It was the doctor’s brain that worked first.  Automatically, from a lifelong habit of diagnosis, he inspected that dreadful figure quite as though it were that of a patient.  Bit by bit his subconscious mind pieced together the evidence; the man in the chair showed no signs of life.  And after a while the doctor’s conscious mind also knew.

“He is dead,” he said positively, in his natural voice; and such was the vast relief of the other two that they were in no way startled by the sound.  Instantly all three drew long breaths; the tension was relaxed; and Van Emmon’s curiosity found a harsh and unsteady voice.

“How under heaven has he been preserved all this time?  Especially,” he added, remembering, “considering the air that we found in the room?”

The doctor answered after a moment, his reply taking the form of advancing a step or two and holding out a hand.  It touched glass.

For the first time since the discovery, the builder shifted the light.  He had held it as still as death for a full minute.  Now he flashed it all about the place, and they saw that the huge figure was entirely encased in glass.  The cabinet measured about six feet on each of its sides, and about five feet in height; but such were the squat proportions of the occupant that he filled the whole space.

A slight examination showed that the case was not fixed to the platform, but had a separate bottom, upon which the stumplike chair was set.  Also, they found that, thanks to the reduced pull of the planet, it was not hard for the three of them to lift the cabinet bodily, despite its weight of almost a thousand pounds.  They left the tools lie there, discarded as much weight as they could, and proceeded to carry that ages-old superman out into the light.

Here they could see that the great man was all but a negro in color.  It was equally clear, however, from an examination of his mammoth cranium and extraordinary expression, that he was as highly developed along most mental lines as the greatest men on earth.  It was the back of his head, however, so flat that it was only a continuation of his neck, or, rather, shoulders, that told where the flaw lay.  That, together with the hardness of his eye, the cruelty of his mouth, and the absolute lack of softness anywhere in the ironlike face or frame—­all this condemned the monster for what he was; inhuman.

It was not easy to get him down the two flights of stairs.  More than once they had to prop the case on a step while they rested; and at one time, just before they reached that curious heap of rubbish at the foot of the upper stairs, Jackson’s strength gave way and it looked as though the whole thing would get away from them.  Van Emmon saved it at the cost of a bruised shoulder.

Once at the bottom of the lower flight, the rest was easy.  Within a very few minutes the astonished face of the engineer was peering into the vestibule; he could hardly wait until the air-tight door was locked before opening the inner valves.  He stared at the mammoth figure in the case long and hard, and from then on showed a great deal of respect for his three friends.