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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/19476-8.txt b/19476-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f530b3a --- /dev/null +++ b/19476-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7376 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, A Honeymoon in Space, by George Griffith, +Illustrated by Stanley Wood and Harold Piffard + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: A Honeymoon in Space + + +Author: George Griffith + + + +Release Date: October 5, 2006 [eBook #19476] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A HONEYMOON IN SPACE*** + + +E-text prepared by the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading +Team (https://www.pgdp.net/) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 19476-h.htm or 19476-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/4/7/19476/19476-h/19476-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/4/7/19476/19476-h.zip) + + + + + +A HONEYMOON IN SPACE + +by + +GEORGE GRIFFITH + +Author of "Valdar the Oft-Born," "The Virgin of the Sun," "The Rose of +Judah," &c., &c. + +Illustrated by Stanley Wood and Harold Piffard + + + + + + + +London +C. Arthur Pearson Ltd. +Henrietta Street +1901 + +Arno Press +A New York Times Company +New York--1975 +Reprint Edition 1974 by Arno Press Inc. + +Reprinted from a copy in The Library +of the University of California, Riverside + + + + +A Honeymoon in Space + + + + +[Illustration: "_The Earth, the Earth--thank God, the Earth!_"] + + + + +Contents + + +PROLOGUE--The First Cruise of the _Astronef_ + +Chapter I. + +Chapter II. + +Chapter III. + +Chapter IV. + +Chapter V. + +Chapter VI. + +Chapter VII. + +Chapter VIII. + +Chapter IX. + +Chapter X. + +Chapter XI. + +Chapter XII. + +Chapter XIII. + +Chapter XIV. + +Chapter XV. + +Chapter XVI. + +Chapter XVII. + +Chapter XVIII. + +Chapter XIX. + +Chapter XX. + +Epilogue + + + + +List of Illustrations + + +"THE EARTH, THE EARTH--THANK GOD, THE EARTH!" + +A HIDEOUS SHAPE ROSE OUT OF THE WATER BEHIND THEM + +IT TOOK THE STRANGE-WINGED CRAFT AMIDSHIPS + +SNOW PEAKS AND CLOUD SEAS + +CAME FORWARD TO MEET THEM WITH BOTH HANDS OUTSTRETCHED + +WHOLE MOUNTAIN RANGES OF GLOWING LAVA WERE HURLED UP MILES HIGH + +WITHOUT ANY APPARENT EFFORT HE RAISED HER ABOUT FIVE FEET FROM THE FLOOR + +THE HUGE PALELY LUMINOUS EYES LOOKED IN UPON THEM + + + + +PROLOGUE + +THE FIRST CRUISE OF THE _ASTRONEF_ + + +About eight o'clock on the morning of the 5th of November, 1900, those +of the passengers and crew of the American liner _St. Louis_ who +happened, whether from causes of duty or of their own pleasure, to be on +deck, had a very strange--in fact a quite unprecedented experience. + +The big ship was ploughing her way through the long, smooth rollers at +her average twenty-one knots towards the rising sun, when the officer in +charge of the navigating bridge happened to turn his glasses straight +ahead. He took them down from his eyes, rubbed the two object-glasses +with the cuff of his coat, and looked again. The sun was shining through +a haze which so far dimmed the solar disc that it was possible to look +straight at it without inconvenience to the eyes. + +The officer took another long squint, put his glasses down, rubbed his +eyes and took another, and murmured, "Well I'm damned!" + +Just then the Fourth Officer came up on to the bridge to relieve his +senior while he went down for a cup of coffee and a biscuit. The Second +took him away to the other end of the bridge, out of hearing of the +helmsman and the quartermaster standing by, and said almost in a +whisper: + +"Say, Norton, there's something ahead there that I can't make out. Just +as the sun got clear above the horizon I saw a black spot go straight +across it, right through the upper and lower limbs. I looked again, and +it was plumb in the middle of the disc. Look," he went on, speaking +louder in his growing excitement, "there it is again! I can see it +without the glasses now. See?" + +The Fourth did not reply at once. He had the glasses close to his eyes, +and was moving them slowly about as though he were following some +shifting object in the sky. Then he handed them back, and said: + +"If I didn't believe the thing was impossible I should say that's an +air-ship; but, for the present, I guess I'd rather wait till it gets a +bit nearer, if it's coming. Still, there _is_ something. Seems to be +getting bigger pretty fast, too. Perhaps it would be as well to notify +the old man. What do you think?" + +"Guess we'd better," said the Second. "S'pose you go down. Don't say +anything except to him. We don't want any more excitement among the +people than we can help." + +The Fourth nodded and went down the steps, and the Second began walking +up and down the bridge, every now and then taking another squint ahead. +Again and again the mysterious shape crossed the disc of the sun, always +vertically as though, whatever it might be, it was steering a direct +course from the sun to the ship, its apparent rising and falling being +due really to the dipping of her bows into the swells. + +"Well, Mr. Charteris, what's the trouble?" said the Skipper as he +reached the bridge. "Nothing wrong, I hope? Have you sighted a derelict, +or what? Ay, what in hell's that!" + +His hands went up to his eyes and he stared for a few moments at the +pale yellow oblate shape of the sun. + +At this moment the _St. Louis'_ head dipped again, and the Captain saw +something like a black line swiftly drawn across the sun from bottom to +top. + +"That's what I wanted to call your attention to, sir," said the Second +in a low tone. "I first noticed it crossing the sun as it rose through +the mist. I thought it was a spot of dirt on my glasses, but it has +crossed the sun several times since then, and for some minutes seemed to +remain dead in the middle of it. Later on it got quite a lot larger, and +whatever it is it's approaching us pretty rapidly. You see it's quite +plain to the naked eye now." + +By this time several of the crew and of the early loungers on deck had +also caught sight of the strange thing which seemed to be hanging and +swinging between the sky and the sea. People dived below for their +glasses, knocked at their friends' state-room doors and told them to get +up because something was flying towards the ship through the air; and in +a very few minutes there were hundreds of passengers on deck in all +varieties of early morning costume, and scores of glasses, held to +anxious eyes, were being directed ahead. + +The glasses, however, soon became unnecessary, for the passengers had +scarcely got up on deck before the mysterious object to the eastward at +length took definite shape, and as it did so mouths were opened as well +as eyes, for the owners of the eyes and mouths beheld just then the +strangest sight that travellers by sea or land had ever seen. + +Within the distance of about a mile it swung round at right angles to +the steamer's course with a rapidity which plainly showed that it was +entirely obedient to the control of a guiding intelligence, and hundreds +of eager eyes on board the liner saw, sweeping down from the grey-blue +of the early morning sky, a vessel whose hull seemed to be constructed +of some metal which shone with a pale, steely lustre. + +It was pointed at both ends, the forward end being shaped something like +a spur or ram. At the after end were two flickering, interlacing circles +of a glittering greenish-yellow colour, apparently formed by two +intersecting propellers driven at an enormous velocity. Behind these was +a vertical fan of triangular shape. The craft appeared to be +flat-bottomed, and for about a third of her length amidships the upper +half of her hull was covered with a curving, domelike roof of glass. + +"She's an air-ship of some sort, there's no doubt about that," said the +Captain, "so I guess the great problem has got solved at last. And yet +it ain't a balloon, because it's coming against the wind, and it's +nothing of the æroplane sort neither, because it hasn't planes or kites +or any fixings of that kind. Still it's made of something like metal and +glass, and it must take a lot of keeping up. It's travelling at a pretty +healthy speed too. Getting on for a hundred miles an hour, I should +guess. Ah! he's going to speak us! Hope he's honest." + +Everybody on board the _St. Louis_ was up on deck by this time, and the +excitement rose to fever-heat as the strange vessel swept down towards +them from the middle sky, passed them like a flash of light, swung round +the stern, and ranged up alongside to starboard some twenty feet from +the bridge rail. + +She was about a hundred and twenty feet long, with some twenty feet of +depth and thirty of beam, and the Captain and many of his officers and +passengers were very much relieved to find that, as far as could be +seen, she carried no weapons of offence. + +As she ranged up alongside, a sliding door opened in the glass-domed +roof amidships, just opposite to the end of the _St. Louis'_ bridge. A +tall, fair-haired, clean-featured man, of about thirty, in grey +flannels, tipped up his golf cap with his thumb, and said: + +"Good morning, Captain! You remember me, I suppose? Had a fine passage, +so far? I thought I should meet you somewhere about here." + +The Captain of the _St. Louis_, in common with every one else on board, +had already had his credulity stretched about as far as it would go, and +he was beginning to wonder whether he was really awake; but when he +heard the hail and recognised the speaker he stared at him in blank and, +for the moment, speechless bewilderment. Then he got hold of his voice +again and said, keeping as steady as he could: + +"Good morning, my Lord! Guess I never expected to meet even you like +this in the middle of the Atlantic! So the newspaper men were right for +once in a way, and you _have_ got an air-ship that will fly?" + +"And a good deal more than that, Captain, if she wants to. I am just +taking a trial trip across the Atlantic before I start on a run round +the Solar System. Sounds like a lie, doesn't it? But it's coming off. +Oh, good morning, Miss Rennick! Captain, may I come on board?" + +"By all means, my Lord, only I'm afraid I daren't stop Uncle Sam's +mails, even for you." + +"There's no need for that, Captain, on a smooth sea like this," was the +reply. "Just keep on as you are going and I'll come alongside." + +He put his head inside the door and called something up a speaking-tube +which led to a glass-walled chamber in the forward part of the roof, +where a motionless figure stood before a little steering wheel. + +The craft immediately began to edge nearer and nearer to the liner's +rail, keeping speed so exactly with her that the threshold of the door +touched the end of the bridge without a perceptible jar. Then the +flannel-clad figure jumped on to the bridge and held out his hand to the +Captain. + +As they shook hands he said in a low tone, "I want a word or two in +private with you, as soon as possible." + +The commander saw a very serious meaning in his eyes. Besides, even if +he had not made his appearance under such extraordinary circumstances, +it was quite impossible that one of his social position and his wealth +and influence could have made such a request without good reason for it, +so he replied: + +"Certainly, my Lord. Will you come down to my room?" + +Hundreds of anxious, curious eyes looked upon the tall athletic figure +and the regular-featured, bronzed, honest English face as Rollo Lenox +Smeaton Aubrey, Earl of Redgrave, Baron Smeaton in the Peerage of +England, and Viscount Aubrey in the Peerage of Ireland, followed the +Captain to his room through the parting crowd of passengers. He nodded +to one or two familiar faces in the crowd, for he was an old Atlantic +ferryman, and had crossed five times with Captain Hawkins in the _St. +Louis_. + +Then he caught sight of a well and fondly remembered face which he had +not seen for over two years. It was a face which possessed at once the +fair Anglo-Saxon skin, the firm and yet delicate Anglo-Saxon features, +and the wavy wealth of the old Saxon gold-brown hair; but a pair of big, +soft, pansy eyes, fringed with long, curling, black lashes, looked out +from under dark and perhaps just a trifle heavy eyebrows. Moreover, +there was that indescribable expression in the curve of her lips and the +pose of her head; to say nothing of a lissome, vivacious grace in her +whole carriage which proclaimed her a daughter of the younger branch of +the Race that Rules. + +Their eyes met for an instant, and Lord Redgrave was startled and even a +trifle angered to see that she flushed up quickly, and that the +momentary smile with which she greeted him died away as she turned her +head aside. Still, he was a man accustomed to do what he wanted: and +what he wanted to do just then was to shake hands with Lilla Zaidie +Rennick, and so he went straight towards her, raised his cap, and held +out his hand saying, first with a glance into her eyes, and then with +one upward at the _Astronef_: + +"Good morning again, Miss Rennick! You see it is done." + +"Good morning, Lord Redgrave!" she replied, he thought, a little +awkwardly. "Yes, I see you have kept your promise. What a pity it is too +late! But I hope you will be