*CHAPTER XI.*
*THE DILEMMA OF MR. MEIGS.*
"My, my!" cried the professor. "What has happened, Mr. Meigs? How isit that we find you in this--er--forlorn condition?"
"I'm a wretched man!" wailed Meigs, grabbing the professor's knees inthe stress of his emotion. "You have got to save me, Professor Quinn.It was you who brought me to this awful planet, and if I am slain myblood will be upon your head!"
That was Meigs for you. Even in his dire extremity he did not forget toheap censure upon the head of our great savant.
"You are not going to be slain," said the professor confidently.
"But these creatures are as venomous as centipedes!" murmured Meigs,suffering himself to be lifted erect by the professor. "Horrors! Therethey come now. Oh, this is too much, too much!"
Meigs got behind the professor. Turning our eyes toward the bend, wesaw a detachment of the Baigadd army just hurling itself into sight.
We had made some acquaintance with military affairs in Baigol.
Soldiers, as may be surmised, were armed with zetbais, but word-boxeswere kept out of the ranks. Only officers carried talking machines,matters being ordered on the principle that privates were to hear andobey. Each soldier wielded two zetbais--one with each pair ofhands--thereby enormously increasing his capacity for destruction.
The fighting force of Baigol, we had been informed, although organizedon a smaller scale, was equipped and maneuvred exactly as was themilitary arm of Baigadd.
The detachment approaching at a double-quick in pursuit of Meigs was, aswe afterward found, a company of Gaddbaizets, or royal guards. Theynumbered fifty, wore yellow kirtles, had the torso gilded, and werecommanded by a single officer carrying nothing but a word-box.
The sight of the professor and myself caused the Gaddbaizets to come toan abrupt halt. They had undoubtedly heard of us, but they were far fromexpecting to encounter us there at that time.
The officer was the first to recover his wits, and approached the placewhere we were standing, holding his talking machine over his head andpunching its keys vigorously. His first words were a command to thesoldiers: "Hold your zetbais and make no move against these fiercecolossi until you get further orders from me!"
Then, to us:
"Behemoths! Whence come you and why are you protecting the monster inthe red kirtle?"
Meigs, it could easily be seen, was not on familiar terms with theword-boxes. So far as he was concerned, the captain's words fell ondeaf ears.
"We are from Baigol," said the professor, giving an amiable twist to hiswords by a deft use of Key 7, "and come on an errand from the king ofthat country. This gentleman is a friend of ours----"
"A friend!" screeched the captain's machine. "He is a thief and hasstolen a hundred djins of kaka from our sovereign storehouse."
I thrilled an amused laugh on the seventh key of my own machine.
"How do you know he is a thief?" I asked. "Did you try the indexographon him?"
"I'll do the talking, Mr. Munn," said the professor in our own tongue;then added to the officer: "There must be some mistake, captain. Thisgentleman has a very good reputation and would not commit a theft, suchas you describe."
"He bears the proof of it upon his person," answered the captain. "Itis the kirtle."
Now, a djin is a unit of measurement and corresponds to the inch of oursystem; from which it follows that Meigs stood convicted of stealingabout eight feet of red kaka--enough to make kirtles for a score of theBaigadds.
"What are you harping about?" asked Meigs.
"They say you are a thief, Mr. Meigs," said I.
"Thief!" he blustered, glaring at the captain over the professor'sshoulder. "I deny it, sir, I deny it!"
"He says you stole that kirtle you have on," I continued.
"A man has a right to clothe himself as well as he may," answered Meigs,aggrieved. "I do not count that theft. The country should see that aman is provided with a respectable covering."
This was too good an opportunity for the professor to let slip.
"Suffer your mind to drift back to your own planet, sir," said he. "Itis your opinion that our government owes every poor man a suit ofclothes?"
J. Archibald Meigs cringed under the blow. It was a thrust at hisclothing trust, and it found the weak point in his armor.
"Circumstances are different here," he mumbled.
"In some ways, yes; in other ways, no. King Gaddbai is the monopolistof this planet. He controls the kaka output and charges for itaccordingly."
The captain of the royal guard was growing impatient.
"If you are here on an errand from the king of Baigol," said he, "weshall be glad to escort you to the capital--but not until you havesurrendered the giant who stole the king's property."
"Take us to his majesty," returned the professor, "and we will explaineverything in a satisfactory manner."
But this the captain would not do, and he became so threatening that weretreated behind a barrier of bowlders.
