Jane blushed, she hated telling lies, and she wondered what David was thinking. It was rather — well — rather an unwomanly thing to have done, but she had done it on the impulse of a moment, prompted by the fear of being handed over to “Willis” — whoever he might be. Her blush was most attractive and was interpreted by its beholders as the confusion of a bride. They did not trouble her any further on the subject of her marriage.
“Why not keep them both?” suggested Glover. “You want a good pilot —”
He was interrupted by the loud booming of a gong summoning the Professor to his evening meal. The Professor rose with alacrity.
“Take them away, Glover,” he said, waving his hand in a lordly manner, “take them away. I’ll think it over while I dine. I’ll see them later, or in the morning, perhaps.”
“May I take them home with me, sir?”
“Yes, yes, do what you like.”
Jane was about to speak, to try once more to persuade Professor Boddington to relent, to beseech him to allow a doctor to visit Sir Richard, but Glover touched her arm and motioned her urgently to be silent.
“It will give my wife and myself much pleasure if you and your husband will dine with us, Mrs. Fenemore,” he said aloud.
CHAPTER
THREE
The Glovers’ Villa
The Glovers lived in a small villa about a quarter of a mile distant from the Professor’s house. Jane and David followed their host meekly as he led them across the fields by a narrow well-worn path. They passed about a dozen villas (built in the newest design, with flat roofs and bow windows) scattered about like an embryo Garden City. The houses were all occupied — or nearly all; bright lights shone in the windows through coloured curtains, and, from one of them, came the sound of music — Jane guessed it was a gramophone — and merry voices. A few fine trees stood like sentinels amongst the houses, and each house had a small garden and a white-painted gate. The moon was bright and the place looked unreal in its white glare, more like a stage scene than a piece of real life.
David tried to question their guide as he led them rapidly along, but he replied very shortly, or not at all, and at last he said in a low voice —
“Wait until we are inside the house. These hedges have ears —”
They stopped at a gate with a large “9” painted clearly on the white wood.
“This is my house,” their guide said. “By the way, my name is Glover.”
Mrs. Glover welcomed her guests with genuine delight; she had been long enough in isolation to be excited by the advent of strangers. Jane judged her to be about her own age; she was a pretty woman with dark hair and a white skin, small and slight and full of chatter.
“It’s a tiny house,” she said, as she took Jane upstairs to tidy herself for dinner. “But perhaps that’s just as well, because, of course, we’ve got no servants. Fortunately, it is well planned and everything is done by electricity, which makes things easier, but I do miss my own lovely house. We had such a lovely house in London,” she added with a little sigh.
“It must be rather dull for you,” Jane suggested.
“Yes,” she admitted, “but all that seems like a hundred years ago, and we’re very happy really, at least I am. I’ve got Jim and my two boys, which is all I need. Jim is a little bored because there is so little for him to do. You see there are only about forty or fifty people here, and all chosen principally for their healthiness — except the professors, who were chosen for their brains —”
“Your husband is a doctor?”
“Yes, he had a big practice in London, and he was nearly run off his feet, but he loved the work. Here, except for an occasional accident, there’s absolutely nothing for him to do.”
“We’ve got something for him to do,” Jane said, and told her about Sir Richard.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, “Jim will love that, and Sir Arthur, too. Sir Arthur Willis, the surgeon, you know. Don’t worry, even the Professor won’t be able to keep Sir Arthur away if he hears there’s a chance of an appendectomy. He hasn’t had his instruments out since we came here, except to cut a splinter out of Mr. Crackling’s hand. Mr. Crackling runs the farm,” she added in explanation.
“I think I remember reading about Sir Arthur’s disappearance from London,” Jane said.
Mrs. Glover nodded. “There was quite a fuss about it in the papers. The Professor had him kidnapped and brought here two days before the ascent. He wanted Sir Arthur because he was the best surgeon in London, but Sir Arthur refused to come without his wife. Lady Willis was very delicate, she had some internal trouble and the Professor wouldn’t have her, so it fell through. Sir Arthur didn’t really believe in the comet, he thought it was all rubbish. Well, the Professor said no more, but just had Sir Arthur kidnapped, and kept him doped until the whole thing was over.”
