dimension—even elementary ones....

Gault, with a glint in his eye, pressed the paper figure flatly on the surface of Harper's desk.

"This paper man, we will say, represents a two dimensional creature. We lay him flatly against the desk, which represents his world—Flatland, we mathematicians call it. Mr. Flatlander can't see into our world. He can see only along the flat plane of his own world. To see us, for instance, he would have to look up, which is the third dimension, a direction inconceivable to him. Now, Doctor, are you beginning to understand why we can never see four dimensional beings?"

Pillbot frowned thoughtfully, then looked up. "And what about the viewpoint of the four dimensioners themselves—what would prevent them from seeing us?"

Harper hardly heard the Professor's snort of disgust. This two dimensional cutout in "Flatland" fascinated him. An idea occurred to him. Now, just supposing the....

As Gault and Pillbot argued, Harper grasped the paper cutout, and bent it, "jacknifed" it, creasing it firmly in the middle. Then he raised the upper half so that it rose vertically from the desk, while the lower half was still pressed flatly against the desk surface.

"Now," he murmured to himself, "the Flatlander would appear to his fellows to have vanished from the waist up, because from the waist up he is bent into the third dimension ... so far as they are concerned...."

"E-e-e-e-e!"

At the wavering scream, Harper looked up quickly. Pillbot was staring frozenly in front of him, toward the floor. Harper followed his glance—and saw it.

Professor Gault had vanished from the waist up.

His lower body still stood before Pillbot, swaying slightly, but the upper body was unconditionally missing. From the large feet planted solidly on the floor, long legs rose majestically, terminating in slim, angular hips—and from thence vanished abruptly into nothingness. It was as though the upper body had been sheared away, neatly and precisely, at the waist.

Pillbot stared from the visible portion of Gault to slack-jawed Harper and back again, sweat splashing from his puffy face.

"Why, why really my dear fellow," he quavered, addressing the half-figure. "This—this is a bit rude of you, vanishing in the midst of my sentence. I—I trust you will—ah, return at once!" Then, as the 

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