by H. G. Wells
CHAPTER VIII
THE ROOF SPACES
As the fans in the circular aperture of the inner room rotated andpermitted glimpses of the night, dim sounds drifted in thereby. AndGraham, standing underneath, was startled by the sound of a voice.
He peered up and saw in the intervals of the rotation, dark and dim, theface and shoulders of a man regarding him. Then a dark hand was extended,the swift vane struck it, swung round and beat on with a little brownishpatch on the edge of its thin blade, and something began to falltherefrom upon the floor, dripping silently.
Graham looked down, and there were spots of blood at his feet. He lookedup again in a strange excitement. The figure had gone.
He remained motionless--his every sense intent upon the flickering patchof darkness. He became aware of some faint, remote, dark specks floatinglightly through the outer air. They came down towards him, fitfully,eddyingly, and passed aside out of the uprush from the fan. A gleam oflight flickered, the specks flashed white, and then the darkness cameagain. Warmed and lit as he was, he perceived that it was snowing withina few feet of him.
Graham walked across the room and came back to the ventilator again. Hesaw the head of a man pass near. There was a sound of whispering. Then asmart blow on some metallic substance, effort, voices, and the vanesstopped. A gust of snowflakes whirled into the room, and vanished beforethey touched the floor. "Don't be afraid," said a voice.
Graham stood under the vane. "Who are you?" he whispered.
For a moment there was nothing but a swaying of the fan, and then thehead of a man was thrust cautiously into the opening. His faceappeared nearly inverted to Graham; his dark hair was wet withdissolving flakes of snow upon it. His arm went up into the darknessholding something unseen. He had a youthful face and bright eyes, andthe veins of his forehead were swollen. He seemed to be exertinghimself to maintain his position.
For several seconds neither he nor Graham spoke.
"You were the Sleeper?" said the stranger at last.
"Yes," said Graham. "What do you want with me?"
"I come from Ostrog, Sire."
"Ostrog?"
The man in the ventilator twisted his head round so that his profile wastowards Graham. He appeared to be listening. Suddenly there was a hastyexclamation, and the intruder sprang back just in time to escape thesweep of the released fan. And when Graham peered up there was nothingvisible but the slowly falling snow.
It was perhaps a quarter of an hour before anything returned to theventilator. But at last came the same metallic interference again; thefans stopped and the face reappeared. Graham had remained all this timein the same place, alert and tremulously excited.
"Who are you? What do you want?" he said.
"We want to speak to you, Sire," said the intruder. "We want--Ican't hold the thing. We have been trying to find a way to you--thesethree days."
"Is it rescue?" whispered Graham. "Escape?"
"Yes, Sire. If you will."
"You are my party--the party of the Sleeper?"
"Yes, Sire."
"What am I to do?" said Graham.
There was a struggle. The stranger's arm appeared, and his hand wasbleeding. His knees came into view over the edge of the funnel. "Standaway from me," he said, and he dropped rather heavily on his hands andone shoulder at Graham's feet. The released ventilator whirled noisily.The stranger rolled over, sprang up nimbly and stood panting, hand to abruised shoulder, and with his bright eyes on Graham.
"You are indeed the Sleeper," he said. "I saw you asleep. When it was thelaw that anyone might see you."
"I am the man who was in the trance," said Graham. "They have imprisonedme here. I have been here since I awoke--at least three days."
The intruder seemed about to speak, heard something, glanced swiftly atthe door, and suddenly left Graham and ran towards it, shouting quickincoherent words. A bright wedge of steel flashed in his hand, and hebegan tap, tap, a quick succession of blows upon the hinges. "Mind!"cried a voice. "Oh!" The voice came from above.
Graham glanced up, saw the soles of two feet, ducked, was struck on theshoulder by one of them, and a heavy weight bore him to the earth. Hefell on his knees and forward, and the weight went over his head. Heknelt up and saw a second man from above seated before him.
"I did not see you, Sire," panted the man. He rose and assistedGraham to rise. "Are you hurt, Sire?" he panted. A succession of heavyblows on the ventilator began, something fell close to Graham's face,and a shivering edge of white metal danced, fell over, and lay fiatupon the floor.
