The City in the Clouds

by Guy Thorne

  CHAPTER TEN

  The wind was getting up on Richmond Hill and masses of cloud werescudding from the South and obscuring the light of the moon, when atabout half-past nine a small, well-appointed motor coupe drew up infront of the great gate at the tower inclosure.

  The small closed-in car was painted dead black, the man who drove it wasin livery, and a professional-looking person in a fur coat stepped outand pressed the electric button of a small door in the wall by the sideof the huge main gates. In his hand he had a little black bag.

  In a moment the door opened a few inches and a large, saffron-colored,intelligent face could be seen in the aperture.

  "The doctor!" said the gentleman from the coupe. The door opened at onceto admit him.

  He turned and spoke to the chauffeur.

  "As I cannot tell you how long I shall be, Williams," he said, "you hadbetter go back to the surgery and wait there. I have no doubt I cantelephone when I require you."

  The man touched his cap and drove off, and the doctor found himself in avaulted passage, to the right of which was a brightly lit room. Standingin the passage and bowing was a gigantic Chinaman, Kwang-su, the keeperof the gate, in a quilted black robe lined with fur. The man bowed low,and a second Chinaman came out of the room, a thin ascetic-lookingperson.

  "Ah, Dr. Thomas!" he said, "we've been expecting you. I am secretary toMr. Morse. Perhaps you will come this way."

  He led the doctor down the passage, unlocked a further door and the twomen emerged into the grounds, proceeding down a wide, graveled road,bordered by strips of lawn and lit at intervals with electric standards.In the distance there were ranges of lit buildings with figures flittingbackwards and forwards before the orange oblongs of doors and windows.In another quarter rose the lighted dome of the great Power House fromwhich the low hum of dynamos and the steady throb of engines could befaintly heard in pauses of the gale. It was exactly like standing atnight in the center of some great exhibition grounds, save that straightahead, overshadowing everything and covering an immense area of ground,were the bases of the three great towers, a nightmare of fantastic steeltracery such as no man's eye had beheld before in the history of theworld.

  "So far, so good," said Pu-Yi with a sigh of relief. "That wasexcellently managed, the motor-car was quite in keeping. Your wonderfullittle friend who speaks my language so well is already in the compoundwith some of the men. He will await here to take any orders that may benecessary."

  I was trembling with excitement and could hardly reply.

  Here I was at last, passed into the Forbidden City with the greatestease.

  "We will walk slowly towards tower number three, which is the one weshall ascend," said my companion, "and I will explain the situation toyou. On the tower top I have supreme authority, except for one man, andthat's the Irish-American, Boss Mulligan. This worthy is much addictedto the use of hot and rebellious liquors, and is generally more or lessintoxicated about this time, though he is more alert and ferocious thanwhen sober. To-night I have taken the opportunity to put a littlesomething in his bottle, a little something from China, which will notbe detected, and which will by now have sent him into a profound,drugged slumber. I then telephoned all down the tower to the lift men onthe various stages, and also to Kwang there, that a doctor was to beexpected and that I would come down to meet him and conduct him to Mr.Morse."

  "Excellent!" I said, "and now--?"

  "Now we are going straight up to the very top. Every one will see us butno one will think anything strange. Moreover, and this is a fact in ourfavor, when Mulligan awakes no one will be able to tell him of theincident even if they suspected anything, for few, if any, of the towermen speak more than a few rudimentary words of English, and I am theintermediary between them and their master. This was specially arrangedby Mr. Morse so that none of them could get into communication withEuropeans. The fact is greatly in our favor."

  I pressed my hand to a pocket over my heart, where lay a little notewhich had been mysteriously conveyed to me early in the evening--alittle agitated note bidding me come at all costs--and passed on insilence until we came under the gloomy shadows of the mighty girdersand columns which sprang up from an expanse of smooth concrete whichseemed to stretch as far as eye could reach.

  We changed our lift at each stage; and I could have wished that it wasday or the night was finer, for the experience is wonderful when oneundergoes it for the first time.

  "We shall ascend by one of the small rapid lifts built for four or fivepersons only, and not the large and more cumbrous machines. Even so, youmust remember, Doctor"--he chuckled as he called me that--"we havenearly half a mile to go."