able to stop long enough to tell us all +about it. This is Mrs. Van Stuyler, who has taken me under her +protection on my journey to Europe." + +His lordship returned the bow of a tall, somewhat hard-featured matron +who looked dignified even in the somewhat nondescript costume which most +of the ladies were wearing. But her eyes were kindly, and he said: + +"Very pleased to meet, Mrs. Van Stuyler. I heard you were coming, and I +was in hopes of catching you on the other side before you left. And now, +if you will excuse me, I must go and have a chat with the Skipper." He +raised his cap again and presently vanished from the curious eyes of the +excited crowd, through the door of the Captain's apartment. + +Captain Hawkins closed the door of his sitting-room as he entered, and +said: + +"Now, my Lord, I'm not going to ask you any questions to begin with, +because if I once began I should never stop; and besides, perhaps you'd +like to have your own say right away." + +"Perhaps that will be the shortest way," said his lordship. "The fact +is, we've not only the remains of this Boer business on our hands, but +we've had what is practically a declaration of war from France and +Russia. Briefly it's this way. A few weeks ago, while the Allies thought +they were fighting the Boxers, it came to the knowledge of my brother, +the Foreign Secretary, that the Tsung-li-Yamen had concluded a secret +treaty with Russia which practically annulled all our rights over the +Yang-tse Valley, and gave Russia the right to bring her Northern Railway +right down through China. + +"As you know, we've stood a lot too much in that part of the world +already, but we couldn't stand this; so about ten days ago an ultimatum +was sent declaring that the British Government would consider any +encroachment on the Yang-tse Valley as an unfriendly act. + +"Meanwhile France chipped in with a notification that she was going to +occupy Morocco as a compensation for Fashoda, and added a few nasty +things about Egypt and other places. Of course we couldn't stand that +either, so there was another ultimatum, and the upshot of it all was +that I got a wire late last night from my brother telling me that war +would almost certainly be declared to-day, and asking me for the use of +this craft of mine as a sort of dispatch-boat if she was ready. She is +intended for something very much better than fighting purposes, so he +couldn't ask me to use her as a war-ship; besides, I am under a solemn +obligation to her inventor--her creator, in fact, for I've only built +her--to blow her to pieces rather than allow her to be used as a +fighting machine except, of course, in sheer personal self-defence. + +"There is the telegram from my brother, so you can see there's no +mistake, and just after it came a messenger asking me, if the machine +was a success, to bring this with me across the Atlantic as fast as I +could come. It is the duplicate of an offensive and defensive alliance +between Great Britain and the United States, of which the details had +been arranged just as this complication arose. Another is coming across +by a fast cruiser, and, of course, the news will have got to Washington +by cable by this time. + +"By the time you get to the entrance of the Channel you will probably +find it swarming with French cruisers and torpedo-destroyers, so if +you'll be advised by me, you'll leave Queenstown out and get as far +north as possible." + +"Lord Redgrave," said the Captain, putting out his hand, "I'm +responsible for a good bit right here, and I don't know how to thank you +enough. I guess that treaty's been given away back to France by some of +our Irish statesmen by now, and it'd be mighty unhealthy for the _St. +Louis_ to fall in with a French or Russian cruiser----" + +"That's all right, Captain," said Lord Redgrave, taking his hand. "I +should have warned any other British or American ship. At the same time, +I must confess that my motives in warning you were not entirely +unselfish. The fact is, there's some one on board the _St. Louis_ whom I +should decidedly object to see taken off to France as a prisoner of +war." + +"And may I ask who that is?" said Captain Hawkins. + +"Why not?" replied his lordship. "It's the young lady I spoke to on deck +just now, Miss Rennick. Her father was the inventor of that craft of +mine. No one would believe his theories. He was refused patents both in +England and America on the ground of lack of practical utility. I met +him about two years ago, that is to say rather more than a year before +his death, when I was stopping at Banff up in the Canadian Rockies. We +made a travellers' acquaintance, and he told me about this idea of his. +I was very much interested, but I'm afraid I must confess that I might +not have taken it up practically if the Professor hadn't happened to +possess an exceedingly beautiful daughter. However, of course I'm pretty +glad now that I did do it; though the experiments cost nearly five +thousand pounds and the craft herself close on a quarter of a million. +Still, she is worth every penny of it, and I was bringing her over to +offer to Miss Rennick as a wedding present, that is to say if she'd have +it--and me." + +Captain Hawkins looked up and said rather seriously: + +"Then, my Lord, I presume you don't know----" + +"Don't know what?" + +"That Miss Rennick is crossing in the care of Mrs. Van Stuyler, to be +married in London next month." + +"The devil she is! And to whom, may I ask?" exclaimed his lordship, +pulling himself up very straight. + +"To the Marquis of Byfleet, son of the Duke of Duncaster. I wonder you +didn't hear of it. The match was arranged last fall. From what people +say she's not very desperately in love with him, but--well, I fancy it's +like rather too many of these Anglo-American matches. A couple of +million dollars on one side, a title on the other, and mighty little +real love between them." + +"But," said Redgrave between his teeth, "I didn't understand that Miss +Rennick ever had a fortune; in fact I'm quite certain that if her father +had been a rich man he'd have worked out his invention himself." + +"Oh, the dollars aren't his. In fact they won't be hers till she +marries," replied the Captain. "They belong to her uncle, old Russell +Rennick. He got in on the ground floor of the New York and Chicago ice +trusts, and made millions. He's going to spend some of them on making +his niece a Marchioness. That's about all there is to it." + +"Oh, indeed!" said Redgrave, still between his teeth. "Well, considering +that Byfleet is about as big a wastrel as ever disgraced the English +aristocracy, I don't think either Miss Rennick or her uncle will make a +very good bargain. However, of course that's no affair of mine now. I +remember that this Russell Rennick refused to finance his brother when +he really wanted the money. He made a particularly bad bargain, too, +then, though he didn't know it; for a dozen crafts like that, properly +armed, would simply smash up the navies of the world, and make sea-power +a private trust. After all, I'm not particularly sorry, because then it +wouldn't have belonged to me. Well now, Captain, I'm going to ask you to +give me a bit of breakfast when it's ready, and then I must be off. I +want to be in Washington to-night." + +"To-night! What, twenty-one hundred miles!" + +"Why not?" said Redgrave; "I can do about a hundred and fifty an hour +through the atmosphere, and then, you see, if that isn't fast enough I +can rise outside the earth's attraction, let it spin round, and then +come down where I want to." + +"Great Scott!" remarked Captain Hawkins inadequately, but with emphasis. +"Well, my Lord, I guess we'll go down to breakfast." + +But breakfast was not quite ready, and so Lord Redgrave rejoined Miss +Rennick and her chaperon on deck. All eyes and a good many glasses were +still turned on the _Astronef_, which had now moved a few feet away from +the liner's side, and was running along, exactly keeping pace with her. + +"It's so wonderful, that even seeing doesn't seem believing," said the +girl, when they had renewed their acquaintance of two years before. + +"Well," he replied, "it would be very easy to convince you. She shall +come alongside again, and if you and Mrs. Van Stuyler will honour her by +your presence for half an hour while breakfast is getting ready, I think +I shall be able to convince you that she is not the airy fabric of a +vision, but simply the realisation in metal and glass and other things +of visions which your father saw some years ago." + +There was no resisting an invitation put in such a way. Besides, the +prospect of becoming the wonder and envy of every other woman on board +was altogether too dazzling for words. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler looked a little aghast at the idea at first, but she +too had something of the same feeling as Zaidie, and besides, there +could hardly be any impropriety in accepting the invitation of one of +the wealthiest and most distinguished noblemen in the British Peerage. +So, after a little demur and a slight manifestation of nervousness, she +consented. + +Redgrave signalled to the man at the steering wheel. The _Astronef_ +slackened pace a little, dropped a yard or so, and slid up quite close +to the bridge-rail again. Lord Redgrave got in first and ran a light +gangway down on to the bridge. Zaidie and Mrs. Van Stuyler were +carefully handed up. The next moment the gangway was drawn up again, the +sliding glass doors clashed to, the _Astronef_ leapt a couple of +thousand feet into the air, swept round to the westward in a magnificent +curve, and vanished into the gloom of the upper mists. + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +The situation was one which was absolutely without parallel in all the +history of courtship from the days of Mother Eve to those of Miss Lilla +Zaidie Rennick. The nearest approach to it would have been the +old-fashioned Tartar custom which made it lawful for a man to steal his +best girl, if he could get her first, fling her across his horse's +crupper and ride away with her to his tent. + +But to the shocked senses of Mrs. Van Stuyler the present adventure +appeared a great deal more terrible than that. Both Zaidie and herself +had sprung to their feet as soon as the upward rush of the _Astronef_ +had slackened and they were released from their seats. They looked down +through the glass walls of what may be called the hurricane deck-chamber +of the _Astronef_, and saw below them a snowy sea of clouds just +crimsoned by the rising sun. + +In this cloud-sea, which spread like a wide-meshed veil between them and +the earth, there were great irregular rifts which looked as big as +continents on a map. These had a blue-grey background, or it might be +more correct to say under-ground, and in the midst of one of these they +saw a little black speck which after a moment or two took the shape of a +little toy ship, and presently they recognised it as the +eleven-thousand-ton liner which a few moments ago had been their ocean +home. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler was shaking in every muscle, afflicted by a sort of St. +Vitus' dance induced by physical fear and outraged propriety. Quite +apart from these, however, she experienced a third sensation which made +for a nameless inquietude. She was a woman of the world, well versed in +most of its ways, and she fully recognised that that single bound from +the bridge-rail of the _St. Louis_ to the other side of the clouds had +already carried her and her charge beyond the pale of human law. + +The same thought, mingled with other feelings, half of wonder and half +of re-awakened tenderness, was just then uppermost in Miss Zaidie's +mind. It was quite obvious that the man who could create and control +such a marvellous vehicle as this could, morally as well as physically, +lift himself beyond the reach of the conventions which civilised society +had instituted for its own protection and government. + +He could do with them exactly as he pleased. They were utterly at his +mercy. He might carry them away to some unexplored spot on one of the +continents, or to some unknown island in the midst of the wide Pacific. +He might even transport them into the midst of the awful solitudes which +surround the Poles. He could give them the choice between doing as he +wished, submitting unconditionally to his will, or committing suicide by +starvation. + +They had not even the option of jumping out, for they did not know how +to open the sliding doors; and even if they had done, what feminine +nerves could have faced a leap into that awful gulf which lay below +them, a two-thousand-foot dive through the clouds into the waters of the +wintry Atlantic? + +They looked at each other in speechless, dazed amazement. Far away below +them on the other side of the clouds the _St. Louis_ was steaming +eastward, and with her were going the last hopes of the coronet which +was to be the matrimonial equivalent of Miss Zaidie's beauty and Russell +Rennick's millions. + +They were no longer of the world. Its laws could no longer protect them. +Anything might happen, and that anything depended absolutely on the will +of the lord and master of the extraordinary vessel which, for the +present, was their only world. + +"My dearest Zaidie," Mrs. Van