"What is this?" cried Graham, confused and looking at the ventilator."Who are you? What are you going to do? Remember, I understand nothing."
"Stand back," said the stranger, and drew him from under the ventilatoras another fragment of metal fell heavily.
"We want you to come, Sire," panted the newcomer, and Graham glancing athis face again, saw a new cut had changed from white to red on hisforehead, and a couple of little trickles of blood starting therefrom."Your people call for you."
"Come where? My people?"
"To the hall about the markets. Your life is in danger here. We havespies. We learned but just in time. The Council has decided--this veryday--either to drug or kill you. And everything is ready. The people aredrilled, the Wind-Vane police, the engineers, and half the way-gearersare with us. We have the halls crowded--shouting. The whole city shoutsagainst the Council. We have arms." He wiped the blood with his hand."Your life here is not worth--"
"But why arms?"
"The people have risen to protect you, Sire. What?"
He turned quickly as the man who had first come down made a hissing withhis teeth. Graham saw the latter start back, gesticulate to them toconceal themselves, and move as if to hide behind the opening door.
As he did so Howard appeared, a little tray in one hand and his heavyface downcast. He started, looked up, the door slammed behind him, thetray tilted side-ways, and the steel wedge struck him behind the ear. Hewent down like a felled tree, and lay as he fell athwart the floor of theouter room. The man who had struck him bent hastily, studied his face fora moment, rose, and returned to his work at the door.
"Your poison!" said a voice in Graham's ear.
Then abruptly they were in darkness. The innumerable cornice lights hadbeen extinguished. Graham saw the aperture of the ventilator with ghostlysnow whirling above it and dark figures moving hastily. Three knelt onthe vane. Some dim thing--a ladder--was being lowered through theopening, and a hand appeared holding a fitful yellow light.
He had a moment of hesitation. But the manner of these men, their swiftalacrity, their words, marched so completely with his own fears of theCouncil, with his idea and hope of a rescue, that it lasted not a moment.And his people awaited him!
"I do not understand," he said. "I trust. Tell me what to do."
The man with the cut brow gripped Graham's arm. "Clamber up the ladder,"he whispered. "Quick. They will have heard--"
Graham felt for the ladder with extended hands, put his foot on thelower rung, and, turning his head, saw over the shoulder of the nearestman, in the yellow flicker of the light, the first-comer astride overHoward and still working at the door. Graham turned to the ladder again,and was thrust by his conductor and helped up by those above, and thenhe was standing on something hard and cold and slippery outside theventilating funnel.
He shivered. He was aware of a great difference in the temperature. Halfa dozen men stood about him, and light flakes of snow touched hands andface and melted. For a moment it was dark, then for a flash a ghastlyviolet white, and then everything was dark again.
He saw he had come out upon the roof of the vast city structure which hadreplaced the miscellaneous houses, streets and open spaces of VictorianLondon. The place upon which he stood was level, with huge serpentinecables lying athwart it in every direction. The circular wheels of anumber of windmills loomed indistinct and gigantic through the darknessand snowfall, and roared with a
varying loudness as the fitful wind roseand fell. Some way off an intermittent white light smote up from below,touched the snow eddies with a transient glitter, and made an evanescentspectre in the night; and here and there, low down, some vaguely outlinedwind-driven mechanism flickered with livid sparks.
All this he appreciated in a fragmentary manner as his rescuers stoodabout him. Someone threw a thick soft cloak of fur-like texture abouthim, and fastened it by buckled straps at waist and shoulders. Thingswere said briefly, decisively. Someone thrust him forward.
Before his mind was yet clear a dark shape gripped his arm. "This way,"said this shape, urging him along, and pointed Graham across the flatroof in the direction of a dim semicircular haze of light. Graham obeyed.
"Mind!" said a voice, as Graham stumbled against a cable. "Between themand not across them," said the voice. And, "We must hurry."
"Where are the people?" said Graham. "The people you said awaited me?"
The stranger did not answer. He left Graham's arm as the path grewnarrower, and led the way with rapid strides. Graham followed blindly. Ina minute he found himself running. "Are the others coming?" he panted,but received no reply. His companion glanced back and ran on. They cameto a sort of pathway of open metal-work, transverse to the direction theyhad come, and they turned aside to follow this. Graham looked back, butthe snowstorm had hidden the others.