"Display the banner, Mr. Munn," said the professor, and I held up theroyal standard so that the captain could not help but see it. His oneeye gleamed insolently, and he came as near swearing as the seventh keyof his word-box would allow.
"Deliver up the thief," he ordered, "or I will command my men toannihilate you with their zetbais."
It was certainly a critical situation. I had already had a slightexperience with the overpowering properties of zet and didn't care forfurther acquaintance with it. Meigs was nothing to me. He would havestripped the coat from a poor man's back, if he could have had his wayon Earth, and it afforded me secret pleasure to see him hoisted by hisown petard.
The trust magnate did not fail to take note of the war-like movements ofthe soldiers.
"Can't you do anything to save me, professor?" he pleaded.
"We shall not give you up," answered Quinn firmly. "Can you think ofany way, Mr. Munn, whereby we can extricate ourselves from thisdifficulty?"
I have a quick mind, if I do say it, and a happy thought presenteditself on the spur of the instant. Stooping, I picked up a stone; then,raising myself, I let the missile fly straight at the captain.
His shoulder-arms still held the word-box above his head, and the stonesmashed against it and carried it away. It was rather neatly done, forthe captain himself was left untouched.
"Bravo!" cried the professor. "You drew the fangs of the enemy by thattrick, Mr. Munn. You have rendered the captain mute, and his men cannotact without orders."
I had already figured this out in my mind, and it was presently provedthat I had not gone far from the mark. The captain recovered theword-box and attempted to use it, but its mechanism was so disarrangedthat the order to attack became a confused jumble that seemed to sound aretreat.
The whole company whirled and fled, their leader following andgesticulating wildly and helplessly with his arms. Meigs was saved forthe present, and he should have thanked me for it--but he did not.
Seating himself on a bowlder, he gazed pensively down at the red kirtle.
"This is what I call the irony of fate," said he in a morose tone. "Andthen, on top of it all, to be called a thief!"
He leaned his bare elbows on his knees and dropped his face in hishands.
"How did this happen, Mr. Meigs?" asked the professor gently.
"Happen!" cried Meigs, lifting his head with a jerk and glaring atQuinn. "It would never have happened but for you!"
"Have you seen Gilhooly?" went on the professor, ignoring the reproach.
"Poor Gilhooly!" sighed Meigs. "He has become a power in the tractioninterests of the country. The last I saw of him he was hauling trainsthroughout the kingdom."
"We know that much already. How about Popham and Markham?"
"Alas!" groaned Meigs. "Popham is working like a galley-slave in a coalmine; and Markham--well, these little fiends are slowly starving him todeath. All
Markham does is to wander about the kingdom with a plate anda paddle begging food enough to keep body and soul together. Think ofit! And the great Augustus Popham, owner of a controlling interest inall the great anthracite and bituminous fields of Earth, delving in themines of this planet--no better than a two-dollar-a-day miner!"
"Coal fields!" I exclaimed. "What do they need of coal in theseunderground kingdoms?"
"They use the coal in the kingdoms of Baijinkz and Baigossh, which aresituated at the poles," explained the professor. "During the longnights in those countries a certain degree of cold must prevail.But"--and here Quinn turned again to Meigs--"tell us what happened toyou and the other two gentlemen during the storm which separated us."
"We managed to regain the car," replied Meigs. "We could not get in, ofcourse, because you had the key, but we hung to the latticework at thewindows. I am a little hazy as to what happened after that, but I thinkthe car must have been picked up by a terrific gust and thrown to thebottom of that crater in the volcano."
"Ah!" murmured the professor, looking at me. "You remember, Mr. Munn, Itold you I feared something of the kind would happen."
I nodded.
"Proceed, Mr. Meigs," added the professor. "This is all intenselyinteresting. Was the car seriously damaged?"
"I haven't seen the car," resumed Meigs. "A hiatus followed the blowingaway of the castle, and when I opened my eyes again I was a prisoner inthe hands of a legion of those one-eyed creatures. For two weeks I waskept confined--an object of curiosity for the whole kingdom, if I couldjudge from the way the little imps flocked to stare at me.
"After a time I was led off to a place where I joined Popham andMarkham. Need I tell you how affecting that meeting was? Popham shedtears, and both Markham and myself were nearly unmanned.
"Our captors had some sort of a contrivance consisting of a small shaftand cord. One end of the cord was put to Markham's head and a slideflew up on the end of the shaft. Then Markham was led off, given aplate and paddle and cast adrift.
