>"I'd clamped the helmet back on, and was adjusting my oxygen intake -when I happened to glance down at my big, square feet."</p> - -<p>Charley chuckled.</p> - -<p>"I've got outsized feet even when I'm as bare as a baby. But I was -wearing heavy moon-shoes, and the prints I'd left in the snow were -eight inches across!</p> - -<p>"There was a straight line of prints, as big and square as my own, -leading out across the valley—prints I couldn't possibly have made. -I'd stumbled around a bit, of course. But I hadn't budged two yards -from the base of the slope.</p> - -<p>"The oddest thing about that single trail of prints was the fact that -it started right where I was standing!</p> - -<p>"An icy wind seemed to blow through me. On the moon you don't slide -down a steep slope and land right where someone else has been standing. -Not if you're in your right mind, you don't. The moon isn't that -thickly populated.</p> - -<p>"I was badly shaken, I can tell you! But I didn't sit down and brood -over it. When you go into a huddle with yourself on the moon you're apt -to wind up looking like an ice-carved replica of Rodin's Thinker.</p> - -<p>"I simply shaded my helmet with my palm, to cut down the starshine, -and stared across the valley. The valley was about a mile wide, and as -smooth as a skating rink over most of its surface. But about halfway -across a big mound of blue-gray sandstone broke the monotony by looming -up on the frozen plain like an African termite's nest.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>"Maybe you've seen some pictures of those big nests in travel books. -They were usually photographed with seven-foot natives standing beside -'em, to make you realize what insects could accomplish. Old travel -books, of course, because Africa is just one big stone highway now.</p> - -<p>"Those nests were huge, weren't they? If my memory doesn't betray -me—some of those nests were twelve feet tall.</p> - -<p>"Uh ... Uh. But this mound would have dwarfed twenty termite nests in -a valley of giants—all tumbled together and piled up in a skyward -direction.</p> - -<p>"As near as I could make out the footprints ran right up to the base of -the mound, and stopped there.</p> - -<p>"Well ... you can be sure I didn't just stand in my own prints goggling -up at the stars. I followed that impossible trail—straight out into -the valley as fast as I could clump.</p> - -<p>"It took me about ten minutes to reach the mound. Once or twice I -stumbled and almost went sprawling. But whenever I felt the plain -slipping out from under me I shot a quick glance at the mound and its -sheer massiveness steadied me.</p> - -<p>"Close up it had a corrugated, hoary look, as if it had bubbled up out -of the ground when the moon had a molten crust and been fused into a -mound by fire and earthquake.</p> - -<p>"But when I halted directly in front of it I saw that it wasn't as -solid as it looked. It was riddled with little dark holes, as though a -woodpecker had spent at least a month making a wreck of it. And at its -base there was a wide, dark, tunnel-like opening.</p> - -<p>"Another man might have thought of a hundred excuses for not crawling -through that tunnel on his hands and knees. But when my curiosity is -aroused I'm a very special kind of idiot.</p> - -<p>"The tunnel was about twenty feet in length. I crawled along through -the darkness with my atomic blaster slapping against my hip, my heart -hammering against my ribs.</p> - -<p>"When the smothering feeling you get in tunnels began to wear thin I -knew that it would be safe for me to stand up. You can feel a stone -wall arching above you without touching it, and I knew suddenly that I -was in the clear.</p> - -<p>"When I got to my feet and stared about me I could see the dark end of -the tunnel and what appeared to be stone walls hemming me in. The walls -arched away into shadows, and were faintly luminous.</p> - -<p>"I've spent as many hours underground as there are seeds in a -watermelon—so I can take a cave interior in my stride. But the mound -wasn't just hollow and cavelike and filled with wavering shadows. It -was—occupied!</p> - -<p>"He was sitting on a projecting ledge in deep shadows. But the wall -behind him glowed, and I could see him clearly. He was wearing a -space-suit exactly like my own, but it was all shriveled up over him.</p> - -<p>"Take a little monkey—a lemur or a spectral tarsier will do—and put -him inside a cumbersome space-suit, and let his bright eyes shine out -through the viewpane. Do that—and you'll have as clear a picture of -him as I could give you if I rambled on for ten minutes.