inkable--and I'm so
cussed dumb that I can't find out how to use it intelligently--can't use
it at all, for that matter. By its very nature it is impenetrable to any
form of matter, however applied; and this calc here," slapping viciously
the sheaf of papers containing his calculations, "shows that it must
also be opaque to any wave whatever, propagated through air or through
ether, clear down to cosmic rays. Behind it, we would be blind and
helpless, so we can't use it at all. It drives me frantic! Think of a
barrier of pure force, impalpable, immaterial, and exerted along a
geometrical surface of no thickness whatever--and yet actual enough to
stop even a Millikan ray that travels a hundred thousand light-years and
then goes through twenty-seven feet of solid lead just like it was so
much vacuum! That's what we're up against! However, I'm going to try out
that model, Mart, right now. Come on, guy, snap into it! Let's get
busy!"

"You are getting idiotic again, Dick," Crane rejoined calmly, without
moving. "You know, even better than I do, that you are playing with the
most concentrated essence of energy that the world has ever seen. That
zone of force probably can be generated----"

"Probably, nothing!" barked Seaton. "It's just as evident a fact as that
stool," kicking the unoffending bit of furniture half-way across the
room as he spoke. "If you'd've let me, I'd've shown it to you
yesterday!"

"Undoubtedly, then. Grant that it is impenetrable to all matter and to
all known waves. Suppose that it should prove impenetrable also to
gravitation and to magnetism? Those phenomena probably depend upon the
ether, but we know nothing fundamental of their nature, nor of that of
the ether. Therefore your calculations, comprehensive though they are,
cannot predict the effect upon them of your zone of force. Suppose that
that zone actually does set up a barrier in the ether, so that it
nullifies gravitation, magnetism, and all allied phenomena; so that the
power-bars, the attractors and repellers, cannot work through it? Then
what? As well as showing me the zone of force, you might well have shown
me yourself flying off into space, unable to use your power and helpless
if you released the zone. No, we must know more of the fundamentals
before you try even a small-scale experiment."

"Oh, bugs! You're carrying caution to extremes, Mart. What can happen?
Even if gravitation should be nullified, I would rise only slowly,
headi