  On and on we went, amid this lifeless forest of steel with its smoothconcrete and shining electric-lamps, until at last we approached asmall, illuminated pavilion, where two silent celestials awaited us. Westepped into the lift, the door was closed, a bell rang and we began tomove upwards. I sat down on a plush-covered seat and didn't attempt tolook out of the frosted windows on either side until at length, afterwhat seemed an interminable time, we stopped with a little jerk. Pu-Yiopened the door and led me down on to a platform.

  "We are now," he said, "on the first stage--just fifty feet higher thanthe golden cross on the top of Saint Paul's. If you will come up thisslant--see! here's the next lift."

  I followed him along a steel platform for some twenty or thirty yards,the wind whistling all around. On looking to the right I saw nothing buta black void, at the bottom of which, far, far below, was the yellowglow of Richmond town. On looking to the left I stopped for a momentand stared, unable to believe my eyes. As I live, there was an immenselake there, surrounded by rushes that sang and swished in the wind, witha boat-house, and a little landing-stage!

  Then, with a clang of wings and a chorus of shrill quacks, a gaggle ofwild duck got up and sped away into the dark.

  "Yes," said Pu-Yi, "that's the lake. There are many variety of waterfowl fed there, who make it their home. On a quiet afternoon, walkinground the margin, or in a canoe, one can feel ten thousand miles awayfrom London. But that's nothing to what you will see if circumstancespermit."

  I have but a dim recollection of the second stage, which was only astage in the particular tower we were mounting, and did not extendbetween the three as the lower and two upper ones did, forming theimmense plateaus of which the lake was one and the City in the cloudsitself another.

  It was when we had slowed down, and even in the dark lift, that I beganto have a curious sensation of an immense immeasurable height, and Pu-Yigave me a warning look as who would say, "Now, get ready, the adventurereally begins."

  We stopped, the door slid back and immediately we were in a blaze oflight. We were no longer out of doors. The lift had come up through thefloor of a large room. It was divided into two portions by polishedsteel bars extending from ceiling to floor. A cat could not havesqueezed through. On our side, the lift side, the floor was coveredwith matting but there was no furniture at all. Beyond the bars were aTurkey carpet, several armchairs, a mahogany table with bottles,siphons, newspapers, and a large, automatic pistol. An electric fireburned cheerily in one corner and at right angles to it was a couch.Upon this couch, purple-faced and snoring like a bull, lay Mulligan,huge, relaxed, helpless.

  "Good heavens!" I whispered. "Gideon Morse is safe enough here."

  "In ten seconds," Pu-Yi whispered, "by pressing that bell button,Mulligan could have the room full of armed guards, and as you see, thissteel fence is impassable without the key. There are only three keys, ofwhich I have one."

  He produced it as he spoke, inserting it in a gleaming, complicatedlock, slid back a portion of the steel-work, and we stepped into theguard-room.

  "We are now," said my guide, "on the platform immediately under that onwhich the City rests, and about a hundred feet below it. This platformis entirely occupied by this guard-room, a range of store and dwellinghouses, the elaborate electric installation, power for which is suppliedfrom below, Turkis
h baths, a swimming bath, and so forth. Please followme."

  With a glance of repulsion at the drugged giant on the couch I wentafter Pu-Yi, through a door on the opposite side of the room, and down along corridor with windows on one side and arched recesses on the other.At the end of this we came out again into the open air, that is to saythat we were shielded by walls and buildings, walking as it were in asleeping town upon streets paved with wood blocks, while instead of thevault of heaven above, about the height of a tallish church tower werethe great beams and girders which supported the City itself, and fromwhich, at regular intervals, hung arc lamps which threw a blue andstilly radiance upon the streets and roofs of the buildings.

  It was colossal, amazing, this great colony in the sky. Now and then weheard voices, the rattle of dice thrown upon a board, and the wailingmusic of Chinese violins. Two or three times silent figures passed uswith a low bow, and without a glimmer of curiosity in their impassivefaces, until at length we came to a long row of lift doors, with aninscription above each one, and in the center, dividing them intosections, a large, vaulted stairway mounting upwards till it was lost tosight. It was lined with white tiles like a subway in some great railwayterminus.

  Pu-Yi unlocked the door of a small lift. We got into it, it rushed upfor a few seconds and then we came out of a small white kiosk upon ascene so wonderful, so enchanted that I forgot all else for a second,caught hold of my conductor's thin arm and gave a cry of admiration andwonder. A mass of clouds had just raced before the moon, leaving it freeto shed its light until another should envelop it.