Stuyler gasped, when she at length +recovered the power of articulate speech, "what an entirely too awful +thing this is! Why, it's abduction and nothing less. Indeed it's worse, +for he's taken us clean off the earth, and there's no more chance of +rescue than if he took us to one of those planets he said he could go +to. If I didn't feel a great responsibility for you, dear, I believe I +should faint." + +By this time Miss Zaidie had recovered a good deal of her usual +composure. The excitement of the upward rush, and what was left of the +momentary physical fear, had flushed her cheeks and lighted her eyes. +Even Mrs. Van Stuyler thought her looking, if possible, more beautiful +than she had done under the most favourable of terrestrial +circumstances. There was a something else too, which she didn't +altogether like to see, a sort of resignation to her fate which, in a +young lady situated as she was then, Mrs. Van Stuyler considered to be +distinctly improper. + +"It is rather startling, isn't it?" she said, with hardly a trace of +emotion in her voice; "but I have no doubt that everything will be all +right in the end." + +"Everything all right, my dear Zaidie! What on earth, or I might say +under heaven, do you mean?" + +"I mean," replied Zaidie even more composedly than before, and also with +a little tightening of her lips, "that Lord Redgrave is the owner of +this vessel, and that therefore it is quite impossible that anything out +of the way could happen to us--I mean anything more out of the way than +this wonderful jump from the sea to the sky has been, unless, of course, +Lord Redgrave is going to take us for a voyage among the stars." + +"Zaidie Rennick!" said Mrs. Van Stuyler, bridling up into her most +frigid dignity, "I am more than surprised to hear you talk in such a +strain. Perfectly safe, indeed! Has it not struck you that we are +absolutely at this man's--this Lord Redgrave's, mercy, that he can take +us where he likes, and treat us just as he pleases?" + +"My dear Mrs. Van," replied Zaidie, dropping back into her familiar form +of address, but speaking even more frigidly than her chaperon had done, +"you seem to forget that, however extraordinary our situation may be +just now, we are in the care of an English gentleman. Lord Redgrave was +a friend of my father's, the only man who believed in his ideals, the +only man who realised them, the only man----" + +"That you were ever in love with, eh?" said Mrs. Van Stuyler with a snap +in her voice. "Is that so? Ah, I begin to see something now." + +"And I think, if you possess your soul in patience, you will see +something more before long," snapped Miss Zaidie in reply. Then she +stopped abruptly and the flush on her cheek deepened, for at that moment +Lord Redgrave came up the companion way from the lower deck carrying a +big silver tray with a coffee pot, three cups and saucers, a rack of +toast, and a couple of plates of bread and butter and cake. + +Just then a sort of social miracle happened. The fact was that Mrs. Van +Stuyler had never before had her early coffee brought to her by a peer +of the British Realm. She thought it a little humiliating afterwards, +but for the moment all sorts of conventional barriers seemed to melt +away. After all she was a woman, and some years ago she had been a young +one. Lord Redgrave was an almost perfect specimen of English manhood in +its early prime. He was one of the richest peers in England, and he was +bringing her her coffee. As she said afterwards, she wilted, and she +couldn't help it. + +"I'm afraid I have kept you waiting a long time for your coffee, +ladies," said Redgrave, as he balanced the tray on one hand and drew a +wicker table towards them with the other. "You see there are only two of +us on board this craft, and as my engineer is navigating the ship, I +have to attend to the domestic arrangements." + +Mrs. Van Stuyler looked at him in the silence of mental paralysis. Miss +Zaidie frowned, smiled, and then began to laugh. + +"Well, of all the cold-blooded English ways of putting things----" she +began. + +"I beg your pardon?" said Lord Redgrave as he put the tray down on the +table. + +"What Miss Rennick means, Lord Redgrave," interrupted Mrs. Van Stuyler, +struggling out of her paralytic condition, "and what I, too, should like +to say, is that under the circumstances----" + +"You think that I am not as penitent as I ought to be. Is that so?" said +Redgrave, with a glance and a smile mostly directed towards Miss Zaidie. +"Well, to tell you the truth," he went on, "I am not a bit penitent. On +the contrary, I am very glad to have been able to assist the Fates as +far as I have done." + +"Assist the Fates!" gasped Mrs. Van Stuyler, helping herself shakingly +to sugar, while Miss Zaidie folded a gossamer slice of bread and butter +and began to eat it; "I think, Lord Redgrave, that if you knew _all_ the +circumstances, you would say that you were working against them." + +"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler," he replied, as he filled his own coffee cup, +"I quite agree with you as to certain fates, but the Fates which I mean +are the ones which, with good or bad reason, I think are working on my +side. Besides, I _do_ know all the circumstances, or at least the most +important of them. That knowledge is, in fact, my principal excuse for +bringing you so unceremoniously above the clouds." + +As he said this he took a sideway glance at Miss Zaidie. She dropped her +eyelids and went on eating her bread and butter; but there was a little +deepening of the flush on her cheeks which was to him as the first flush +of sunrise to a benighted wanderer. + +There was a rather awkward silence after this. Miss Zaidie stirred the +coffee in her cup with a dainty Queen Anne spoon, and seemed to +concentrate the whole of her attention upon the operation. Then Mrs. Van +Stuyler took a sip out of her cup and said: + +"But really, Lord Redgrave, I feel that I must ask you whether you think +that what you have done during the last few minutes (which already, I +assure you, seem hours to me) is--well, quite in accordance with +the--what shall I say--ah, the rules that we have been accustomed to +live under?" + +Lord Redgrave looked at Miss Zaidie again. She didn't even raise her +eyelids, only a very slight tremor of her hand as she raised her cup to +her lips told that she was even listening. He took courage from this +sign, and replied: + +"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler, the only answer that I can make to that just +now is to remind you that, by the sanction of ages, everything is +supposed to be fair under two sets of circumstances, and, whatever is +happening on the earth down yonder, we, I think, are not at war." + +The next moment Miss Zaidie's eyelids lifted a little. There was a +tremor about her lips almost too faint to be perceptible, and the +slightest possible tinge of colour crept upwards towards her eyes. She +put her cup down and got up, walked towards the glass walls of the +deck-chamber, and looked out over the cloud-scape. + +The shortness of her steamer skirt made it possible for Lord Redgrave +and Mrs. Van Stuyler to see that the sole of her right boot was swinging +up and down on the heel ever so slightly. They came simultaneously to +the conclusion that if she had been alone she would have stamped, and +stamped pretty hard. Possibly also she would have said things to herself +and the surrounding silence. This seemed probable from the almost +equally imperceptible motion of her shapely shoulders. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler recognised in a moment that her charge was getting +angry. She knew by experience that Miss Zaidie possessed a very proper +spirit of her own, and that it was just as well not to push matters too +far. She further recognised that the circumstances were extraordinary, +not to say equivocal, and that she herself occupied a distinctly +peculiar position. + +She had accepted the charge of Miss Zaidie from her Uncle Russell for a +consideration counted partly by social advantages and partly by dollars. +In the most perfect innocence she had permitted not only her charge but +herself to be abducted--for, after all, that was what it came to--from +the deck of an American liner, and carried, not only beyond the clouds, +but also beyond the reach of human law, both criminal and conventional. + +Inwardly she was simply fuming with rage. As she said afterwards, she +felt just like a bottled volcano which would like to go off and daren't. + +About two minutes of somewhat surcharged silence passed. Mrs. Van +Stuyler sipped her coffee in ostentatiously small sips. Lord Redgrave +took his in slower and longer ones, and helped himself to bread and +butter. Miss Zaidie appeared perfectly contented with her contemplation +of the clouds. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +At length Mrs. Van Stuyler, being a woman of large experience and some +social deftness, recognised that a change of subject was the easiest way +of retreat out of a rather difficult situation. So she put her cup down, +leant back in her chair, and, looking straight into Lord Redgrave's +eyes, she said with purely feminine irrelevance: + +"I suppose you know, Lord Redgrave, that, when we left, the machine +which we call in America Manhood Suffrage--which, of course, simply +means the selection of a government by counting noses which may or may +not have brains above them--was what some of our orators would call in +full blast. If you are going to New York after Washington, as you said +on the boat, we might find it a rather inconvenient time to arrive. The +whole place will be chaos, you know; because when the citizen of the +United States begins electioneering, New York is not a very nice place +to stop in except for people who want excitement, and so if you will +excuse me putting the question so directly, I should like to know what +you just do mean to do----" + +Lord Redgrave saw that she was going to add "with us," but before he had +time to say anything, Miss Zaidie turned round, walked deliberately +towards her chair, sat down, poured herself out a fresh cup of coffee, +added the milk and sugar with deliberation, and then after a preliminary +sip said, with her cup poised half-way between her dainty lips and the +table: + +"Mrs. Van, I've got an idea. I suppose it's inherited, for dear old Pop +had plenty. Anyhow we may as well get back to common-sense subjects. Now +look here," she went on, switching an absolutely convincing glance +straight into her host's eyes, "my father may have been a dreamer, but +still he was a Sound Money man. He believed in honest dealings. He +didn't believe in borrowing a hundred dollars gold and paying back in +fifty dollars silver. What's your opinion, Lord Redgrave; you don't do +that sort of thing in England, do you? Uncle Russell is a Sound Money +man too. He's got too much gold locked up to want silver for it." + +"My dear Zaidie," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, "what _have_ democratic and +republican politics and bimetalism got to do with----" + +"With a trip in this wonderful vessel which Pop told me years ago could +go up to the stars if it ever was made? Why just this, Lord Redgrave is +an Englishman and too rich to believe in anything but sound money, so is +Uncle Russell, and there you have it, or should have." + +"I think I see what you mean, Miss Rennick," said their host, leaning +back in his chair and folding his hands behind his head, as steamboat +travellers are wont to do when seas are smooth and skies are blue. "The +_Astronef_ might come down like a vision from the clouds and preach the +Gospel of Gold in electric rays of silver through the commonplace medium +of the Morse Code. How's that for poetry and practice?" + +"I quite agree with his lordship as regards the practice," said Mrs. Van +Stuyler, talking somewhat rudely across him to Zaidie. "It would be an +excellent use to put this wonderful invention to. And then, I am sure +his lordship would land us in Central Park, so that we could go to your +Uncle's house right away." + +"No, no, I'm afraid I must ask you to excuse me there, Mrs. Van +Stuyler," said Redgrave, with a change of tone which Miss Zaidie +appreciated with a swiftly veiled glance. "You see, I have placed myself +beyond the law. I have, as you have been good enough to intimate, +abducted--to put it brutally--two ladies from the deck of an Atlantic +liner. Further, in doing so I have selfishly spoiled the prospects of +one of the ladies. But, seriously, I really must go to Washington +first----" + +"I think, Lord Redgrave," interrupted Mrs. Van Stuyler, ignoring the +last unfinished sentence and assuming her best Knickerbocker dignity, +"if you will forgive me saying so, that that is scarcely a subject for +discussion here." + +"And if that's so," interrupted Miss Zaidie, "the less we say about it +the better. What I wanted to say was this. We all want the Republicans +in, at least all of us that have much to lose. Now, if Lord Redgrave was +to use this wonderful air-ship of his on the right side--why there +wouldn't be any standing against it." + +"I must say that until just now I had hardly contemplated turning the +_Astronef_ into an electioneering machine. Still, I admit that she might +be made use of in a good cause, only I hope----" + +"That we shan't want you to paste her over with election bills, eh?