"Come on!" said his guide. Running now, they drew near a little windmillspinning high in the air. "Stoop," said Graham's guide, and they avoidedan endless band running roaring up to the shaft of the vane. "This way!"and they were ankle deep in a gutter full of drifted thawing snow,between two low walls of metal that presently rose waist high. "I will gofirst," said the guide. Graham drew his cloak about him and followed.Then suddenly came a narrow abyss across which the gutter leapt to thesnowy darkness of the further side. Graham peeped over the side once andthe gulf was black. For a moment he regretted his flight. He dared notlook again, and his brain spun as he waded through the half liquid snow.
Then out of the gutter they clambered and hurried across a wide flatspace damp with thawing snow, and for half its extent dimly translucentto lights that went to and fro underneath. He hesitated at this unstablelooking substance, but his guide ran on unheeding, and so they came toand clambered up slippery steps to the rim of a great dome of glass.Round this they went. Far below a number of people seemed to be dancing,and music filtered through the dome.... Graham fancied he heard ashouting through the snowstorm, and his guide hurried him on with a newspurt of haste. They clambered panting to a space of huge windmills, oneso vast that only the lower edge of its vanes came rushing into sight andrushed up again and was lost in the night and the snow. They hurried fora time through the colossal metallic tracery of its supports, and came atlast above a place of moving platforms like the place into which Grahamhad looked from the balcony. They crawled across the sloping transparencythat covered this street of platforms, crawling on hands and kneesbecause of the slipperiness of the snowfall.
For the most part the glass was bedewed, and Graham saw only hazysuggestions of the forms below, but near the pitch of the transparentroof the glass was clear, and he found himself looking sheerly downupon it all. For awhile, in spite of the urgency of his guide, he gaveway to vertigo and lay spread-eagled on the glass, sick and paralysed.Far below, mere stirring specks and dots, went the people of theunsleeping city in their perpetual daylight, and the moving platformsran on their incessant journey. Messengers and men on unknownbusinesses shot along the drooping cables and the frail bridges werecrowded with men. It was like peering into a gigantic glass hive, andit lay vertically below him with only a tough glass of unknownthickness to save him from a fall. The street showed warm and lit, andGraham was wet now to the skin with thawing snow, and his feet werenumbed with cold. For a space he could not move. "Come on!" cried hisguide, with terror in his voice. "Come on!"
Graham reached the pitch of the roof by an effort.
Over the ridge, following his guide's example, he turned about and slidbackward down the opposite slope very swiftly, amid a little avalanche ofsnow. While he was sliding he thought of what would happen if some brokengap should come in his way. At the edge he stumbled to his feet ankledeep in slush, thanking heaven for an opaque footing again. His guide wasalready clambering up a metal screen to a level expanse.
Through the spare snowflakes above this loomed another line of vastwindmills, and then suddenly the amorphous tumult of the rotating wheelswas pierced with a deafening sound. It was a mechanical shrilling ofextraordinary intensity that seemed to come simultaneously from everypoint of the compass.
"They have missed us already!" cried Graham's guide in an accent ofterror, and suddenly, with a blinding flash, the night became day.
Above the driving snow, from the summits of the wind-wheels, appearedvast masts carrying globes of livid light. They receded in illimitablevistas in every direction. As far as his eye could penetrate the snowfallthey glared.
"Get on this," cried Graham's conductor, and thrust him forward to a longgrating of snowless metal that ran like a band between two slightlysloping expanses of snow. It felt warm to Graham's benumbed feet, and afaint eddy of steam rose from it.
"Come on!" shouted his guide ten yards off, and, without waiting, ranswiftly through the incandescent glare towards the iron supports of thenext range of wind-wheels. Graham, recovering from his astonishment,followed as fast, convinced of his imminent capture....
In a score of seconds they were within a tracery of glare and blackshadows shot with moving bars beneath the monstrous wheels. Graham'sconductor ran on for some time, and suddenly darted sideways and vanishedinto a black shadow in the corner of the foot of a huge support. Inanother moment Graham was beside him.
