Time Machine

like a flash.

'Then I stopped the machine, and saw about me again the old familiar
laboratory, my tools, my appliances just as I had left them. I got
off the thing very shakily, and sat down upon my bench. For several
minutes I trembled violently. Then I became calmer. Around me was
my old workshop again, exactly as it had been. I might have slept
there, and the whole thing have been a dream.

'And yet, not exactly! The thing had started from the south-east
corner of the laboratory. It had come to rest again in the
north-west, against the wall where you saw it. That gives you the
exact distance from my little lawn to the pedestal of the White
Sphinx, into which the Morlocks had carried my machine.

'For a time my brain went stagnant. Presently I got up and came
through the passage here, limping, because my heel was still
painful, and feeling sorely begrimed. I saw the _Pall Mall Gazette_
on the table by the door. I found the date was indeed to-day, and
looking at the timepiece, saw the hour was almost eight o'clock. I
heard your voices and the clatter of plates. I hesitated--I felt so
sick and weak. Then I sniffed good wholesome meat, and opened the
door on you. You know the rest. I washed, and dined, and now I am
telling you the story.

'I know,' he said, after a pause, 'that all this will be absolutely
incredible to you. To me the one incredible thing is that I am here
to-night in this old familiar room looking into your friendly faces
and telling you these strange adventures.'

He looked at the Medical Man. 'No. I cannot expect you to believe
it. Take it as a lie--or a prophecy. Say I dreamed it in the
workshop. Consider I have been speculating upon the destinies of our
race until I have hatched this fiction. Treat my assertion of its
truth as a mere stroke of art to enhance its interest. And taking
it as a story, what do you think of it?'

He took up his pipe, and began, in his old accustomed manner, to tap
with it nervously upon the bars of the grate. There was a momentary
stillness. Then chairs began to creak and shoes to scrape upon the
carpet. I took my eyes off the Time Traveller's face, and looked
round at his audience. They were in the dark, and little spots of
colour swam before them. The Medical Man seemed absorbed in the
contemplation of our host. The Editor was looking hard at the end
of his cigar--the sixth. The Journalist fumbled for his watch. The
others, as far as I remember, were motionless.

The Editor stood up with a sigh. 'What a pity it is you're not
a writer of stories!' he said, putting his hand on the Time
Traveller's shoulder.

'You don't believe it?'

'Well----'

'I thought not.'

The Time Traveller turned to us. 'Where are the matches?' he said.
He lit one and spoke over his pipe, puffing. 'To tell you the truth
... I hardly believe it myself.... And yet...'

His eye fell with a mute inquiry upon the withered white flowers
upon the little table. Then he turned over the hand holding his
pipe, and I saw he was looking at some half-healed scars on his
knuckles.

The Medical Man rose, came to the lamp, and examined the flowers.
'The gynaeceum's odd,' he said. The Psychologist leant forward to
see, holding out his hand for a specimen.

'I'm hanged if it isn't a quarter to one,' said the Journalist.
'How shall we get home?'

'Plenty of cabs at the station,' said the Psychologist.

'It's a curious thing,' said the Medical Man; 'but I certainly don't
know the natural order of these flowers. May I have them?'

The Time Traveller hesitated. Then suddenly: 'Certainly not.'

'Where did you really get them?' said the Medical Man.

The Time Traveller put his hand to his head. He spoke like one who
was trying to keep hold of an idea that eluded him. 'They were put
into my pocket by Weena, when I travelled into Time.' He stared
round the room. 'I'm damned if it isn't all going. This room and you
and the atmosphere of every day is too much for my memory. Did I
ever make a Time Machine, or a model of a Time Machine? Or is it all
only a dream? They say life is a dream, a precious poor dream at
times--but I can't stand another that won't fit. It's madness. And
where did the dream come from? ... I must look at that machine. If
there is one!'

He caught up the lamp swiftly, and carried it, flaring red, through
the door into the corridor. We followed him. There in the flickering
light of the lamp was the machine sure enough, squat, ugly, and
askew; a thing of brass, ebony, ivory, and translucent glimmering
quartz. Solid to the touch--for I put out my hand and felt the rail
of it--and with brown spots and smears upon the ivory, and bits of
grass and moss upon the lower parts, and one rail bent awry.