Estelle nodded. Her eyes wide open.

"What _is_ the matter?" she asked helplessly.

She turned again to the window. The square was almost empty once
more. The motor-cars still traveling about the streets were going so
swiftly they were hardly visible. Their speed seemed to increase
steadily. Soon it was almost impossible to distinguish them,
and only a grayish blur marked their paths along Fifth Avenue and
Twenty-Third Street.

It grew dusk, and then rapidly dark. As their office was on the
western side of the building they could not see that the sun had
sunk in the east, but subconsciously they realized that this must
be the case.

In silence they watched the panorama grow black except for the
street-lamps, remain thus for a time, and then suddenly spring into
brilliantly illuminated activity.

Again this lasted for a little while, and the west once more began
to glow. The sun rose somewhat more hastily from the Jersey hills
and began to soar overhead, but very soon darkness fell again. With
hardly an interval the city became illuminated, and then the west
grew red once more.

"Apparently," said Arthur, steadying his voice with a conscious
effort, "there's been a cataclysm somewhere, the direction of
the earth's rotation has been reversed, and its speed immensely
increased. It seems to take only about five minutes for a rotation