They cowered panting and stared out.
The scene upon which Graham looked was very wild and strange. The snowhad now almost ceased; only a belated flake passed now and again acrossthe picture. But the broad stretch of level before them was a ghastlywhite, broken only by gigantic masses and moving shapes and lengthystrips of impenetrable darkness, vast ungainly Titans of shadow. Allabout them, huge metallic structures, iron girders, inhumanly vast as itseemed to him, interlaced, and the edges of wind-wheels, scarcely movingin the lull, passed in great shining curves steeper and steeper up into aluminous haze. Wherever the snow-spangled light struck down, beams andgirders, and incessant bands running with a halting, indomitableresolution, passed upward and downward into the black. And with all thatmighty activity, with an omnipresent sense of motive and design, thissnow-clad desolation of mechanism seemed void of all human presence savethemselves, seemed as trackless and deserted and unfrequented by men assome inaccessible Alpine snowfield.
"They will be chasing us," cried the leader. "We are scarcely halfwaythere yet. Cold as it is we must hide here for a space--at least until itsnows more thickly again."
His teeth chattered in his head.
"Where are the markets?" asked Graham staring out. "Where are allthe people?"
The other made no answer.
"_Look_!" whispered Graham, crouched close, and became very still.
The snow had suddenly become thick again, and sliding with the whirlingeddies out of the black pit of the sky came something, vague and largeand very swift. It came down in a steep curve and swept round, wide wingsextended and a trail of white condensing steam behind it, rose with aneasy swiftness and went gliding up the air, swept horizontally forward ina wide curve, and vanished again in the steaming specks of snow. And,through the ribs of its body, Graham saw two little men, very minute andactive, searching the snowy areas about him, as it seemed to him, withfield glasses. For a second they were clear, then hazy through a thickwhirl of snow, then small and distant, and in a minute they were gone.
"_Now_!" cried his companion. "Come!"
He pulled Graham's sleeve, and incontinently the two were runningheadlong down the arcade of iron-work beneath the wind-wheels. Graham,running
blindly, collided with his leader, who had turned back on himsuddenly. He found himself within a dozen yards of a black chasm. Itextended as far as he could see right and left. It seemed to cut offtheir progress in either direction.
"Do as I do," whispered his guide. He lay down and crawled to the edge,thrust his head over and twisted until one leg hung. He seemed to feelfor something with his foot, found it, and went sliding over the edgeinto the gulf. His head reappeared. "It is a ledge," he whispered. "Inthe dark all the way along. Do as I did."
Graham hesitated, went down upon all fours, crawled to the edge, andpeered into a velvety blackness. For a sickly moment he had courageneither to go on nor retreat, then he sat and hung his leg down, felt hisguide's hands pulling at him, had a horrible sensation of sliding overthe edge into the unfathomable, splashed, and felt himself in a slushygutter, impenetrably dark.
"This way," whispered the voice, and he began crawling along the gutterthrough the trickling thaw, pressing himself against the wall. Theycontinued along it for some minutes. He seemed to pass through a hundredstages of misery, to pass minute after minute through a hundred degreesof cold, damp, and exhaustion. In a little while he ceased to feel hishands and feet.
The gutter sloped downwards. He observed that they were now many feetbelow the edge of the buildings. Rows of spectral white shapes like theghosts of blind-drawn windows rose above them. They came to the end of acable fastened above one of these white windows, dimly visible anddropping into impenetrable shadows. Suddenly his hand came against hisguide's. "_Still_!" whispered the latter very softly.
He looked up with a start and saw the huge wings of the flying machinegliding slowly and noiselessly overhead athwart the broad band ofsnow-flecked grey-blue sky. In a moment it was hidden again.
"Keep still; they were just turning."
For awhile both were motionless, then Graham's companion stood up, andreaching towards the fastenings of the cable fumbled with someindistinct tackle.
"What is that?" asked Graham.
The only answer was a faint cry. The man crouched motionless. Grahampeered and saw his face dimly. He was staring down the long ribbon ofsky, and Graham, following his eyes, saw the flying machine small andfaint and remote. Then he saw that the wings spread on either side, thatit headed towards them, that every moment it grew larger. It wasfollowing the edge of the chasm towards them.
