Read Online Sherlock Holmes: The Coils of Time & Other Stories (Sherlock Holmes Adventures Book 1) by Ralph Vaughan - Free Book Online Page A

could any possible inhabitants of  the lower dimensions perceive us, or each other, for that matter.
    “For example, an inhabitant of the one-dimensional universe, let us call it Lineland, would know the cosmos only an endless line,” Hinton continued.  “Any existence beyond that line would be utterly inconceivable to our little lineman, but rotate his universe at right angles to itself, and you have a two-dimensional universe as familiar to Euclid as to any schoolboy who has studied plane geometry – Flatland.  The lives of the inhabitants of Flatland, be they triangular women, square men or pentagonal priests,  would be as an open book to us, gentlemen, observers from the Third Dimension, a universe lifted at a right angle from their own.  To them, we would be as gods, able to see into their homes and beings from a direction they cannot imagine; if we attempted to physically pass through Flatland, we would be perceived only as a series of circles and ovals of changing size.”
    Kent leaned back in his chair and blew out a puff of air.
    Hinton laughed.  “I understand your consternation, Inspector.  Your turmoil is no different than that felt by any schoolboy under my tutelage when asked to proceed beyond the limits of vision and common sense.”
    “Now that you have worked up to the dimensions of our visible universe,” Holmes said dryly, “your next step presumably would be to rotate it by a right angle to itself.”
    “Very good, Mr Holmes,” said Hinton, as if the consulting detective were a student bright enough to follow  a complex lesson.  “A fourth dimension extended from our common three, the dimension of Time.  Some people, even learned men, appear to think that the Fourth Dimension is in some way different from the three which we know.  But there is nothing mysterious at all about it.  It is just an ordinary dimension tilted up in some way, which with our bodily organs we cannot point to.  A point extended becomes a line; turn a line and you have a square; lift a square and you have a cube; turn a cube as common as a gaming die in a direction we cannot imagine, and you have what I have termed a hyper-cube, a fourth-dimensional cube.”
    “Quite fascinating, Professor Hinton,” Holmes commented, “but valuable only as an exercise to the mental faculties.”
    “I quite agree, Mr Holmes.”
    “What about Maddoc?” Kent demanded.
    Hinton’s features again twisted into a savage scowl.  “That Welsh mechanic!”
    “The source of the contention, then,” Holmes said calmly, subtly motioning Kent to back off, “is that Maddoc did not view it as a mental exercise, but as a means to a practical end?”
    “He utterly twisted my research and my words away from their intent,” Hinton explained.  “The visualisation of Time as a fourth dimension to our common three is a means to an end, that end being the expansion of human consciousness.  I did not democratise the once-ethereal realms of higher geometry simply so a mechanic with a dangerous smattering of mathematics and physics could develop an engine to power a machine.  A base machine, gentlemen!  A Time Machine!”
    Kent glanced at his companion.  He did not know which was more disquieting, Hinton’s revelation or the utterly calm expression on Holmes’ face.  There was an aura of absolute serenity surrounding the detective, and Kent was vaguely reminded of the saints of old, whose serene faces he had seen in the stained-glass windows of the chapels of his youth.
    “Do you know where we might find Moesen Maddoc, Professor?” voiced Kent in the awkward silence following Hinton’s outburst.  “Madman or not, it is quite important that we speak to him.”
    Hinton shook his head.  “I’ve no idea, and no desire to know.”  He then frowned and gently tapped his temple with a lean forefinger.  “However, there is one person you might try in London, if memory serves me correct, a young man named Wells, Herbert George