PART THREE OF A FOUR-PART NOVEL
By Charles W. Diffin
Two fighting Yankees--war-torn Earth's sole representatives on
Venus--set out to spike the greatest gun of all time.
WHAT HAS GONE BEFORE
The attack comes without warning; its reason is unknown. But Venus is
approaching the earth, and flashes from the planet are followed by
terrific explosions that wreak havoc throughout the world. Lieutenant
McGuire and Captain Blake of the U. S. Army Air Service see a great
ship fly in from space. Blake attacks it with the 91st Squadron in
support, and Blake alone survives. McGuire and Professor Sykes, an
astronomer of Mount Lawson, are captured.
The bombardment ceases as Venus passes on, and the people of Earth
sink into hopeless despondency. Less than a year and a half and the
planet will return, and then--the end! The armament of Earth is futile
against an enemy who has conquered space. Blake hopes that science
might provide a means; might show our fighters how to go out into
space and throttle the attack at its source. But the hope is blasted,
until a radio from McGuire supplies a lead.
McGuire is on Venus. He and Sykes land on that distant planet,
captives of a barbarous people. They are taken before Torg, the
emperor, and his council, and they learn that these red, man-shaped
beasts intend to conquer the earth. Spawning in millions, they are
crowded, and Earth is to be their colony.
Imprisoned on a distant island, the two captives are drugged and
hypnotized before a machine which throws their thoughts upon a screen.
Involuntary traitors, they disclose the secrets of Earth and its
helplessness; then attempt to escape and end their lives rather than
be forced to further betrayal of their own people.
McGuire finds a radio station and sends a message back to Earth. He
implores Blake to find a man named Winslow, for Winslow has invented a
space ship and claims to have reached the moon.
No time for further sending--McGuire does not even know if his message
has been received--but they reach the ocean where death offers them
release. A force of their captors attacking on land, they throw
themselves from a cliff, then swim out to drown beyond reach in the
ocean. An enemy ship sweeps above them: its gas cloud threatens not
the death they desire but unconsciousness and capture. "God help us,"
says Sykes; "we can't even die!"
They sink, only to be buoyed up by a huge metal shape. A metal
projector raises from the ocean, bears upon the enemy ship and sends
it, a mass of flame and molten metal, into the sea. And friendly
voices are in McGuire's ears as careful hands lift the two men and
carry them within the craft that has saved them.
CHAPTER XIII
Lieutenant McGuire had tried to die. He and Professor Sykes had
welcomed death with open arms, and death had been thwarted by their
enemies who wanted them alive--wanted to draw their knowledge from
them as a vampire bat might seek to feast. And, when even death was
denied them, help had come.
The enemy ship had gone crashing to destruction where its melting
metal made hissing clouds of steam as it buried itself in the ocean.
And this craft that had saved them--Lieutenant McGuire had never been
on a submarine, but he knew it could be only that that held him now
and carried him somewhere at tremendous speed.
This was miracle enough! But to see, with eyes which could not be
deceiving him, a vision of men, human, white of face--men like
himself--bending and working over Sykes' unconscious body--that could
not be immediately grasped.
Their faces, unlike the bleached-blood horrors he had seen, were aglow
with the flush of health. They were tall, slenderly built, graceful in
their quick motions as they worked to revive the unconscious man. One
stopped, as he passed, to lay a cool hand on McGuire's forehead, and
the eyes that looked down seemed filled with the blessed quality of
kindness.
They were human--his own kind!--and McGuire was unable to take in at
first the full wonder of it.
Did the tall man speak? His lips did not move, yet McGuire heard the
words as in some inner ear.
"We were awaiting you, friend Mack Guire." The voice was musical,
thrilling, and yet the listening man could not have sworn that he
heard a voice at all. It was as if a thought were placed within his
mind by the one beside him.
The one who had paused hurried on to aid the others, and McGuire let
his gaze wander.
* * * * *
The porthole beside him showed dimly a pale green light; they were
submerged, and the hissing rush of water told him that they were
travelling fast. There was a door in the farther wall; beyond was a
room of gleaming lights that reflected from myriads of shining levers
and dials. A control room. A figure moved as McGuire watched, to press
on a lever where a red light was steadily increasing in brightness. He
consulted strange instruments before him, touched a metal button here
and there, then opened a switch, and the rippling hiss of waters
outside their craft softened to a gentler note.
The tall one was beside him again.
"Your friend will live," he told him in that wordless tongue, "and we
are almost arrived. The invisible arms of our anchorage have us now
and will draw us safely to rest."
The kindly tone was music in McGuire's ears, and he smiled in reply.
"Friends!" he thought. "We are among friends."
"You are most welcome," the other assured him, "and, yes, you are
truly among friends." But the lieutenant glanced upward in wonder, for
he knew that he had uttered no spoken word.
Their ship turned and changed its course beneath them, then came
finally to rest with a slight rocking motion as if cushioned on
powerful springs. Sykes was being assisted to his feet as the tall man
reached for McGuire's hand and helped him to rise.
The two men of Earth stood for a long minute while they stared
unbelievingly into each other's eyes. Their wonder and amazement found
no words for expression but must have been apparent to the one beside
them.
"You will understand," he told them. "Do not question this reality
even to yourselves. You are safe!... Come." And he led the way through
an opening doorway to a wet deck outside. Beyond this was a wharf of
carved stone, and the men followed where steps were inset to allow
them to ascend.
Again McGuire could not know if he heard a tumult of sound or sensed
it in some deeper way. The air about them was aglow with soft light,
and it echoed in his ears with music unmistakably real--beautiful
music!--exhilarating! But the clamor of welcoming voices, like the
words from their tall companion, came soundlessly to him.
* * * * *
There were people, throngs of them, waiting. Tall like the others,
garbed, like those horrible beings of a past that seemed distant and
remote, in loose garments of radiant colors. And everywhere were
welcoming smiles and warm and friendly glances.
McGuire let his dazed eyes roam around to find the sculptured walls of
a huge room like a tremendous cave. The soft glow of light was
everywhere, and it brought out the beauty of flowing lines and
delicate colors in statuary and bas-relief that adorned the walls.
Behind him the water made a dark pool, and from it projected the upper
works of their strange craft.
His eyes were hungry for these new sights, but he turned with Sykes to
follow their guide through the colorful crowd that parted to let them
through. They passed under a carved archway and found themselves in
another and greater room.
But was it a room? McGuire marveled at its tremendous size. His eyes
took in the smooth green of a grassy lawn, the flowers and plants, and
then they followed where the hand of Sykes was pointing. The
astronomer gripped McGuire's arm in a numbing clutch; his other hand
was raised above.
"The stars," he said. "The clouds are gone; it is night!"
And where he pointed was a vault of black velvet. Deep hues of blue
seemed blended with it, and far in its depths were the old familiar
star-groups of the skies. "Ah!" the scientist breathed, "the
beautiful, friendly stars!"
Their guide waited; then, "Come," he urged gently, and led them toward
a lake whose unruffled glassy surface mirrored the stars above. Beside
it a man was waiting to receive them.
McGuire had to force his eyes away from the unreal beauty of opal
walls like the fairy structures they had seen. There was color
everywhere that blended and fused to make glorious harmony that was
pure joy to the eyes.
* * * * *
The man who waited was young. He stood erect, his face like that of a
Grecian statue, and his robe was blazing with the flash of jewels.
Beside him was a girl, tall and slender, and sweetly serious of face.
Like the man, her garments were lovely with jeweled iridescence, and
now McGuire saw that the throng within the vast space was similarly
apparelled.
The tall man raised his hand.
"Welcome!" he said, and McGuire realized with a start that the words
were spoken aloud. "You are most welcome, my friends, among the people
of that world you call Venus."
Professor Sykes was still weak from his ordeal; he wavered perceptibly
where he stood, and the man before them them turned to give an order.
There were chairs that came like magic; bright robes covered them; and
the men were seated while the man and girl also took seats beside them
as those who prepare for an intimate talk with friends.
Lieutenant McGuire found his voice at last. "Who are you?" he asked in
wondering tones. "What does it mean? We were lost--and you saved us.
But you--you are not like the others." And he repeated, "What does it
mean?"
"No," said the other with a slight smile, "we truly are not like those
others. They are not men such as you and I. They are something less
than human: animals--vermin!--from whom God, in His wisdom, has seen
fit to withhold the virtues that raise men higher than the beasts."