--or +start handbill-snowstorms from the deck--or kidnap Croker and Bryan just +as you did us, for instance?" + +"If I could, I'm quite sure that I shouldn't have as pleasant guests as +I have now on board the _Astronef_. What do you think, Mrs. Van +Stuyler?" + +"My dear Lord Redgrave," she replied, "that would be quite impossible. +The idea of being shut up in a ship like this which can soar not only +from earth, but beyond the clouds, with people who would find out your +best secrets and then perhaps shoot you so as to be the only possessors +of them--well, that would be foolishness indeed." + +"Why, certainly it would," said Zaidie; "the only use you could have for +people like that would be to take them up above the clouds and drop them +out. But suppose we--I mean Lord Redgrave--took the _Astronef_ down over +New York and signalled messages from the sky at night with a +searchlight----" + +"Good," said their host, getting up from his deck-chair and stretching +himself up straight, looking the while at Miss Zaidie's averted profile. +"That's gorgeously good! We might even turn the election. I'm for sound +money all the time, if I may be permitted to speak American." + +"English is quite good enough for us, Lord Redgrave," said Miss Zaidie a +little stiffly. "We may have improved on the old language a bit, still +we understand it, and--well, we can forgive its shortcomings. But that +isn't quite to the point." + +"It seems to me," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, "that we are getting nearly as +far from the original subject as we are from the _St. Louis_. May I ask, +Zaidie, what you really propose to do?" + +"_Do_ is not for us to say," said Miss Zaidie, looking straight up to +the glass roof of the deck-chamber. "You see, Mrs. Van, we're not free +agents. We are not even first-class passengers who have paid their fares +on a contract ticket which is supposed to get them there." + +"If you'll pardon me saying so," said Lord Redgrave, stopping his walk +up and down the deck, "that is not quite the case. To put it in the most +brutally material form, it is quite true that I have kidnapped you two +ladies and taken you beyond the reach of earthly law. But there is +another law, one which would bind a gentleman even if he were beyond the +limits of the Solar System, and so if you wish to be landed either in +Washington or New York it shall be done. You shall be put down within a +carriage drive of your own residence, or of Mr. Russell Rennick's. I +will myself see you to his door, and there we may say goodbye, and I +will take my trip through the Solar System alone." + +There was another pause after this, a pause pregnant with the fate of +two lives. They looked at each other--Mrs. Van Stuyler at Zaidie, Zaidie +at Lord Redgrave, and he at Mrs. Van Stuyler again. It was a kind of +three-cornered duel of eyes, and the eyes said a good deal more than +common human speech could have done. + +Then Lord Redgrave, in answer to the last glance from Zaidie's eyes, +said slowly and deliberately: + +"I don't want to take any undue advantage, but I think I am justified in +making one condition. Of course I can take you beyond the limits of the +world that we know, and to other worlds that we know little or nothing +of. At least I could do so if I were not bound by law as strong as +gravitation itself; but now, as I said before, I just ask whether or not +my guests or, if you think it suits the circumstances better, my +prisoners, shall be released unconditionally wherever they choose to be +landed." + +He paused for a moment and then, looking straight into Zaidie's eyes, he +added: + +"The one condition I make is that the vote shall be unanimous." + +"Under the circumstances, Lord Redgrave," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, rising +from her seat and walking towards him with all the dignity that would +have been hers in her own drawing-room, "there can only be one answer to +that. Your guests or your prisoners, as you choose to call them, must be +released unconditionally." + +Lord Redgrave heard these words as a man might hear words in a dream. +Zaidie had risen too. They were looking into each other's eyes, and many +unspoken words were passing between them. There was a little silence, +and then, to Mrs. Van Stuyler's unutterable horror, Zaidie said, with +just the suspicion of a gasp in her voice: + +"There's one dissentient. We are prisoners, and I guess I'd better +surrender at discretion." + +The next moment her captor's arm was round her waist, and Mrs. Van +Stuyler, with her twitching fingers linked behind her back, and her nose +at an angle of sixty degrees, was staring away through the blue +immensity, dumbly wondering what on earth or under heaven was going to +happen next. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +After a couple of minutes of silence which could be felt, Mrs. Van +Stuyler turned round and said angrily: + +"Zaidie, you will excuse me, perhaps, if I say that your conduct is +not--I mean has not been what I should have expected--what I did, +indeed, expect from your uncle's niece when I undertook to take you to +Europe. I must say----" + +"If I were you, Mrs. Van, I don't think I'd say much more about that, +because, you see, it's fixed and done. Of course, Lord Redgrave's only +an earl, and the other is a marquis, but, you see, he's a man, and I +don't quite think the other one is--and that's about all there is to +it." + +Their host had just left the deck-saloon, taking the early coffee +apparatus with him, and Miss Zaidie, in the first flush of her pride and +re-found happiness, was taking a promenade of about twelve strides each +way, while Mrs. Van Stuyler, after partially relieving her feelings as +above, had seated herself stiffly in her wicker-chair, and was following +her with eyes which were critical and, if they had been twenty years +younger, might also have been envious. + +"Well, at least I suppose I must congratulate you on your ability to +accommodate yourself to most extraordinary circumstances. I must say +that as far as that goes I quite envy you. I feel as though I ought to +choke or take poison, or something of that sort." + +"Sakes, Mrs. Van, please don't talk like that!" said Zaidie, stopping in +her walk just in front of her chaperon's chair. "Can't you see that +there's nothing extraordinary about the circumstances except this +wonderful ship? I have told you how Pop and I met Lord Redgrave in our +tour through the Canadian Rockies two or three years ago. No, it's two +years and nine months next June; and how he took an interest in Pop's +theories and ideas about this same ship that we are on now----" + +"Oh yes," said Mrs. Van Stuyler rather acidly, "and not only in the +abstract ideas, but apparently in a certain concrete reality." + +"Mrs. Van," laughed Zaidie, with a cunning twist on her heel, "I know +you don't mean to be rude, but--well, now did any one ever call _you_ a +concrete reality? Of course it's correct just as a scientific +definition, perhaps--still, anyhow, I guess it's not much good going on +about that. The facts are just this way. I consented to marry that +Byfleet marquis just out of sheer spite and blank ignorance. Lord +Redgrave never actually asked me to marry him when we were in the +Rockies, but he did say when he went back to England that as soon as he +had realised my father's ideal he would come over and try and realise +one of his own. He was looking at me when he said it, and he looked a +good deal more than he said. Then he went away, and poor Pop died. Of +course I couldn't write and tell him, and I suppose he was too proud to +write before he'd done what he undertook to do, and I, like most +girl-fools in the same place would have done, thought that he'd given +the whole thing up and just looked upon the trip as a sort of interlude +in globe-trotting, and thought no more about Pop's ideas and inventions +than he did about his daughter." + +"Very natural, of course," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, somewhat mollified by +the subdued passion which Zaidie had managed to put into her commonplace +words; "and so as you thought he had forgotten you and was finding a +wife in his own country, and a possible husband came over from that same +country with a coronet----" + +"That'll do, Mrs. Van, thank you," interrupted Miss Zaidie, bringing her +daintily-shod foot down on the deck this time with an unmistakable +stamp. "We'll consider that incident closed if you please. It was a +miserable, mean, sordid business altogether; I am utterly, hopelessly +ashamed of it and myself too. Just to think that I could ever----" + +Mrs. Van Stuyler cut short her indignant flow of words by a sudden +uplifting of her eyelids and a swift turn of her head towards the +companion way. Zaidie stamped again, this time more softly, and walked +away to have another look at the clouds. + +"Why, what on earth is the matter?" she exclaimed, shrinking back from +the glass wall. "There's nothing--we're not anywhere!" + +"Pardon me, Miss Rennick, you are on board the _Astronef_," said Lord +Redgrave, as he reached the top of the companion way, "and the +_Astronef_ is at present travelling at about a hundred and fifty miles +an hour above the clouds towards Washington. That is why you don't see +the clouds and sea as you did after we left the _St. Louis_. At a speed +like this they simply make a sort of grey-green blur. We shall be in +Washington this evening, I hope." + +"To-night, sir--I beg your pardon, my Lord!" gasped Mrs. Van Stuyler. "A +hundred and fifty miles an hour! Surely that's impossible." + +"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler," said Redgrave, with a side-look at Zaidie, +"nowadays 'impossible' is hardly an English or even an American word. In +fact, since I have had the honour of realising some of Professor +Rennick's ideas it has been relegated to the domain of mathematics. Not +even he could make two and two more or less than four, but--well, would +you like to come into the conning-tower and see for yourselves? I can +show you a few experiments that will, at any rate, help to pass the time +between here and Washington." + +"Lord Redgrave," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, dropping gracefully back into +her wicker armchair, "if I may say so, I have seen quite enough +impossibilities, and--er, well--other things since we left the deck of +the _St. Louis_ to keep me quite satisfied until, with your lordship's +permission, I set foot on solid ground again, and I should also like to +remind you that we have left everything behind us on the _St. Louis_, +everything except what we stand up in, and--and----" + +"And therefore it will be a point of honour with me to see that you want +for nothing while you are on board the _Astronef_, and that you shall be +released from your durance----" + +"Now don't say vile, Lenox--I mean----" + +"It is perfectly plain what you mean, Zaidie," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, in +a tone which seemed to send a chill through the deck-chamber. "Really, +the American girl----" + +"Just wants to tell the truth," laughed Zaidie, going towards Redgrave. +"Lord Redgrave, if you like it better, says he wants to marry me, and, +peer or peasant, I want to marry him, and that's all there is to it. You +don't suppose I'd have----" + +"My dear girl, there's no need to go into details," interrupted Mrs. Van +Stuyler, inspired by fond memories of her own youth; "we will take that +for granted, and as we are beyond the social region in which chaperons +are supposed to be necessary, I think I will have a nap." + +"And we'll go to the conning-tower, eh?" + +"Breakfast will be ready in about half an hour," said Redgrave, as he +took Zaidie by the arm and led her towards the forward end of the +deck-chamber. "Meanwhile, _au revoir_! If you want anything, touch the +button at your right hand, just as you would on board the _St. Louis_." + +"I thank your lordship," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, half melting and half +icy still. "I shall be quite content to wait until you come back. Really +I feel quite sleepy." + +"That's the effect of the elevation on the dear old lady's nerves," +Redgrave whispered to Zaidie as he helped her up the narrow stairway +which led to the glass-domed conning-tower, in which in days to come she +was destined to pass some of the most delightful and the most terrible +moments of her life. + +"Then why doesn't it affect me that way?" said Zaidie, as she took her +place in the little chamber, steel-walled and glass-roofed, and half +filled with instruments of which she, Vassar girl and all as she was, +could only guess the use. + +"Well, to begin with, you are younger, which is an absolutely +unnecessary observation; and in the second place, perhaps you were +thinking about something else." + +"By which I suppose you mean your lordship's noble self." + +This was said in such a tone and with such an indescribable smile that +there immediately ensued a gap in the conversation, and a silence which +was a great deal more eloquent than any words could have made it. + +When Miss Zaidie had got free again she put her hands up to her hair, +and