"Popham was the next one to have the queer machine tried on him. Whenhe was removed my turn came."
Meigs wrung his hands despairingly.
"After the storm," he continued with an effort, "my costume was not ascomplete as I would have had it, but those impudent creatures denuded mestill further. In self-defense I was forced to steal this red cloth andrun for my life. Oh, it was terrible! Woe is me that I should everhave lived to see this day!"
"Some good may come out of this unfortunate experience, Mr. Meigs," saidthe professor.
"Good!" almost shouted Meigs. "Sir, you express yourself strangely. Isit good to have a man used to such luxury as I have been fleeing throughthese rocky underground hills merely because he committed theft in orderto retain his self-respect? Have a care, sir! Do not think for amoment that I am under any misapprehension as to the real cause of mysorry situation."
"The king of this country is evidently a man of a humorous and practicalturn," observed Professor Quinn after a little thought. "Theindexograph made him familiar with the natural bent of you threegentlemen and he is seeking to show you the error of your ways. OnEarth you were at one end of a trust; here you are placed at the otherend. Really, I think the experience will prove most wholesome."
J. Archibald Meigs stared at the speaker with distended eyes.
"Is it possible," said he, "that your brain has been turned, likeGilhooly's?"
"Nonsense!" I struck in. "The professor's head is as clear as a bell.He's got the right of this thing, Meigs. The king of Baigadd is makingyou take a little of the medicine you measured out in such large doseson the other planet."
"You are both crazy," snarled Meigs. "I never stripped a man to hishide and threw him out in the cold world--as the king of this countryhas done to me, in a figurative sense."
"You don't know how much evil you have done," said Quinn, an expressionon his face similar to the one I had seen when he jerked the lever andshot us into the unknown. "You have taken your pound of flesh, Mr.Meigs, but are now under the heel of a monopoly yourself."
"Stuff!" cried Meigs. "We will talk no longer about a matter in whichyou display such poor judgment. Although I have told you my story, Ihave heard little of yours. Am I to conclude that you and Munnpurposely cut loose from myself and my friends? After bringing us tothis miserable planet did you have the heart willfully to abandon us?"
"Not at all, Meigs," said the professor hastily.
I wondered if Meigs had forgotten all about the attempt he and hisfriends had made to abandon the professor and me? He was one of themost inconsistent men I have ever encountered.
"Like yourself and the others, Mr. Meigs," continued the professor, "Mr.Munn and I were taken prisoners----"
"But you were not treated with the same barbarity as the rest of us,"burst out Meigs, his small mind finding even that a cause for temper."You, who engineered the plot, and plunged us all into these terrificdifficulties, escape the consequences. What is that banner?"
"We are under the protection of the ruler of the neighboring kingdom ofBaigol. That is the royal standard."
"Ah," said Meigs bitterly, "you are even received at court--you and aprofessed thief--while Markham, Popham, Gilhooly, and I are no more thanoutcasts! Is there no such thing as justice, even on this disgustingplanet? Look at me! _Look at me!_"
His final request for us to look at him was a frantic wail. He yankedsavagely at his kirtle, and twisted his bare feet around in fearsomedejection.
"We are looking at you, Mr. Meigs," observed the professor quietly.
"Do you find any pleasure in the spectacle? Does not my situation arouseeven a spark of pity? I do not ask Munn for his sympathy, but you,Professor Quinn, although criminally careless in evolving plans andcarrying them out, are a scientist, and you must have a heart."
"My heart is wrung with your misfortunes," replied the professor gently,"but I realize that desperate diseases require desperate remedies."
"What disease are you referring to," snapped Meigs, suddenly changinghis tack, "and what remedy?"
"The disease that afflicts our common country, and which you would denyand ridicule were I even to name it. The remedy, too, you wouldconsider no remedy at all, but a useless infliction of discomfort andmental anguish. What you are undergoing, Mr. Meigs, is not accidental,but providential. The workings of fate are as marvelous as they areeffective. Patience a little, and we shall see what we shall see."
