She

Man: Holly.

Holly.

What time is it now?

Just ten minutes later.

Than when you asked before.

And do you think he'll get here in time?

He'll be here any minute now.

Take it easy, John.

Do you really have to tell him tonight?

Yes. Tonight.

I feel that it may be my last.

Now, now, now.

You know you're going to get better.

Holly...

What's become of your passion.

For cold, scientific fact?

There he is now.

Hurry.

I believe my uncle's expecting me.

I'm Leo Vincey.

Yes, I can see that. Hi, Vincey.

Come on in. Thank you.

My name's Holly, Horace Holly.

Glad to know you.

Confound your English fog.

Our ship was a whole day late.

Well, thank heavens you're... you're here in time.

Time? What's all the rush?

Your cable said, "catch first boat,

Greatest adventure in the world."

What's all the mystery?

You'll hear all about that from your uncle.

But there's one thing my cable didn't say...

John Vincey's dying.

Good lord. What of?

Radium poisoning.

Hmm.

I haven't seen the old man since I was a kid.

He never quite got over.

Our side of the family going American.

Why did he send for me?

There's no time to explain that now, every minute counts.

Come along in.

I'm sorry, sir, I couldn't get here any sooner.

Never mind that, my boy.

There's no time for explanations now.

Come closer.

Holly, did you ever see such a striking resemblance?

Extraordinary. I'd already noticed it.

Look at that portrait.

Holly, turn on that light.

He does resemble me at that.

Or should I say that I resemble him?

That is your ancestor of a dozen generations ago.

Really?

John Vincey in the 15th century.

Wow. I must say we Vinceys.

Have a way of looking like each other.

I have no time for explanations now, my boy.

I'm a man of science.

I'm not superstitious.

If I were, I might imagine.

That your resemblance to a man dead nearly 500 years.

Is fate's way of showing me.

That you will find again what he discovered.

What is that, sir?

The means of overcoming man's enemy.

Man's enemy?

My enemy, your enemy,

The enemy of all living things.

Careful, John.

That is what I mean, Leo.

That is the swinging march of man's enemy.

Time, bringing death...

Invisible, relentless death.

I guess nobody can stop that.

Who knows?

A lot of men have believed that they could...

Ponce de Leon,

Who searched for the fountain of youth,

Or those 15th-century alchemists.

Who tried to discover the elixir of life.

But what connection has all this with me.

Or John Vincey over there on the wall?

That's what your uncle's going to tell you.

Holly, get me the box.

Listen to me carefully, Leo.

I haven't time left to tell you more than once.

Uncle John, I don't think you should exert yourself...

Please, please.

What I am going to tell you is a secret.

Handed down in our family from father to son.

The first John Vincey there.

Did not go on his last great adventure alone.

His wife left their son in England to go with him.

For five years, they vanished from the world.

Then, one night in a town in northern Poland,

A woman... ill, starving, dying...

Collapsed at the door of an English merchant.

He took her in and heard her ravings of hardship.

And fantastic terror.

And that woman was John Vincey's widow.

Before she died, she became more coherent,

Begged for someone to write a letter.

To her family in England.

Here's the letter,

Dictated by that dying woman.

Almost five centuries ago.

Yes, it is something of a puzzle.

Doesn't she tell what happened to John Vincey?

Here.

"So he was killed.

Because he refused to abandon me."

Does it give any idea where they went to?

Not much, mentions the land of muscovy.

Russia, eh?

Or Siberia or kamchatka...

All known as muscovy in the 15th century.

The place where he was killed.

Was far, far north.

She escaped with their English servant.

They fell in with some natives.

Who guided them back across a glacier.

Over what she calls the schugle barrier.

And there, death struck again.

Holly, read it.

"Then a great beast sprang on our guides

"and killed them all.

"My servant giles killed the beast,

"but died of his grievous wounds.

So I was left alone."

But what about the discovery you spoke of?

What'd they find?

John: Read on.

"In this strange land, we saw the flame.

"And he who stands therein comes forth unharmed.

To triumph over death."

But John Vincey died there.

Why, if he found this, uh, this flame?

Because he was murdered.

But you are scientists.

Do you really take all this seriously?

Seriously?

Come, my boy.

I'll show you how seriously.

Come into the laboratory where Holly and I.

Have done our lifework.

In the beginning, I was as skeptical as you.

Then Holly and I,

Years ago... In this very room,

Began our efforts to reproduce

John Vincey's life-prolonging flame.

We failed.

But our researches in radioactivity.

Carried us far enough to make us believe.

That such an element really exists.

An element to preserve life?

Yes.

Seventeen years in this room.

There's one other thing we ought to show him, John.

Here.

Can you make out the inscription?

Holly: It means, "here burns the flame of life."

That is the sole possession Vincey's wife had left.

She sent it to the son she never saw again.

It's all so mysterious, it doesn't make sense.

This thing's gold, not an unknown element.

To be sure, it's gold.

It's only the symbol of the flame of life

John Vincey found.

Don't you understand? I'm afraid I don't.

Flame destroys life.

A thousand volts of electricity will destroy life.

But increase the frequency,

And you may safely take a million volts.

Through your body.

And the radiation from this unknown element,

This flame of life,

May be a million degrees hotter than any fire we know,

Or it may be as cold as ice.

That's too much.

A cold flame?

Did you ever hear of a man being burned.

By x-rays or radium?

Mm-hmm.

Did he feel himself being burned?

No. No more than I did myself.

This flame of life, Vincey, is pure radiation,

The most intense and flame-like radiation.

In the whole universe.

Radiation from what? From the unknown element.

Do you really believe such a thing exists?

We no longer believe, we know it exists.

Our experiments prove that. That's right.

And they also prove something else.

This element cannot be artificially produced.

Only nature, only god can produce it.

But where?

In a glacial region of volcanic character.

That's largely guesswork, isn't it?