His eyes were big, luminous as torches; his white face expressionless with the shock of it. Failure! “Yes, Jeff. We’d better get away.” The window near the broken mechanism was closed by its heavy thick pane. We found now that the other window was closed! And the door! We pulled at them. With all our shattered strength we tore at them. Futile! We were trapped. A metal cage, now, this little house clinging to the rocks, with the mounting torrent already risen almost to engulf it! CHAPTER XX. DOOMED REALM! It seemed for an instant that we had not the courage left to struggle. Yet even a rat within a cage plunged into water frantically fights to its last strength. We stood with full realization, apathetic; and then panic descended upon us. The instinct for self-preservation, overwhelming, driving us into unreasonable panic. We flung ourselves at the door; upon the thick windows we beat with bruised, futile fists. This inconceivable torrent, rising. The windows were wet with the spray; as though a wave had struck us, solid water dashed against them and then receded. A white chaos out there, with the violet light leaping through it. “Jeff! We can’t--we can’t get out! Jeff! Here--help me hit it! Let’s try hitting it with the table--” I stood, with some remnant of reason, striving to master the panic. So this was the end? “Tad, for God’s sake, stop! Don’t waste time. Stop and think what’s best to do. We’ve got to find a way out!” I held him, shook him. “We’ve got a few minutes--there must be some way!” So this was the end of Tad Megan and Jeff Grant? Ah, there is a fate to guide us all in the making of our destiny. In stress, in crisis, in disaster--always some little thing. My foot struck against the small projector lying on the floor. I stooped and seized it. “Tad. This?” I moved about the room. With this stabbing, burning light, could we not blast or burn our way out through some vulnerable spot? We were both suddenly calmer. “Easy, Jeff, don’t waste its charge. How many flashes has it got?” “I don’t know.” The building shook under the blow of an upflung surge of solid spray. “We’ll find some spot that might fuse easily.” The window facing the ladder platform--its thick pane seemed embedded in a casement like lead, a gray soft metal. I stood a foot from it and fired. The stab of light came back at me, the recoil like a blow, and burning. My hand and arm were seared. But a portion of the casement was gone. The wind from outside came through. “It works, Jeff! Give it to me--I’ll try one.” A dozen or more blasts of the projector, then it failed us, empty, its charge exhausted. I flung it away. But the bull’s-eye pane was almost free. We raised the metal table, heaved it. The corner of it struck the pane; the whole thing fell outward. Wind and spume came beating madly through.