  The pure radiance, unspoiled by smoke, mist, or the miasma which hangsabove the roofs of earthly cities, poured down in floods of light upon avast quadrangle of buildings, white as snow and with roofs that seemedof gold.

  I had the impression of immensity, though magnified a dozen times, thatthe great quadrangle of Christ Church, Oxford, or the court of Trinity,Cambridge, give to one who sees them for the first time. But thatimpression was only fleeting. These buildings seemed to obey noarchitectural law. They were tossed up like foam in the upper air,marvelous, fantastic, beautiful beyond words.

  We hurried along by the side of a great green lawn which might have beena century growing, past bronze dragons supporting fountain basins, downan arcade, where the broad leaves of palms clicked together and therewas a scent of roses, until we hurried through a little postern door andup some steps and came out in what Pu-Yi whispered was the library.

  Wonder upon wonders! My brain reeled as we stepped out of the door inthe wall into a great Gothic room with groined roof of stone, an orielwindow at one end, and thousands upon thousands of books in the embayedshelves of ancient oak. It was exactly like the library of some greatcollege or castle; one expected to see learned men in gowns and hoodsmoving slowly from shelf to shelf, or writing at this or that table.

  "But, but," I stammered, "this might have been here for seven hundredyears!" and indeed there was all the deep scholastic charm and dignityof one of the great libraries of the past.

  For answer he turned to me, and I saw that his thin hand clutched at hisheart.

  "It's all illusion," he whispered, "all cunning and wonderful illusion.The walls of this place are not of ancient stone. They are plates oftoughened steel. The old oak was made yesterday at great expense. 'Tisall a picture in a dream."

  I saw that he was powerfully affected for a moment, but for just thatmoment I did not understand why.

  "But the books!" I cried, looking round me in amazement--"surely thebooks--?"

  "Ah, yes," he sighed, "they are the collection of Mr. Gideon Morse,which is second to very few in the world. They were all brought overfrom Rio nearly two years ago. We cannot compete with the BritishMuseum, or some of the great American collectors in certain ways, butthere are treasures here--"

  We had by now walked half-way up the great hall. He stopped, went topart of the wall covered with books, withdrew one, turned a littlehandle which its absence revealed, and a whole section of the shelvesswung outwards.

  "In here, please," said Pu-Yi, "this is a little room where I sometimesdo secretarial work. At any rate it is hidden, and you will be quitesafe here while I go to the Senorita and tell her that you await her."

  The door clicked. I sat down on a low couch and waited.

  The experiences of the night had been so strange, the intense longing ofmonths seemed now so near fruition, that every artery in my body pulsedand drummed, and it was only by a tremendous effort of will that I satdown and forced myself to think.

  Here I was, at her own invitation, to rescue my love. As my mind beganto work I saw that I must be guided in my course of action by what shetold me. Juanita obviously thought that her father's aberration was aform of madness without foundation. She did not know what I haddiscovered. If she did she might realize that her father was possiblynot so mad as she imagined. For myself, after this space of time, I cansay that I was very seriously disturbed by Arthur Winstanley'srevelations in regard to the unspeakable Midwinter and the news that hewas now in England. Perhaps you will remember that in Bill Rolston'stelegram to me he hinted at some suspicious strangers having been seenin the private bar of the "Golden Swan." One of them, I had ascertained,answered to the description of Midwinter in every detail, and the twomen were seen by Sliddim to drive away through Richmond Park in a large,private car.

  Certainly I must tell Juanita something of this and help her to warn herfather, perhaps....

  And then I remembered the elaborate precautions of my ascent, theliteral impossibility of any stranger or strangers ever getting to whereI was, and I breathed again.

  The place--one couldn't call it a room--in which I sat, was simply alittle sexagonal nook or retreat, masked from the great library by itsgreat door of books. Three of the panels which went from the floor tothe vaulted ceiling were of dead black silk. The other three were ofChinese embroidery, stiff, with raised gold, and gems, which I realizedmust be from the choicest examples of their kind in the world. Still, Iwasn't interested in dragons of tarnished gold, with opal eyes, ivoryteeth, and scales of lapislazuli. I was getting restive when the blackpanel, which was the back of the entrance door, swung towards me, and Isaw Juanita.