"This is no time for oracular remarks!" scowled Meigs. "Thesefour-handed, one-eyed demons are forcing Gilhooly, Markham, Popham, andme steadily toward destruction. Gilhooly, daft as he is, is pulling hisheart out on their ugly little transportation system; Markham isgalloping from place to place pounding his paddle against his dish andbegging a few morsels of food; Popham is working like a galley-slave,and his wages, already insufficient to give him the necessary food herequires for his heart-breaking labor, are being systematically cutdown; as for me, the army of Baigadd is at my heels. Baigadd!" and, inhis extreme discouragement, Meigs gave vent to a wild, mirthless laugh."Baigadd and Baigol! They sound like expletives from our own goodplanet, but altogether too mild to express the state of my feelings."
"Be calm," adjured the professor, with an apprehensive look at me.
"Calm!" echoed Meigs brokenly. "I shall be as mad as Gilhooly if thiskeeps up much longer." He started forward with a truculent air. "Whatare you going to do for me, Quinn?" he cried. "How are you going to getme out of this fix? Those infernal little soldiers went away, butthey'll come back again. Then what?"
"We are here in the role of ambassadors," answered the professor,"and----"
"Munn an ambassador!" sneered Meigs, drawing away from me.
"And, as such, we are entitled to some courtesy at the hands of KingBaigadd. I feel quite sure that, when the higher authorities understandyou are my friend, they will be lenient in their treatment of you."
"That is rather a vague suppo
sition on which to ground a man's hopes oflife or death," muttered Meigs.
"It is all we can fall back on, Mr. Meigs. There are but six of us onthis small planet, and we must make the inhabitants our friends. If wedo not, annihilation will overtake the lot of us."
"We were fools ever to land on Mercury in the first place," pursuedMeigs, still wild and unreasoning.
He stamped with his bare foot to emphasize his anger, and a sharp stoneunexpectedly gave point to it. With a howl of pain he caught his footin his hands.
I have never been called particularly hard-hearted, but somehow I took ameasure of enjoyment out of all this. However, I had the grace to turnmy head and conceal the smile.
"You must be careful, Mr. Meigs," warned the professor. "Sit down andrest yourself."
"Rest!" fumed Meigs, "just as though such a thing were possible! I amone of the miserable victims of your duplicity, and if I could haverecourse to the law of our planet for about an hour, I would soon putyou where you belong."
"Be sensible," I struck in, perhaps ill-advisedly. "You act like awhipped schoolboy, Meigs."
"I'll hear nothing from you," he cried, glaring at me.
"As I was saying, Mr. Meigs," proceeded the professor, "Mr. Munn and I,although we appear to be free, are, nevertheless, virtual prisoners ofthe king of Baigol. We are being sent to Baigadd upon an importantmission, and on our success or failure depends, very largely----"
"That will do," interrupted the broker irritably; "I don't care to hearan account of your experiences, Quinn. It is evident, I think, that youand Munn have not been crossed by the same adversity which has overtakenmyself and the others. I have a demand to make."
Meigs arose from the bowlder and struck an attitude which he intended tobe both dignified and compelling. With his unshaven face and red kirtlehe succeeded only in making himself ludicrous.
"What is the demand?" inquired Quinn.
"You and Munn are fairly well-clothed," replied Meigs, "and I demandthat you share my distress to the extent of donating enough of your ownclothing to make me presentable."
On the impulse of the moment the professor began removing his coat.When the garment was half off he changed his mind and slipped back intoit again.
"No," he returned. "You have made your own bed, Mr. Meigs, and I thinkyou should lie in it until you experience a change of heart. When youcan truly say to Mr. Munn and me that you realize how sadly mistaken youwere on the other planet, we will share your distress--but not tillthen."
"Out on you for a pair of heartless wretches!" exclaimed the brokerangrily. "Your reasoning is false, and I will never yield assent to it.I wash my hands of both of you"--and he went through the motions--"andif our paths should cross in the future, it is my desire that we pass asstrangers."
He glared at us, turned on his bare heel and made his way to the road.Then he strode off in the direction of the bend.
We watched him silently, the professor with apprehension and I withunrestrained enjoyment. As he was about to vanish from our sight we sawhim come to a startled halt, gaze off along the road that lay beyond thebend, then throw up his arms, whirl and race back to us.
"They're coming!" he shouted frantically; "the whole army is coming! Isthere no way you can save me, gentlemen? Think, for mercy's sake,_think_!"
Meigs was continually building barriers between himself and theprofessor and me, only to knock them down again whenever the slightestdanger threatened him. Had I been the one to decide, he should then andthere have been left to shift for himself.
Adrift in the Unknown; or, Queer Adventures in a Queer Realm Page 11