asking each other what had happened.

Arthur led Estelle to one of the corners.

"Wait for me here," he ordered. "I'm going to talk to this crowd."

He pushed his way through until he could reach the confectionery and
news-stand in the main hallway. Here he climbed up on the counter
and shouted:

"People, listen to me! I'm going to tell you what's happened!"

In an instant there was dead silence. He found himself the center
of a sea of white faces, every one contorted with fear and anxiety.

"To begin with," he said confidently, "there's nothing to be afraid
of. We're going to get back to where we started from! I don't
know how, yet, but we'll do it. Don't get frightened. Now I'll
tell you what's happened."

He rapidly sketched out for them, in words as simple as he could make
them, his theory that a flaw in the rock on which the foundations
rested had developed and let the skyscraper sink, not downward,
but into the Fourth Dimension.

"I'm an engineer," he finished. "What nature can do, we can
imitate. Nature let us into this hole. We'll climb out. In the
mean time, matters are serious. We needn't be afraid of not getting
back. We'll do that. What we've got to fight is--starvation!"