Just after seven o’clock, there was another tremendous explosion; but this time the concussion seemed less violent than before. Mitchell himself was not killed outright; but he suffered injuries which proved fatal within a few days. Meanwhile the work went on. One after another, the Chemistry section of Nordenholt’s young men went into the furnace, some to be killed instantaneously, others to escape alive, but blasted almost out of recognition by the forces which they unchained. Yet none of them faltered. Link by link they built up the chain which was to bring safety to the Area; and each link represented a life lost or a body crippled. Day after day the work went on, interrupted periodically by the rending crash of these fearful explosions, until at last it seemed almost beyond hope that the problem would ever be solved. But ten days later Barclay staggered into Nordenholt’s room, smothered in bandages, with one arm useless at his side, and gasped out the news that he had been successful. Looking back on that moment, I sometimes wonder that we were not almost hysterical with joy; but as a matter of fact, none of us said anything at all. Probably we did not really grasp the thing at the time. I know that I was busy getting a drink ready for Barclay, who had collapsed as soon as he gave his news; and all that I remember of Nordenholt is a picture of him standing looking out of the window with his back to us. Certainly it wasn’t the kind of scene one might have imagined. CHAPTER XIX The Breaking-strain Although Barclay’s work furnished us with the means of tapping the stores of energy which lie imprisoned within the atoms of elementary matter, it did not place us immediately in a position to utilise these immense forces for practical purposes. To tell the truth, we were in much the same position as a savage to whom a dynamite cartridge has been given, ready fitted with a detonator. We could liberate the energy, but at first we could not bring it under control. The next few weeks were spent in planning and building machine after machine. All the best talent of Nordenholt’s group of engineers was brought to bear on the problem; but time after time we had to admit failure. Either the engines were too fragile for the power which they employed or there was some radical defect in their construction which could only be detected on trial. Thus the days passed in a series of disappointments, until it seemed almost as though hope of success was fading before our eyes. During that period, Nordenholt himself grew visibly older. It was the last lap in his great race against Time; and I think that this final strain told on him more than any that had gone before. The mines of the Area were still empty and silent; no fuel was coming forward to fill the gaps in our ever-shrinking reserves; and within a very short period the whole industry of the Area must collapse for want of coal.