ADAM'S EVE

by Richard O. Lewis

Originally published in Amazing Stories, May 1943

Adam Harper left his own time-dimension to rescue the victim of an experiment. He did not succeed—but the reward was Eve!

Adam Harper didn't know when it was he had fallen in love with the shadow.

Perhaps it had been upon that first day when she had appeared out of no where in his lonely laboratory. Had it been a week ago? Two weeks?

Adam Harper didn't know. After all, when a man lives for three years alone in a laboratory and away from civilization with nothing more animate than a machine and a dog . . . well, he is likely to lose a certain amount of perspective; likely, even, to fall in love with a shadow.

Adam paused in his work at the table to look at her again, to marvel at her beauty. She was standing beside the huge machine watching him.

“Beautiful,” he murmured. "Beautiful and primitive."

His eyes traveled the symmetrical length of her. The slender roundness of her legs. The curve of her hips, covered only by what appeared to be a loin cloth. The bare torso. The full breasts. And the cascade of hair that framed her oval face and fell in folds about her shapely shoulders.

He wondered about the color of that hair. Would it be brown? Red? Yellow? Golden? And what about the lips and the round eyes?

But he had no way of knowing. She was but a shadow, and the far wall of the laboratory was dimly visible through her body.

Adam felt keenly his responsibility for the girl. It was due to his experiments with the time-dimension that she had been caught up out of her remote past and stranded somewhere between that past and the present.

Adam did not thoroughly understand the fourth-dimension—the time-dimension—as it was usually called. It was just as impossible for him to under stand the fourth-dimension as it would be for a two-dimensional creature on a flat surface to understand the third dimension.

Yet, he knew something about it. He knew that all the events of the past, present and future existed simultaneously like photos in a huge album. And light rays were flowing through the book, illuminating first one page and then the other. All humanity and events moved with the light rays. And each light ray represented a NOW. The people of one NOW could not see the people of another NOW because the light rays were changing, fading the past for each NOW and slowly illuminating the future.

This changing of light rays was the fourth-dimension, the time-dimension that the human brain could not quite grasp.

That was why Adam Harper had built the machine; he wanted to see if it were possible to step through the pages of the album from one NOW to another NOW. And he had succeeded.

Twice, he had sent Tige, his faithful dog, into the remote past by merely changing the light rays and sense perceptions of the animal with the aid of the machine he had built. Each time, he had sent along a crystallization of light rays in a packet of hamburger tied to the dog's collar. And each time, Tige had torn the packet from his collar after an hour or so in the past and had returned to Adam's NOW, bringing back pictures of the remote past that had been taken with a small automatic camera strapped to his back,

But the third time Tige had not reappeared.

Instead, the girl had come. Not in the flesh; but as a shadow. Obviously, she had eaten Tige's hamburger.

"There was too much difference in weight between her and Tige,” Adam reasoned as he had tried to explain the situation to himself. “The crystallization of light rays meant for Tige was only enough to bring her to some half way point. Now she is stranded there. The crystallization made her visible to me, but was not powerful enough to bring her through.”

The girl seemed thinner now than when she had first appeared in the laboratory. And that bothered Adam. What if there was no food in that half way world? What if she were starving?

That thought always left Adam cold.

He had tried to get her out of that half-way world. Several times, he had turned the rays of the machine upon her shadowy figure. But those rays, he found, would not reach across the time-dimension, would not send her back as they had sent Tige.

Then he had tried to bring her into the laboratory, into his own NOW, by sending apples to her, apples that had been impregnated with sufficient light ray crystallization to take her out of her precarious existence.

So far he had failed.

“If I just knew what time-period she was existing in,” he kept telling him self, “it would be easy." But he had no way of knowing.

Once again, he went to the great machine that stood near the wall of the laboratory, and closed one of the switches. He made adjustments on it that would change the light rays it would send out. Then, while the tubes were warming, he placed another apple on the platform before it.

She was standing near him as he bent over. He could feel her presence as always when he was near her. It seemed that there was some magnetic pull between them.

He saw her hand reach out toward him as it had done many times in the past. But the hand did not touch him, it passed completely through his brow.

"Don't worry," he told her. "I'll get you out of this somehow."

He indicated the apple upon the platform, and stood up.

She was smiling at him, and he had an almost overwhelming desire to gather her into his arms. But he knew that such a gesture would be useless; his arms would pass through her shadowy body the same as they had a few days before.

Once more he indicated the apple, and she nodded. It seemed that she understood what he was trying to do. Then he closed another switch upon the machine.

A soundless vibration shimmered across the platform for an instant, enveloping the apple, blurring its outline. Then it was gone.

