The Plague, Pestilence & Apocalypse MEGAPACK™

by Robert Reed

  out without being plainly seen . I started up a once and looked for a

  shadow, for it occurred to me immediately that this light was thrown

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  from one of the invisible cars . But there was no moonlight, for the

  moon was just then hidden by clouds, and so there was no shadow

  except such as the light itself might cause . But presently, by walk-

  ing backward from the window and again towards it, and then this

  way and that way before it, I discovered a star which appeared and

  disappeared as I walked . On further inspection it became evident

  that when the star disappeared it was hidden by some object which,

  though dark itself, was nevertheless that from which the light before

  the door proceeded . There could be no doubt that the light in ques-

  tion was thrown from one of the cars, and that the car from which it

  was thrown was not a hundred feet from the ground .

  “Look,” I said, “look! we are closely watched even here .” But

  Jack was already fast asleep . I threw myself upon my bed and lay

  for hours broad awake .

  CHAPTER IX

  THE SEED BEDS

  As I lay awake the events of the last few days passed and re-

  passed before my mind, and the more I thought over them the less

  I felt myself able to give any satisfactory account of them or to see

  any way of escape . I could make up my mind to no plan of action, to

  nothing except passive but obstinate resistance .

  But although I did not see any way of escape I did not feel as if

  we were going to die . I suppose that youth and a sanguine temper

  enabled me to keep hoping . Anyhow I found myself again and again

  reckoning upon a return to civilisation .

  But what kept my thoughts busiest was the fact that Jack and I

  were to be separated next day, and I asked myself over and over

  again, what could be the purpose of such separation . And here, after

  a while, I thought I saw my way a little . Such and such at least I felt

  I could say is not the purpose . Foul play is no doubt what our host is

  quite capable of; but what is to be gained by foul play? Why not kill

  either or both of us openly if he wishes? And when I had gotten as

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  far as that I began to see, clearly enough, part at least of his purpose

  in separating us. And the revelation was greatly more flattering to

  Jack than to myself . Then I fell asleep and slept quite soundly for

  some hours, and I got up quite refreshed .

  After we had dressed and refreshed ourselves there still remained

  an hour before it would be time to keep our appointments . For Jack

  had arranged with the man who had been told off to keep him com-

  pany to meet him at nine o’clock, the same hour at which I was

  to meet Signor Davelli . And here I may as well mention that these

  men or whatever they were, understood our way of reckoning time .

  But they did not, as far as I could see, make use of it themselves .

  They had a method of reckoning time but I was not able to discover

  exactly what it was . I have sometimes thought since then that they

  were able to measure the earth’s diurnal motion directly . But they

  used no clockwork nor (as far as I could see) any observation of the

  altitude of sun or stars .

  In some of the cars which were fitted for long voyages there was

  fixed an instrument about a foot long, and this consisted of a hand

  moving along a graduated scale . I made sure (so far as my very brief

  opportunity of observation permitted) that this hand did not move

  by clockwork, but I was quite unable to discover by what power it

  did move .

  I told Jack very briefly about the light I had seen last night, and

  then we held a brief conference before we parted .

  “Jack,” said I, “you thought yesterday that Signor Niccolo had

  given his man instructions either to kill you or to put you in the way

  of killing yourself?”

  “Yes,” he said, “under certain circumstances . If I attempt to make

  my escape the fellow is undoubtedly under orders to compass my

  death . But not otherwise; certainly not at present . And I need not say

  that I am not going to attempt my escape without you . If you and

  I agree to force a crisis, good and well; then we shall both run the

  risk of our lives . But you seem to think, and I am disposed to agree

  with you, that we had better for the present keep on the watch and let

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  things take their course . Very well, then, I shall not be in any special

  danger to-morrow .”

  “Why do you think so?”

  “Because, as I have said before, this man, or call him what you

  will, has got some design upon you . What that design is will prob-

  ably appear shortly . And he will not hinder the success of it by al-

  lowing anything to happen to me .”

  “And if it succeeds?”

  “Then it will depend on circumstances not now evident what will

  become of me .”

  “And if it fails?”

  “Then I think that you and I are certain to be put to death unless

  we can manage to make our escape from this place .”

  “Which appears hardly to be expected .”

  “Yes, hardly to be expected, but the unexpected happens .”

  “And now, Jack,” said I, “I agree with you in all that you have

  said; but do you know why he is sending you away?”

  “Well, no, I don’t .”