His face hardened as he spoke and for a moment the eyes were stern,
but he smiled again as he continued.
"And we," he said, "you ask who we are. We are the people of Venus. I
am Djorn, ruler, in name, of all. 'In name' I say, for we rule here by
common reason; I am only selected to serve. And this is my sister,
Althora. The name, with us, means 'radiant light.'" He turned to
exchange smiles with the girl at his side. "We think her well named,"
he said.
"The others,"--he waved toward the throng that clustered about--"you
will learn to know in time."
* * * * *
Professor Sykes felt the need of introductions.
"This is Lieutenant--" he began, but the other interrupted with an
upraised hand.
"Mack Guire," he supplied; "and you are Professor Sykes.... Oh, we
know you!" he laughed; "we have been watching you since your arrival;
we have been waiting to help you."
The professor was open-mouthed.
"Your thoughts," explained the other, "are as a printed page. We have
been with you by mental contact at all times. We could hear, but, at
that distance, and--pardon me!--with your limited receptivity, we
could not communicate.
"Do not resent our intrusion," he added; "we listened only for our own
good, and we shall show you how to insulate your thoughts. We do not
pry."
Lieutenant McGuire waved all that aside. "You saved us from them," he
said; "that's the answer. But--what does it mean? Those others are in
control; they are attacking our Earth, the world where we lived. Why
do you permit--?"
Again the other's face was set in sterner lines.
"Yes," he said, and his voice was full of unspoken regret, "they do
rule this world; they _have_ attacked your Earth; they intend much
more, and I fear they must be successful. Listen. Your wonderment is
natural, and I shall explain.
"We are the people of Venus. Some centuries ago we ruled this world.
Now you find us a handful only, living like moles in this underworld."
"Underworld?" protested Professor Sykes. He pointed above to the
familiar constellations. "Where are the clouds?" he asked.
The girl, Althora, leaned forward now. "It will please my brother,"
she said in a soft voice, "that you thought it real. He has had
pleasure in creating that--a replica of the skies we used to know
before the coming of the clouds."
* * * * *
Professor Sykes was bewildered. "That sky--the stars--they are not
real?" he asked incredulously. "But the grass--the flowers--"
Her laugh rippled like music. "Oh, they are real," she told him, and
her brother gave added explanation.
"The lights," he said: "we supply the actinic rays that the clouds cut
off above. We have sunlight here, made by our own hands; that is why
we are as we are and not like the red ones with their bleached skins.
We had our lights everywhere through the world when we lived above,
but those red beasts are ignorant; they do not know how to operate
them; they do not know that they live in darkness even in the light."
"Then we are below ground?" asked the flyer. "You live here?"
"It is all we have now. At that time of which I tell, it was the red
ones who lived out of sight; they were a race of rodents in human
form. They lived in the subterranean caves with which this planet is
pierced. We could have exterminated them at any time, but, in our
ignorance, we permitted them to live, for we, of Venus--I use your
name for the planet--do not willingly take life."
"They have no such compunctions!" Professor Sykes' voice was harsh; he
was remembering the sacrifice to the hungry plants.
A flash as of pain crossed the sensitive features of the girl, and the
man beside her seemed speaking to her in soundless words.
"Your mind-picture was not pleasant," he told the scientist; then
continued:
"Remember, we were upon the world, and these others were within it.
There came a comet. Oh, our astronomers plotted its course; they told
us we were safe. But at the last some unknown influence diverted it;
its gaseous projection swept our world with flame. Only an instant;
but when it had passed there was left only death...."
* * * * *
He was lost in recollection for a time; the girl beside him reached
over to touch his hand.
"Those within--the red ones--escaped," he went on. "They poured forth
when they found that catastrophe had overwhelmed us. And we, the
handful that were left, were forced to take shelter here. We have
lived here since, waiting for the day when the Master of Destinies
shall give us freedom and a world in which to live."
"You speak," suggested the scientist, "as if this had happened to you.
Surely you refer to your ancestors; you are the descendants of those
who were saved."
"We are the people," said the other. "We lived then; we live now; we
shall live for a future of endless years.
"Have you not searched for the means to control the life
principle--you people of Earth?" he asked. "We have it here. You
see"--and he waved a hand toward the standing throng--"we are young to
your eyes and the others who greeted you were the same."
McGuire and the scientist exchanged glances of corroboration.
"But your age," asked Sykes, "measured in years?"
"We hardly measure life in years."
Professor Sykes nodded slowly; his mind found difficulty in accepting
so astounding a fact. "But our language?" he queried. "How is it that
you can speak our tongue?"
The tall man smiled and leaned forward to place a hand on a knee of
each of the men beside him. "Why not," he asked, "when there doubtless
is relationship between us.
"You called the continent Atlantis. Perhaps its very existence is but
a fable now: it has been many centuries since we have had instruments
to record thought force from Earth, and we have lost touch. But, my
friends, even then we of Venus had conquered space, and it was we who
visited Atlantis to find a race more nearly like ourselves than were
the barbarians who held the other parts of Earth.
"I was there, but I returned. There were some who stayed and they were
lost with the others in the terrible cataclysm that sank a whole
continent beneath the waters. But some, we have believed, escaped."
"Why have you not been back?" the flyer asked. "You could have helped
us so much."
"It was then that our own destruction came upon us. The same comet,
perhaps, may have caused a change of stresses in your Earth and sunk
the lost Atlantis. Ah! That was a beautiful land, but we have never
seen it since. We have been--here.
"But you will understand, now," he added, "that, with our insight into
your minds, we have little difficulty in mastering your language."
This talk of science and incredible history left Lieutenant McGuire
cold. His mind could not wander long from its greatest concern.
"But the earth!" he exclaimed. "What about the earth? This attack!
Those devils mean real mischief!"
"More than you know; more than you can realize, friend Mack Guire!"
"Why?" demanded the flyer. "Why?"
"Have your countries not reached out for other countries when land was
needed?" asked the man, Djorn. "Land--land! Space in which to
breed--that is the reason for the invasion.
"This world has no such continents as yours. Here the globe is covered
by the oceans; we have perhaps one hundredth of the land areas of your
Earth And the red ones breed like flies. Life means nothing to them;
they die like flies, too. But they need more room; they intend to find
it on your world."
* * * * *
"A strange race," mused Professor Sykes. "They puzzled me. But--'less
than human,' I think you said. Then how about their ships? How could
they invent them?"
"Ours--all ours! They found a world ready and waiting for them.
Through the centuries they have learned to master some few of our
inventions. The ships!--the ethereal vibrations! Oh, they have been
cleverer than we dreamed possible."
"Well, how can we stop them?" demanded McGuire. "We must. You have the
submarines--"
"One only," the other interrupted. "We saved that, and we brought some
machinery. We have made this place habitable; we have not been idle.
But there are limitations."
"But your ray that you projected--it brought down their ship!"
"We were protecting you, and we protect ourselves; that is enough.
There is One will deliver us in His own good time; we may not go forth
and slaughter."
There was a note of resignation and patience in the voice that filled
McGuire with hopeless forebodings. Plainly this was not an aggressive
race. They had evolved beyond the stage of wanton slaughter, and, even
now, they waited patiently for the day when some greater force should
come to their aid.
The man beside them spoke quickly. "One moment--you will pardon
me--someone is calling--" He listened intently to some soundless call,
and he sent a silent message in reply.
"I have instructed them," he said. "Come and you shall see how
impregnable is our position. The red ones have resented our
destruction of their ship."
The face of the girl, Althora, was perturbed. "More killings?" she
asked.
"Only as they force themselves to their own death," her brother told
her. "Be not disturbed."
* * * * *
The throng in the vast space drew apart as the figure of their leader
strode quickly through with the two men following close. There were
many rooms and passages; the men had glimpses of living quarters, of
places where machinery made soft whirring sounds; more sights than
their eyes could see or their minds comprehend. They came at last to
an open chamber.
The men looked up to see above them a tremendous inverted-cone, and
there was the gold of cloudland glowing through an opening at the top.
It was the inside of a volcano where they stood, and McGuire
remembered the island and its volcanic peak where the ship had swerved
aside. He felt that he knew now where they were.
Above them, a flash of light marked the passage of a ship over the
crater's mouth, and he realized that the ships of the reds were not
avoiding the island now. Did it mean an attack? And how could these
new friends meet it?