Adam shut off the machine and indicated the spot where the apple had been. She shook her head; the apple had not arrived in her time-dimension.

Several more times he tried, adjusting the machine to a different time-dimension before each try.

Finally, he sat down in a chair and held his weary head in his hands. The despair of failure was upon him. "It would be an accident," he told himself patiently, "a miracle if I should hit her time-period out of all the thousands of years of existence. But I can't just let her stay there, starve...."

He looked at her again, his eyes following the shadowy contour of her body. She was lovely. The most beautiful thing he had ever seen. And she had become an obsession with him.

Adam Harper was a tall young man with dark hair and a broad, white forehead. The forehead was wrinkled now with his troubles, making him look older than he actually was.

"If I could just find a way...."

Then, suddenly, the thought-wrinkles cleared from his forehead, and he leaped to his feet. "I've got it!” he shouted. "I've got it! I've found a way!"

It was so simple that Adam wondered why he had not thought of it long ago.

He knew that the NOW the girl had once lived in, the NOW where she existed at present and his own NOW were running parallel through the photo album of Time, each maintaining its exact relationship with the other. Then, instead of trying to get the crystallization of light rays to her by the hit-and miss method of apples, he could take those light rays to her in person!

"All I'll have to do,” he told himself, "is to set the ray machine the same as I did when I sent Tige through. That will take me into the same time-dimension as it did Tige. Once there, I can subject my own body to the same amount of light-ray crystallization as the girl did when she ate Tige's packet of hamburger. That will put me into her present time-existence! And I'll take along enough of the light-ray crystallization to bring us both back here to the laboratory...."

Adam Harper was so carried away with the possibility of seeing her in the flesh at last and of bringing her back with him that the dangers of the trip never entered his mind. It never occurred to him that he might make a mistake, that something might go wrong..

He smiled reassuringly at the girl as he set hurriedly about making arrangements for the culmination of his plan.

"It won't be long," he told her. "Soon I'll be with you. Soon we'll be together!"

Adam was ready within a half hour.

He was standing on the platform before the giant ray machine, waiting for the automatic device he had installed, waiting for it to close the second switch.

In his hands were several packets of prepared hamburger sandwiches. One of them he would give to Tige to insure the dog's safe return. He would eat one of the others. That would take him into the girl's time dimension. Then he would have two left; one for the girl and one for himself.

He saw the concern that showed in her eyes as he stood upon the platform. She had seen those apples disappear into nothingness. Obviously, she was wondering if the same thing would happen to him.

"It'll be all right,” he told her. He knew that she couldn't hear him, but he was being carried away by his emotions and the prospect of being with her soon.

"It'll be all right. Don't be alarmed. I'll be with you in a few minutes." His whole body was trembling. "Just wait . . .

There was an almost inaudible click as the automatic device closed the switch.

Adam felt the sudden surge of shimmering light rays as they struck his body. They were similar to X-rays—making his body invisible to the NOW of his own time-existence: they were like a gentle impulse that pushed him through a gossamer curtain into a world of bright sunshine.

He stood blinking for a moment, waiting for his eyes to become accustomed to the change from the dark laboratory to the naked sunlight.

Then he saw with a sudden welling up of elation that the first step of his journey had been successful . . .

He was standing upon the edge of a sandy plain that stretched away into a barren waste at his left. To his right were low rock formations with a jumble of loose stone . . . the same place that Tige had been. The scene corresponded with the pictures Tige's automatic camera had brought back.

Distance shouts and cries broke into Adam's consciousness. His eyes swept the scene again, and saw straight ahead of him the cause of the disturbance. A cloud of dust was hanging over the edge of the plain, and in that cloud of dust men were fighting.

He saw some of them—squat, ape like creatures-brandishing clubs and screaming guttural war-cries. But, in the dust and distance, he could not see clearly the opponents of the squat men.

Adam knew that he was in no danger from the fighting men; they were too far away and too busily engaged to notice him.

"Tige!” he cried. "Tige!"

He didn't want to go away and leave the dog stranded here if the dog were still alive.

He waited a moment, his eyes scanning the plain. "Tige!” he called again, louder this time. "Tige! Come Tige!"

It was then that he heard the click of a stone as it rolled down from a jumble of rock behind him. He wheeled about, fully expecting to see the yellow and white Tige bolting to ward him, tail threshing and lips grinning.

But it was not the dog coming down over the pile of rock; it was a squat, ape-like thing with a gnarled club.

The sudden appearance of the beast man—not over twenty paces away sent a paralyzing fear through Adam that rooted him to the spot. He couldn't move.