while she was patting it into something like shape again she said: + +"But I thought you brought me here to show me some experiments, and not +to----" + +"Not to take advantage of the first real opportunity of tasting some of +the dearest delights that mortal man ever stole from earth or sea? Do +you remember that day when we were coming down from the big +glacier--when your foot slipped and I just caught you and saved a +sprained ankle?" + +"Yes, you wretch, and went away next day and left something like a +broken heart behind you! Why didn't you--Oh what idiots you men can be +when you put your minds to it!" + +"It wasn't quite that, Zaidie. You see, I'd promised your father the day +before--of course I was only a younger son then--that I wouldn't say +anything about realising _my_ ideal until I had realised his, and +so----" + +"And so I might have gone to Europe with Uncle Russell's millions to buy +that man Byfleet's coronet, and pay the price----" + +"Don't, Zaidie, don't! That is quite too horrible to think of, and as +for the coronet, well, I think I can give you one about as good as his, +and one that doesn't want re-gilding. Good Lord, fancy you married to a +thing like that! What could have made you think of it?" + +"I didn't think," she said angrily; "I didn't think and I didn't feel. +Of course I thought that I'd dropped right out of your life, and after +that I didn't care. I was mad right through, and I'd made up my mind to +do what others did--take a title and a big position, and have the +outside as bright as I could get it, whatever the inside might be like. +I'd made up my mind to be a society queen abroad, and a miserable woman +at home--and, Lenox, thank God and you, that I wasn't!" + +Then there was another interlude, and at the end of it Redgrave said: + +"Wait till we've finished our honeymoon in space, and come back to +earth. You won't want any coronets then, although you'll have one, for +all the lands of earth won't hold another woman like yourself--your own +sweet self! Of course it doesn't now, but--there, you know what I mean. +You'll have been to other worlds, you'll have made the round trip of the +Solar System, so to say, and----" + +"And I think, dear, that is about promise of wonders enough, and of +other things too--no, you are really quite too exacting. I thought you +brought me here to show me some of the wonders that this marvellous ship +of yours can work." + +"Then just one more and I'll show you. Now you stand up there on that +step so that you can see all round, and watch with all your eyes, +because you are going to see something that no woman ever saw before." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +Above a tiny little writing-desk fixed to the wall of the conning-tower +there was a square mahogany board with six white buttons in pairs. On +one side of the board hung a telephone and on the other a speaking-tube. +To the right hand opposite where Zaidie stood were two nickel-plated +wheels and behind each of them a white disc, one marked off into 360 +degrees, and the other into 100 with subdivisions of tens. Overhead hung +an ordinary tell-tale compass, and compactly placed on other parts of +the wall were barometers, thermometers, barographs, and, in fact, +practically every instrument that the most exacting of aeronauts or +Space-explorers could have asked for. + +"You see, Zaidie, this is what one might call the cerebral chamber of +the _Astronef_, and, granted that my engines worked all right, I could +make her do anything I wanted without moving out of here, but as a rule, +of course, Murgatroyd is in the engine-room. If he wasn't the most +whole-souled Wesleyan that Yorkshire ever produced, I believe he'd +become an idolater and worship the _Astronef's_ engines." + +"And who is Murgatroyd, please?" + +"In the first place he is what I might call an hereditary retainer of +the House of Redgrave. His ancestors have served mine for the last seven +hundred years. When my ancestors were burglar-barons, his were +men-at-arms. When we went on the Crusades they went too; when we raised +a regiment for the King against the Parliament they were naturally the +first to enlist in it; and as we gradually settled down into peaceful +respectability they did the same. Lastly, when we went into trade as +ironmasters and engineers they went in too. This Murgatroyd, for +instance, was master-foreman of my works at Smeaton, and he was the only +man I dared trust with the secrets of the _Astronef_, and the only one I +would trust myself on board her with, and that's why we're a crew of +two. You see the command of a vessel like this is a fairly big business, +and if it got into the wrong sort of hands----" + +"Yes, I see," said Zaidie with a little nod. "It would be just too awful +to think about. Why you might keep the world in terror with it; but I +know you wouldn't do that, because, for one thing, I wouldn't let you." + +"Gently, gently, Ma'm'selle; permit me most humbly to remind you that +you are still my prisoner, and that I am still Commander of the +_Astronef_." + +"Oh, very well then," said Zaidie, interrupting him with a pretty little +gesture of impatience, "and now suppose you let me see what the +_Astronef's_ commander can do with her." + +"Certainly," replied Redgrave, "and with the greatest pleasure--but, by +the way, that reminds me you haven't paid your footing yet." + +When due payment had been given and taken, or perhaps it would be more +correct to say taken and given, Redgrave put his finger on one of the +buttons. + +Immediately Zaidie heard the swish of the air past the smooth wall of +the conning-tower grow fainter and fainter. Then there came a little +check which nearly upset her balance, and presently the clouds beneath +them began to take shape and great white continents of them with grey +oceans in between went sweeping silently and swiftly away behind them. + +Redgrave turned the wheel in front of the 100-degree disc a little to +the left. The next instant the clouds rose up. For a moment Zaidie could +see nothing but white mist on all sides. Then the atmosphere cleared +again, and she saw far below her what looked like a vast expanse of +ocean that had been suddenly frozen solid. + +There were the long Atlantic rollers tipped with snowy foam. Here and +there at wide intervals were little black dots, some of them with brown +trails behind them, others with little patches of white which showed up +distinctly against the dark grey-blue of the sea. Every moment they grew +bigger. Then the white-crested waves began to move, and the big ocean +steamers and full-rigged sailing ships looked less and less like toys. +Just under them there was a very big one with four funnels pouring out +dense volumes of black smoke. Redgrave took up a pair of glasses, looked +at her for a moment and said: + +"That's the _Deutschland_, the new Hamburg-American record-breaker. +Suppose we go down and have a lark with her. I wonder if she's taking +news of the war. We're in with Germany, and they may know something +about it." + +"That would be just too lovely!" said Zaidie. "Let's go and show them +how _we_ can break records. I suppose they've seen us by this time and +are just wondering with all their wits what we are. I guess they'll feel +pretty tired about poor Count Zeppelin's balloon when they see _us_." + +Redgrave noted the "we" and the "us" with much secret satisfaction. + +"All right," he said, "we'll go and give them a bit of a startler." + +In front of the conning-tower there was a steel flagstaff about ten feet +high, with halliards rove through a sheer in the top. He took a little +roll of bunting out of a locker under the desk, opened a glass slide, +brought in the halliards and bent the flag on. + +Meanwhile the long shape of the great liner was getting bigger and +bigger. Her decks were black, with people staring up at this strange +apparition which was dropping upon them from the clouds. Another minute +and the _Astronef_ had dropped to within five hundred feet of the water, +and about half a mile astern of the _Deutschland_. Redgrave turned the +wheel back two or three inches and touched a second button. + +The _Astronef_ stopped her descent instantly, and then she shot forward. +The new greyhound was making her twenty-two and a half knots, hurling a +broad white torrent of foam away from under her counters. But in half a +minute the _Astronef_ was alongside her. + +Redgrave ran the roll of bunting up to the top of the flagstaff, pulled +one of the halliards, and the White Ensign of England floated out. +Almost at the same moment the German flag went up to the staff at the +stern of the _Deutschland_, and they heard a roar of cheers, mingled +with cries of wonder, come up from her swarming decks. + +Each flag was dipped thrice in due course. Redgrave took off his cap and +bowed to the Captain on the bridge. Zaidie nodded and fluttered her +handkerchief in reply to hundreds of others that were waving on the +decks. Mrs. Van Stuyler woke up in wonder and waved hers instinctively, +half longing to change crafts. In fact, if it hadn't been for her +absolute devotion to the proprieties she would have obeyed her first +impulse and asked Lord Redgrave to put her on board the steamer. + +While the officers and crew and passengers of the _Deutschland_ were +staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the graceful glittering shape of +the _Astronef_, Redgrave touched the first button in the second row +once, moved the 100-degree wheel on a few degrees, and then gave the +other a quarter turn. Then he closed the window slide, and the next +moment Zaidie saw the great liner sink down beneath them in a curious +twisting sort of way. She seemed to stop still and then spin round on +her centre, getting smaller and smaller every moment. + +"What's the matter, Lenox?" she said, with a little gasp. "What's the +_Deutschland_ doing? She seems to be spinning round on her own axis like +a top." + +"That's only the point of view, dear. She's just plugging along straight +on her way to New York, and we've been making rings round her and going +up all the time. But of course you don't notice the motion here any more +than you would if you were in a balloon." + +"But I thought you were going to speak them. Surely you don't mean to +say that you intended that just as a little bit of showing off?" + +"That's about what it comes to, I suppose, but you must not think it was +altogether vanity. You see the German Government has bought Count +Zeppelin's air-ship or steerable balloon, as it ought to be called, +always supposing that they can steer it in a wind, and of course their +idea is to make a fighting machine of it. Now Germany is engaged to +stand by us in this trouble that's coming, and by way of cementing the +alliance I thought it was just as well to let the wily Teuton know that +there's something flying the British flag which could make very small +mincemeat of their gas-bags." + +"And what about Old Glory?" said Miss Zaidie. "The _Astronef_ was built +with English money and English skill, but----" + +"She is the creature of American genius. Of course she is. In fact she +is the first concrete symbol of the Anglo-American Alliance, and when +the daughter of her creator has gone into partnership with the man who +made her we'll have two flagstaff's, and the Jack and Old Glory will +float side by side." + +"And meanwhile where are we going?" asked Zaidie, after a moment's +interval. "Ah, there we are through the clouds again. What makes us +rise? Is that the force that Pop told me he discovered?" + +"I'll answer the last question first," said Redgrave. "That was the +greatest of your father's discoveries. He got at the secret of +gravitation, and was able to analyse it into two separate forces just as +Volta did with electricity--positive and negative, or, to put it better, +attractive and repulsive. + +"Three out of the five sets of engines in the _Astronef_ develop the R. +Force, as I call it for short. This wheel with the hundred degrees +marked behind it regulates the development. The further I turn it this +way to the right, the more the R. Force overcomes the attractive force +of the earth or any other planet that we may visit. Turn it back, and +gravitation asserts itself. If I put this arrow-head on the wheel +opposite zero the weight of the _Astronef_ is about a hundred and fifty +tons, and of course she would go down like a stone, and a very big one +at that. At ten she weighs nothing; that is to say the R. Force exactly +counteracts gravitation. At eleven she begins to rise. At a hundred she +would be hurled away from the earth like a shell from a twelve-inch gun, +or even faster. Now, watch." + +He took up the speaking-tube. "Is she all tight everywhere, Andrew?" + +"Yes, my Lord," came gurgling through the tube. + +Then Redgrave slowly turned the wheel till the indicator pointed to +twenty-five. Zaidie, all eyes and wonder, saw a vast sea of glittering +white spread out beneath them, an ocean of snow with grey-blue patches +here and there. It sank away from under them till the patches became +spots and the sunlit clouds a vast, luminous blur. The air about them +grew marvellously clear and limpid. The sun blazed down on them with a +tenfold intensity of light, but Zaidie was astonished to find that very +little