Jane was beginning to feel positively light-headed at the spate of information she was receiving, but she pulled herself together, and decided that she must not miss a word.
“We all went up in a stratosphere balloon,” Mrs. Glover continued. “Of course, the boys thought it tremendous fun. Jim and I were not at all sure that anything was really going to happen — I think a lot of us felt like that — but we thought there was a chance that he might be right, and we were determined to save the boys. So we agreed to go. It was just as well we did, because, if we hadn’t, the Professor would most probably have kidnapped Jim like he did Sir Arthur — he just takes what he wants, and doesn’t care a brass tack for the consequences.”
“He has the courage of his opinions,” Jane said.
“He is mad, of course,” said Mrs. Glover. “Jim has got some long word for his condition, but I can describe it just as well in three letters — mad. I must say the whole thing was well managed,” added Mrs. Glover, somewhat grudgingly. “Every little detail was thought out, there was no muddle at all, and I expected a frightful muddle with all those animals and birds and insects. I couldn’t help thinking all the time that it must have been like that when Noah took all the animals into his ark.”
“How was it done?” asked Jane with interest.
“The birds were in cages, of course, and the insects in specially prepared boxes and trays, and they were all under the care of experts in that particular line,” said Mrs. Glover. “Some of the people were given injections before we started and they slept through the whole thing — Jim thought it better to do that to the hysterical ones in case they should die of fright or something. And all the animals were doped, but I wanted to see all I could, so Jim did not give me the stuff till after we had started — would you like my comb?” she enquired solicitously. “You look tidy, of course, but I know how nice it is to feel tidy — and some powder —” She pulled out drawers and produced what was required. “It’s so nice to have somebody to talk to, Mrs. Fenemore. I know I talk too much, so just shut me up if I addle your brain.”
“I like hearing about it,” Jane told her. “But surely there are plenty of people here to talk to.”
“Oh yes — but you’re new, and I feel free to say what I like to you. The only other woman here that I really like is Mrs. Hervey. She lives next door, and has a dear baby. They come from Glasgow.”
“Hervey!” Jane exclaimed. “Could that be Miss May Hervey’s nephew?”
They pursued the subject and found that it was. Mr. Hervey being an astronomer, had followed the Professor’s theories, and had managed to procure places in the stratosphere balloon for himself and his wife and baby.
“Miss May will be pleased,” Jane said. It was delightful to feel that she had good news for dear fat little Miss May.
“Have you been married long?” enquired Mrs. Glover, when the subject of Miss May’s relations had been exhausted.
“I’m not really married at all,” Jane said, powdering her nose with care. “My name is really Jane Forrest. But I had to say we were married because Professor Boddington talked gaily of “giving me” to somebody — Sir Arthur Willis, I
think.”
“Goodness!” exclaimed Mrs. Glover.
“We’re engaged, of course,” Jane added. “But only since this afternoon —”
“It was rather clever of you to think of it,” Mrs. Glover said. “But you will have to go on pretending now. The Professor would be furious if he got to know that you had deceived him.”
“Why are you all so frightened of the Professor?” Jane wanted to know.
“He’s powerful,” Mrs. Glover replied. “When a man’s both mad and powerful it’s a frightening combination. Some of us are getting a little tired of being treated like children, but what are we to do? He has his guard, which is really a sort of police force, under Major Keen, and they are his, body and soul. They wouldn’t stop at murder if the Professor ordered it. Jim and I are afraid for the boys’ sakes.”
“Hostages to Fortune,” Jane said.
“Yes, I suppose so,” agreed her hostess. “You can bear a lot yourself, but, when it comes to your children, you want to do the best you can for them, and sometimes I wonder if we have.”
“What do you mean?” Jane enquired.