The creature's forehead sloped back, his brows were prominent and shaggy over bloodshot eyes, his thick jaws were covered with a grisly beard and his chest looked like a barrel that had sprouted a thick growth of unhealthy hair.

Adam realized instantly that this man was not of the same race as the girl. This man was probably a part of an invading force. And that would explain the fight. . . .

"Hello," said Adam.

But the man didn't seem to be in the mood for conversation. He came forward slowly, his uneven teeth bared and his club half raised. Stalking.

Adam took an uncertain step backward and began fumbling with the packet of hamburgers, his fingers tumbling over each other like so many thumbs. He wanted to eat one of those hamburgers and get out of the picture as soon as possible. He knew that he would be no match against this brute with a club if it came to any kind of a fight.

He saw the creature's wide nostrils flare. Obviously, those nostrils had scented the food, and the man was hungry. Perhaps the beast-man had been hunting food somewhere beyond the ridge of rocks . . .

Adam almost had the packet open when the brute charged. The beast thing didn't swing with the club; it merely leaped forward, its hairy hands grasping for the food.

Adam knew that the loss of the food would spell disaster, disaster for him, for the stranded girl, for Tige—if the dog were still alive.

He did the only thing he could think of under the circumstances: clutching the food tightly to him with his left arm, he balled his right fist and brought it up in a quick hay-maker to the dull point of the grisly chin.

There was a sharp crack. The beast man's bloodshot eyes snapped shut and flew open again. He staggered back a pace.

Then, as if the blow had surprised and angered the creature rather than hurt him, a hideous and savage snarl gushed from the wide mouth and he charged, club swinging.

Adam tried to leap aside, but the soft sand gave way suddenly beneath his feet. A sharp twinge lanced his left leg as his ankle turned painfully beneath him. He stumbled backward, measuring his length upon the sand.

That fall was the only thing that saved him from the sweep of the club.

The beast-man recovered quickly from the empty swing and was raising the weapon again,

A thousand thoughts hammered through Adam's brain as he lay there helplessly upon his back in the sand. He knew by the mad light in the wild man's eyes that the brute intended to kill him now.

He thought of the girl, stranded in some time-dimension beyond him. Alone. Starving, perhaps. And he couldn't reach her . . .

He thought of the ray machine and his laboratory. Some day, someone would stumble on to the laboratory and see the machine and wonder about it. And there would be the shadow of a beautiful girl there . . .

And he thought about the crystallization of light rays in the hamburgers. If he could but have time to eat one! He knew what would happen once those light rays were released within him from their crystalline state. A dull glow would permeate his entire being and diffuse itself about him, a glow not unlike the fluorescence some times seen in the hair and fingernails of an aspirin-eater when subjected to the invisible rays of black light . . .

There was a sharp crack. The beast man's bloodshot eyes snapped shut and flew open again. He staggered back a pace.

Then, as if the blow had surprised and angered the creature rather than hurt him, a hideous and savage snarl gushed from the wide mouth and he charged, club swinging.

That fall was the only thing that saved him from the sweep of the club.

The beast-man recovered quickly from the empty swing and was raising the weapon again.

A thousand thoughts hammered through Adam's brain as he lay there helplessly upon his back in the sand. He knew by the mad light in the wild man's eyes that the brute intended to kill him now.

He thought of the girl, stranded in some time-dimension beyond him. Alone. Starving, perhaps. And he couldn't reach her . . .

But there was no time. The beast man's face was twisted hideously, the club already in descent.

Adam knew there was but a second left. But he couldn't move as the club swirled toward him. It was the last . . .

And then there came a sudden, snarling streak. It was a yellow and white savage streak with its ears laid back. It seemed to come from nowhere; and it ended abruptly at the back of one of the beast-man's legs.

There was a sharp howl of pain. The club swept wildly away from its mark. The beast-man spun about in his tracks.

Adam struggled to a sitting position, every nerve fiber within him tingling with relief at what his eyes told him was true.

"Tige!” he shouted as he saw the yellow and white snarling streak close in again. “Good boy, Tige! Chew hell out of him!”

But Tige seemed to know more about his business than his master did. The dog had leaped away out of range of the swinging club, was staying out of range, dancing and snarling, teeth dripping crimson.

Several times, the beast-man turned menacingly toward Adam, but, each time, Tige came flashing in, his teeth lancing and ripping at the bare legs.

The hamburger stuck to the roof of Adam's dry mouth like so much gluey sawdust. He took another bite, trying to force the previous one down. He stretched his neck like a chicken that had got an over-sized grain of corn caught in its gullet. He chewed and gulped. He choked and swallowed, and chewed and gulped some more. His throat felt dry and sticky. He wanted a drink . . .

