The Golden Age of Science Fiction Novels Vol 03

by Anthology

  "If Tao comes back as he plans, we have not got a chance. That's why Miela stole this little vehicle and, without it being publicly known in Mercury, came here to warn us. That's what she was after, to help us, risked her life to warn us people of another world."

  Alan stopped abruptly, and, dropping to the floor of the porch beside Miela, laid his arm across her lap, looking up into her face as though she were a goddess. She stroked his hair tenderly, and I could see her eyes were wet with tears.

  There was a moment's silence. I could not have known what Professor Newland and Beth were thinking, but a moment later I understood.

  Then I realized the sorrow that was oppressing them both.

  "What can be done?" I asked finally.

  Alan jumped to his feet. He began pacing up and down the porch before us; evidently he was laboring under a great nervous excitement.

  "There's nothing to be done," he said--"nothing at all--here on earth. We have not got a chance. It's up there the thing has got to be fought out--up there on Mercury--to keep them from returning."

  Alan paused again. When he resumed his voice was pitched lower, but was very tense.

  "I'm going there, Bob--with Miela."

  I heard Professor Newland's sharply indrawn breath, and saw Beth's dear face suddenly whiten.

  "I'm going there to fight it out with them. I may come back; I may not. But if I am successful, they never will--which is all that matters.

  "Miela's mother gave her up to come down here and help us. It is a little thing to go back there to help us, also. If I can help her people with their own problems, so much the better."

  He pulled Miela to her feet beside him and put his arm protectingly about her shoulders.

  "And Miela is going back to her world as my wife--her body unmutilated--the first married woman in Mercury with wings as God gave them to her!"

  CHAPTER XI.

  TO SAVE THE WORLD.

  Two days later Alan and Miela were quietly married in Bay Head. She still wore the long cloak, and no one could have suspected she was other than a beautiful stranger in the little community. When we got back home Alan immediately made her take off the cloak. He wanted us to admire her wings--to note their long, soft red feathers as she extended them, the symbol and the tangible evidence of her freedom from male dominance.

  She was as sweet about it all as she could be, blushing, as though to expose the wings, now that she was married, were immodest. And by the way she regarded Alan, by the gentleness and love in her eyes, I could see she would never be above the guidance, the dominance, of one man, at least.

  The day before their marriage Alan had taken me up the bayou to see the little silver car in which Miela had come. I was intensely curious to learn the workings of this strange vehicle. As soon as we were inside I demanded that Alan explain it all to me in detail.

  He smiled.

  "That's the remarkable part of it, Bob," he answered. "Miela herself didn't thoroughly understand either the basic principle or the mechanism itself when she started down here."

  "Good Lord! And she ventured--"

  "Tao was already on the point of leaving when she conceived the idea. He had already made one trip almost to the edge of the earth's atmosphere, you know, and now was ready to start again."

  "That first trip was last November," I said. "Tell me about that. What were those first light-meteors for?"

  "As far as I can gather from what Miela says," Alan answered, "Tao wanted to make perfectly sure the light-ray would act in our atmosphere. He came--there were several vehicles they had ready even then--without other apparatus than those meteors, as we called them. Those he dropped to earth with the light-ray stored in them. They did discharge it properly--they seemed effective. The thing was merely a test. Tao was satisfied, and went back to arrange for this second preliminary venture in which he is engaged now."

  "I understand," I said. "Go on about Miela."

  "Well, she and her mother went before the Scientific Society, she calls it--the men who own and control these vehicles in the Light Country. They called it suicide. No one could be found to come with her. Lua, her mother, wanted to, but Miela would not let her take the risk, saying she was needed more there in her own world.

  "As a matter of fact, the thing, while difficult perhaps to understand in principle, in operation works very simply. Miela knew that, and merely asked them to show her how to operate it practically. This they did. She spent two days with them--she learns things rather easily, you know--and then she was ready."

  I waited in amazement.

  "For practical purposes all she had to understand was the operation of these keys. The pressure of the light-ray in these coils"--he was standing beside a row of wire coils which in the semidarkness I had not noticed before--"is controlled by the key-switches." He indicated the latter as he spoke. "They send a current to the outer metal plates of the car which makes them repel or attract other masses of matter, as desired.

  "All that Miela had to understand then was how to operate these keys so as to keep the base of the vehicle headed toward the earth. They took her to the outer edge of the atmosphere of Mercury over the Dark Country and showed her the earth. They have used terrestrial telescopes for generations, and since the invention of this vehicle telescopes for celestial observation have been greatly improved.

  "All Miela had to do was keep the air in here purified. That is a simple chemical operation. By using this attractive and repellent force she allowed the earth's gravity and the repelling power of the sun and Mercury to drive her here."

  He paused.

  "But, doesn't she--don't you understand the thing in detail?" I asked finally.

  "I think father and I understand it now better than she does," he answered. "We have studied it out here and questioned her as closely as possible. We understand its workings pretty thoroughly. But the exact nature of the light-ray we do not understand, any more than we understand electricity. Nor do we understand this metallic substance which when charged with the current becomes attractive or repellent in varying degrees."