heat penetrated the glass walls and roof of the conning-tower. + +"What an awful height!" she exclaimed, looking round at him with +something like fear in her eyes. "How high are we, Lenox?" + +"You'll find afterwards that the _Astronef_ doesn't take any account of +high or low or up or down," he replied, looking at the dial of an +aneroid barometer by the side of him. "Roughly speaking, we're rather +over 60,000 feet--say ten miles--from the surface of the Atlantic. +That's why I asked Andrew whether everything was tight. You see we +couldn't breathe the air there is outside there--too thin and cold--and +so the _Astronef_ makes her own atmosphere as we go along. But I won't +spoil what you're going to see by any more of this. So if you please, +we'll go down now and get along to Washington. Anyhow, I hope I've +convinced you so far that I've kept my promise." + +"Yes, dear, you have, and splendidly! I've only one regret. If _he_ was +only here now, what a happy man he'd be! Still, I daresay he knows all +about it and is just as happy. In fact he must be. I feel certain he +must. The very soul of his intellect was in the dream of this ship, and +now that it's a reality he must be here still. Isn't it part of himself? +Isn't it his mind that's working in these wonderful engines of yours, +and isn't it his strength that lifts us up from the earth and takes us +down again just as you please to turn that wheel?" + +"There's little doubt about that, Zaidie," said Redgrave quietly, but +earnestly. "You know we North-country folk all have our traditions and +our ghosts; and what more likely than that the spirit of a dead man or a +man gone to other worlds should watch over the realisation of his +greatest work on earth? Why shouldn't we believe that, we who are going +away from this world to other ones?" + +"Why not?" interrupted Zaidie, "why, of course we will. And now suppose +we come down in more ways than one and go and give poor Mrs. Van Stuyler +something to eat and drink. The dear old girl must be frightened half +out of her wits by this time." + +"Very well," replied Redgrave; "but we'll come down literally first, so +that we can get the propellers to work." + +He turned the wheel back till the indicator pointed to five. The +cloud-sea came up with a rush. They passed through it, and stopped about +a thousand feet above the sea. Redgrave touched the first button twice, +and then the next one twice. The air began to hiss past the walls of the +conning-tower. The crest-crowned waves of the Atlantic seemed to sweep +in a hurrying torrent behind them, and then Redgrave, having made sure +that Murgatroyd was at the after-wheel, gave him the course for +Washington, and then went down to induct his bride-elect into the art +and mystery of cooking by electricity as it was done in the kitchen of +the _Astronef_. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +As this narrative is the story of the personal adventures of Lord +Redgrave and his bride, and not an account of events at which all the +world has already wondered, there is no necessity to describe in any +detail the extraordinary sequence of circumstances which began when the +_Astronef_ dropped without warning from the clouds in front of the White +House at Washington, and his lordship, after paying his respects to the +President, proceeded to the British Embassy and placed the copy of the +Anglo-American agreement in Lord Pauncefote's hands. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler's spirits had risen as the _Astronef_ descended towards +the lights of Washington, and when the President and Lord Pauncefote +paid a visit to the wonderful craft, the joint product of American +genius and English capital and constructive skill, she immediately +assumed, at Redgrave's request, the position of lady of the house _pro +tem._, and described the "change of plans," as she called it, which led +to their transfer from the _St. Louis_ to the _Astronef_ with an +imaginative fluency which would have done credit to the most +enterprising of American interviewers. + +"You see, my dear," she said to Zaidie afterwards, "as everything turned +out so very happily, and as Lord Redgrave behaved in such a splendid +way, I thought it was my duty to make everything appear as pleasant to +the President and Lord Pauncefote as I could." + +"It was real good of you, Mrs. Van," said Zaidie. "If I hadn't been +paralysed with admiration I believe I should have laughed. Now if you'll +just come with us on our trip, and write a book about it afterwards just +as you told--I mean as you described what happened between the _St. +Louis_ and Washington, to the President and Lord Pauncefote, you'd make +a million dollars out of it. Say now, won't you come?" + +"My dear Zaidie," Mrs. Van Stuyler replied, "you know that I am very +fond of you. If I'd only had a daughter I should have wanted her to be +just like you, and I should have wanted her to marry a man just like +Lord Redgrave. But there's a limit to everything. You say that you are +going to the moon and the stars, and to see what the other planets are +like. Well, that's your affair. I hope God will forgive you for your +presumption, and let you come back safe, but I----No. Ten--twenty +millions wouldn't pay me to tempt Providence like that." + +The _Astronef_ had landed in front of the White House, as everybody +knows, on the eve of the Presidential election. After dinner in the +deck-saloon, as the Space Navigator lay in the midst of a square of +troops, outside which a huge crowd surged and struggled to get a look at +the latest miracle of constructive science, the President and the +British Ambassador said goodbye, and as soon as the gangway ladder was +drawn in the _Astronef_, moved by no visible agency, rose from the +ground amidst a roar of cheers coming from a hundred thousand throats. +She stopped at a height of about a thousand feet, and then her forward +searchlight flashed out, swept the horizon, and vanished. Then it +flashed out again intermittently in the longs and shorts of the Morse +Code, and these, when translated, read: + +"Vote for sound men and sound money!" + +In five minutes the wires of the United States were alive with the +terse, pregnant message, and under the ocean in the dark depths of the +Atlantic ooze, vivid narratives of the coming of the miracle went +flashing to a hundred newspaper offices in England and on the Continent. +The New York correspondent of the London _Daily Express_ added the +following paragraph to his account of the strange occurrence: + +"The secret of this amazing vessel, which has proved itself capable of +traversing the Atlantic in a day, and of soaring beyond the limits of +the atmosphere at will, is possessed by one man only, and that man is an +English nobleman. The air is full of rumours of universal war. One +vessel such as this could scatter terror over a continent in a few days, +demoralise armies and fleets, reduce Society to chaos, and establish a +one-man despotism on the ruins of all the Governments of the world. The +man who could build one ship like this could build fifty, and, if his +country asked him to do it, no doubt he would. Those who, as we are +almost forced to believe, are even now contemplating a serious attempt +to dethrone England from her supreme place among the nations of Europe, +will do well to take this latest potential factor in the warfare of the +immediate future into their most serious consideration." + +This paragraph was not perhaps as absolutely correct as a proposition in +Euclid, but it stopped the war. The _Deutschland_ came in the next day, +and again the press was flooded, this time with personal narratives, and +brilliantly imaginative descriptions of the Vision which had descended +from the clouds, made rings round the great liner going at her best +speed, and then vanished in an instant beyond the range of field-glasses +and telescopes. + +Thus did the creature of Professor Rennick's inventive genius play its +first part as the peacemaker of the world. + +When the _Astronef's_ message had been duly given and recorded, her +propellers began to revolve, and her head swung round to the north-east. +So began, as all the world now knows, the most extraordinary +electioneering trip that ever was known. First Baltimore, then +Philadelphia, and then New York saw the flashes in the sky. There were +illuminations, torchlight processions, and all the machinery of American +electioneering going at full blast. But when people saw, far away up in +the starlit night, those swiftly-changing beams glittering down, as it +were, out of infinite Space, and when the telegraph operators caught on +to the fact that they were signals, a sort of awe seemed to come over +both Republicans and Democrats alike. Even Tammany's thoughts began to +lift above the sordid level of boodle. It was almost like a message from +another world. There was something supernatural about it, and when it +was translated and rushed out in extra editions of the evening papers: +"Vote for sound men and sound money" became the watchword of millions. + +From New York to Boston, Boston to Albany, and then across country to +Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Omaha--then westward to St. Paul and +Minneapolis, and northward to Portland and Seattle, southward to San +Francisco and Monterey, then eastward again to Salt Lake City, and then, +after a leap across the Rockies which frightened Mrs. Van Stuyler almost +to fainting point and made Zaidie gasp for breath, away southward to +Santa Fé and New Orleans. + +Then northward again up the Mississippi Valley to St. Louis, and thence +eastward across the Alleghanies back to Washington--such was the famous +night-voyage of the _Astronef_, and so by means of that long silver +tongue of light did she spread the message of common-sense and +commercial honesty throughout the length and breadth of the Great +Republic. The world knows how America received and interpreted it the +next day. + +Meanwhile Mr. Russell Rennick had taken train to Washington, and the day +after the election he willingly took back all that he had intended with +regard to the Marquis of Byfleet, accepted Lord Redgrave in his stead, +and bestowed his avuncular blessing at the wedding breakfast held in the +deck-chamber of the _Astronef_ poised in mid-air, five hundred feet +above the dome of the Capitol, a week later. To this he added a cheque +for a million dollars--payable to the Countess of Redgrave on her return +from her wedding trip. + +Breakfast over, the wedding party made an inspection of the wonderful +vessel under the guidance of her Commander. After this, while they were +drinking their coffee and liqueurs, and the men were smoking their +cigars in the deck-chamber, a score of the most distinguished men and +women in the United States experienced the novel sensation of sitting +quietly in deck-chairs while they were being hurled at the rate of a +hundred and fifty miles an hour through the atmosphere. + +They ran up to Niagara, dropped to within a few feet of the surface of +the Falls, passed over them, fell to the Rapids, and drifted down them +within a couple of yards of the raging waters. Then in an instant they +leapt up into the clouds, dropped again, and took a slanting course for +Washington at a speed incredible, but to them quite imperceptible, save +for the blurred rush of the half-visible earth behind them. + +That night the _Astronef_ rested again in front of the steps of the +White House, and Lord and Lady Redgrave were the guests at a +semi-official banquet given by the newly re-elected President. The +speech of the evening was made by the President himself in proposing the +health of the bride and bridegroom, and this is the way he ended: + +"There is something more in the ceremony which we have been privileged +to witness than the union of a man and a woman in the bonds of holy +matrimony. Lord Redgrave, as you know, is the descendant of one of the +noblest and most ancient families in the Motherland of New Nations. Lady +Redgrave is the daughter of the oldest and, I hope I may be allowed to +say without offence, the greatest of those nations. It is, perhaps, +early days to talk about a formal federation of the Anglo-Saxon people, +but I think I am only voicing the sentiments of every good American when +I say that, if the rumours which have drifted over and under the +Atlantic, rumours of a determined attempt on the part of certain +European powers to assault and, if possible, destroy that magnificent +fortress of individual liberty and collective equity which we call the +British Empire should unhappily prove to be true, then it may be that +the rest of the world will find that America does not speak English for +nothing. + +"But I must also remind you that a few yards from the doors of the White +House there lies the greatest marvel, I had almost said the greatest +miracle, that has ever been accomplished by human genius and human +industry. That wonderful vessel in which some of us have been privileged +to take the most marvellous journey in the history of mechanical +locomotion was thought out by an American man of science, the man whose +daughter sits on my right hand to-night. In her concrete material form +this vessel, destined to navigate the shoreless Ocean of Space, is +English. But she is also the result of the belief and the faith of an +Englishman in an American ideal.... So when she leaves this earth, as +she will do in an hour or so, to enter the confines of other worlds than +this--and, it may be, to make the acquaintance of peoples other than +those who inhabit the earth--she will have done infinitely more than she +has already done, incredible as that seems. She will not only have +convinced this world that the greatest triumph of human genius is of +Anglo-Saxon origin, but she will carry to other worlds than this the +truth which this world will have learnt before the nineteenth century +ends. + +"England in the person of Lord Redgrave, and America in the person of +his Countess, leave this world to-night to tell the other worlds of our +system, if haply they may find some intelligible means of communication, +what this world, good and bad, is like. And it is within the bounds of +possibility that in doing so they may inaugurate a wider fellowship of +created beings than the limits of this world permit; a fellowship, a +friendship, and, as the _Astronef_ entitles us to believe, even a +physical communication of world with world which, in the dawn of the +twentieth century, may transcend in sober fact the wildest dreams of all +the philanthropists and the philosophers who have sought to educate +humanity from Socrates to Herbert Spencer." