“After ten or twelve minutes I became aware of the fact that a particular insect, about the size of a house-fly, was always close to my head. I tried to shoo it away, but it evaded my flapping hand, and circled around just beyond my reach. When I walked faster, the insect accelerated. I could not see it with perfect clarity because it was perpetually on the move, but it obviously was not a fly or bee. In the end, I decided to ignore the creature. I came to a sluggish and murky stream, and turned to walk along its bank. I followed the course of the meandering stream until I came to the rim of a little waterfall, where it tumbled into a pool some five feet below. There I saw a strange figure kneeling to drink from the pool. To my astonishment, I saw that it was a satyr: a male creature with the torso and belly of a man the hindquarters of a goat.
“The creature’s head was very hairy, and two small horns projected from his forehead. The only thing which did not quite match the classical image of a satyr was his feet, which were more massive than a goat’s although they seemed as horny as hooves. He was slight of stature and slender in the body, but his face somehow gave the impression of extreme age. How can this be the future? I asked myself. It could not even be the past, into which I might have slipped had my timeshadow been displaced in the wrong direction, for satyrs are figments of the human imagination: creatures born of superstitious fantasy. To encounter fauns as well as vampires is surely proof positive that all this is a mere dream. My disappointment was, however, alleviated by curiosity. Well, I thought, If I am removed to Hesiod’s Age of Gold, I must make the most of it.
“I must have been staring at the creature for ten seconds before he suddenly became aware of my presence and turned to look up at me. I could not easily read his expression, so I could not tell how astonished he might be by the sight of me, but at least he did not start with alarm and flee in panic. He stood up slowly, and stared at me as steadily as I was staring at him. Then he threw back his head and uttered a loud sound, which seemed far less human than his head or legs – a sound resembling the note of some huge musical instrument like a church organ. I quickly realized that the cry must have been a summons, or at least an invitation. From the trees around the clearing other figures appeared.
“In Greek myth, if I remember rightly, fauns and satyrs were exclusively male, and their chief delight was the pursuit of delicately human-seeming nymphs. Here, though, there were females of the species too, and children. The females were less shaggy in the shanks, and the hair on their heads was less coarse, but no one seeing them in daylight could possibly have mistaken them for humans. Within the space of a few minutes a company of thirteen gathered, five of which were little ones. They did not menace me in any way. Like the one who had summoned them, they simply stared, with frank curiosity. I scrambled down the bank. At the bottom, which I reached rather too hurriedly, I sprawled in a most ungainly fashion. I was not winded, but I could not immediately rise, and one of the fauns approached me tentatively, his hand outstretched. I took it, and he helped me up. I was a foot taller than he, but he was very strong.
“ ‘Thank you,’ I said, letting go of his slender, warm fingers. The sound of my voice, so different from his own, did not alarm him. He continued to stare up into my eyes, so intently that I wished I could read his unhuman expression.
“The bushes parted again, and another creature came out. This one was of another kind. He was much taller than the dwarfish fauns, and far more manlike in the face, but as his hindquarters emerged from the undergrowth which at first concealed them I saw that he too was only half-human. He was a centaur of sorts, although his lower body did not much resemble that of a horse; it was more like that of a sleek brown bear. Like all the rest he stood still and stared at me from a distance, reaching up with an oddly delicate hand to stroke his lank brown beard. Then he spoke, or seemed to speak, to the satyr who had sounded the summons. His voice was not in the least manlike, nor did it resemble the whinnying of a horse; again, it was like a series of profound notes sounded by a musical instrument. The faun replied, but I cannot say whether their speech was meaningful.
“Again the thought occurred to me that perhaps I had made a mistake and cast my timeshadow into the distant past, before the race of men came into being, and that my mind had seen fit to populate its emptiness according to the imagination of the first story-tellers. Then I wondered whether the images of the past which ancient societies possessed might have been based on misinterpretations of the glimpses of the distant future which their seers had caught. The most gifted among their priest-magicians must always have had the power to journey into the farther reaches of time, but they had never been able to stabilise their timeshadows as I had contrived to do. It was easily understandable that those ancient visionaries had located the Golden Age in the past rather than the future, and made it part of their fantasies of Creation and Descent. This notion raised my spirits. I became convinced once more that I was in an actual future, perhaps the one and only future of destiny. But was there more to this future than gentle and uncommunicative chimeras? Had I any chance of finding out what had happened during the gulf of time which separated this seemingly happy era from that in which vampires had ruled the world?
“Impulsively, I stepped towards the centaur, and reached out my hand as though to clasp his. He did not shy away, but nor did he reach out in friendship. His face showed no detectable expression. He is an animal, I thought, despite his human features, but he does not fear me! Either he is perfectly tame or he thinks me one of his own kind, a freakish cousin. I stepped back so that I could look at all the assembled crowd. I raised my arms, palms open, in a gesture which was intended to signal farewell and reassurance. I felt a slight thrill of triumph as they copied me. With the sole exception of the tiniest child, they raised their arms exactly as I had done. Their imitation suggested to me a kind of kinship which ran far deeper than any partial similarity of form.