  "Yes," I said. "That I can appreciate."

  "Father has a theory about the light-ray," he went on, "which seems rather reasonable from what we can gather from Miela. The thing seems more like electricity than anything else, and father thinks now that it is generated by dynamos on Mercury, similar to those we use here for electricity."

  "Along that line," I said, "can you explain why this light-ray, which will immediately set anything on fire that is combustible, and which acts through metal, like those artillery shells, for instance, does not seem to raise the temperature of the ground it strikes to any extent?"

  "Because, like electricity, it is dissipated the instant it strikes the ground. The earth is an inexhaustible storehouse and receptacle for such a force. That is why the broken country around the Shoshone River protected Garland and Mantua from its direct rays."

  "Tell me about the details of this mechanism," I said, reverting to our original subject. "You say you understand its workings pretty thoroughly now."

  "Yes, I do," he admitted, "and so does father. But I cannot go into it now with you. You see," he added hastily, as though he feared to hurt my feelings, "the scientific men of Mercury--some of them--objected to Miela's coming, on the ground that the inhabitants of the earth, obtaining from her a knowledge that would enable them to voyage through space, might take advantage of that knowledge to undertake an invasion of Mercury.

  "As a matter of fact, that was a remote possibility. I could explain to you all I know about this mechanism without much danger of your ever being able to build such a car. But Miela promised them that she would use all possible precautions, in the event of her having any choice in the matter, to prevent the earth people learning anything about it.

  "Father and I have examined everything here closely. But no one else has--and I am sure Miela would prefer no one else did. You understand, Bob?"

  I did understand; and of c
ourse I had to be satisfied with that.

  "It seems to me," I said when, later in the day, we were discussing affairs in Wyoming, "that with things in Mercury as we now know they are, it would help the situation tremendously if Tao and these Twilight People with him were prevented from ever returning."

  "That's my idea exactly," Professor Newland agreed.

  I could see by the look on his face he was holding on to this thought as a possibility that might make Alan's plan unnecessary.

  "I've thought about it constantly," the professor said, "ever since these facts first came to us through Miela. It would be important. With his expedition here a total failure, I think we might assume that nothing more would be done up there in attempting to conquer the earth. I've tried to make Alan see that we should give the authorities all the information we have. It might help--something might be accomplished--"

  "Nothing would, father," Alan interrupted. "There wouldn't be time. And even if this expedition of Tao's were destroyed, I don't see why that's any guarantee another attempt would not be made. Miela doesn't, either, and she ought to know.

  "Besides, don't you see, Bob"--he turned to me earnestly--"I can't have the eyes of the world turned on Miela and her affairs? Why, think of it--this little woman sent to Washington, questioned, photographed, written about, made sport of, perhaps, in the newspapers! And all for nothing. It is unthinkable."

  "You may be right, my boy," said the professor sadly. "I am giving in to you, but I still--"

  "The thing has come to me," said Alan. "A duty--a responsibility put squarely up to me. I've accepted it. I'll do my best all the way."

  A week after Alan and Miela were married the report came that the Mercutians had suddenly departed, abandoning, after partly destroying, their apparatus. The world for a few days was in trepidation, fearing a report that they had landed somewhere else, but no such report came.

  Three days later Alan and Miela followed them into space.

  Professor Newland, Beth and I went up the bayou with them that morning they left. We were a solemn little party, none of us seemingly wishing to voice the thoughts that possessed us all.

  Professor Newland never spoke once during the trip. When the moment of final parting came he kissed Miela quietly, and, pressing Alan's hand, said simply: "Good luck, my boy. We appreciate what you are doing for us. Come back, some day, if you can."

  Then he faced about abruptly and trudged back to the launch alone, as pathetic a figure as I have ever seen. We all exchanged our last good-bys, little Beth in tears clinging to Alan, and then kissing Miela and making her promise some day to come back with Alan when he had accomplished his mission.

  Then they entered the vehicle. Its heavy door closed. A moment later it rose silently--slowly at first, then with increasing velocity until we could see it only as a little speck in the air above us. And then it was gone.

  CHAPTER XII.

  THE LANDING ON MERCURY.

  (Narrative continued by Alan Newland.)

  With hardly more than a perceptible tremor our strange vehicle came to rest upon the surface of Mercury. For a moment Miela and I stood regarding each other silently. Then she left her station at the levers of the mechanism and placed her hands gently on my shoulders. "You are welcome, my husband, here to my world."

  I kissed her glowing, earnest face. We had reached our journey's end. My work was about to begin--upon my own efforts now depended the salvation of that great world I had left behind. What difficulties, what dangers, would I have to face, here among the people of this strange planet? I thrilled with awe at the thought of it; and I prayed God then to hold me firm and steadfast to my purpose.

  Miela must have divined my thoughts, for she said simply: "You will have great power here, Alan; and it is in my heart that you will succeed."

  We slid back one of the heavy metallic curtains and looked out through the thick glass of the window. It was daylight--a diffused daylight like that of a cloudy midday on my own earth. An utterly barren waste met my gaze. We seemed to have landed in a narrow valley. Huge cliffs rose on both sides to a height of a thousand feet or more.

