The Hidden World: A Golden Age SF Classic

by Stanton A. Coblentz

  "But, certainly, they could recognize the taste of salt! And, besides, chemists could analyze the capsules."

  "No, they couldn't. They've always had their salt in such minute quantities they don't know what it tastes like. As for the chemists, of course, they made the analysis, but the people had been so well trained in thoughtlessness that they couldn't recognize the obvious. So they went right on believing they'd been poisoned."

  "Even so,” I argued, “what was to prevent the authorities from throwing away the salted food and distributing new capsules?"

  "Nothing. Nothing at all!” Through the darkness, I heard a peal of laughter. “They did just as you say; but they were reckoning without me!"

  "Without you?"

  "Yes; you see, it had come to me that whoever controlled the food controlled the country—and I was getting tired of a second-rate position. I had access to the food vats, and I arranged to have a few more kegs of salt poured into the capsule mixture every time it was made.

  "Then how the sparks did fly! When I felt it about time to strike, I circulated an anonymous letter, stating that I, and I alone, knew how to remove the poison from the food, and offering to give a demonstration. I won't weary you now, Frank, with the details; it's enough to say that, when the people found I could keep my promise and give them unadulterated food, they threw over En Yuno and his party, whom they blamed for the bad capsules, and installed me in his place as dictator, pledged to a policy of ‘No salt in the bread!’ So here I am! A wonderful sort of dictator, eh?” Once more, Clay's laughter rang merrily through the darkness.

  "We're a beautiful pair of dictators, Phil!” I agreed, joining in his laughter.

  Then abruptly, my mirth was cut short. Did I not again see a shadow shifting amid the dimness far down the gallery?

  Clay, however, could see nothing, though he strained his eyes in the attempt. He slapped me heartily on the shoulder, and resumed. “Yes, we've both struck our gait at last! A lovely couple of dictators! But we shouldn't meet like this for a friendly chat. We're supposed to be enemies!"

  "Deadly enemies!” I laughed.

  "If we were found together, it would be treason! Dictators of rival countries aren't expected to be friends."

  "Well, I'll tell you, Phil, we don't have to keep on breaking the rules, do we? Let's both chuck this dictator job and make a dash for home. I know all about the ventilation flues, and if we tried the climb by means of ropes—"

  "Hold on there just a minute, Frank! What's getting into you?” he interrupted. “I've only been dictator a few wakes, you know. I want to find out what it feels like."

  "Oh, you'll find out, all right!” I predicted.

  "Besides,” he pursued, a little more somberly, “don't you think we ought to try to settle things down here before making our get-away? I mean, about this war. Suppose we fix up a little treaty?"

  "A very good idea,” I agreed.

  "We'll have to split up Nullnull between Wu and Zu about fifty-fifty. Then we'll both claim a glorious victory, and the most thoughtless patriots everywhere will be satisfied. First, of course, you and I will have to conduct some diplomatic negotiations, couched in the deadliest and dullest language. Then we'll meet formally as enemies, and sign the treaty. After that, the war will be over, and everyone will go home happy."

  "Splendid!” I approved.

  "Well, I suppose I'd better get back to my followers.” Clay rose from his ledge and took my hand in a warm grip. “Might be missed if I stayed away too long. Guess you're in the same boat. Goodbye ... see you again soon!"

  CHAPTER XX

  TOPPLING THRONES

  According to our agreement, the Dictator of Zu and I lost no time about negotiating for peace. Within about thirty wakes, we had come to the stage of arranging an armistice; and Clay and I, meeting with great bluster and ceremony at the borderline of the two countries, duly affixed our signatures to the document which officially ended the war.

  All this, however, was not quite so easy as it may sound; both of us were splashing in stormy waters. I was unable to keep close track of events in Zu, for the waves were dashing so threateningly about my own head that I had no time for outside affairs.

  Never had any of my acts aroused such opposition as the attempt to establish peace. Even the move to tax the First and Second Classes had been less tempestuously received: the Blare and the Screamer openly condemned me as “capitulating to the enemy,” and were not silenced even by my threat to suspend their publication; the people rose in mass demonstrations, shouting, “Down with Zu! Down with Zu!"