“We’ve saved them,” Mrs. Glover admitted. “But what have we saved them for. Was it worth while saving them just to be slaves? Jack is going to be a doctor, he doesn’t want to be a doctor at all, and Jim tried to persuade the Professor that he was quite unfitted for it, but the reply was that the eldest son of a doctor was fitted to be a doctor. Each man’s eldest son is to be trained to fill his father’s shoes — just like slaves,” repeated Mrs. Glover, in a low tone. “Now Jack would be in his element in Mr. Franklin’s department. He is mad about stratosphere balloons and all sorts of mechanical things, whereas the sight of blood makes him sick. I don’t really see what good he will be as a doctor.”
While these confidences were in progress David was learning much the same news in different words from his host. They sat in the small cosy drawing-room, smoking cigarettes and sipping sherry.
“I had attended Boddington for some years,” Glover was saying, “and he was good enough to think well of my professional services, so he offered me a place in his stratosphere balloon. I refused to make the ascent unless I could take my wife and boys. Boddington agreed to take them, but he bound us to the strictest secrecy. He did not want anybody to know where the ascent was to take place. He was afraid of a last-minute rush of people anxious to save themselves. Personally I think his fears on that score were groundless, nobody believed in his electric wave. We left London one night without telling anybody of our intention; I was the more willing to do this as I had not enough scientific knowledge to follow Boddington’s elaborate calculations upon the course of the comet, and I had no wish to look a fool. It would have been exceedingly bad for my practice as a fashionable physician if it had got about that I had been taken in by a madman, and spent the night in a stratosphere balloon, so as to escape an electric wave which had failed to materialise.”
“You didn’t really believe in it?”
“I did, and I didn’t,” replied Glover. “When I was with Boddington I believed in it implicitly, but when I went about London and saw everything going on as usual, everybody worrying over their business affairs, buying clothes or planning their holidays, I didn’t believe anything so — so grim, so bizarre could possibly happen.”
David nodded; he could understand that.
“Have some more sherry, Fenemore,” said his host. “It’s quite light.”
“It’s excellent sherry,” David said, helping himself to some more.
“That is one of the few advantages of the new régime,” Glover told him, laughing. “You can live like a fighting cock, and all for nothing. Nancy thinks it is counter-balanced by the absence of servants. Everyone is equal — in theory — in Boddington’s ideal world.”
“Except Boddington,” suggested David.
Glover nodded. “The man is a monomaniac and completely egocentric. His brain has been wavering on the edge of mania for some years — this has finished him. Pushed him right over the edge. Only a monomaniac could have arranged the whole thing and carried it through without a hitch. He has been preparing for years, of course.”
“How did he find the money?” David asked.
“Schnautzer financed him — the man who invented the storage of sunshine. He was to have a place in the stratosphere balloon, and share the honours with Boddington, but he died a couple of months before the day. It was a shock for the Professor — Schnautzer’s death — for the two men had worked together for years, Boddington supplying the brains and Schnautzer the money. They bought this valley in the wilds, and converted it for their purpose. Boddington’s own house was here already, of course. It is a relic of the past. And the farm was here, and the gardens and greenhouses. They built these villas, and the huge shed for the stratosphere balloon, and they set up a dynamo in the river. They even built a large lecture hall which can be used for a theatre.”
“How did he collect the people?” asked David with interest.
“In various ways,” replied the doctor. “I can’t tell you how he collected them all. I’ve told you how I was collected; Sir Arthur Willis was kidnapped on his way to an operation. The two medical students came for a lark. Zumbach was lured here by the offer of a violin — a Strad —”
“Zumbach — the great violinist?”
“Yes, he’s here. He represents Music,” Dr. Glover said, smiling, “and Feruzzi, the painter, represents Art. I think perhaps he is the happiest man in Shallowdale. He only understands about half you say and he does nothing but paint from morning to night. Everybody in the place is a potential model — you must certainly meet Feruzzi.”
“I should like to,” David said, “not that I know anything about painting —”
“He would certainly want to paint you — you’ve got that airman’s look so unmistakably — he would paint you in an aeroplane and call the picture “The Human Bird” — or whatever the Italian equivalent of that may be.”