And then, with a last choking gulp, the food was down.

He knew it would be but a matter of seconds now.

“Good boy, Tige!” he called, and tossed a hamburger in the dog's direction. "That will get you back to the lab."

Then a shimmering mist rose before Adam's eyes, a shimmering mist that was as a curtain between him and another time-dimension—another page in the photo album . . .

The mist cleared as quickly as it had come. The beast-man, the dog, the desert of fighting men, and the jumble of rock were gone.

Adam found himself lying in lush grass beneath a mild, warm sun. Where the sandy plain had once been was now a grove of trees, trees with fruit-laden branches. A tiny brook gurgled and tinkled where but a moment before had been a senseless jumble of stone. Birds piped cheerful melodies, and the drone of bees lent a feeling of drowsy contentment.

“Why, it's like a paradise!” said Adam, aloud. "An Eden!”

But there was a dim shadow over the scene, the shadowy outline of a laboratory, a giant machine and a work table. It was like a double exposure on a negative.

He wondered about it for a moment. Perhaps the time-dimension he was now in and the time-dimension occupied by the laboratory were closely akin. Or perhaps the use of that giant ray-machine had sensitized the walls and equipment of the laboratory, making them shadowy visible in this other time-dimension . . .

The twisted ankle was not paining him now. He got slowly to his feet and turned around.

And then he saw the girl, her graceful body bold against the backdrop of green branches behind her.

A gasp escaped Adam's lips. When she had been but a shadow in the laboratory, his imagination had run riot—trying to build up a tangible picture of her. But now! Now that he was actually seeing her! He wondered how his imagination could have done her such an injustice!

Her whole body was of a delicate, satiny bronze. The hair that fell about her naked shoulders and over the curve of her breasts was like golden strands that had been spun upon some elfen loom from the raw rays of a shimmering moon. Green eyes were spaced wide beneath arched brows in an oval face that was perfection. And even rows of sparkling teeth enhanced the smile of curved, inviting lips . . .

Adam's senses reeled at the stark reality and nearness of her beauty. He had reached her at last! Had reached the time-dimension where she was stranded! And in his hands was a packet of hamburgers: one for the girl and one for himself!

It didn't quite seem possible that he, Adam Harper, should be alone here with this girl! He, Adam . . .

A disquieting thought stung his brain. He tried to pull the thought loose; but it stuck there, poisoning him with uncertainty.

He, Adam! And this girl who was smiling at him! This girl in a Garden of Eden! This girl in the loin clout of plaited, green leaves! Could it be. . . . Could she be Eve?

He remembered the Biblical story of Genesis concerning Adam and Eve, and was suddenly afraid.

"If there are no other human beings in this time-dimension," he thought; "if we are the only ones, then it has been predestined that we do not return to the laboratory—and I am destined to become the . . . father of a new . . . a new race!"

He glanced about, fully expecting to see the serpent lurking somewhere in the grass nodding its head knowingly.

The girl was coming toward him now, the smile widening her red lips. Never before had Adam seen a body move with such languorous grace. It did something to him.

Her arms were partially out stretched in his direction. And, as she stepped out into the direct rays of the soft sun, her golden hair sprang into sudden life, engulfing the oval of her face in a halo of shimmering radiance.

Adam took a step backward. Things were coming too fast for him now. He wanted a little time—a little time to think it over . . .

Then the girl stopped. The smile left her lips. The light that was in her eyes faded into a terrified stare. A tiny shriek of warning started from her lips.

Adam wheeled about, and a cold chill raced down his spine.

There, not three paces behind him, was a squat, bearded individual with protruding brows and a receding forehead! The beast-man! The club was in his hands, and his thick lips were smeared with grease! Obviously, he had beaten Tige to the hamburger and had gulped it down! Perhaps he had killed Tige!

Adam's first thought was to devour one of his two remaining hamburgers and get out of the picture as rapidly as possible.

But he didn't. He had to think of the girl. He couldn't run away now and leave her here with this . . . this beast!

He opened the remaining packet of hamburgers as rapidly as possible, selected one and pressed it into her hand. Even under the tenseness of the situation, the touch of his fingers against her hand sent a thrill coursing through him.

"Here," he said, "eat this! Quick!"

He knew she didn't understand him. She was backing away from the approaching brute, her whole body trembling. She probably recognized him as one of the horde that was invading her own time-dimension, and was afraid.

The ugly creature was paying no attention to Adam. Its bloodshot eyes were upon the girl, one hand out stretched, club half raised. There was lust in those red eyes. Greed. Hunger.