</p> - -<p>"I couldn't see the little fellow's face through the pane. It was all -a shadowy blue. But I could see his bright eyes, and I could tell he -was little by the way the suit overlapped, and bulged out in the wrong -places.</p> - -<p>"You know how a kid of eight or ten looks when he puts on a man's suit -on Hallowe'en? But this wasn't Hallowe'en, and he wasn't trying to -scare anyone!</p> - -<p>"He was too scared himself. He was shaking all over and when he saw me -his eyes got even brighter, and he started to get up. He was trembling -so I had to help him to his feet.</p> - -<p>"I steadied him with one arm and lifted off the helmet with my free -hand. As you know, you can stay outside a suit on the moon without -getting frost-bitten for about half a minute.</p> - -<p>"When his face came into view and his eyes looked straight into -mine I was so startled that fifteen seconds were lost right at the -start—before a single word could be exchanged between us. But at least -I had a chance to get a good look at him.</p> - -<p>"If you saw yourself as a boy of ten, suddenly, without warning, would -you recognize yourself? Maybe some men would. If you looked at yourself -a lot in a mirror when you were growing up—or kept photographs of -yourself, carefully preserved in an old album, you might not have any -trouble. Right off you might hear yourself muttering, 'Why, that's -<i>me</i>!'</p> - -<p>"But I had trouble. The kid's face was just enough like my own to give -me a start. But I couldn't really place it—couldn't remember where I -had seen it before.</p> - -<p>"Then the kid spoke. 'I—I thought you were Pops! But you're not! He's -older! Where am I? How did I get here?'</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>"The voice did something to me. You get a chance to hear yourself -talking a lot when you're knee-high to a grasshopper. And I had no kids -of my own! But my own father had looked enough like me to be my twin -brother, and if this kid thought I was his dad—</p> - -<p>"It hit me between the eyes—and like a voice screaming at me through a -blur of spinning suns!</p> - -<p>"I was staring at myself as I had been long ago—and no tracks made by -a dead man in a bog could have been more nerve-shattering.</p> - -<p>"He wasn't even a poor little kid in a desperate plight, because you -can't feel paternal about yourself! He was a tormented ghost out of the -past, and for an instant I had an impulse to blame him and rail at him -for returning to torture me.</p> - -<p>"But I'm not a cruel man, deep down, and that crazy impulse passed -quickly. He was a poor little lost cuss, even if he <i>was</i> myself, and -all my sympathy went out to him.</p> - -<p>"I even forgot for a moment how insane the whole thing was. He was -gasping for breath, so I put the helmet back on, and gave the oxygen -tube a double twist to straighten it out. But an instant before the -helmet descended over his mouth he managed to stammer, 'I was up in the -attic playing—'</p> - -<p>"Playing 'Pirate's den!' I had spent the happiest years of my boyhood -in the attic, pretending I was Captain Kidd, or climbing out on the -tree that arched over our house when the December snows weighed it -down, and making myself out to be in the crow's nest of an arctic -windjammer!</p> - -<p>"As I swayed there beside myself my mind followed crazy-paved paths -in all directions. Great chunks of the past seemed to float before -me—like icebergs nine-tenths submerged.</p> - -<p>"But all the while the sanest part of my mind was seeking an -explanation that would one-tenth explain it! I gripped my own boy-self -by the shoulder to make sure he'd stay solid until the man he'd become -could get a mental toe-hold on the problem.</p> - -<p>"If you can persuade a man to mount a stepladder and plant himself -firmly on the air you've taken your first brave step into the unknown. -The poor devil may or may not fall. But at least you've made a start in -the right direction.</p> - -<p>"It isn't too hard to believe that certain things can happen to Time -on the wrong side of yesterday—or tomorrow! Time—the physicists tell -us—never stops flowing. It's like a melting candle or silk before it -hardens on the loom—all crinkled up and sparkling like a dew-drenched -spider web.</p> - -<p>"If Time melts in a back-of-yesterday dimension what's to stop a man -from dissolving with it, and running in a thin trickle back to his -yesterdays? You were a boy once and you could be a boy again—without -ceasing to be a man.