Before them on the level volcanic floor were great machines that came
suddenly to life, and their roar rose to a thunder of violence, while,
in the center, a cluster of electric sparks like whirling stars formed
a cloud of blue fire. It grew, and its hissing, crackling length
reached upward to a fine-drawn point that touched the opening above.
"Follow!" commanded their leader and went rapidly before them where a
passage wound and twisted to bring them at last to the light of day.
The flame of the golden clouds was above them in the midday sky, and
beneath it were scores of ships that swept in formations through the
air.
"Attacking?" asked the lieutenant with ill-concealed excitement.
"I fear so. They tried to gas us some centuries ago; it may be they
have forgotten what we taught them then."
* * * * *
One squadron came downward and swept with inconceivable speed over a
portion of the island that stretched below. The men were a short
distance up on the mountain's side, and the scene that lay before them
was crystal clear. There were billowing clouds of gas that spread over
the land where the ships had passed. Other ships followed; they would
blanket the island in gas.
The man beside them gave a sigh of regret. "They have struck the first
blow," he said. He stood silent with half-closed eyes; then: "I have
ordered resistance." And there was genuine sorrow and regret in his
eyes as he looked toward the mountain top.
McGuire's eyes followed the other's gaze to find nothing at first save
the volcanic peak in hard outline upon the background of gold; then
only a shimmer as of heat about the lofty cone. The air above him
quivered, formed to ripples that spread in great circles where the
enemy ships were flashing away.
Swifter than swift aircraft, with a speed that shattered space, they
reached out and touched--and the ships, at that touch, fell helplessly
down from the heights. They turned awkwardly as they fell or dropped
like huge pointed projectiles. And the waters below took them silently
and buried in their depths all trace of what an instant sooner had
been an argosy of the air.
The ripples ceased, again the air was clear and untroubled, but
beneath the golden clouds was no single sign of life.
* * * * *
The flyer's breathless suspense ended in an explosive gasp. "What a
washout!" he exclaimed, and again he thought only of this as a weapon
to be used for his own ends. "Can we use that on their fleets?" he
asked. "Why, man--they will never conquer the earth; they will never
even make a start."
The tall figure of Djorn turned and looked at him. "The lust to kill!"
he said sadly. "You still have it--though you are fighting for your
own, which is some excuse.
"No, this will not destroy their fleets, for their fleets will not
come here to be destroyed. It will be many centuries before ever again
the aircraft of the reds dare venture near."
"We will build another one and take it where they are--" The voice of
the fighting man was vibrant with sudden hope.
"We were two hundred years building and perfecting this," the other
told him. "Can you wait that long?"
And Lieutenant McGuire, as he followed dejectedly behind the leader,
heard nothing of Professor Sykes' eager questions as to how this
miracle was done.
"Can you wait that long?" this man, Djorn, had asked. And the flyer
saw plainly the answer that spelled death and destruction to the
world.
CHAPTER XIV
The mountains of Nevada are not noted for their safe and easy landing
places. But the motor of the plane that Captain Blake was piloting
roared smoothly in the cool air while the man's eyes went searching,
searching, for something, and he hardly knew what that something might
be.
He went over again, as he had done a score of times, the remarks of
Lieutenant McGuire. Mac had laughed that day when he told Blake of his
experience.
"I was flying that transport," he had said, "and, boy! when one motor
began to throw oil I knew I was out of luck. Nothing but rocky peaks
and valleys full of trees as thick and as pointed as a porcupine's
quills. Flying pretty high to maintain altitude with one motor out, so
I just naturally _had_ to find a place to set her down. I found it,
too, though it seemed too good to be true off in that wilderness.
"A fine level spot, all smooth rock, except for a few clumps of grass,
and just bumpy enough to make the landing interesting. But, say,
Captain! I almost cracked up at that, I was so darn busy staring at
something else.
"Off in some trees was a dirigible--Sure; go ahead and laugh; I didn't
believe it either, and I was looking at it. But there had been a whale
of a storm through there the day before, and it had knocked over some
trees that had been screening the thing, and there it was!
"Well, I came to in time to pull up her nose and miss a rock or two,
and then I started pronto for that valley of trees and the thing that
was buried among them."
* * * * *
Captain Blake recalled the conversation word for word, though he had
treated it jokingly at the time. McGuire had found the ship and a
man--a half-crazed nut, so it seemed--living there all alone. And he
wasn't a bit keen about Mac's learning of the ship. But leave it to
Mac to get the facts--or what the old bird claimed were facts.
There was the body of a youngster there, a man of about Mac's age. He
had fallen and been killed the day before, and the old man was half
crazy with grief. Mac had dug a grave and helped bury the body, and
after that the old fellow's story had come out.
He had been to the moon, he said. And this was a space ship. Wouldn't
tell how it operated, and shut up like a clam when Mac asked if he had
gone alone. The young chap had gone with him, it seemed, and the man
wouldn't talk--just sat and stared out at the yellow mound where the
youngster was buried.
Mac had told Blake how he argued with the man to prove up on his
claims and make a fortune for himself. But no--fortunes didn't
interest him. And there were some this-and-that and be-damned-to-'em
people who would never get _this_ invention--the dirty, thieving rats!
And Mac, while he laughed, had seemed half to believe it. Said the old
cuss was so sincere, and he had nothing to sell. And--there was the
ship! It never got there without being flown in, that was a cinch. And
there wasn't a propellor on it nor a place for one--just open ports
where a blast came out, or so the inventor said.
Captain Blake swung his ship on another slanting line and continued to
comb the country for such marks as McGuire had seen. And one moment he
told himself he was a fool to be on any such hunt, while the next
thought would remind him that Mac had believed. And Mac had a level
head, and he had radioed from Venus!
There was the thing that made anything seem possible. Mac had got a
message through, across that space, and the enemy had ships that could
do it. Why not this one?
And always his eyes were searching, searching, for a level rocky
expanse and a tree-filled valley beyond, with something, it might be,
shining there, unless the inventor had camouflaged it more carefully
now.
* * * * *
It was later on the same day when Captain Blake's blocky figure
climbed over the side of the cockpit. Tired? Yes! But who could think
of cramped limbs and weary muscles when his plane was resting on a
broad, level expanse of rock in the high Sierras and a sharp-cut
valley showed thick with pines beyond. He could see the corner only of
a rough log shack that protruded.
Blake scrambled over a natural rampart of broken stone and went
swiftly toward the cabin. But he stopped abruptly at the sound of a
harsh voice.
"Stop where you are," the voice ordered, "and stick up your hands!
Then turn around and get back as fast as you can to that plane of
yours." There was a glint of sunlight on a rifle barrel in the window
of the cabin.
Captain Blake stopped, but he did not turn. "Are you Mr. Winslow?" he
asked.
"That's nothing to you! Get out! Quick!"
Blake was thinking fast. Here was the man, without doubt--and he was
hostile as an Apache; the man behind that harsh voice meant business.
How could he reach him? The inspiration came at once. McGuire was the
key.
"If you're Winslow," he called in a steady voice, "you don't want me
to go away; you want to talk with me. There's a young friend of yours
in a bad jam. You are the only one who can help."
"I haven't any friends," said the rasping voice: "I don't want any!
Get out!"
"You had one," said the captain, "whether you wanted him or not. He
believed in you--like the other young chap who went with you to the
moon."
* * * * *
There was an audible gasp of dismay from the window beyond, and the
barrel of the rifle made trembling flickerings in the sun.
"You mean the flyer?" asked the voice, and it seemed to have lost its
harsher note. "The pleasant young fellow?"
"I mean McGuire, who helped give decent burial to your friend. And now
he has been carried off--out into space--and you can help him. If
you've a spark of decency in you, you will hear what I have to say."
The rifle vanished within the cabin; a door opened to frame a picture
of a tall man. He was stooped; the years, or solitude, perhaps, had
borne heavily upon him; his face was a mat of gray beard that was a
continuation of the unkempt hair above. The rifle was still in his
hand.
But he motioned to the waiting man, and "Come in!" he commanded. "I'll
soon know if you're telling the truth. God help you if you're not....
Come in."
An hour was needed while the bearded man learned the truth. And Blake,
too, picked up some facts. He learned to his great surprise that he
was talking with an educated man, one who had spent a lifetime in
scientific pursuits. And now, as the figure before him seemed more the
scientist and less the crazed fabricator of wild fancies, the truth of
his claims seemed not so remote.