  “I’ll tell you why: he fears your influence over me. I came to that

  conclusion as I lay awake last night . And he means to try on some

  new game to-day or to begin to try . But as I thought over all that I

  couldn’t but go on to ask, why does he want me and not you, and

  why is he shy of you? What do you think?”

  “I can’t say, Bob, unless it be that I am not clever enough .”

  “Clever! you’re a modest man, Jack, I know, but if I did not know

  you to be genuine I should say now that some of the modesty was

  put on . Not clever enough? You’ve seen through this fellow sooner

  and farther than I . You might better say too clever, but that is not it

  either .”

  “Well, what is it, then?”

  “You are too good for him . You have too quick and clear a per-

  ception of what is right, and you are not ready enough to let the lust

  of knowledge blind your conscience . But, please God, this fellow

  will find that I am not after all quite the sort of man he takes me to

  be .”

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  “My dear Bob, I am just as likely as you are to have dust thrown

  in the eyes of my conscience, only a different sort of dust . Your turn

  has come first, that is all. You’ll baffle him and then my turn perhaps

  won’t come at all . Let us both keep our eyes open to-day . If I can

  learn how to manage those cars of theirs, and if they give us half a

  chance, we will make a run for it .”

  “Do you forget the light last night?”

  “I forget nothing, but we will give them the slip somehow .”

  “Well, perhaps we may, for one thing is c
lear me, Jack: those

  fellows once they come among us have to work under the same

  conditions as we .”

  “Did not Dr . Leopold say something of that sort?”

  “Yes, and he was right; that we have seen proves it: everything

  that they do is done by some chemical or mechanical or other con-

  trivance, they have to get round their work just as we have; they

  know more of nature than we do, and so they can do more . But if we

  knew as much we could do as much as they .”

  “Well, all that is so much in our favour .”

  We were now at the foot of the stairway, and it was within a few

  minutes of nine . So we shook hands and parted . Jack went up the

  stairway, and I made my way to the square .

  I saw in the centre of the square a car somewhat smaller than that

  in which we had travelled previously, but, like it, visible throughout .

  It was just alighting as I came up . Signor Davelli was standing in

  the square, and the man in the car was the same whom he had as-

  signed yesterday to Jack, and as he alighted he addressed him with

  a few words and signs as before, and the man went away towards

  the stairway .

  Signor Niccolo turned to me, and, after the usual salutation, he

  said shortly but civilly, “I have had a car prepared like the other .

  As we use them ourselves, you might find them awkward and even

  dangerous . I have left the larger car for your friend .”

  “Thank you,” I replied . “I dare say we shall both do very well .”

  I was glad to know that Jack would have the opportunity that he

  wished for, and I felt sure that he would make the most of it . I felt

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  confident now that we were on the verge of a desperate effort for

  freedom . It was likely enough, indeed most likely, that the issue of

  such an effort would be immediately fatal to us, but, if not imme-

  diately fatal, then I thought that we might escape . Meanwhile I was

  determined to observe as closely as possible every person and thing

  that should come under my notice to-day .

  There was no difference between this car and the other except in

  respect of size . This one was a shade smaller . Also this one was fur-

  nished with some instruments which I had not observed in the other .

  There were two good field-glasses and a very powerful microscope.

  There were also some instruments whose use I did not recognise, but

  they seemed to suggest spectrum analysis . In addition to these there

  were some glass instruments that looked like test tubes, and other

  chemical apparatus of apparently simple construction, but quite un-

  familiar to me .

  We got under way just as formerly, and we moved rapidly to-

  wards the western end of the valley . I reckon that it was two miles,

  or perhaps a little more, from the eastern to the western extrem-

  ity . The valley was bounded all round by hills . But I seemed to see

  to-day more than ever before an air of artificial construction about

  these . From some points of view this disappeared altogether, while

  from other points the evidence of it was all but conclusive . I made

  sure sometimes that I could detect the junction of a great embank-

  ment with the hills on either side, but in each case after I had got

  another view I was not quite so sure . Just the same impression, as I

  have told you, was produced on me by the view of the hills when I

  first approached them from the east; but the appearance or impres-

  sion of artificial construction was very much stronger now.