</p> - -<p>"Put it this way. On the dark side of the moon there was a valley of -shadows. A big, blundering fool went stumbling into it, and landed in -a heap. Before he could pick himself up a part of himself dissolved -in some unimaginable backwash of time, and he became a boy again. His -boy-self split off from him, and went stumbling off over the plain in a -suit five sizes too large for him.</p> - -<p>"It's not as impossible as it sounds. The boy you were still exists in -Time, and he could emerge from the past to stand beside you in a vortex -of dissolving Time. Was there something in the valley that could change -the flow of time, reverse it, and twist it around like butter in a -churn?</p> - -<p>"The answer was right there in the cave with me. But I couldn't see -it because <i>another</i> space-suited figure was making my brain whirl. -He'd come clumping into the cave bent nearly double, and now he was -shuffling toward me as though I'd committed some horrible crime I could -never hope to atone for.</p> - -<p>"Through the pane of his helmet his eyes burned accusingly into mine. -But it wasn't until he halted directly in front of me and lifted the -helmet from his head that I knew what my crime was and why he found it -hard to forgive me.</p> - -<p>"I had committed the crime of living beyond my alloted span! The man -facing me was old ... old. His face was still my face, but if ever I -had been young and handsome and a target for the wiles of a pretty -woman I was so no longer!</p> - -<p>"He seemed to realize that I could hardly bear to look upon myself as I -would be, for he spoke sharply, quickly, without attempting to explain -his presence, or even to prepare me for what he had to say by working -up to it like a story-teller with a great load of unimaginable horror -on his mind.</p> - -<p>"'It's a monstrous beast of prey!' he croaked. 'It can dissolve Time -and re-shape Time in a hundred horrible ways!'</p> - -<p>"He quirked his head at me. 'You know more than that lad but I know -more than you—for I have lived through this moment before! Once long -ago I stood in this cave and warned you! You are at the crossroads of -a branching future! If you take the right turn now you will live to -become me. But, if you take the wrong turn—'</p> - -<p>"He straightened, and pointed with his gloved forefinger into the -shadows behind me. 'It is there—at your back! When you turn you will -see the shining web which it uses to dissolve Time! All over this -valley the creature has thrown a Time-dissolving web of force!'</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>"His voice rose warningly. 'It is as intelligent as we are, but it -moves with glacial slowness. An inch in an hour—a foot in a day! When -it dissolves Time it nourishes itself by drawing the energy-whirl into -itself, and spinning it out again in another form, like an immense, -living shuttlecock. A spider—'</p> - -<p>"He looked at me with a haggard intensity of appeal. 'It will try to -hold you with the web—to hold you in complete helplessness until you -become a hundred lads and a hundred men. You'll be an infant, a boy of -five, a lad of twenty, and a man older than myself. But every time you -split up in the folds of the web you'll lose a part of your substance.</p> - -<p>"'You'll cease to be a man with a past and a future. You'll become a -mere hollow shell—no more substantial than I am, and I am little more -than a wraith. You'll be drained, and you'll vanish like a puff of -smoke. You'll be devoured and swallowed up!'</p> - -<p>"He was struggling for breath and the veins on his forehead had begun -to swell. 'You've got to blast it down before the web dazzles and -confuses you! You'll have to face it to blast, but if you fight it with -your mind—'</p> - -<p>"Suddenly the helmet was back on his head and he was turning from me. -He moved straight toward the lad and put a palsied hand on the shoulder -of that younger me.</p> - -<p>"Then, slowly, they both turned to face me, and I could see their -eyes inside their helmets, trained upon me in desperate appeal. At -least—there was appeal in the eyes of the old one. The lad may have -been merely terrified, and confused.</p> - -<p>"He couldn't have been more terrified than I was as the shadows -lengthened about me, and a coldness crept into my bones.