Half demented now, beyond a doubt! A lifetime of disappointments and
one invention after another stolen from him by those who knew more of
law than of science. And now he held fortune in the secret of his
ship--a secret which he swore should never be given to the world.
"Damn the world!" he snarled. "Did the world ever give anything to me?
And what would they do with this? They would prostitute it to their
own selfish ends; it would be just one more means to conquer and kill;
and the capitalists would have it in their own dirty hands so that new
lines of transportation beyond anything they dared dream would be
theirs to exploit."
* * * * *
Blake, remembering the history of a commercial age, found no ready
reply to that. But he told the man of McGuire and the things that had
made him captive; he related what he, himself, had seen in the dark
night on Mount Lawson, and he told of the fragmentary message that
showed McGuire was still alive.
"There's only one way to save him," he urged. "If your ship is what
you claim it is--and I believe you one hundred per cent--it is all
that can save him from what will undoubtedly be a horrible death.
Those things were monsters--inhuman!--and they have bombarded the
earth. They will come back in less than a year and a half to destroy
us."
Captain Blake would have said he was no debater, but the argument and
persuasion that he used that night would have done credit to a
Socrates. His opponent was difficult to convince, and not till the
next day did the inventor show Blake his ship.
"Small," he said as he led the flyer toward it. "Designed just for the
moon trip, and I had meant to go alone. But it served; it took us
there and back again."
He threw open a door in the side of the metal cylinder. Blake stood
back for only a moment to size up the machine, to observe its smooth
duralumin shell and the rounded ends where portholes opened for the
expelling of its driving blast. The door opening showed a thick wall
that gave insulation. Blake followed the inventor to the interior of
the ship.
* * * * *
The man had seen Winslow examining the thick walls. "It's cold out
there, you know," he said, and smiled in recollection, "but the
generator kept us warm." He pointed to a simple cylindrical casting
aft of the ship's center part. It was massive, and braced to the
framework of the ship to distribute a thrust that Blake knew must be
tremendous. Heavy conduits took the blast that it produced and poured
it from ports at bow and stern. There were other outlets, too, above
and below and on the sides, and electric controls that were
manipulated from a central board.
"You've got a ship," Blake admitted, "and it's a beauty. I know
construction, and you've got it here. But what is the power? How do
you drive it? What throws it out through space?"
"Aside from one other, you will be the only man ever to know." The
bearded man was quiet now and earnest. The wild light had faded from
his eyes, and he pondered gravely in making the last and final
decision.
"Yes, you shall have it. It may be I have been mistaken. I have known
people--some few--who were kindly and decent; I have let the others
prejudice me. But there was one who was my companion--and there was
McGuire, who was kind and who believed. And now you, who will give
your life for a friend and to save humanity!... You shall have it. You
shall have the ship! But I will not go with you. I want nothing of
glory or fame, and I am too old to fight. My remaining years I choose
to spend out here." He pointed where a window of heavy glass showed
the outer world and a grave on a sloping hill.
* * * * *
"But you shall have full instructions. And, for the present, you may
know that it is a continuous explosion that drives the ship. I have
learned to decompose water into its components and split them into
subatomic form. They reunite to give something other than matter. It
is a liquid--liquid energy, though the term is inaccurate--that
separates out in two forms, and a fluid ounce of each is the product
of thousands of tons of water. The potential energy is all there. A
current releases it; the energy components reunite to give matter
again--hydrogen and oxygen gas. Combustion adds to their volume
through heat.
"It is like firing a cannon in there,"--he pointed now to the massive
generator--"a super-cannon of tremendous force and a cannon that fires
continuously. The endless pressure of expansion gives the thrust that
means a constant acceleration of motion out there where gravity is
lost.
"You will note," he added, "that I said 'constant acceleration.' It
means building up to speeds that are enormous."
Blake nodded in half-understanding.
"We will want bigger ships," he mused. "They must mount guns and be
heavy enough to take the recoil. This is only a sample; we must
design, experiment, build them! Can it be done? ... It _must_ be
done!" he concluded and turned to the inventor.
"We don't know much about those devils of the stars, and they may have
means of attack beyond anything we can conceive, but there is just one
way to learn: go up there and find out, and take a licking if we have
to. Now, how about taking me up a mile or so in the air?"
* * * * *
The other smiled in self-deprecation. "I like a good fighter," he
said; "I was never one myself. If I had been I would have accomplished
more. Yes, you shall go up a mile or so in the air--and a thousand
miles beyond." He turned to close the door and seal it fast.
Beside the instrument board he seated himself, and at his touch the
generator of the ship came startlingly to life. It grumbled softly at
first, then the hoarse sound swelled to a thunderous roar, while the
metal grating surged up irresistibly beneath the captain's feet. His
weight was intolerable. He sank helplessly to the floor....
Blake was white and shaken when he alighted from the ship an hour
later, but his eyes were ablaze with excitement. He stopped to seize
the tall man by the shoulders.
"I am only a poor devil of a flying man," he said, "but I am speaking
for the whole world right now. You have saved us; you've furnished the
means. It is up to us now. You've given us the right to hope that
humanity can save itself, if humanity will do it. That's my next
job--to convince them. We have less than a year and a half...."
* * * * *
There was one precious week wasted while Captain Blake chafed and
waited for a conference to be arranged at Washington. A spirit of
hopelessness had swept over the world--hopelessness and a mental sloth
that killed every hope with the unanswerable argument: "What is the
use? It is the end." But a meeting was arranged at Colonel Boynton's
insistence, though his superiors scoffed at what he dared suggest.
Blake appeared before the meeting, and he told them what he knew--told
it to the last detail, while he saw the looks of amusement or
commiseration that passed from man to man.
There were scientists there who asked him coldly a question or two and
shrugged a supercilious shoulder; ranking officers of both army and
navy who openly excoriated Colonel Boynton for bringing them to hear
the wild tale of a half-demented man. It was this that drove Blake to
a cold frenzy.
The weeks of hopeless despair had worn his nerves to the breaking
point, and now, with so much to be done, and so little time in which
to do it, all requirements of official etiquette were swept aside as
he leaped to his feet to face the unbelieving men.
"Damn it!" he shouted, "will you sit here now and quibble over what
you think in your wisdom is possible or not. Get outside those
doors--there's an open park beyond--and I'll knock your technicalities
all to hell!"
The door slammed behind him before the words could be spoken to place
him under arrest, and he tore across a velvet lawn to leap into a
taxi.
There was a rising storm of indignant protest within the room that he
had left. There were admirals, purple of face, who made heated remarks
about the lack of discipline in the army, and generals who turned
accusingly where the big figure of Colonel Boynton was still seated.
It was the Secretary of War who stilled the tumult and claimed the
privilege of administering the rebuke which was so plainly needed.
"Colonel Boynton," he said, and there was no effort to soften the
cutting edge of sarcasm in his voice, "it was at your request and
suggestion that this outrageous meeting was held. Have you any more
requests or suggestions?"
The colonel rose slowly to his feet.
"Yes, Mr. Secretary," he said coldly, "I have. I know Captain Blake.
He seldom makes promises; when he does he makes good. My suggestion is
that you do what the gentleman said--step outside and see your
technicalities knocked to hell." He moved unhurriedly toward the door.
* * * * *
It was a half-hour's wait, and one or two of the more openly skeptical
had left when the first roar came faintly from above. Colonel Boynton
led the others to the open ground before the building. "I have always
found Blake a man of his word," he said quietly, and pointed upward
where a tiny speck was falling from a cloud-flecked sky.
Captain Blake had had little training in the operation of the ship,
but he had flown it across the land and had concealed it where fellow
officers were sworn to secrecy. And he felt that he knew how to handle
the controls.
But the drop from those terrible heights was a fearful thing, and it
ended only a hundred feet above the heads of the cowering, shouting
humans who crouched under the thunderous blast, where a great shell
checked its vertical flight and rebounded to the skies.
Again and again the gleaming cylinder drove at them like a projectile
from the mortars of the gods, and it roared and thundered through the
air or turned to vanish with incredible speed straight up into the
heights, to return and fall again ... until finally it hung motionless
a foot above the grass from which the uniformed figures had fled. Only
Colonel Boynton was there to greet the flyer as he laid his strange
craft gently down.
"Nice little show, Captain," he said, while his broad face broke into
the widest of grins. "A damn nice little show! But take that look off
of your face. They'll listen to you now; they'll eat right out of your
hand."
CHAPTER XV
If Lieutenant McGuire could have erased from his mind the thought of
the threat that hung over the earth he would have found nothing but
intensest pleasure in the experiences that were his.