“At that moment, however, I was reminded once again of the insect which had kept close company with me since my arrival. It now descended to fly around my head, buzzing more loudly than before – and it was no longer alone. Within seconds there were a dozen of the tiny flying things, and then hundreds. I flapped my arms reflexively, and although I half-closed my eyes against the imagined assault I saw that the satyrs and the centaur had similarly began to swat the air. This time their gestures were not mere imitation; the hollow was beset by a coalescing cloud, and the air itself seemed to be abuzz with all-pervading sound. The centaur and his companions turned to run away, possessed by a panic which the sight of me had failed to induce. They ran away from the stream, into the depths of the wood, but I ran a different way.
“I, and I alone, was pursued by the swarm. It was as difficult to run in this world as it had been in the earlier one, and I knew immediately that I could not possibly outrun the tiny things which buzzed around my head, but my fear was unreasoning. I must have blundered on for several hundred yards before I caught my foot upon a trailing root and stumbled. I fell to my knees, still flailing my arms. It seemed that my flailing was not without effect, for there were not so many of the insects about my head now. They were moving ahead of me, as though to anticipate the resumption of my headlong flight, and I cursed their apparent determination to block my way. While I remained where I was, trying hard to catch my breath, I saw that the whole vast swarm was now coming together. The vague cloud began to take on a definite shape, which became ever more distinct.
“As I lowered my arms I saw that the shape which the cloud of insects was assuming was approximately human. While I watched, more astonished than before, it seemed that they ceased to be insects at all, and became the cells of an upright body: an animate bronze statue, its surface as smooth as silk. My terror did not abate; I could not conceive that any being supernaturally distilled from a horde of noxious insects could be anything but loathsome and malevolent. I lost my head completely. When I managed to get to my feet, I hurled myself at the monster, striking out violently with my fis
ts, as though to batter it to the ground – but my blows passed clean through it. Its myriad components flew apart as I struck at it, presenting no resistance.
“I fell again, more heavily this time. The swarm coalesced again into the hideous golem, which seemed to be a mocking reflection of my own form. It had my height and my girth, and it did not seem to me that this was mere coincidence. Then, in a travesty of the gesture which the faun had made when I slipped down the bank into the hollow, it stretched out a ‘hand’, offering to help me up. I simply stared at the horrible thing, paralysed by fear. It slowly lowered the proffered arm. Then it opened its brazen mouth and spoke. The syllables were as deep and as hoarse and as hollow as the words which had spilled from my own mouth while I practised the art of pronunciation, but they were quite distinct and there was no mistaking the name that they pronounced.
“ ‘Cop-ple-stone!’ said the monster, laboriously. ‘Cop-ple-stone!’ ”
VIII
“Had my anxiety been capable of increase, the fact that the monster could pronounce my name might have sent yet another thrill of terror coursing through my attenuated form, but my distress was absolute. But as time passed without my being rent or crushed by those metallic hands, puzzlement gradually took command of my thoughts and drove panic out.
“ ‘How do you know my name?” I demanded. “Can you read my thoughts?”
“The golem waved its arm in what seemed to be a negative gesture.
“ ‘Copplestone,’ it said, speaking with a little more assurance now that it had heard my reply. ‘Are you Copplestone?’
“ ‘That is my name,’ I said. ‘How do you know it?’ The golem took a step towards me, but I did not flinch; by speaking to it I had accepted it as a thinking being. It reached out again, and this time I took its hand. It felt as hard as polished metal, but was not cold. I had the impression that it was very strong. The tiny things which had combined to make it had knitted together perfectly to make a single seamless body.
“ ‘Thank you,’ I said, as I came to my feet. ‘What are you?’
“It did not reply. I stood face to face with it now, and I looked into its eyes. They were black orbs, of a subtly different texture from the surrounding bronze, infinitely more alien than the eyes of the faun or the eyes of the centaur. Its cheeks were contoured like a man’s, although I could not believe that there were similar muscles beneath the outer tegument, and it had a nose of sorts. Its mouth was a black slit.
“ ‘Copplestone,’ it said, yet again. ‘You are Copplestone.’
“ ‘How do you know me?’ I countered. I wondered whether something as strange as this automaton made of insects could be a product of my own fevered imagination.
“The golem opened its arms wide, as if to embrace me. ‘Come,’ it said.
“ ‘Where to?’ I asked – but the golem did not want me to go with it; it merely wanted me to step into its embrace. When I would not do so, it stepped forward to take me. Its countless units came apart again, but it did not break up into a flying swarm; instead, it flowed around and over me, enclosing me. It formed a new body around my own, fitting itself about me like a suit of living armour – but it had the courtesy, or the common sense, to leave my face uncovered. I could breathe and I could see.