Adam didn't know how it happened, but he found himself standing between the two, barring the creature's way.

"You can't do this!” his voice grated. “You've got to stop. ..."

A gnarled hand swept out savagely against Adam's chest. The blow sent him reeling and stumbling backward among loose stones. His injured ankle turned beneath him and he went heavily to the ground, jarring his senses.

Even as he fell, Adam heard the girl's scream of terror. He rolled quickly to one side and pushed him self to a sitting position.

The ape-man had a hairy arm about the girl's slim waist, holding her tightly to him. They were fighting and clawing at each other.

Adam shook his head to clear it, and the hot blood of anger rushed through his veins. His hand came in contact with something. It was a flat stone about the size of a dinner platter. He clutched it firmly and pushed himself to his feet, closing his teeth against the pain in his ankle.

The beast-man's back was to him. Adam couldn't see what the creature was doing to the girl; but he could see the girl's hands striking and clawing, could see her round, green eyes flashing.

It would have been an easy matter for Adam to have crushed the beast's skull from behind with the rock. But he didn't. That was the disadvantage of being too highly civilized; it gave you too many principles to live by.

"Stop that!” shouted Adam. And he clutched the beast-man by a hairy shoulder.

The brute swung around, a snarl on savage, greasy lips.

Adam got a quick glance at the girl. The hamburger was no longer in her hand. Perhaps she had dropped it somewhere.

"Run!” he shouted to her. Then the beast-man was upon him.

The first rush sent Adam stumbling backward a few paces. He regained his balance, and fury possessed him. He knew now that he either had to kill or be killed. It was savagery against civilization. It was one time dimension against another. He and the beast could not exist together with the girl.

All about him was the shadowy out lines of his laboratory, the shadow of civilization. But within his heart was virgin savagery.

He met the beast head on.

Adam knew that his chances of victory were extremely remote, his own strength pitiable against that of the beast. But he hoped that this diversion would give the girl a chance to get away. If something had happened to the whole of the human race in that other time-dimension, if this beast and the girl were the only survivors . . . well, he didn't want the monster to father a new race . . .

The savage, blood-shot eyes were glaring. The huge club in the gnarled hand was swinging down with pile driver force toward Adam's head.

Adam knew he could not escape that club; his only hope was to deliver a telling blow simultaneously with the rock platter. With cold, deadly viciousness, he swung the rock at the bestial face.

The club passed down through Adam's skull. It went down through his neck and through his chest . . .

At the same time, the rock in Adam's hand entered the savage face, went through it and beyond . . .

The momentum of his blow carried Adam stumbling forward. He regained his balance quickly and wheeled about. The beast-man was behind him! A shadow! A shadow within a shadowy laboratory!

Quick realization flooded through Adam.

“The . . . the hamburger!” he gasped. "He ate the girl's hamburger, and the crystallization of light rays sent him on into my own time-dimension just . . . just as he swung the club!”

The beast-man was still swinging his club. Filled with savage bewilderment at finding himself suddenly imprisoned within four strange walls, he was smashing everything within reach. Chairs disintegrated before the club. The work table buckled in the middle and went down. The great machine rocked and swayed to the assault and began to fall apart. And as the machine crumpled, the shadowy picture of the laboratory faded slowly into nothingness and was gone. The last connecting link had been broken.

The girl was coming toward Adam, her arms outstretched.

He experienced a moment of indecision. There was one remaining hamburger—enough crystallization of light rays to take him back to his own time dimension where the beast was wrecking the laboratory. But that would leave the girl stranded. Alone!

"I am Adam Harper,” Adam said, pointing to himself.

The girl paused at the sound of his voice. Then she pointed to her own person and said something that sounded strangely like "Eve.”

That sent hot and cold chills racing through Adam's body. Eve! And his name was Adam! Was it a mere coincidence? Or had all this been predestined? Predestined that he, Adam, should be here with this beautiful girl in this veritable Garden of Eden where rosy apples ...?

Apples? The word was a question mark in Adam's brain. With the aid of his ray machine, he had tried a hundred times to send impregnated apples into the girl's dimension. Had he succeeded? Did some of these apples contain a crystallization of light rays? There were many of them scattered about the ground . . .

And then the girl was in his arms, her eyes smiling, her red lips inviting.

And Adam, still looking at the apples, felt the soft warmth of her body against him and knew the ravages of emotion.

Perhaps some of the apples contained the crystallization of light rays that would take them to civilization; perhaps they didn't. Adam felt that he had no control over the situation.

He tried to keep his arm from tightening about the girl. “Eve," he said finally, his voice a husky whisper, "I . . . I think we are going to eat an . . . an apple."

END