But night after night they had heard the reverberating echoes of the
giant gun speeding its messenger of death toward the earth, and he saw
as plainly as if he were there the terrible destruction that must come
where the missiles struck. Gas, of course; that seemed the chief and
only weapon of these monsters, and Djorn, the elected leader of the
Venus folk, confirmed him in this surmise.
"We had many gases," he told McGuire, "but we used them for good ends.
You people of Earth--or these invaders, if they conquer Earth--must
some day engage in a war more terrible than wars between men. The
insects are your greatest foe. With a developing civilization goes the
multiplication of insect and bacterial life. We used the gases for
that war, and we made this world a heaven." He sighed regretfully for
his lost world.
"These red ones found them, and our factories for making them. But
they have no gift for working out or mastering the other means we had
for our defense--the electronic projectors, the creation of tremendous
magnetic fields: you saw one when we destroyed the attacking ships.
Our scientists had gone far--"
"I wish to Heaven you had some of them to use now," said the
lieutenant savagely, and the girl, Althora, standing near, smiled in
sympathy for the flyer's distress. But her brother, Djorn, only
murmured: "The lust to kill: that is something to be overcome."
The fatalistic resignation of these folk was disturbing to a man of
action like McGuire. His eyes narrowed, and his lips were set for an
abrupt retort when Althora intervened.
"Come," she said, and took the flyer's hand. "It is time for food."
* * * * *
She took him to the living quarters occupied by her brother and
herself, where opal walls and jewelled inlays were made lovely by the
soft light that flooded the rooms.
"Just one tablet," she said, and brought him a thin white disc, "then
plenty of water. You must take this compressed food often and in small
quantities till your system is accustomed."
"You make this?" he asked.
"But certainly. Our chemists are learned men. We should lack for food,
otherwise, here in our underground home."
He let the tablet dissolve in his mouth. Althora leaned forward to
touch his hand gently.
"I am sorry," she said, "that you and Djorn fail to understand one
another. He is good--so good! But you--you, too, are good, and you
fear for the safety of your own people."
"They will be killed to the last woman and child," he replied, "or
they will be captured, which will be worse."
"I understand," she told him, and pressed his hand; "and if I can
help, Lieutenant Mack Guire, I shall be so glad."
He smiled at her stilted pronunciation of his name. He had had the
girl for an almost constant companion since his arrival; the sexes, he
found, were on a level of mutual freedom, and the girl's companionship
was offered and her friendship expressed as openly as might have been
that of a youth. Of Sykes he saw little; Professor Sykes was deep in
astronomical discussions with the scientists of this world.
But she was charming, this girl of a strange race so like his own. A
skin from the velvet heart of a rose and eyes that looked deep into
his and into his mind when he permitted; eyes, too, that could crinkle
to ready laughter or grow misty when she sang those weird melodies of
such thrilling sweetness.
Only for the remembrance of Earth and the horrible feeling of impotent
fury, Lieutenant McGuire would have found much to occupy his thoughts
in this loveliest of companions.
* * * * *
He laughed now at the sounding of his name, and the girl laughed with
him.
"But it _is_ your name, is it not?" she asked.
"Lieutenant Thomas McGuire," he repeated, "and those who like me call
me 'Mac.'"
"Mac," she repeated. "But that is so short and hard sounding. And what
do those who love you say?"
The flyer grinned cheerfully. "There aren't many who could qualify in
that respect, but if there were they would call me Tommy."
"That is better," said Althora with engaging directness; "that is much
better--Tommy." Then she sprang to her feet and hurried him out where
some further wonders must be seen and exclaimed over without delay.
But Lieutenant McGuire saw the pink flush that crept into her face,
and his own heart responded to the telltale betrayal of her feeling
for him. For never in his young and eventful life had the man found
anyone who seemed so entirely one with himself as did this lovely girl
from a distant star.
He followed where she went dancing on her way, but not for long could
his mind be led away from the menace he could not forget. And on this
day, as on many days to come, he struggled and racked his brain to
find some way in which he could thwart the enemy and avert or delay
their stroke.
* * * * *
It was another day, and they were some months on their long journey
away from the earth when an inspiration came. Althora had offered to
help, and he knew well how gladly she would aid him; the feeling
between them had flowered into open, if unspoken love. Not that he
would subject her to any danger--he himself would take all of that
when it came--but meanwhile--
"Althora," he asked her, "can you project your mind into that of one
of the reds?"
"I could, easily," she replied, "but it would not be pleasant. Their
minds are horrible; they reek of evil things." She shuddered at the
thought, but the man persisted.
"But if you could help, would you be willing? I can do so little; I
can never stop them; but I may save my people from some suffering at
least. Here is my idea:
"Djorn tells me that I had it figured right: they plan an invasion of
the earth when next the two planets approach. He has told me of their
armies and their fleets of ships that will set off into space. I can't
prevent it; I am helpless! But if I knew what their leader was
thinking--"
"Torg!" she exclaimed. "You want to know the mind of that beast of
beasts!"
"Yes," said the man. "It might be of value. Particularly if I could
know something of their great gun--where it is and what it is--well, I
might do something about that."
The girl averted her eyes from the savage determination on his face.
"No--no!" she exclaimed; "I could not. Not Torg!"
McGuire's own face fell at the realization of the enormity of this
favor he had demanded. "That's all right," he said and held her soft
hand in his; "just forget it. I shouldn't have asked."
But she whispered as she turned to walk away: "I must think, I must
think. You ask much of me, Tommy; but oh, Tommy, I would do much for
you!" She was sobbing softly as she ran swiftly away.
And the man in khaki--this flyer of a distant air-service--strode
blindly off to rage and fume at his helplessness and his inability to
strike one blow at those beings who lived in that world above.
* * * * *
There were countless rooms and passages where the work of the world
below went on. There were men and women whose artistic ability found
outlet in carvings and sculpture, chemists and others whose work was
the making of foods and endless experimentation, some thousand of men
and women in the strength of their endless youth, who worked for the
love of the doing and lived contentedly and happily while they waited
for the day of their liberation. But of fighters there were none, and
for this Lieutenant McGuire grieved wholeheartedly.
He was striding swiftly along where a corridor ended in blackness
ahead. There was a gleaming machine on the floor beside him when a
hand clutched at his arm and a warning voice exclaimed: "No further,
Lieutenant McGuire; you must not go!"
"Why?" questioned the lieutenant. "I've got to walk--do something to
keep from this damnable futile thinking."
"But not there," said the other; "it is a place of death. Ten paces
more and you would have vanished in a flicker of flame. The
projector"--he touched the mechanism beside them--"is always on. Our
caves extend in an endless succession; they join with the labyrinth
where the red ones used to live. They could attack us but for this.
Nothing can live in its invisible ray; they are placed at all such
entrances."
"Yet Djorn," McGuire told himself slowly, "said they had no weapons.
He knows nothing of war. But, great heavens! what wouldn't I give for
a regiment of scrappers--good husky boys with their faces tanned and a
spark in their eyes and their gas masks on their chests. With a
regiment, and equipment like this--"
And again he realized the futility of armament with none to serve and
direct it.
* * * * *
It was a month or more before Althora consented to the tests. Djorn
advised against it and made his protest emphatic, but here, as in all
things, Althora was a free agent. It was her right to do as she saw
fit, and there was none to prevent in this small world where
individual liberty was unquestioned.
And it was still longer before she could get anything of importance.
The experiments were racking to her nerves, and McGuire, seeing the
terrible strain upon her, begged her to stop. But Althora had gained
the vision that was always before her loved one's eyes--a world of
death and disaster--and he, here where the bolt would be launched, and
powerless to prevent. She could not be dissuaded now.
It was a proud day for Althora when she sent for McGuire, and he found
her lying at rest, eyes closed in her young face that was lined and
tortured with the mental horror she was contacting. She silenced his
protests with a word.
"The gun," she whispered; "they are talking about the gun ... and the
bombardment ... planning...."
More silent concentration. Then:
"The inland of Bergo," she said, "--remember that! The gun is there ...
a great bore in the earth ... solid rock ... but the casing of
titanite must be reinforced ... and bands shrunk about the muzzle that
projects ... heavy bands ... it shows signs of distortion--the
heat!..."
She was listening to the thoughts, and selecting those that bore upon
gun.
