“Hawkins, you said that this plate corresponded to the cylinder-head of an engine? Then the tube beneath us is full of steam?” “Yes, yes!” “And if we get too much steam--as we seem to be getting it--will the plate blow off?” “Yes--no--yes--no, of course not,” answered Hawkins faintly. “It's bolted down with----” “But if it should,” I said, dashing the streaming perspiration from my eyes for another look at the accursed plate. “If it should,” the inventor admitted, “we'd either go up to Heaven on it, or we'd stay here and drop!” “Help!” I screamed. “Look out! Look out! Hug the wall!” Hawkins shrieked. A mighty spasm shook the Hydro-Vapor Lift. I fell flat and rolled instinctively to one side. Then, ere my bewildered senses could grasp what was occurring, my ears were split by a terrific roar. The roof of the car disappeared as if by magic, and through the opening shot that huge, round plate of iron, seemingly wafted upon a cloud of dense white vapor. Then the steam obscured all else, and I felt that we were falling. Yes, for an instant the car seemed to shudder uncertainly--then she dropped! I can hardly say more of our descent from the fatal thirteenth story. In one second--not more, I am certain--twelve spots of light, representing twelve floors, whizzed past us. I recall a very definite impression that the Blank Building was making an outrageous trip straight upward from New York; and I wondered how the occupants were going to return and whether they would sue the building people for detention from business. But just as I was debating this interesting point, earthly concerns seemed to cease. In the cellar of the Blank Building annex a pile of excelsior and bagging and other refuse packing materials protruded into the shaft where once had been the Hawkins Hydro-Vapor Lift. That fact, I suppose, saved us from eternal smash. At any rate, I realized after a time that my life had been spared, and sat up on the cement flooring of the cellar. Hawkins was standing by a steel pillar, smiling blankly. Steam, by the cubic mile, I think, was pouring from the flooring of the Hydro-Vapor Lift and whirling up the shaft. I struggled to my feet and tried to walk--and succeeded, very much to my own astonishment. Shaken and bruised and half dead from the shock I certainly was, but I could still travel. I picked up my coat and turned to Hawkins. “I--I think I'll go home,” he said weakly. “I'm not well, Griggs.” We ascended a winding stair and passed through a door at the top, and instead of reaching the annex we stepped into the lower hall of the Blank Building itself. The place was full of steam. People were tearing around and yelling “Fire!” at the top of their lungs. Women were screaming. Clerks were racing back and forth with big books. Older men appeared here and there, hurriedly making their exit with cash boxes and bundles of documents. There was an exodus to jig-time going on in the Blank Building.