  At the same time, insidious propaganda was being passed by word of mouth through every pit and gallery of the land. “What's to become of the munitions makers if we end the war? They will lose ruinously on their investments."

  "Yes, and millions will be thrown out of work.” ... “Have we none of the ancient hardihood of our fathers? Do we pusillanimously dread to be turned over? Let's not surrender till Nullnull is wholly ours!"

  And, mingled with these cries, there were exclamations about “The lofty ideals of the battle caves,” “The triumph of thoughtlessness,” and “The turnover to end turnovers."

  I was fast approaching despair, and was even debating whether it would not be better to renew the war than to risk revolution.

  Early one wake, shortly after rising from a sleepless bed, I picked up a copy of the Screamer, and was greeted by news that made my eyes almost bulge out of my head:

  REBELLION IN ZU!

  RA THE RIGHTEOUS OVERTHROWN!

  COUNTRY IN A TURMOIL!

  A counter-revolution broke out yesterday in Zu, owing to the charges of military authorities that Dictator Ra the Righteous was be-traying his people into a disgraceful peace. Substantiating their accusations of treason against the popular interests, they produced the testimony of two sworn witnesses who asserted that one wake, shortly after Ra's accession to power, they followed him as he made his way in disguise into a remote gallery at the borderline of Nullnull. There he held an illicit conversation with one who, they say, is high in the government circles of Wu; in fact, they claim to have identified the second man as no less a personage than our own dictator.

  This tale, which can only be held to be a gross libel so far as Luma the Illustrious is concerned, has been accepted without question by the people of Zu. As a result, they have stormed the royal palace, demanding resumption of the war and threatening the life of Ra the Righteous, who is now known as Ra the Treacherous. Ra himself is believed to have escaped. The former dictator, En Yuno, is said to be on his way back to resume power.

  It is impossible to describe with what emotion I read this account.

  I rushed to my secretary and gave orders that scouts be sent out, and that if anyone answering to the description of the former Dictator of Zu was found, he was to be offered sanctuary, as a spy, in Wu.

  Several anxious hours went by—hours during which, in my troubled preoccupation for Clay's welfare, I was unable to attend to the affairs of state or consider my own safety. And then, one of my palace guards approached with every evidence of excitement. After bowing to the floor in the established manner, he addressed me hastily:

  "Your Abysmal Excellency, there is a vagabond outside who asks to see you. I told him it was impossible, you were tied up in a conference; but he gave me a bit of paper, and said that if I passed it to you, you would understand. He must be a madman, Your Excellency, for the paper is filled with a meaningless scrawl."

  "Let me see it!” I demanded.

  I am sure that the man, thoughtless though he was trained to be, was surprised to note the gasp of astonished joy with which I glanced at the paper, and the haste with which I demanded, “Show the visitor in!"

  After the guard had saluted and left, I began to pace rapidly back and forth, while reading over and over again those few words in a handwriting I knew so well!

  A minute later, a queer-looking figure entered. I do not wonder that the guard had called hi
m a vagabond; his robe was ripped and torn in a hundred places, and here and there was stained with blood; a dark hood was drawn over his face, concealing the hair and features; his eyes looked out at me from behind binoculars; his long, cone-shaped hat was battered and dented as if from a scuffle, and the black glove was missing from his right hand.

  My visitor waited until the guard had left; then removed the binoculars, and threw off his hood, revealing a figure familiar and yet strange.

  For a moment I stared in astonishment at that closely cropped head, and that face from which every vestige of a beard had been shaved; at those eyes, deeply sunken as if from a sleepless vigil; at the drawn features, with the worn and ravaged lines.

  "Phil!” I exclaimed. “Lord! I hardly recognized you!"

  "No wonder!” He sank down upon a chair.

  "But thank heaven, you're here at last!” I rejoiced. “You don't know how worried I was!"

  "You don't know how worried I was. I ought to've taken your advice, Frank. This dictator business just doesn't agree with me!"

  "How did you escape?” I asked. “The paper says—"

  "Says Ra the Righteous is about done?” he interrupted. “Well, there wouldn't have been even mincemeat if that mob had gotten me. It was a mighty close call."