  She was dressed in black, a sort of tea-gown I suppose you'd call it,though round her shoulders and falling on each side of her slim form wasa cloak of heavy sable.

  In her blue-black hair--oh, my dear, how true you were then to thefashions of the south, and how true you are to-day--there was a glowing,crimson rose.

  We stood and looked at each other, in this tiny room, for I suppose twoor three seconds.

  What Juanita felt she told me afterwards, and it isn't part of thisnarrative.

  What I felt was awe, sheer, impersonal awe, as I realized that I hadsurmounted incredible difficulties, endured ages of longing, plotting,planning, and now stood alone in front of the most Beautiful Girl in theWorld.

  I saw her as that. I remembered the night at Lady Brentford's when theleague was formed.

  And then, thank Heaven, for in another second everything might have beenquite spoiled, I remembered that she was just my Juanita, who had sentfor me, and I took her in my arms and, and....

  * * * * *

  We sat hand in hand upon the odd little Chinese couch.

  "Now look here, darling," I said, "you've told me all about yourGovernor. How he says that you must live up here in this extraordinaryplace and never go into the world again. You think him mad, and yet,d'you know, I don't."

  "But, my heart--?"

  "I've got to tell you, dearest, that he has more reason than you think."

  She shrugged her shoulders--it was about the most graceful thing I hadever seen in my life.

  "But to tell me that I am to be a nun because, if I were to go back intothe world, my life wouldn't be worth a moment's purchase. _Caro!_ It ismadness! It cannot be anything else."

  I didn't quite know how to tell her, and I was considering,
when shewent on:

  "It is getting dreadful. Father cannot sleep, he prowls about thisnightmare of a place all the night long."

  "Sweetheart," I said, "I've been making all sorts of inquiries and I'vefound out that your Governor is really in serious danger ofassassination--or was until he built this place, to which I think thedevil could hardly penetrate without an invitation. Don't think yourfather a coward. Remember what we saw that night in the Ritz Hotel, whenI was just about to tell you that I adored you. No, I'd lay long odds,Juanita darling, that Mr. Morse is more afraid for you than for himself.And there I'll back him up every time."

  She laughed, and her laughter was like water falling into water inparadise!

  "I have you," she said; "I have father--what do I care?"

  "Quite so," I replied. "I think you take a very sensible view of it. Theobvious thing to do is to relieve your father by coming with meto-night, while the coast is clear. Lady Brentford is in town. She willbe delighted to receive you. Once out of the place, we can be freewithin an hour. To-morrow morning I can get a special license from theArchbishop of Canterbury and we can be married.

  "Once that happens, I'll defy all the Santa Hermandads, and all the MarkAntony Midwinters in the world, to hurt you. And as for Mr. Morse, we'llprotect him too, in a far more sensible way than--"

  I suppose I had been holding her rather tightly. At any rate she brokeaway and stood up in the center of the little room. The brightness ofher face was clouded with thought.

  I had not risen and she stared down at me with great, smoldering eyes.

  "So it is true!" she said, nodding her head, "it is true, father and Iare in peril, after all! Names escaped you just now, I think I haveheard one of them before--"

  She passed her hand over her brow, like some one awaking from sleep, andI watched her, fascinated.

  Oh, how lovely she was at that moment, my dear, my perfect dear!

  "But, _caro_, _of course_ I cannot run away with you and be married. _Imust_ stay with father, cannot you see that?"

  Well, of course I did, there were no two words about it. "Very well," Ianswered, "Little Lady of my heart, I'll stick by the old chap too. I'vecrept up here in a sort of underhand way, but not for underhand reasons.After all, I've just as much right to love you as anybody else in thisworld."

  I took her by her sweet hands and I laughed in her face.

  "I'm not the Duke of Perth," I said, "but, but, Juanita--?"

  There came a little knocking at the door.

  Juanita swirled round, flung up her arm--I saw her sweet face glowingfor an instant--and then she seemed to whirl away like an autumn leaf.

  The only thing I could possibly do was to light a cigarette.

  Juanita, having met me, having delivered her ultimatum, having turned meinto a jelly, flitted away quite oblivious of the fact that I was aburglar, an intruder into what was probably the most guarded and secretplace in Europe at that moment.