</p> - -<p>"I knew I'd have to come to grips with the web. I knew, too, that -if it was behind me I'd be safer facing it. When there's something -unspeakable at your back, you can die so many deaths just waiting for -it to make its presence known that all the courage and decision goes -out of you.</p> - -<p>"Panic smote me as I turned, hip and thigh like a flat sword. But all I -could see for an instant was a faint, moving radiance blending with the -shadows, a kind of nebulous flowing in the darkness on the far side of -the cave.</p> - -<p>"My hand must have closed on my blaster, for I could feel the bite of -cold metal against my palm. But there was something about the light -that my will could not withstand. My arms seemed to freeze as I stared -at it, and terrifying thoughts rushed into my brain.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus.jpg" alt=""/> - <div class="caption"> - <p><i>My arms seemed to freeze!</i></p> - </div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>"At first I experienced only a feeling of almost unbearable oppression. -Then something in the glow seemed to reach out toward me and there was -no sound in the cave but the beating of my heart.</p> - -<p>"A ghastly something seemed to be watching me with a kind of fiendish -triumph, as though the soul of a devil lurked in the depth of the light -which could send out vampire tendrils, filmed with writhing menace.</p> - -<p>"I couldn't tear my eyes from the glow and the longer I stared the -worse it got.</p> - -<p>"The light seemed filled with an evil purpose. It writhed and changed -shape as I stared at it, seeming to sweep out through the walls of the -cave and back again with a pulsing greediness.</p> - -<p>"Then, gradually, it ceased to blend with the shadows. It became -stationary and transparent, hanging suspended in the murky air like a -gigantic burning glass.</p> - -<p>"As though in a dream-delirium I became slowly aware that a picture -was forming within it. A valley swept into view, walled with high, -saw-toothed mountain ranges.</p> - -<p>"Deep in the weaving radiance I could see a tiny, plodding figure -coming toward me across the valley.</p> - -<p>"For an instant I thought I was looking at the far-off image of a human -figure plodding over the plain. A figure clad in a heavy space-suit, -moving awkwardly—as I had moved.</p> - -<p>"Nearer it came and nearer, its reflection floating on ahead of it, -bobbing about like a little ship.</p> - -<p>"And then, suddenly, I saw that it was <i>skimming</i> the plain. It was -balancing itself on flapping wings, sweeping across the plain without -actually touching it, but so slowly that it appeared to be advancing -with the plodding, awkward gait of a man.</p> - -<p>"It swerved abruptly as I stared, made a full turn, and soared into the -air. It flew straight toward me, its wings beating the air as though it -were struggling against a furious uprush of wind.</p> - -<p>"There was a sloping wall of light-dappled rock at the edge of the -radiance, and for an instant the winged shape disappeared behind it. I -didn't see it descend.</p> - -<p>"I saw only a shadow forming behind the rock, and swirling out from -it. It came into view again abruptly, dragging its wings behind it, -hobbling toward me over the ice.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>"My spine congealed. The thing that had crossed the valley was a -monstrous bird of prey. It was wearing a space-suit, but no helmet, and -I could see its vulture-like head bobbing about in the glow.</p> - -<p>"It seemed to be in pain. It had halted at the edge of the glow, as -if fearful of what lay beyond it, and suddenly as I stared it began -furiously to pluck and tear at its breast with its taloned foreclaws.</p> - -<p>"So frenzied were the creature's exertions that the front of its -space-suit came away in shreds. The hideous creature had scales on its -breast instead of feathers, and a pulsing, lizardlike throat ... a -throat which turned red as it continued to inflict cruel injuries on -itself.</p> - -<p>"The impression I got was one of agonized despair, of a creature -trapped and cornered that could only escape by destroying itself. Again -and again it slashed at its flesh, twisting about in the glow, its eyes -brimming with agony.</p> - -<p>"Then, suddenly, it was no longer alone. A little bird-lizard shape -had materialized at its side and was going through the same grisly -pantomime.</p> - -<p>"As I blinked in stunned disbelief a third shape swam into view—and a -fourth. The eyes of the third shape were dull and opaque, like frosted -glass, and the fourth shape was so atrophied that the scales on its -breast seemed to overlap, squeezing out the flesh between them.