entitled to the name of "skyscraper"--he now saw miles and miles
of waving green branches.

The wide Hudson flowed on placidly, all unruffled by the arrival of
this strange monument upon its shores--the same Hudson Arthur knew
as a busy thoroughfare of puffing steamers and chugging launches.
Two or three small streams wandered unconcernedly across the land
that Arthur had known as the most closely built-up territory on
earth. And far, far below him--Arthur had to lean well out of his
window to see it--stood a collection of tiny wigwams. Those small
bark structures represented the original metropolis of New York.

His telephone rang. Van Deventer was on the wire. The exchange in
the building was still working. Van Deventer wanted Arthur to come
down to his private office. There were still a great many things to
be settled--the arrangements for commandeering offices for sleeping
quarters for the women, and numberless other details. The men who
seemed to have best kept their heads were gathering there to settle
upon a course of action.

Arthur glanced out of the window again before going to the
elevator. He saw a curiously compact dark cloud moving swiftly
across the sky to the west.

"Miss Woodward," he said sharply, "What is that?"

Estelle came to the window and looked.

"They are birds," she told him. "Birds flying in a group. I've
often seen them in the country, though never as many as that."