  My heart sang high music, and that was well. But at the same time Irecognized that I was in the deuce of a mess and had planned out nocourse of action at all.

  I prayed, almost audibly, for Pu-Yi.

  But nobody came. There I was in the sexagonal room, with the golddragons with their jeweled eyes leering at me.

  A dull anger welled up within me. On every side, mentally as well asphysically, I seemed baffled, hemmed in. I determined, at any risk tomyself, to get out into the library. I took two steps towards the doorthrough which Juanita had gone, when I heard a sharp snap just behindme.

  I whipped round, clutching the only weapon I had--which was a brassknuckle-duster in the side pocket of my coat, and then I stoodabsolutely still.

  One of the dragon panels had rolled up like a theater curtain, andstanding in what appeared to be the end of a passage, was the greatbrute Mulligan, with a Winchester rifle at his shoulder, covering me.

  As a man does in the presence of imminent danger, I swerved out of theline of the deadly barrel.

  As I did so--click! A second panel disappeared, and I was confronted byGideon Morse, his hands in the pockets of his dinner jacket, his mouthfaintly smiling, his eyes inscrutable.

  Imagine it! let the picture appear to you of the fool, Thomas Kirby,trapped like a rat!

  Once, twice I swallowed in my throat, and I swear it wasn't from fearbut only from an enormous, immeasurable disgust.

  I turned to Morse.

  "You've been listening," I said, "you and your servant here."

  "I have been listening, Sir Thomas Kirby, that's true. I have everyright to. When a man breaks into my house without my knowledge and makesclandestine love to my daughter, he's not the person to accuse one ofeavesdropping. As for my servant there, you do me an injustice, which Ifind harder to forgive than anything, when you suggest that I allowedhim to overhear what passed in this room just now. He was not at hispost until Juanita had been gone from here some seconds. Mulligan, youcan go now. Sir Thomas, please come with me into the library."

  There was something so magnetic about this strange and compellingpersonality that I followed him without a word.

  "Then you knew," I asked in a husky voice, "you knew all the time?"

  He smiled.

  "Yes," he said, "I arranged a little comedy. The faithful Mulligan wasnot drugged at all, and I did everything to facilitate your entrance."

  "Then that treacherous cur, Pu-Yi, was playing with me the whole time!And yet I could have sworn that he was genuine. When I meet him--"

  "You will shake hands with him if you are a wise man. Pu-Yi wasabsolutely genuine, but he, in common with my daughter, knew nothing ofthe truth until you told it him. He had believed me a madman. Then heunderstood not only the peril in which I was, and am, but also that ofmy daughter. Do you think, Kirby, that I should have built these towers,let imagination transcend itself, made myself the cynosure of Europe,unless I was sure of what I was doing? Now, alas, you've told Juanita,and brought terror into her life as well as mine."

  "Sir," I said, "her relief is greater than any fear. I'll answer forthat."

  I faced him fair and square.

  "God knows," I said, "I'm not worth a single glance of her sweet eyes,but somehow or other she loves me, though she wouldn't fly with me whenI suggested it."

  "She has some decent feeling left," he answered, with a dry chuckle."Well, I overheard everything that passed in that little room and Imust say I rather appreciate the way in which you behaved. You are arapid thinker, Sir Thomas. What suggests itself to you as the next movein our relations?"

  "Quite obvious, sir. You give your consent to my engagement with yourdaughter. You please her, you bind me to your interests by hoops ofsteel--though as a matter of fact I'm bound already--and you add a notinvaluable auxiliary to your staff."

  "Very well," he said, perfectly calmly, and held out his hand. "Now comeand have some supper and tell me all you know."

  Then that astonishing man thrust his arm through mine and led me downthe great library.

  "What a marvelous intellect that fellow Pu-Yi has," he saidconfidentially. "He saw the situation in all its bearings, from allsides at once, and made an instant decision. I'll tell you now, Kirby,that he actually predicted every detail of what has just come to pass.He told me that he owed you his life and was perfectly ready to die foryou, as of course for me and my daughter, but that it had occurred tohim that his living for all three of us might be by far the wisestattitude to adopt under the circumstances. I quite agree with him."

  Then again came the little dry, strange chuckle.

  "But no more peddling poppy-juice to my Chinese, my boy. It plays thedevil with their nerves in the end!"