DR. HOWELL had found the story amusing, and yet, garbled as it may have been by being handed down through the centuries by word of mouth, at times it seemed even to his intensely practical mind to hold some sinister threat for the future of the world he loved. But the realms of fantasy were not for him, and he dared not allow an unproved Indian legend to influence his scientific thought. Yet he had, only within the past year, gone so far as to suggest and even attempt to prove, that science would ultimately defeat its own ends by destroying itself.
Only recently science had made such strides that things undreamed of but a decade before were now accomplished facts. And there was no logical end in sight. Totally uncontrolled by any natural agency except time, the scientists of the world had entered an era of mad accomplishment, striving for the "Supremacy of Science" at any cost. And Dr. Howell, by his act of publicly calling attention to certain fundamental facts, had brought down upon his head the wrath of the entire scientific world—to his own undoing. He was now discredited while all his previous brilliant accomplishments had been forgotten.
With a feeling of helpless futility he sought the seclusion of his summer home on the Crawling Stone, where, hidden from a ridiculing world, he could seek the answer to the strange problems of Creation. The world of science had called him a madman, and sent him away to the strange laboratory he had constructed in this out of the way place. Indeed, a modern scientist would have called it a "negative" laboratory, designed to destroy the positive accomplishments of science if a need arose. And Dr. Howell did believe that the ravages of science would some day make such a course necessary.
Yet his retirement to the island had brought a strange blight upon the island and to the members of his household. Once the favored spot for many of the social activities of the fashionable summer colony, it was now shunned as a plague. One short space of time between summer seasons had brought this about, and the world would have none of him.
Although largely lacking in what the world calls wealth, Dr. Howell's wife, Eleanor Howell, and their daughter Mary, had on previous summers taken an active part in the social life of the north woods. But now they were barred from this pleasurable summer game, apparently by a capricious rumor, or rumors, which had gone the rounds of this select group.
Yet the seclusion of the four members of Dr. Howell's household,—he had included another at the beginning of the season,—was purely social. No signs banned the uninvited guest, and no bars restrained the island inhabitants on their bit of land.
THOUGH the lake was dotted with water craft, none stopped at the island landing. No fisherman cast his lure toward its rocky shore, and all seemed intent on giving the Crawling Stone as wide a berth as possible. Indeed, any attempt of either side toward the resumption of friendly intercourse would have been futile, for the sinister rumor persisted—Dr. Howell had gone completely mad.
Perhaps the addition of Alan Winters to the Doctor’s family had something to do with the rumor, for current gossip, ever seeking to dramatize the commonest incident, offered more than one reason for his presence. One