  These cliffs, as well as the floor of the valley itself, shone with a brilliant glare, even in the half light of the sunless day. They were not covered with soil, but seemed rather to be almost entirely metallic, copper in color. The whole visible landscape was devoid of any sign of vegetation, nor was there a single living thing in sight.

  I shuddered at the inhospitable bleakness of it.

  "Where are we, Miela?"

  She smiled at my tone. It was my first sight of Mercury except vague, distant glimpses of its surface through the mist coming down.

  "You do not like my world?"

  She was standing close beside me, and at her smiling words raised one of her glorious red wings and spread it behind me as though for protection. Then, becoming serious once more, she answered my question.

  "We are fortunate, Alan. It is the Valley of the Sun, in the Light Country. I know it well. We are very close to the Great City."

  I breathed a sigh of relief.

  "I'll leave it all to you, little wife. Shall we start at once?"

  Her hand pressed mine.

  "I shall lead you now," she said. "But afterward--you it will be who leads me--who leads us all."

  She crossed to the door fastenings. As she loosed them I remember I heard a slight hissing sound. Before I could reach her she slid back the door. A great wave of air rushed in upon us, sweeping us back against the wall. I clutched at something for support, but the sweep of wind stopped almost at once.

  I had stumbled to my knees. "Miela!" I cried in terror.

  She was beside me in an instant, wide-eyed with fear, which even then I could see was fear only for me.

  I struggled to my feet. My head was roaring. All the blood in my body seemed rushing to my face.

  After a moment I felt better. Miela pulled me to a seat.

  "I did not think, Alan. The pressure of the air is different here from your world. It was so wrong of me, for I knew. It was so when I landed there on your earth."

  I had never thought to ask her that, nor had she ever spoken of it to me. She went on now to tell me how, when first she had opened the door on that little Florida island, all the air about her seemed rushing away. She had felt then as one feels transported quickly to the rarified atmosphere of a great height.

  Here the reverse had occurred. We had brought with us, and maintained, an air density such as that near sea level on earth. But here on Mercury the air was far denser, and its pressure had rushed in upon us instantly the door was opened. Miela had been affected to a much less extent than I, and in consequence recovered far more quickly.

  The feeling, after the first nausea, the pressure and pain in my ears and the roaring in my head, had passed away. A sense of heaviness, an inability to breathe with accustomed freedom, remained with me for days.

  We sat quiet for some minutes, and then left the vehicle. Miela was dressed now as I had first seen her on the Florida bayou. As we stepped upon the ground she suddenly tore the veil from her breast, spread her wings, and, with a laugh of sheer delight, flew rapidly up into the air. I stood watching her, my heart beating fast. Up--up she went into the gray haze of the sky. Then I could see her spread her great wings, motionless, a giant bird soaring over the valley.

  A few moments more, and she was again beside me, alighting on the tip of one toe with perfect poise and grace almost within reach of my hand.

  I do not quite know what feelings possessed me at that moment. Perhaps it was a sense of loss as I saw this woman I loved fly away into the air while I remained chained to the ground. I cannot tell. But when she came back, dropping gently down beside me, ethereal and beautiful as an angel from heaven itself, a sudden rush of love swept over me.

  I crushed her to me, glorying in the strength of my arms and the frailness of her tender little body.

  When I released her she looked up into my eyes arch
ly.

  "You do not like me to fly? Your wife is free--and, oh, Alan, it is so good--so good to be back here again where I can fly."

  She laughed at my expression.

  "You are a man, too--like all the men of my world. That is the feeling you came here to conquer, Alan--so that the women here may all keep their wings--and be free."

  I think I was just a little ashamed of myself for a moment. But I knew my feeling had been only human. I did want her to fly, to keep those beautiful wings. And in that moment they came to represent not only her freedom, but my trust in her, my very love itself.

  I stroked their sleek red feathers gently with my hand.

  "I shall never feel that way again, Miela," I said earnestly.

  She laughed once more and kissed me, and the look in her eyes told me she understood.

  The landscape, from this wider viewpoint, seemed even more bleak and desolate than before. The valley was perhaps half a mile broad, and wound away upward into a bald range of mountains in the distance.

  The ground under my feet was like a richly metallic ore. In places it was wholly metal, smooth and shining like burnished copper. Below us the valley broadened slightly, falling into what I judged must be open country where lay the city of our destination.

  For some minutes I stood appalled at the scene. I had often been in the deserts of America, but never have I felt so great a sense of desolation. Always before it had been the lack of water that made the land so arid; and always the scene seemed to hold promise of latent fertility, as though only moisture were needed to make it spring into fruition.

  Nothing of the kind was evident here. There was, indeed, no lack of water. I could see a storm cloud gathering in the distance. The air I was breathing seemed unwarrantably moist; and all about me on the ground little pools remained from the last rainfall. But here there was no soil, not so much even as a grain of sand seemed to exist. The air was warm, as warm as a midsummer's day in my own land, a peculiarly oppressive, moist heat.