  He paused, mopped his brow once more, and continued:

  "Lordy! When I heard the rabble streaming through the streets, I had to think fast! I took just about the quickest shave of my life, cutting off my hair and whiskers. Then I pasted them on a dummy, which I placed near the palace entrance. While the mob was storming the gates, trying to get at that old scarecrow, I slipped on these binoculars and hood, dressed in servants’ clothes, went out the back way, mixed with the mob, and even joined in yelling, ‘Down with Ra the Righteous!’ Finally I escaped through a side-gallery, and took a scoot here. I've been at it all night! At the border of Wu I had a tussle with some sentries; that explains my nice society appearance.” With a rueful grimace, he looked down at his torn, blood-spattered clothes.

  "Well, don't mind that, Phil,” I said, slapping him heartily on the shoulder. “I'll look out for you now! We've stuck together most of our lives, and I guess we can stick it out just a little longer!"

  * * * *

  Only three wakes later, catastrophe struck.

  During the interval, I had been sheltering Clay as best I could, trying to keep him disguised and hidden, and laying out a course of action. Many were the hurried little talks in which we decided that the only safety for either of us lay in the Overworld. However, since premature flight would be worse than none at all, we were making our plans coolly and deliberately. I had withdrawn the military guard from the tubes; I had secreted a quantity of hooks, ropes, and other climbing tackle at the base of a flue, which, I knew, led upward to the Overworld. I had taken steps to secure concentrated food, medical supplies, and other necessities, to be strapped in knapsacks about our backs...

  But before these projects were complete, the tempest broke. The report of the overthrow of the Dictator of Zu, and the statement that he and I had been suspected of collusion, had taken dangerous fire in the public mind. Demagogues, too numerous to suppress, had risen to warn the people that I was “conspiring against their interests.” These charges, added to complaints about my conclusion of an “inglorious peace, could not but have an effect upon a public so far advanced in thoughtlessness as the people of Wu.

  Worst of all, my visitor from Zu unwittingly betrayed me. It would be impossible, I knew, for him to stay hidden forever; but I had hardly expected him to reveal himself just when he did. Not that I blame him; when he came out of the rooms where I had told him to remain, he had expected to find me alone. But, as it happened, I was just being interviewed by a reporter for the Screamer! Too late, I saw Clay, on whose face a stubbly red beard was beginning to sprout! The knowing gleam in the reporter's eyes flashed at me like a danger signal.

  To threaten the journalist, to offer him a bribe, would only have been to make him more suspicious, and hence more of a peril; my only hope was that he would misinterpret what he had seen. But only a few hours later the Screamer appeared in a special edition, describing the “mysterious stranger” seen in the home of Luma the Illustrious—a stranger whose “foreign origin” was evident from his queer appearance. It was stated that his eyes were of an outlandish blue, and that his stubbly hair was faintly red—a color attributed only to one man in all history. Rumors were current, the paper went on to report, that the outcast Dictator of Zu had found shelter beneath Luma's roof, and that Luma was plotting with Ra the Righteous against his own people.

  The storm burst over us with cataclysmic suddenness. I had been having one of my many little discussions with Clay, talking over old times and planning for the future, when I heard a great thumping at the door, and opened to admit one of the guards, who entered in such excitement that he forgot the customary formality of bowing till his palms scraped the floor. His face, normally white, had grown red with agitation; his hands fluttered; his salmon eyes were wide with bewilderment and alarm.

  "Excellency!” he gasped. “Your Abysmal Excellency! Quick! The mob!"

  "What mob?” I demanded.

  "Come! Look!” he cried. “Great caverns, quick!” And he started away down the long greenish-yellow gallery.

  Exchanging frightened glances, Clay and I followed in silence, until we had reached the farther end of the palace, where the guard lifted a slit of stone in one of the walls—a fragment barely an inch across, just enough to permit us a peep through the partition, while keeping us safe from observation.

  Instantly a confusion of cries came to our ears—cries fierce, shrill, blood-curdling. “Down with Luma! Down with Luma! Down with him! Lynch him! Stab him! Massacre him! ... Long live Thuno Flatum!"