"... Only fifty days ... the bombardment must begin ... Tahnor has
provided a hundred shells; two thousand tals of the green gas-powder
in each one ... the explosive charges ready ... yes--yes!..."
"Oh!" she exclaimed and opened her troubled eyes. "The beast is so
complacent, so sure! And the bombardment will begin in fifty days!
Will it really cause them anguish on your Earth, Tommy?"
"Just plain hell; that's all!"
McGuire's voice was low; his mind was reaching out to find and reject
one plan after another. The gun!... He must disable it; he could do
that much at least. For himself--well, what of it?--he would die, of
course.
The guard he had been taught to place about his own thoughts must have
relaxed, for Althora cried out in distress.
"No--no!" she protested; "you shall not! I have tried to help you,
Tommy dear--say that I have helped you!--but, oh, my beloved, do not
go. Do not risk your life to silence this one weapon. They would still
have their ships. Remember what Djorn has told of their mighty fleets,
their thousands of fighting men. You cannot stop them; you can hardly
hinder them. And you would throw away your life! Oh, please do not
go!"
McGuire was seated beside her. His face was hidden in one hand while
the other was held tight between the white palms of Althora's tense
hands. He said nothing, and he shielded his eyes and locked his mind
against her thought force.
"Tommy," said Althora, and now her voice was all love and softness,
"Tommy, my dear one! You will not go, for what can you do? And if you
stay--oh, my dear!--you can have what you will--the secret of life
shall be yours--to live forever in perpetual youth. You may have that.
And me, Tommy.... Would you throw your life away in a hopeless
attempt, when life might hold so much? Am I offering so little,
Tommy?"
And still the silence and the hand that kept the eyes from meeting
hers; then a long-drawn breath and a slim figure in khaki that stood
unconsciously erect to look, not at the girl, but out beyond the solid
walls, through millions of miles of space, to the helpless speck
called Earth.
"You offer me heaven, my dear," he spoke softly. "But sometimes"--and
his lips twisted into a ghost of a smile--"sometimes, to earn our
heaven, we have to fight like hell. And, if we fail to make the fight,
what heaven worth having is left?
"And the people," he said softly; "the homes in the cities and towns
and villages. My dear, that's part of loving a soldier: you can never
own him altogether; his allegiance is divided. And if I failed my own
folk what right would I have to you?"
* * * * *
He dared to look at the girl who lay before him. That other vision was
gone but he had seen a clear course charted, and now, with his mind at
rest, he could smile happily at the girl who was looking up at him
through her tears.
She rose slowly to her feet and stood before him to lay firm hands
upon his shoulders. She was almost as tall as he, and her eyes, that
had shaken off their tears but for a dewy fringe, looked deep and
straight into his.
"We have thought," she said slowly, "we people of this world, that we
were superior to you and yours; we have accepted you as someone a
shade below our plane of advancement. Yes, we have dared to believe
that. But I know better. We have gone far, Tommy, we people of this
star; we have lived long. Yet I am wondering if we have lost some
virtues that are the heritage of a sterner race.
"But I am learning, Tommy; I am so thankful that I can learn and that
I have had you to teach me. We will go together, you and I. We will
fight our fight, and, the Great One willing, we will earn our heaven
or find it elsewhere--together."
She leaned forward to kiss the tall man squarely upon the lips with
her own soft rose-petal lips that clung and clung ... and the reply of
Lieutenant McGuire, while it was entirely wordless, seemed eminently
satisfactory.
* * * * *
Althora, the beautiful daughter of Venus, had the charm and allure of
her planet's fabled namesake. But she thought like a man and she
planned like a man. And there was no dissuading her from her course.
She was to fight beside McGuire--that was her intention--and beyond
that there was no value in argument. McGuire was forced to accept the
insistent aid, and he needed help.
Sykes dropped his delving into astronomical lore and answered to the
call, but there was no other assistance. Only the three, McGuire,
Althora and Sykes. There were some who would agree to pilot the
submarine that was being outfitted, but they would have no part in the
venture beyond transporting the participants.
More than once McGuire paused to curse silently at the complaisance of
this people. What could he not do if they would help. Ten companies of
trained men, armed with their deadly electronic projectors that
disintegrated any living thing they reached--and he would clutch at
his tousled hair and realize that they were only three, and go grimly
back to work.
"I don't know what we can do till we get there," he told Sykes. "Here
we are, and there is the gun: that is all we know, except that the
thing must be tremendous and our only hope is that there is some
firing mechanism that we can destroy. The gun itself is a great
drilling in the solid rock, lined with one of their steel alloys, and
with a big barrel extending up into the air: Althora has learned that.
"They went deep into the rock and set the firing chamber there; it's
heavy enough to stand the stress. They use a gas-powder, as Althora
calls it, for the charge, and the same stuff but deadlier is in the
shell. But they must have underground workings for loading and firing.
Is there a chance for us to get in there, I wonder! There's the big
barrel that projects. We might ... but no!--that's too big for us to
tackle, I'm afraid."
"How about that electronic projector on the submarine?" Sykes
suggested. "Remember how it melted out the heart of that big ship? We
could do a lot with that."
"Not a chance! Djorn and the others have strictly forbidden the men to
turn it on the enemy since they have given no offense.
"No offense!" he repeated, and added a few explosive remarks.
"No, it looks like a case of get there and do what dirty work we can
to their mechanism before they pot us--and that's that!"
* * * * *
But Sykes was directing his thoughts along another path.
"I wonder ..." he mused; "it might be done: they have laboratories."
"What are you talking about? For the love of heaven, man, if you're
got an idea, let's have it. I'm desperate."
"Nitrators!" said the scientist. "I have been getting on pretty good
terms with the scientific crowd here, and I've seen some mighty pretty
manufacturing laboratories. And they have equipment that was never
meant for the manufacture of nitro-explosives, but, with a few
modifications--yes, I think it could be done."
"You mean nitro-glycerine? TNT?"
"Something like that. Depends upon what materials we can get to start
with."
The lieutenant was pounding his companion upon the back and shouting
his joy at this faintest echo of encouragement.
"We'll plant it alongside the gun--No, we'll get into their working
underground. We'll blow their equipment into scrap-iron, and perhaps
we can even damage the gun itself!" He was almost beside himself with
excitement at thought of a weapon being placed in his straining
helpless hands.
* * * * *
It was the earth-shaking thunder of the big gun that hastened their
final preparations and made McGuire tremble with suppressed excitement
where he helped Sykes to draw off a syrupy liquid into heavy crystal
flasks.
There were many of these, and the two men would allow no others to
touch them, but stored them themselves and nested each one in a soft
bed within the submarine. Then one last repetition of their
half-formed plans to Djorn and his followers and a rush toward the
wharf where the submarine was waiting.
Althora was waiting, too, and McGuire wasted minutes in a petition
that he knew was futile.
"Wait here, Althora," he begged. "I will come back; this is no venture
for you to undertake. I can take my chances with them, but you--! It
is no place for you," he concluded lamely.
"There is no other place for me," she said; "only where you are." And
she led the way while the others followed into the lighted control
room of the big under-water craft.
McGuire's eyes were misty with a blurring of tears that were partly
from excitement, but more from a feeling of helpless remonstrance that
was mingled with pure pride. And his lips were set in a straight line.
The magnetic pull that held them to their anchorage was reversed; the
ship beneath them was slipping smoothly beneath the surface and out to
sea, guided through its tortuous windings of water-worn caves and
rocky chambers under the sea by the invisible electric cords that drew
it where they would.
And ahead on some mysterious island was a gun, a thing of size and
power beyond anything of Earth. He was going to spike that gun if it
was the last act of his life; and Althora was going with him. He drew
her slim body to him, while his eyes stared blindly, hopefully, toward
what the future held.
CHAPTER XVI
Throughout the night they drove hour after hour at terrific speed. The
ship was running submerged, for McGuire was taking no slightest chance
of their being observed from the air. He and the others slept at
times, for the crew that handled the craft very evidently knew the
exact course, and there were mechanical devices that insured their
safety. A ray was projected continuously ahead of them; it would
reflect back and give on an indicator instant warning of any derelict
or obstruction. Another row of quivering needles gave by the same
method the soundings from far ahead.
But the uncertainty of what their tomorrow might hold and the worry
and dread lest he find himself unable to damage the big gun made real
rest impossible for McGuire.
But he was happy and buoyant with hope when, at last, the green light
from the ports showed that the sun was shining up above, and the
slackening drive of the submarine's powerful motors told that their
objective was in sight.