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +After the _Astronef's_ forward searchlight had flashed its farewells to +the thronging, cheering crowds of Washington, her propellers began to +whirl, and she swung round northward on her way to say goodbye to the +Empire City. + +A little before midnight her two lights flashed down over New York and +Brooklyn, and were almost instantly answered by hundreds of electric +beams streaming up from different parts of the Twin Cities, and from +several men-of-war lying in the bay and the river. + +"Goodbye for the present! Have you any messages for Mars?" flickered out +from above the _Astronef's_ conning-tower. + +What Uncle Sam's message was, if he had one, was never deciphered, for +fifty beams began dotting and dashing at once, and the result was that +nothing but a blur of many mingled rays reached the conning-tower from +which Lord Redgrave and his bride were taking their last look at human +habitations. + +"You might have known that they would all answer at once," said Zaidie. +"I suppose the newspapers, of course, want interviews with the leading +Martians, and the others want to know what there is to be done in the +way of trade. Anyhow, it would be a feather in Uncle Sam's cap if he +made the first Reciprocity Treaty with another world." + +"And then proceeded to corner the commerce of the Solar System," laughed +Redgrave. "Well, we'll see what can be done. Although I think, as an +Englishman, I ought to look after the Open Door." + +"So that the Germans could get in before you, eh? That's just like you +dear, good-natured English. But look," she went on, pointing downwards, +"they're signalling again, all at once this time." + +Half a dozen beams shone out together from the principal newspaper +offices of New York. Then simultaneously they began the dotting and +dashing again. Redgrave took them down in pencil, and when the +signalling had stopped he read off: + +"No war. Dual Alliance climbs down. Don't like idea of _Astronef_. +Cables just received. Goodbye, and good luck! Come back soon, and safe!" + +"What? We have stopped the war!" exclaimed Zaidie, clasping his arm. +"Well, thank God for that. How could we begin our voyage better? You +remember what we were saying the other day, Lenox. If that's only true, +my father somewhere knows now what a blessing he has given his brother +men! We've stopped a war which might have deluged the world in blood. +We've saved perhaps hundreds of thousands of lives, and kept sorrow from +thousands of homes. Lenox, when we get back, you and the States and the +British Government will have to build a fleet of these ships, and then +the Anglo-Saxon race must say to the rest of the world----" + +"The millennium has come and its presiding goddess is Zaidie Redgrave. +If you don't stop fighting, disband your armies and turn your fleets +into liners and cargo boats, she'll proceed to sink your ships and +decimate your armies until you learn sense. Is that what you mean, +dear?" laughed Redgrave, as he slipped his left hand round her waist and +laid his right on the searchlight-switch to reply to the message. + +"Don't be ridiculous, Lenox. Still, I suppose that is something like it. +They wouldn't deserve anything else if they were fools enough to go on +fighting after they knew we could wipe them out." + +"Exactly. I perfectly agree with your Ladyship, but still sufficient +unto the day is the Armageddon thereof. Now I suppose we'd better say +goodbye and be off." + +"And what a goodbye," whispered Zaidie, with an upward glance into the +starlit ocean of Space which lay above and around them. "Goodbye to the +world itself! Well, say it, Lenox, and let us go; I want to see what the +others are like." + +"Very well then; goodbye it is," he said, beginning to jerk the switch +backwards and forwards with irregular motions, sending short flashes and +longer beams down towards the earth. + +The Empire City read the farewell message. + +"Thank God for the peace. Goodbye for the present. We shall convey the +joint compliments of John Bull and Uncle Sam to the peoples of the +planets when we find them. _Au revoir!_" + +The message was answered by the blaze of the concentrated searchlights +from land and sea all directed on the _Astronef_. For a moment her +shining shape glittered like a speck of diamond in the midst of the +luminous haze far up in the sky, and then it vanished for many an +anxious day from mortal sight. + +A few moments later Zaidie pointed over the stern and said: + +"Look, there's the moon! Just fancy--our first stopping place! Well, it +doesn't look so very far off at present." + +Redgrave turned and saw the pale yellow crescent of the new moon +swimming high above the eastern edge of the Atlantic Ocean. + +"It almost looks as if we could steer straight to it right over the +water--only, of course, it wouldn't wait there for us," she went on. + +"Oh, it'll be there when we want it, never fear," he laughed, "and, +after all, it's only a mere matter of about two hundred and forty +thousand miles away, and what's that in a trip that will cover hundreds +of millions? It will just be a sort of jumping-off place into Space for +us." + +"Still, I shouldn't like to miss seeing it," she said. "I want to see +what there is on that other side which nobody has ever seen yet, and +settle that question about air and water. Won't it just be heavenly to +be able to come back and tell them all about it at home? But just fancy +me talking stuff like this when we are going, perhaps, to solve some of +the hidden mysteries of Creation, and, may be, look upon things that +human eyes were never meant to see," she went on, with a sudden change +in her voice. + +He felt a little shiver in the arm that was resting upon his, and his +hand went down and caught hers. + +"Well, we shall see a good many marvels, and, perhaps, miracles, before +we come back, but why should there be anything in Creation that the eyes +of created beings should not look upon? Anyhow, there's one thing we +shall do I hope, we shall solve once and for all the great problem of +the worlds. + +"Look, for instance," he went on, turning round and pointing to the +west, "there is Venus following the sun. In a few days I hope you and I +will be standing on her surface, perhaps trying to talk by signs with +her inhabitants, and taking photographs of her scenery. There's Mars +too, that little red one up yonder. Before we come back we shall have +settled a good many problems about him, too. We shall have navigated the +rings of Saturn, and perhaps graphed them from his surface. We shall +have crossed the bands of Jupiter, and found out whether they are clouds +or not; perhaps we shall have landed on one of his moons and taken a +voyage round him. + +"Still, that's not the question just now, and if you are in a hurry to +circumnavigate the moon we'd better begin to get a wriggle on us as they +say down yonder; so come below and we'll shut up. A bit later I'll show +you something that no human eyes have ever seen." + +"What's that?" she asked as they turned away towards the companion +ladder. + +"I won't spoil it by telling you," he said, stopping at the top of the +stairs and taking her by the shoulders. "By the way," he went on, "I may +remind your Ladyship that you are just now drawing the last breaths of +earthly air which you will taste for some time, in fact until we get +back. And you may as well take your last look at earth as earth, for the +next time you see it it will be a planet." + +She turned to the open window and looked over into the enormous void +beneath, for all this time the _Astronef_ had been mounting swiftly +towards the zenith. + +She could see, by the growing moonlight, vast, vague shapes of land and +sea. The myriad lights of New York and Brooklyn were mingled in a tiny +patch of dimly luminous haze. The air about her had suddenly grown +bitterly cold, and she saw that the stars and planets were shining with +a brilliancy she had never seen before. Redgrave came back to her, and +laying his arm across her shoulder, said: + +"Well, have you said goodbye to your native world? It is a bit solemn, +isn't it, saying goodbye to a world that you have been born on; which +contains everything that has made up your life, everything that is dear +to you?" + +"Not quite everything," she said, looking up at him--"at least I don't +think so." + +He lost no time in making the only reply which was appropriate under the +circumstances; and then he said, drawing her close to him: + +"Nor I, as _you_ know, darling. This is our world, a world travelling +among worlds, and since I have been able to bring the most delightful of +the daughters of Terra with me, I, at any rate, am perfectly happy. Now, +I think it's getting on to supper time, so if your Ladyship will go to +your household duties, I'll have a look at my engines and make +everything snug for the voyage." + +The first thing he did when he left the conning-tower was to +hermetically close every external opening in the ship. Then he went and +carefully inspected the apparatus for purifying the air and supplying it +with fresh oxygen from the tanks in which it was stored in liquid form. +Lastly he descended into the lower hold and turned on the energy of +repulsion to its fullest extent, at the same time stopping the engines +which had been working the propellers. + +It was now no longer necessary or even possible to steer the _Astronef_. +She was directed solely by the repulsive force which would carry her +with ever-increasing swiftness, as the attraction of the earth +diminished, towards that neutral point at which the attraction of the +earth is exactly balanced by the moon. Her momentum would carry her past +this point, and then the "R. Force" would be gradually brought into play +in order to avert the unpleasant consequences of a fall of some forty +odd thousand miles. + +Andrew Murgatroyd, relieved from his duties in the wheel-house, made a +careful inspection of the auxiliary machinery, which was under his +special charge, and then retired to his quarters in the after end of the +vessel to prepare his own evening meal. + +Meanwhile, her Ladyship, with the help of the ingenious contrivances +with which the kitchen of the _Astronef_ was stocked, had prepared a +dainty little _souper à deux_. Her husband opened a bottle of the finest +champagne that the cellars of Smeaton could supply, to drink to the +prosperity of the voyage, and the health of his beautiful +fellow-voyager. When he had filled the two tall glasses the wine began +to run over the side which was toward the stern of the vessel. They took +no notice of this at first, but when Zaidie put her glass down she +stared at it for a moment, and said, in a half-frightened voice: + +"Why, what's the matter, Lenox? look at the wine! It won't keep +straight, and yet the table's perfectly level--and see! the water in the +jug looks as though it were going to run up the side." + +Redgrave took up the glass and held it balanced in his hand. When he had +got the surface of the wine level the glass was no longer perpendicular +to the table. + +"Ah, I see what it is," he said, taking another sip and putting the +glass down. "You notice that, although the wine isn't lying straight in +the glass, it isn't moving about. It's just as still as it would be on +earth. That means that our centre of gravity is not exactly in line with +the centre of the earth. We haven't quite swung into our proper +position, and that reminds me, dear. You will have to be prepared for +some rather curious experiences in that way. For instance, just see if +that jug of water is as heavy as it ought to be." + +She took hold of the handle, and exerting, as she thought, just enough +force to lift the jug a few inches, was astonished to find herself +holding it out at arm's length with scarcely any effort. She put it down +again very carefully as though she were afraid it would go floating off +the table, and