I slew a man. A woman I slew by accident. The others pulled me down, clawing at me, biting, scratching....

I knew, as I knew that they were killing me, that these people would survive, for I had made them strong, and that in them—soulless, merciless, heartless though they were—I would survive to the end of time. Perhaps, eventually, the Masters, or other Masters would do that missing thing, speak that fruitful word, which would bring the light of life into those dead eyes, but I had little time to think upon it.

For they were tearing me apart, and I was begging for mercy from the merciless. I cried out, but they did not understand, how could they, when what I called aloud was:

"Doctor A! Doctor A! Doctor A?"

I stepped from beneath the hood in the Lab in Westchester. The table before me was littered with new sketches I had done. Doctor A and his colleagues were jubilant.

"Here's a perfect job of city planning!" he cried. "Here's the answer to the housing problem! This concentration of great force is the answer to the atom bomb, for it was developed for defense as well as offense. It was known, you told us, ages beyond ages ago to Atlanteans, but not used for all those ages because the world was at peace. But it could be used to cause continents to sink as Atlantis sank."

I stared at the scientists.

"Don't give it to mankind!" I cried. "I have seen such destruction. I caused it. Don't make me the instrument to bring it about again. Keep it secret, for all our lives, and afterward, unless somewhere in the Secret Wisdom of the Sages of the Past, there is an answer to dreadful knowledge such as this, to make it safe for men to manage!"

They understood me, every one of them, for they were men of intelligence beyond their time—and why not? Three of them were obviously the Three Masters of Atlantis!

"To trace every possible knowledge of man," said Doctor A, "we must trace in detail the past of every man on earth. That we cannot do. To trace all the past of even one would take generations."

"But we can begin," I said eagerly. "I shall devote my life to it. And if you're somehow giving the world the benefit of what we're doing and believe that man can learn from the evil in his past, dredge up my disastrous lives if you wish, also."

"Maybe I can 

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