  Peering through the slit in the wall, I witnessed a sight that made my heart give a tremendous leap and my hair prickle. Back and forth, through the gallery outside, a savage throng was parading. Hundreds deep, they moved with a swarming fury. Some brandished sticks and poles, some held ropes coiled into nooses, some waved faggots ready for lighting. At the same time, there came a battering sound from one corner of the wall—a din as of a sledge hammer striking.

  "Glorious abysses! They're pounding down the gates!” whispered the guard, as he hastily shoved the stone into place again. “We can't hold them back much longer!"

  "Can't hold them back!” I agreed, knowing that no wild beast was more to be feared than that mad rabble. And then, swiftly turning to Clay, who stood watching with eyes half popping out of his head, “Come! There's no time to lose!"

  We sprinted back through the gallery, then down a side-passage beneath the palace, where we paused long enough to secure provisions, and to disguise ourselves—Clay by donning again the garb in which he had escaped from Zu, and I by smearing my face with white powder, exchanging my royal clothes for a plain black robe, and covering my eyes with dark glasses.

  Already, from the palace above, we could hear the mob screaming.

  "They've broken in!” I muttered. “In a minute they'll be down here!"

  He nodded; and while the howling from upstairs grew louder, we started down a dark and tortuous channel sloping deep underground.

  Neither of us spoke as we hastened along, scarcely daring to turn on a flashlight to guide us. But we well knew our destination—the base of the ventilating flue, where we had concealed the climbing tackle.

  In a straight line, this point was not far; but, in order to avoid detection, we had to circle miles out of our way, through obscure and little used corridors. Hours passed before we had approached safety. And then, for a few minutes, we had to risk a greater peril. Separating us from the ventilation flue was a stretch of more frequented avenue.

  Trusting to our disguise, we stepped boldly out of hiding.

  As we emerged into the wider thoroughfare, we found the people crowding back and forth excitedly; but, fortunately, none seemed to notice us. The s
coots rushed hither and thither as crazily as ever, several of them missing us by inches; while a newsgirl squeaked, “Latest Screamer! Buy the latest Screamer! Super-extra-extra-extra! Great revolution! Luma the Illustrious abdicates! Thuno Flatum restored to power! Super extra-extra-extra!"

  "Super-extra-extra! Buy the latest Blare!” I heard from another side. “War with Zu breaks out again! Thuno Flatum sends troops to the depths! Huge turnover! Subterrain attacks renewed! Buy the latest Blare! Super-extra-extra-extra!"

  Even as this cry rang forth, we caught a glimpse of marching helmeted forms, hundreds upon hundreds, tramping with a prancing military motion along a side-gallery, beneath waving green and vermilion banners.

  At the same time, a turn in the gallery gave us a glance into the mile-deep vastness of a prodigious chasm. Far beneath us, in the eerie depths, we saw multitudes of tiny forms, drawn up in military columns and regiments; while, from the walls of the abyss, great shafts of lightning—white and violet, orange and green—began to dart to the accompaniment of portentous thunders.

  But all these sounds and sights were swept from our consciousness by something still more alarming. Straight toward us, from down the gallery, a swarm of Third Class citizens came flocking, thousands deep, wielding spears, ropes, and clubs.

  "Down with Luma the Illustrious!” they shouted hoarsely. “Down with Luma! Grab the traitor! Tear him to bits! Turn him over!"

  "Quick!” I whispered to Clay; and we slid across the avenue into a smaller gallery, which, a few yards farther on, gave access to the ventilating flue.

  "Down with Luma! Down with him! To the deepest caverns with him! Turn him over! Turn him over!” I heard the mob repeating, with rising fury, as the ventilating lid slammed shut above our heads and the multitudes not observing us, went shouting on its way down the avenue.

  The next moment, Clay and I had seized the ropes and hooks and had begun the climb back to the Overworld.

  * * * *

  There is no need to dwell upon our adventures when, lashed together like mountain climbers, we accomplished the ascent through the air-tubes. Several hours later, thanks to my expert knowledge of the ventilation system, we had reached the outlet, and, for the first time in years, stood beneath the open sky, blinking in the bright sunlight and exposing our skin to the luxury of the breeze...