The man's movements became convulsive. He thrust two cross bars intoGraham's hand. Graham could not see them, he ascertained their form byfeeling. They were slung by thin cords to the cable. On the cord werehand grips of some soft elastic substance. "Put the cross between yourlegs," whispered the guide hysterically, "and grip the holdfasts. Griptightly, grip!"
Graham did as he was told.
"Jump," said the voice. "In heaven's name, jump!"
For one momentous second Graham could not speak. He was glad afterwardsthat darkness hid his face. He said nothing. He began to trembleviolently. He looked sideways at the swift shadow that swallowed up thesky as it rushed upon him.
"Jump! Jump--in God's name! Or they will have us," cried Graham's guide,and in the violence of his passion thrust him forward.
Graham tottered convulsively, gave a sobbing cry, a cry in spite ofhimself, and then, as the flying machine swept over them, fell forwardinto the pit of that darkness, seated on the cross wood and holding theropes with the clutch of death. Something cracked, something rappedsmartly against a wall. He heard the pulley of the cradle hum on itsrope. He heard the aeronauts shout. He felt a pair of knees digging intohis back.... He was sweeping headlong through the air, falling throughthe air. All his strength was in his hands. He would have screamed but hehad no breath.
He shot into a blinding light that made him grip the tighter. Herecognised the great passage with the running ways, the hanging lightsand interlacing girders. They rushed upward and by him. He had amomentary impression of a great round mouth yawning to swallow him up.
He was in the dark again, falling, falling, gripping with aching hands,and behold! a clap of sound, a burst of light, and he was in a brightlylit hall with a roaring multitude of people beneath his feet. The people!His people! A proscenium, a stage rushed up towards him, and his cableswept down to a circular aperture to the right of this. He felt he wastravelling slower, and suddenly very much slower. He distinguished shoutsof "Saved! The Master. He is safe!" The stage rushed up towards him withrapidly diminishing swiftness. Then--
He heard the man clinging behind him shout as if suddenly terrified, andthis shout was echoed by a shout from below. He felt that he was nolonger gliding along the cable but falling with it. There was a tumult ofyells, screams, and cries. He felt something soft against his extendedhand, and the impact of a broken fall quivering through his arm....
He wanted to be still and the people were lifting him. He believedafterwards he was carried to the platform and given some drink, but hewas never sure. He did not notice what became of his guide. When his mindwas clear again he was on his feet; eager hands were assisting him tostand. He was in a big alcove, occupying the position that in hisprevious experience had been devoted to the lower boxes. If this wasindeed a theatre.
A mighty tumult was in his ears, a thunderous roar, the shouting of acountless multitude. "It is the Sleeper! The Sleeper is with us!"
"The Sleeper is with us! The Master--the Owner! The Master is with us.He is safe."
Graham had a surging vision of a great hall crowded with people. He sawno individuals, he was conscious of a froth of pink faces, of waving armsand garments, he felt the occult influence of a vast crowd pouring overhim, buoying him up. There were balconies, galleries, great archwaysgiving remoter perspectives, and everywhere people, a vast arena ofpeople, densely packed and cheering. Across the nearer space lay thecollapsed cable like a huge snake. It had been cut by the men of theflying machine at its upper end, and had crumpled down into the hall. Menseemed to be hauling this out of the way. But the whole effect was vague,the very buildings throbbed and leapt with the roar of the voices.
He stood unsteadily and looked at those about him. Someone supported himby one arm. "Let me go into a little room," he said, weeping; "a littleroom," and could say no more. A man in black stepped forward, took hisdisengaged arm. He was aware of officious men opening a door before him.Someone guided him to a seat. He staggered. He sat down heavily andcovered his face with his hands; he was trembling violently, his nervouscontrol was at an end. He was relieved of his cloak, he could notremember how; his purple hose he saw were black with wet. People wererunning about him, things were happening, but for some time he gave noheed to them.
He had escaped. A myriad of cries told him that. He was safe. These werethe people who were on his side. For a space he sobbed for breath, andthen he sat still with his face covered. The air was full of the shoutingof innumerable men.