“I moved, not by my own volition but according to the will of the entity which enclosed me. It began to run, swiftly accelerating its pace to a sprint. Had I tried to achieve such a velocity using the ghostly muscles of my timeshadow it would have required enormous effort, but because the motive force was provided by my captor I felt for the first time that I really was a kind of phantom, lighter than the air. Thus cocooned, I was taken through the forest for many a mile, but we came before very long to a clearing where stood a huge iron mast, a number of low huts, and several strange machines with rounded bodies and long tails, each with four long horizontal vanes on top and four much smaller ones arranged vertically at the extremity of the tail.
“I expected to be taken to one of the huts, but I was brought instead to one of these machines. My suit of armour opened a hatch in the belly of one of them, and climbed in. It was very dark inside. I ended in a sitting position, and my armour flowed away again, to leave me largely uncovered. I was still secured by bands about my arms, legs and waist. My ears were filled with a sound like the droning of a million insects. A sinking sensation in my stomach told me that the machine in whose belly I was now enclosed was lifting from the ground, and I knew that I had simply been transferred from one prison to another, from a running-machine to a flying-machine. The hatchway through which I had entered the machine had closed, and I was in darkness for two or three minutes, but then light returned. It was not diffuse light, like the artificial phosphorescence which had lit the town and the Underworld of my previous vision; it was localized within a space in front of my head. It was as though I were looking into an illuminated aquarium, but there were no fish swimming there. Instead, there was a disembodied head.
“The head seemed undiscomfited by its detachment. Its features were animated and not unhandsome, but I knew immediately that it was not a man. I recognized the pallid complexion, the blackish lips and the cat-like eyes. It was an overman, or the simulacrum of an overman.
“ ‘Are you truly Copplestone?’ the face said. At any rate, those were the words which came from a speaker somewhere above the image; the dark lips moved to pronounce quite different syllables, and I inferred that some kind of translation machine was again being used.
“ ‘I am,’ I replied, hoarsely.
“ ‘From what time do you come, Copplestone?’ he asked.
“ ‘From the nineteenth century Anno Domini,’ I told him.
“The expression on his face shifted, and he seemed perplexed. There followed a long hesitation. I realized that if he somehow had access to the substance of the conversation I had had with his remote ancestor, so many thousands of years before, he could only know a little about me.
“ ‘I am Edward Copplestone,’ I told him, proudly. ‘I am the pioneer of the exploration of the future. Others will doubtless follow where I have led, but none can come from any earlier time for more than the fleetest moment. Is that why you set your insectile machines to keep watch for my timeshadow? Is that why I am a miracle in your eyes?’
“ ‘Tell me the exact day and hour from which you came,’ said the disembodied head, in a peremptory fashion.
“I was suddenly struck by a fit of suspicion, and hesitated before replying. ‘Why do you want to know?’ I asked.
“He frowned – an unmistakable gesture of annoyance. ‘Answer,’ he said.
“He does not know what I am, I thought. Perhaps my secret was lost, But if so, how? What prevented me from making it known and giving all mankind the power to send timeshadows into the future? Is it possible that this creature desires to know my point of origin in order to take action against me, to prevent my revealing what I know about the fate which awaits mankind? Can these overmen be so worldly wise as to reach backwards through time to annul events which might threaten their victory over mankind? The head still wanted its answer, but I decided that I must be cautious until I knew more.
“ ‘I have questions of my own,’ I replied, ‘and little time to ask them. You must know a great deal already about my world, while I know nothing at all about yours, save that your kind once reduced mine to the level of mere cattle, which you milked for blood. Why are you so curious about me, when all the curiosity should be on my side?’
“He looked at me very carefully, as though he could not make up his mind what to say. He seemed remarkably unintelligent, considering all the marvellous machines which he had at his disposal. Was he, I wondered, no more than a machine himself – another golem, of limited intellectual performance?
“ ‘Answer,’ he said, impotently.
“ ‘I am not a fool,’ I told him. ‘I refuse to talk to golems and disembodied heads, if they will not tell me what I ardently desire to know. I am your prisoner, f
orced to go wherever you care to take me, but I have nothing to say to you unless you will condescend to contribute to my enlightenment.’ The image flickered, as if rippled by the current of my displeasure. The features of the face shifted eerily.
“ ‘Ask,’ said the head, emotionlessly, ‘and I will answer.’
“I felt a surge of triumph, but restrained my exultation.
“ ‘Is yours truly a race of vampires?’ I asked. ‘Did your kind enslave mine, at some point in our mutual history, and reduce the descendants of man to mere animality? Is mankind now extinct?’
“ ‘In a time of trial, thousands of years ago,’ the head reported, ‘your ancestors fought with mine, and were subdued. Once subdued, they were bred for blood and not for brains, and in the space of a few hundred generations became as docile and as unintelligent as cattle or swine. Overmen no longer need the blood of men, but there was no way to return the sentience and intelligence that mankind had lost. My more recent forefathers remade men in the myriad images of ancient human dreams, and gave them a garden in which to live contentedly.’ This recitation was delivered as though it were a dull lecture of no particular substance. There was no trace of emotion in it, nor of apology.
“I was still sorely puzzled as to the origins of the race which called now themselves overmen. ‘If your forefathers were not mine,’ I said to him, ‘where did they come from? Were they invaders from Mars?’
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