They lay quietly at last while a periscope of super-sensitiveness was
thrust cautiously above the water. It brought in a panoramic view of
the shoreline ahead, amplified it and projected the picture in
clear-cut detail upon a screen. If Lieutenant McGuire had stood on the
wet deck above and looked directly at the island the sight could have
been no clearer. The colors of torn and blasted tree-growths showed in
all their pale shades, and there was stereoscopic depth to the picture
that gave no misleading illusions as to distance.
The shore was there with the white spray of breakers on a rocky shoal,
and a beach beyond. And beyond that, in hard outline against a golden
sky, was a gigantic tube that stood vertically in air to reach beyond
the upper limits of the periscope's vision.
* * * * *
McGuire tingled at the sight. To be within reach of this weapon that
had sent those blasting, devastating missiles upon the earth! He paced
back and forth in the small room to stop and stare again, and resume
his pacing that helped to while away the hours they must wait. For
there were man-shapes swarming over the land, and the dull, blood-red
of their loose uniforms marked them as members of the fighting force
spawned by this prolific breed.
"Not a chance until they're out of the picture," said the impatient
man; "they would snow us under. It's just as I thought: we must wait
until the gun is ready to fire; then they will beat it. They won't
want to be around when that big boy cuts loose."
"And then?" asked Althora.
"Then Sykes and I will take our collection of gallon flasks ashore,
and I sure hope we don't stumble." He grinned cheerfully at the girl.
"That reinforced concrete dome seems to be where they get down into
the ground; it is close to the base of the gun. We will go there--blow
it open if we have to--but manage in some way to get down below. Then
a time-fuse on the charge, and the boat will take me off, and we will
leave as fast as these motors can drive us."
He omitted to mention any possible danger to Sykes and himself in the
handling of their own explosive, and he added casually, "You will stay
here and see that there is no slip-up on the getaway."
He had to translate the last remark into language the girl could
understand. But Althora shook her head.
"You do try so hard to get rid of me, Tommy," the laughed, "but it is
no use. I am going with you--do not argue--and I will help you with
the attack. Three will work faster than two--and I am going."
McGuire was silent, then nodded his assent. He was learning, this
Earth-man, what individual freedom really meant.
* * * * *
Only the western sky showed golden masses on the shining screen when
McGuire spoke softly to the captain:
"Your men will put us ashore; you may ask them to stand by now." And
to Professor Sykes, "Better get that 'soup' of yours ready to load."
The red-clad figures were growing dim on the screen, and the blotches
of colors that showed where they were grouped were few. Some there
were who left such groups to flee precipitately toward a waiting
airship.
This was something the lieutenant had not foreseen. He had expected
that the force that served the gun would have some shock-proof
shelter; he had not anticipated a fighting ship to take them away.
"That's good," he exulted; "that is a lucky break. If they just get
out of sight we will have the place to ourselves."
There were no red patches on the screen now, and the picture thrown
before them showed the big ship, its markings of red and white
distinct even in the shadow-light of late afternoon, rising slowly
into the air. It gathered speed marvelously and vanished to a speck
beyond the land.
"We're getting the breaks," said McGuire crisply. "All right--let's
go!"
The submarine rose smoothly, and the sealed doors in the
superstructure were opened while yet there was water to come trickling
in. Men came with a roll of cloth that spread open to the shape of a
small boat, while a metal frame expanded within it to hold it taut.
McGuire gasped with dismay as a seaman launched it and leaped heavily
into the frail shell to attach a motor to one end.
"Metal!" the captain reassured him; "woven metal, and water-tight! You
could not pierce it with anything less than a projector."
* * * * *
Sykes was ready with one of the crystal flasks as the boat was brought
alongside, and McGuire followed with another. They took ten of the
harmless-looking containers, and both men held their breaths as the
boat grounded roughly on the boulder-strewn shore.
They lifted them out and bedded them in the sand, then returned to the
submarine. This time Althora, too, stepped into the boat. They loaded
in the balance of the containers; the motor purred. Another landing,
and they stood at last on the island, where a mammoth tube towered
into the sky and the means for its destruction was at their feet.
But there was little time; already the light was dimming, and the time
for the firing of the big weapon was drawing near. The men worked like
mad to carry the flasks to the base of the gun, where a dome of
concrete marked the entrance to the rooms below.
Each man held a flask of the deadly fluid when Althora led the way
where stairs went deep down into the earth under the domed roof. This
part of the work had been foreseen, and the girl held a slender
cylinder that threw a beam of light, intensely bright.
They found a surprising simplicity in the arrangements underground.
Two rooms only had been carved from the solid rock, and one of these
ended in a wall of gray metal that could be only the great base of the
gun. But nowhere was a complication of mechanism that might be damaged
or destroyed, nor any wiring or firing device.
A round door showed sharp edges in the gray metal, but only the
strength of many men could have removed its huge bolts, and these two
knew there must be other doors to seal in the mighty charge.
"Not a wire!" the scientist exclaimed. "How do they fire it?" The
answer came to him with the question.
"Radio, of course; and the receiving set is in the charge itself; the
barrel of the gun is its own antenna. They must fire it from a
distance--back on the island where we were, perhaps. It would need to
be accurately timed."
"Come on!" shouted McGuire, and raised the flask of explosive to his
shoulder.
* * * * *
Each one knew the need for haste; each waited every moment for the
terrible blast of gun-fire that would jar their bodies to a lifeless
pulp or, by detonating their own explosive, destroy them utterly. But
they carried the flasks again to the top, and the three of them worked
breathlessly to place their whole supply where McGuire directed.
The massive barrel of the gun was beside them; it was held in
tremendous castings of metal that bolted to anchorage in the ground.
One great brace had an overhanging flange; the explosive was placed
beneath it.
Professor Sykes had come prepared. He attached a detonator to one of
the flasks, and while the other two were placing the explosive in
position he fastened two wires to the apparatus with steady but
hurrying fingers; then at full speed he ran with the spool from which
the wires unwound.
McGuire and Althora were behind him, running for the questionable
safety of the sand-hills. Sykes stopped in the shelter of a tiny
valley where winds had heaped the sand.
"Down!" he shouted. "Get down--behind that sand dune, there!"
He dropped beside them, the bared ends of the wires in his hands.
There was a battery, too, a case no larger than his hands. Professor
Sykes, it appeared, had gained some few concessions from his friends,
who had learned to respect him in the field of science.
One breathless moment he waited; then--
"Now!" he whispered, and touched the battery's terminals with the bare
wires.
* * * * *
To McGuire it seemed, in that instant of shattering chaos, that the
great gun itself must have fired. He had known the jar of heavy
artillery at close range; he had had experience with explosives. He
had even been near when a government arsenal had thrown the
countryside into a hell of jarring, ear-splitting pandemonium. But the
concussion that shook the earth under him now was like nothing he had
known.
The hill of sand that sheltered them vanished to sweep in a sheet
above their heads. And the air struck down with terrific weight, then
left them in an airless void that seemed to make their bodies swell
and explode. It rushed back in a whirling gale to sweep showers of
sand and pebbles over the helpless forms of the three who lay battered
and stunned.
An instant that was like an age; then the scientist pointed with a
weak and trembling hand where a towering spire of metallic gray leaned
slowly in the air. So slowly it moved, to the eyes of the watchers--a
great arc of gathering force and speed that shattered the ground where
it struck.
"The gun!" was all that the still-dazed lieutenant could say.
"The--the gun!" And he fell to shivering uncontrollably, while tears
of pure happiness streamed down his face.
The mammoth siege gun--the only weapon for bombardment of the helpless
Earth--was a mass of useless metal, a futile thing that lay twisted
and battered on the sands of the sea.
* * * * *
The submarine now showed at a distance; it had withdrawn, by
prearrangement, to the shelter of the deeper water. McGuire looked
carefully at the watch on his wrist, and listened to make certain that
the explosion had not stopped it. Sykes had told him the length of the
Venusian day--twenty hours and nineteen minutes of Earth time, and he
had made his calculations from the day of the Venusians. And, morning
and night, McGuire had set his watch back and had learned to make a
rough approximation of the time of that world.
The watch now said five-thirteen, and the sun was almost gone; a line
of gold in the western sky; and McGuire knew that it was a matter only
of minutes till the blast of the big gun would rock the island. One
heavy section of the great barrel was resting upon the shattered base,
and McGuire realized that this blocking of the monster's throat must
mean it would tear itself and the island around it to fragments when
it fired. He ran toward the beach and waved his arms wildly in air to
urge on the speeding craft that showed dim and vague across the
heaving sea.