  I had on this day a very full view of the arrangement of the val-

  ley from end to end . You remember the large square in which on

  the second day we had seen the men drilled, and in which on the

  day after we had witnessed our host’s wonderful disappearance and

  reappearance . You remember also the broad walk which led from

  the eastern stairway to the square . Very well; at the further end of the

  square that walk was continued . It was the same breadth all the way

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  through, and it was planted with trees and with flowering shrubs,

  mostly of a kind which I had never seen elsewhere . On each side

  of it narrower ways branched off, leading to houses of the same

  style as those in which Jack and I were lodged . There was an air of

  trimness and regularity about the whole but no beauty . I can imagine

  one looking at the scene and pronouncing it stiff and formal and

  nothing more . But as I looked I felt that if there was no beauty there

  was at least an eerie suggestiveness that took the place of beauty .

  Seen from above, as we saw, even trimness and regularity have

  an odd look . But after all the trimness and regularity of the scene

  were its least remarkable characteristics . The frowning hills with

  rampart-like ridges between them that might be walls or that might

  be natural embankments; the silence broken only by the whirr of our

  motion through the air, for there was no bird in the valley from end

  to end, and indeed no living creature of any sort except its human (if

  they were human) inhabitants, and I think a few snakes; the uncouth

  aspect of the chimneyless and smokeless houses; the absence of ev-

  ery object that might remind one of the cares and pleasures of life:

  no garden, or orchard, or playground, no child or woman;—all this

  formed altogether a picture as unearthly and inhuman as the barren

  surface of the moon . The odd-looking trees and shrubs which, as

  I have told you, were planted along the roadway, made this worse

  and not better . Their approach to naturalness made the unnaturalness

  of all the rest only the more apparent . Besides, their very presence

  made you feel that it was not nature, as on the surface of the moon,

  which caused the silence and desolation, but some foul and malefi-

  cent influence which was external to nature. The broad walk and the

  rows of houses both ended abruptly, abutting upon a belt of timber

  artificially planted. The trees were like the blue gum, they were so

  close together that no passage between them was possible, and as

  far as I could judge the intervals from tree to tree were quite equal

  and regular . This plantation extended a good way up the cliff on both

  sides, and it was a hundred yards across, or more . Beyond it was a

  space of about twenty feet, and then another row of trees of quite a

  different kind, and like nothing that I had ever seen . But as far as I

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  could guess from such a height the leaves were as thick as the gum

  leaves, but in other ways much larger . This row of trees was nearly

  of the same depth as the other, and extended like it high up on either

  side of the cliff . I have little doubt that all these trees were intended

  as a defence against the vapours which were generated by certain

  works which were carried on beyond, and of which I must now try

  to tell you what I saw .

  From what I have said it will be clear to you that there was only

  one way from the eastern part of the valley to the western, and that

&
nbsp; was through the air . No one could pass through either belt of timber .

  And as we floated over them I noticed that Signor Niccolo at once

  raised the car several hundred feet, and kept well away to the south .

  Then he stopped; then he lowered the car a little and asked me what

  I saw .

  I saw several very unequal belts of what seemed to be cultivated

  ground . But it was a very queer-looking sort of cultivation . There

  was almost no green from end to end of it, and what green there

  was looked like the scum that you sometimes see floating upon the

  surface of a stagnant pool . And even this was only to be seen at the

  southern extremity of the cultivated ground . As you looked north

  the growth was more and more foul and offensive, and thick, filthy

  looking vapours floated over it here and there. I thought of Shelley’s

  ruined garden, where—

  “Agaric and fungi with mildew and mould

  Started like mist from the wet ground cold.”

  Only that here certainly it was not lack of care that produced all

  the foulness, for there was plenty of evidence of care everywhere .

  The beds were divided according to a well-marked plan: they were

  six in all . The bed on the southern extremity must have been over

  two hundred and fifty feet wide, and it had several narrow pathways

  through it, well formed from end to end . Then there was a wide

  pathway, say about eight feet in width, separating it from the next

  bed . The next bed was only half the width, with about half as many

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  narrow pathways through it, and then a walk twice as wide as that

  which separated it from the first bed. Then the third bed was only

  half the width of the second, with a separating walk of about thirty-

  two feet across . And so on, the width of the beds decreasing and the

  width of the walks increasing in geometrical progression, so that the

  last bed was only about eight feet wide, while the walk beyond it

  was about two hundred and fifty feet wide.

  All the beds and walks were the same length . As I was making

  these approximate measurements mentally, with the aid of a power-

  ful field-glass, I observed another fact that seems worthy of notice.

  The foul growths and vapours which, as I have told you, increased

  from the southern extremity of the ground northward, came abso-