</p> - -<p>"Then, abruptly, the first shape began to grow transparent. It -shriveled and glistened, and I could see its skeleton gleaming beneath -the glassy transparency of its dissolving flesh.</p> - -<p>"It vanished in a gush of gray light, so quickly that the air about it -had a sucked-in look. Swiftly, terribly, the other shapes converged -toward that swirling vacuum and were swallowed up, as though with their -passing Time had collapsed in upon itself.</p> - -<p>"That Time <i>had</i> collapsed I knew! For I am no fool. Long ago the alien -inhabitant of another world had landed in that valley of all horror, -and the living shuttlecock had split it up into time fragments, the -better to destroy it.</p> - -<p>"It wanted me to know that—to realize that my time was short. So it -had brought back a scene out of the past to unnerve me, and sap my will!</p> - -<p>"Could I go on taking it? I hadn't much time to think about it—for the -web was filling with another picture. A living shuttlecock, the old one -had called it. So now it was weaving another picture for me on Time's -dissolving loom.</p> - -<p>"It was a picture so hideous I could hardly bring myself to believe in -it. It was a picture of still another me. But if the old one had seemed -palsied, wretched, at the end of his endurance—the face that stared -out at me from the radiance was a thousandfold more so!</p> - -<p>"It was a face that had lost itself in Time—a face that was all -sagging jowls and puckered brows, a toothless, yellowed caricature of a -face.</p> - -<p>"But it was my face still—<i>my</i> face ravaged by a century's decay!</p> - -<p>"Looking at myself as I would be—I suddenly had no longer any desire -to live. A small, shrill voice shrieked within me that the monstrous, -living shuttlecock desired just that—that it was resorting to a -devilish subterfuge!</p> - -<p>"But I did not heed the voice. I just stood there, waiting to die, -hoping that the end would come quickly.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>"The blast was deafening! The sudden crash of it made a muffled booming -in the thin air, and smashed against my eardrums like a trump of doom. -The flare was blinding. The awful brightness of it lit up the cave like -a hundred suns, and burned through my eyeballs into my brain.</p> - -<p>"When the smoke cleared all I could see at first was a shattered -something lying on the floor of the cave, all twisted and bent back on -itself like a smoking heap of shattered glass.</p> - -<p>"As I shook my big, dull head to clear it my boy-self lifted off his -helmet and returned his blaster to the holster on his hip. His face was -shining with triumph. The sweat was running off it and he was breathing -heavily.</p> - -<p>"But he spoke to me and his words were good to hear.</p> - -<p>"'We got him, pal!'</p> - -<p>"He didn't say 'it'—didn't refer to the monstrous creature as -something unspeakably alien.</p> - -<p>"No—why should he? To him it wasn't a horror in the valley of the -moon. It was something out of a nightmare and he knew he'd wake up safe -in his own little bed at home.</p> - -<p>"He was still thinking of me as his father—in a nightmare. We'd been -hunting jabberwocks together!</p> - -<p>"And that lad was still in me—a part of me! I tell you, it sobered me -and made me feel ashamed.</p> - -<p>"I was still feeling ashamed when both the boy and the old one -vanished. Perhaps melted back would be a better way of putting it. For -they did seem to dissolve and flow back, rush back, into me an instant -before I found myself standing alone again—in that valley that would -never grow old!"</p> - -<p>Charley had arisen and was standing by the fire. Suddenly he stooped -and threw another log into the flames.</p> - -<p>Far to the west the lights of the biggest spaceport on Earth blinked -through the purple haze, and every time a ship took off, bound for the -great outer planets, the desert would light up for miles.</p> - -<p>But that light couldn't hold a candle to the one that blazed in -Charley's eyes.</p> - -<pre style='margin-top:6em'> -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TIME TRAP *** - -This file should be named 63838-h.htm or 63838-h.zip - -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: -http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/8/3/63838/ - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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