It drove swiftly toward them and stopped for the launching of the
little boat. There was a delay, and McGuire stood quivering with
impatience where the others, too, watched the huddle of figures on the
submarine's deck.
It was Althora who first sensed their danger. Her voice was shrill
with terror as she seized McGuire's arm and pointed landward.
"Tommy--Tommy!" she said. "They are coming! I saw them!"
* * * * *
A swarming of red figures over the nearby dunes gave quick
confirmation of her words. McGuire looked about him for a
weapon--anything to add efficiency to his bare hands--and the swarm
was upon them as he looked.
He leaped quickly between Althora and the nearest figures that
stretched out grasping hands, and a red face went white under the
smashing impact of the flyer's fist.
They poured over the sand-hills now---scores of leaping
man-shapes--and McGuire knew in an instant of self-accusation that
there had been a shelter after all, where a portion of the enemy force
had stayed. The explosion had brought them, and now--
He struck in a raging frenzy at the grotesque things that came racing
upon them. He knew Sykes was fighting too. He tore wildly at the lean
arms that bound him and kept him from those a step or two away who
were throwing the figure of a girl across the shoulders of one of
their men, while her eyes turned hopelessly toward McGuire.
They threw the two men upon the sand and crowded to kneel on the
prostrate bodies and strike and tear with their long hands, then tied
them at ankles and wrists with metal cords, and raised them helpless
and bound in the air.
One of the red creatures pointed a long arm toward the demolished gun
and shrieked something in a terror-filled tone. The others, at the
sound, raced off through the sand, while those with the burden of the
three captives followed as best they could.
"The gun!" said Professor Sykes in a thick voice: the words were
jolted out of him as the two who carried him staggered and ran. "They
know--that it--hasn't--gone off--"
* * * * *
The straggling troop that strung out across the dim-lit dunes was
approaching another domed shelter of heavy concrete. They crowded
inside, and the bodies of the three were thrown roughly to the floor,
while the red creatures made desperate haste to close the heavy door.
Then down they went into the deeper safety of a subterranean room,
where the massive walls about them quivered to a nerve-deadening jar.
It shook those standing to the floor, and the silence that followed
was changed to a bedlam by the inhuman shrieking of the creatures who
were gloating over their safety and the capture they had achieved.
They leaped and capered in a maniacal outburst and ceased only at the
shrill order of one who was in command.
At his direction the three were carried out of doors and thrown upon
the ground. McGuire turned his head to see the face of Althora. There
was blood trickling from a cut on her temple, and her eyes were dazed
and blurred, but she managed a trembling smile for the anxious eyes of
the man who could only struggle hopelessly against the thin wires that
held him.
Althora hurt! Bound with those cutting metal cords! Althora--in such
beastly hands! He groaned aloud at the thought.
"You should never have come; I should never have let you. I have got
you into this!" He groaned again in an agony of self-reproach, then
lay silent and waited for what must come. And the answer to his
speculations came from the night above, where the lights of a ship
marked the approach of an enemy craft.
* * * * *
The ships of the red race could travel fast, as McGuire knew, but the
air monster whose shining, pointed beak hung above them where they lay
helpless in the torturing bonds of fine wire, was to give him a new
conception of speed.
It shot to the five thousand-foot level, when the captives were safe
aboard, and the dark air shrieked like a tortured animal where the
steel shell tore it to tatters. And the radio, in an adjoining room,
never ceased in its sputtering, changing song.
The destruction of the Earth-bombarding gun! The capture of the two
Earth-men who had dared to fight back! And a captive woman of the
dreaded race of true Venusians! There was excitement and news enough
for one world. And the discordant singing of the radio was sounding in
the ears of the leaders of that world.
They were waiting on the platform in the great hall where Sykes and
McGuire had stood, and their basilisk eyes glared unwinkingly down at
the three who were thrown at their feet.
The leader of them all, Torg himself, arose from his ornate throne and
strode forward for a closer view of the trophies his huntsmen had
brought in. A whistled word from him and the wires that had bound
Althora's slim ankles were cut, while a red-robed warrior dragged her
roughly to her feet to stand trembling and swaying as the blood shot
cruelly through her cramped limbs.
Torg's eyes to McGuire were those of a devil feasting on human flesh,
as he stared appraisingly and gloatingly at the girl who tried vainly
to return the look without flinching. He spoke for a moment in a harsh
tone, and the seated councilors echoed his weird notes approvingly.
"What does he say?" McGuire implored, though he knew there could be
nothing of good in that abominable voice. "What does he say, Althora?"
* * * * *
The face that turned slowly to him was drained of the last vestige of
color. "I--do not--know," she said in a whisper scarcely audible; "but
he thinks--terrible things!"
She seemed speaking of some nightmare vision as she added haltingly,
"There is a fleet of many ships, and Torg is in command. He has
thousands of men, and he goes forth to conquer your Earth. He goes
there to rule." She had to struggle to bring the words to her lips
now. "And--he takes me--with--him!"
"No--no!" the flyer protested, and he struggled insanely to free his
hands from the wires that cut the deeper into his flesh. The voice of
Althora, clear and strong now, brought him back.
"I shall never go, Tommy; never! The gift of eternal life is mine, but
it is mine to keep only if I will. But, for you and your friend--" She
tried to raise her hands to her trembling lips.
"Yes," said Lieutenant McGuire quietly, "for us--?"
But there were some things the soft lips of Althora refused to say.
Again she tried vainly to raise her hands, then turned her white,
stricken face that a loved one might not see the tears that were
mingling with the blood-stains on her cheeks, nor read in her eyes the
horror they beheld.
But she found one crumb of comfort for the two doomed men.
"You will live till the sailing of the ships, Tommy," she choked, "and
then--we will go together, Tommy--you and I."
Her head was bowed and her shoulders shaking, but she raised her head
proudly erect as she was seized by a guard whose blood-red hands
forced her from the room.
And the dry, straining eyes of Lieutenant McGuire, that watched her
going, saw the passing to an unknown fate of all he held dear, and the
end of his unspoken dreams.
He scarcely felt the grip of the hands that seized him, nor knew when
he and Sykes were carried from the room where Torg, the Emperor, held
his savage court. The stone walls of the room where they were thrown
could not hold his eyes; they looked through and beyond to see only
the white and piteous face of a girl whose lips were whispering: "We
will go together, Tommy--you and I."
(_Concluded in the next issue_)
MYSTERIOUS CARLSBAD CAVERN
The largest cavern ever discovered, at Carlsbad Cavern, N. M., is soon
going to be explored.
Carlsbad Cavern is so large that that three sky-scrapers a half-mile
apart could be built in the largest of its innumerable "rooms,"
according to Mr. Nicholson, who was there once before, about a year
ago. Only 22 miles of the cavern's apparently limitless tunnels have
been explored, revealing such natural beauties that President Coolidge
established it as a national monument.
The stalagmites in the cavern tower 100 feet high. The age of the
cavern was put at 60,000,000 years by Dr. Willis T. Lee of the
National Geographic Society, after his survey three years ago.
The caverns were discovered fifteen years ago by a New Mexican cowboy
named Jim White, according to Mr. Nicholson. White was riding across a
desert waste one day when he saw what appeared to be smoke from a
volcano. After riding three hours in the direction of the smoke he
discovered that it was an enormous cloud of bats issuing from the
mouth of a gigantic cavern. He decided the cavern deserved
exploration, and a few years later he and a Mexican boy were lowered
in a barrel over the 750-foot cliff which overhangs the cavern.
The stalagmites of the cavern, according to Mr. Nicholson, are very
vibrant and resonant. One can play a "xylophone solo" on them with
practice, he said, but it is dangerous, since a certain pitch would
crack them.
The temperature of the cavern is 56 degrees Fahrenheit, never varies,
day and night, winter and summer. The air is purified every
twenty-four hours in some mysterious fashion, though there are no air
currents. This is explained by the theory that there exists a great
subterranean stream at a lower level, probably 1,200 feet down.
Specimens of stalagmites will be collected and reconstructed for the
American Museum of Natural History. The explorers expect to find also
flying fish, flying salamanders, rare insects and thousands of bats. A
Government representative will go along, and drawings and motion
pictures will be made.
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