enormous amount of machinery had gone to smash everywhere when the guiding hands had been removed and the guiding brains frozen to useless metal. He gave a little shudder.

They swung round before a shoe store with grating brakes. The door was locked, but Ben, lifting his foot, calmly kicked a hole in the show window. Murray extended a restraining hand, but his friend shook it off.

"No use asking permission. If the proprietor of this place is still alive anywhere, it will be easy enough to settle up for the damage; if he isn't, we have as good a right to it as anybody."

The new toes, which appeared to be longer than those he remembered, made fitting a difficulty, and Murray split two or three shoes before he got a pair on.

"What next?" he asked. "I feel like a drink."

"No use," said Ben. "You're on the wagon for good. Alcohol would play merry hell with your metalwork. The best thing is to find out how many people we are. For all we know, we're the only ones in the world. This thing seems to have knocked out everybody along the street level. Let's try some of the taller apartment buildings and see if we can find more penthouse dwellers."

"Or maybe the others came to before us and went away," offered Murray.

"True," Ben replied. "Anyhow, look-see." He led the way to the taxi.

"Wait," said Murray. "What's that?"

Above the sound of the starting engine came the echo of heavy footsteps, muffled by shoes.

"Hey! Coo-ee! This way!" shouted Ben. The footsteps tentatively approached the corner. Murray ran forward, then stopped in amazement. The newcomer was a girl—or would have been a girl had she not been all metal and machinery like themselves. To his eyes, still working on flesh-and-blood standards, she was anything but good-looking. She was fully and formally dressed, save that she wore no hat—the high pile of tangled wire that crowned her head made this obviously impossible.

"Oh, what has happened?" she cried at them. "What can I do? I took a drink of water and it hurt."

"Everything's all right. Just a little metal transformation," said Ben. "Stick around, I'll get you some oil. You squeak." He was off down the street in a clatter, leaving Murray with the newcomer.

"Permit me to 

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