David laughed, but his eyes were thoughtful. His imagination was stirred by the magnitude of the task that Boddington had attempted: — to collect the most important people in the world, doctors, painters, musicians, etc., and save their lives; to make these people the nucleus of a new civilisation — it was tremendous.
“And the ordinary people,” David said. “The men and women who were harvesting?”
“That must have been difficult,” Dr. Glover said. “I don’t know how it was done exactly. The people were chosen for various reasons — they had to have a plumber, and a carpenter, electricians and builders, and all these people had to pass the scientists for physical perfection, and, of course, they all had to be willing to do what they were told. There are no trades unions in Shallowdale,” continued the doctor, smiling. “Everybody has to turn to and lend a hand when and where they are needed. This last week, for instance, we have all been working like slaves in the fields getting in the corn. But to return to your question. I don’t know whether they sent people round to different towns and villages to find suitable subjects, or whether they advertised. I have often wondered. Crackling — he’s the practical farmer of the colony — Crackling told me he met Professor Paignton at an Agricultural Show —”
“Who is Professor Paignton?”
“The physiologist. Professor Paignton stood him a drink and asked if he wanted a job as bailiff of a big farm at a thousand a year. He jumped at it, of course, and they put him in here to look after the stock. It wasn’t until he had been here for a couple of months that Boddington tackled him, and told him what was coming.”
“Did he believe it?”
“No, of course not. He’s a practical hard-headed farmer, but the money was good, so he stayed on and did what he was told.”
It was all very interesting, very amazing. David looked forward to seeing more of this place and its inhabitants. But most of all he looked forward to seeing the balloon in which the marvellous ascent had been made.
“Wh
at about the stratosphere balloon?” he said at last.
Glover smiled. “You are an airman, so you know more about that than I do. You must get Franklin and Holmes to explain it to you. I can only tell you what happened from a layman’s point of view —”
“Please do,” David said eagerly.
Glover lighted another cigarette and began.
“I was told to be here on the 27th August, two days before the disaster was expected. We arrived by car, and settled into this house which had been prepared for us. Boddington sent for me the next morning to give me some last instructions. We had already arranged that I was to inject everybody with a specially prepared narcotic to eliminate all chance of panic. You must remember I only knew my own part in the arrangements, we were all under orders, and simply did what we were told. I was rather amused at the imperious way in which Boddington gave me my orders, but I have ceased to find it amusing —” He broke off for a moment, and frowned thoughtfully, then he continued, “I was helped by two young medical students who thought Boddington a lunatic, and the whole affair a vast joke. We started doping the animals at midnight; as each one was done it was carried in to a specially prepared cabin and laid in rows upon straw. There were two large cabins, one for animals, and one for the sleeping passengers, and a small cabin for the professors and scientists. The small cabin was full of weird instruments for measuring height and air-currents and that sort of thing.
“When we had finished loading the animals we started on the human passengers. They were doped and carried in to the cabin on stretchers which fitted into shelves all round the walls. It was a weird sight, the darkness was illuminated by electric flares, there was scarcely a sound, everybody knew exactly what to do and did it. An armed guard stood round the balloon.
“At 6 a. m. all our preparations were complete. We left the ground some minutes later, and soared straight up into the air.”
“The cabins were oxygenated, of course,” David remarked.
“Yes, that part of the business was well done,” replied his host. “It was in the hands of an expert, a man called Barber — I don’t know if you have heard of him, I believe he is well known. At any rate I can testify that I experienced no discomfort at all, in spite of the enormous height to which we ascended. At midday the earth was completely gone — vanished! I was never so frightened in my life. It seemed to me impossible that we should ever find the earth again. There we were, floating in an immensity of space — it was the queerest feeling. Boddington and I, and half a dozen scientists, were the only conscious beings in the balloon. They were perfectly calm, calm enough to start some absurd scientific argument about the curvature of light. I felt as if I were the one sane person in the firmament; it was most unpleasant. Shortly after one p. m. Boddington gave the word to descend. We descended rapidly, and reached the earth about ten p. m. I confess I was thankful to see it. I wondered, as we neared earth, whether or not anything had happened — had I endured all that agony of fear for nothing?
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