said, looking rather scared: + +"That's very strange, but I suppose it's all perfectly natural?" + +"Perfectly; it merely means that we have left Mother Earth a good long +way behind us." + +"How far?" she asked. + +"I can't tell you exactly," he replied, "until I go to the +instrument-room and take the angles, but I should say roughly about +seventy thousand miles. When we've finished we'll go and have coffee on +the upper deck, and then we shall see something of the glories of Space +as no human eyes have ever seen them before." + +"Seventy thousand miles away from home already, and we only started a +couple of hours ago!" Zaidie found the idea a trifle terrifying, and +finished her meal almost in silence. When she got up she was not a +little disconcerted when the effort she made not only took her off her +chair but off her feet as well. She rose into the air nearly to the +surface of the table. + +"Sakes!" she said, "this is getting quite a little embarrassing; I shall +be hitting my head against the roof next." + +"Oh, you'll soon get used to it," he laughed, pulling her down on to her +feet by the skirt of her dress; "always remember to exert very little +strength in everything you do, and don't forget to do everything very +slowly." + +When the coffee was made he carried the apparatus up into the +deck-chamber. Then he came back and said: + +"You'd better wrap yourself up warmly. It's a good deal colder up there +than it is here." + +When she reached the deck and took a first glance about her, Zaidie +seemed suddenly to lapse into a state of somnambulism. + +The whole heavens above and around were strewn with thick clusters of +stars which she had never seen before. The stars she remembered seeing +from the earth were only pin-points in the darkness compared with the +myriads of blazing orbs which were now shooting their rays across the +black void of Space. + +So many millions of new ones had come into view, that she looked in vain +for the familiar constellations. She saw only vast clusters of living +gems of every colour crowding the heavens on every side of her. + +She walked slowly round the deck, gazing to right and left and above, +incapable for the moment either of thought or speech, but only of dumb +wonder, mingled with a dim sense of overwhelming awe. Presently she +craned her neck backwards and looked straight up to the zenith. A huge +silver crescent, supporting, as it were, a dim greenish-coloured body in +its arms, stretched overhead across nearly a sixth of the heavens. + +Then Redgrave came to her side, took her in his arms, lifted her as if +she had been a little child, and laid her in a long, low deck-chair, so +that she could look at it without inconvenience. + +The splendid crescent seemed to be growing visibly bigger, and as she +lay there in a trance of wonder and admiration she saw point after point +of dazzling white light flash out in the dark portions, and then begin +to send out rays as though they were gigantic volcanoes in full +eruption, and were pouring torrents of living fire from their blazing +craters. + +"Sunrise on the Moon!" said Redgrave, who had stretched himself on +another chair beside her. "A glorious sight, isn't it? But nothing to +what we shall see to-morrow morning--only there doesn't happen to be any +morning just about here." + +"Yes," she said dreamily, "glorious, isn't it? That and all the +stars--but I can't think anything yet, Lenox, it's all too mighty and +too marvellous. It doesn't seem as though human eyes were meant to look +upon things like this. But where's the earth? We must be able to see +that still." + +"Not from here," he said, "because it's underneath us. Come below now, +and you shall see what I promised you." + +They went down into the lower part of the vessel and to the after end +behind the engine-room. Redgrave switched on a couple of electric +lights, and then pulled a lever attached to one of the side-walls. A +part of the flooring about six feet square slid noiselessly away; then +he pulled another lever on the opposite side and a similar piece +disappeared, leaving a large space covered only by a thick plate of +absolutely transparent glass. He switched off the lights again and led +her to the edge of it, and said: + +"There is your native world, dear. That is your Mother Earth." + +Wonderful as the moon had seemed, the gorgeous spectacle which lay +seemingly at her feet was infinitely more magnificent. A vast disc of +silver grey, streaked and dotted with lines and points of dazzling +lights, and more than half covered with vast, glimmering, greyish-green +expanses, seemed to form the floor of the tremendous gulf beneath them. +They were not yet too far away to make out the general features of the +continents and oceans, and fortunately the hemisphere presented to them +happened to be singularly free from clouds. + +To the right spread out the majestic outlines of the continents of North +and South America, and to the left Asia, the Malay Archipelago, and +Australia. At the top was a vast, roughly circular area of dazzling +whiteness, and Redgrave, pointing to this, said: + +"There, look up a little further north than the middle of that white +patch, and you'll see what no eyes but yours and mine have ever +seen--the North Pole! When we come back we shall see the South Pole, +because we shall approach the earth from the other end, as it were. + +"I suppose you recognise a good deal of the picture. All that bright +part up to the north, with the black spots on it, is Canada. The black +spots are forests. That long white line to the left is the Rockies. You +see they're all bright at the north, and as you go south you only see a +few bright dots. Those are the snow-peaks. + +"Those long thin white lines in South America are the tops of the Andes, +and the big, dark patches to the right of them are the forests and +plains of Brazil and the Argentine. Not a bad way of studying geography, +is it? If we stopped here long enough we should see the whole earth spin +right round under us, but we haven't time for that. We shall be in the +moon before it's morning in New York, but we shall probably get a +glimpse of Europe to-morrow." + +Zaidie stood gazing for nearly an hour at this marvellous vision of the +home-world which she had left so far behind her before she could tear +herself away and allow her husband to shut the slides again. The greatly +diminished weight of her body destroyed the fatigue of standing almost +entirely. In fact, on board the _Astronef_ just then it was almost as +easy to stand as it was to lie down. + +There was of course very little sleep for the travellers on this first +night of their wonderful voyage, but towards the sixth hour after +leaving the earth, Zaidie, overcome as much by the emotions which had +been awakened within her as by physical fatigue, went to bed, after +making her husband promise that he would wake her in good time to see +the descent upon the moon. Two hours later she was awake and drinking +the coffee which he had prepared for her. Then she went on to the upper +deck. + +To her astonishment she found, on one hand, day more brilliant than she +had ever seen it before, and on the other hand darkness blacker than the +blackest earthly night. On the right was an intensely brilliant orb, +about half as large again as the full moon seen from the earth, shining +with inconceivable brightness out of a sky black as midnight and +thronged with stars. It was the Sun; the Sun shining in the midst of +airless Space. + +The tiny atmosphere enclosed in the glass-domed deck-space was lighted +brilliantly, but it was not perceptibly warmer, though Redgrave warned +her not to touch anything upon which the sun's rays fell directly, as +she might find it uncomfortably hot. On the other side was the same +black immensity which she had seen the night before, an ocean of +darkness clustered with islands of light. High above in the zenith +floated the great silver-grey disc of earth, a good deal smaller now. +But there was another object beneath them which was at present of far +more interest to her. + +Looking down to the left, she saw a vast semi-luminous area in which not +a star was to be seen. It was the earth-lit portion of the long familiar +and yet mysterious orb which was to be their resting place for the next +few hours. + +"The sun hasn't risen over there yet," said Redgrave, as she was peering +down into the void. "It's earth-light still. Now look at the other +side." + +She crossed the deck, and saw the strangest scene she had yet beheld. +Apparently only a few miles below her was a huge crescent-shaped plain +arching away for hundreds of miles on either side. The outer edge had a +ragged look, and little excrescences, which soon took the shape of +flat-topped mountains, projected from it and stood out bright and sharp +against the black void beneath, out of which the stars shone up, as it +seemed, a few feet beyond the edge of the disc. + +The plain itself was a scene of awful and utter desolation. Huge +mountain-walls, towering to immense heights and enclosing great circular +and oval plains, one side of them blazing with intolerable light, and +the other side black with impenetrable obscurity; enormous valleys +reaching down from brilliant day into rayless night--perhaps down into +the very bowels of the dead world itself; vast grey-white plains lying +round the mountains, crossed by little ridges and by long black lines, +which could only be immense fissures with perpendicular sides--but all +hard, grey-white and black, all intolerable brightness or inky gloom; +not a sign of life anywhere; no shady forests, no green fields, no +broad, glittering oceans; only a ghastly wilderness of dead mountains +and dead plains. + +"What an awful place," Zaidie whispered. "Surely we can't land there. +How far are we from it?" + +"About fifteen hundred miles," replied Redgrave, who was sweeping the +scene below him with one of the two powerful telescopes which stood on +the deck. "No, it doesn't look very cheerful, does it? But it's a +marvellous sight for all that, and one that a good many people on earth +would give one of their eyes to see from here. I'm letting her drop +pretty fast, and we shall probably land in a couple of hours or so. +Meanwhile you may as well get out your moon atlas, and study your +lunography. I'm going to turn the power a bit astern so that we shall go +down obliquely, and see more of the lighted disc. We started at new moon +so that you should have a look at the full earth, and also so that we +could get round to the invisible side while it is lighted up." + +They both went below, he to deflect the repulsive force so that one set +of engines should give them a somewhat oblique direction, while the +other, acting directly on the surface of the moon, simply retarded their +fall; and she to get out her maps. + +When they got back the _Astronef_ had changed her apparent position, +and, instead of falling directly on to the moon, was descending towards +it in a slanting direction. The result of this was that the sunlit +crescent rapidly grew in breadth. Peak after peak and range after range +rose up swiftly out of the black gulf beyond. The sun climbed quickly up +through the star-strewn, mid-day heavens, and the full earth sank more +swiftly still behind them. + +Another hour of silent, entranced wonder and admiration followed, and +then Redgrave said: + +"Don't you think it's about time we were beginning to think of +breakfast, dear--or do you think you can wait till we land?" + +"Breakfast on the moon!" she exclaimed. "That would be just too lovely +for words--of course we'll wait!" + +"Very well," he said; "you see that big black ring nearly below +us?--that, as I suppose you know, is the celebrated Mount Tycho. I'll +try and find a convenient spot on the top of the ring to drop on, and +then you will be able to survey the scenery from seventeen or eighteen +thousand feet above the plains." + +About two hours later a slight, jarring tremor ran through the frame of +the vessel, and the first stage of the voyage was ended. After a passage +of less than twelve hours the _Astronef_ had crossed a gulf of nearly +two hundred and fifty thousand miles, and rested on the untrodden +surface of the lunar world. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +"Well, Madame, we've arrived. This is the moon and there is the earth. +To put it into plain figures, you are now two hundred and forty thousand +odd miles away from home. I think you said you would like breakfast on +the surface of the World that Has Been, and so, as it's about eleven +o'clock earth-time, we'll call it a _déjeuner_, and then we'll go and +see what this poor old skeleton of a world is like." + +"Oh, then we shan't actually have breakfast on the moon?" + +"My dear child, of course you will. Isn't the _Astronef_ resting +now--right now as they say in some parts of the States--on the top of +the crater wall of Tycho? Aren't we really and actually on the surface +of the moon? Just look at this frightful black and white, god-forsaken +landscape! Isn't it like everything that you've ever learnt about the +moon? Nothing but light and shade, black and white, peaks of mountains +blazing in sunlight, and valleys underneath them as black as the hinges +of----" + +"Tophet," said Zaidie, interrupting him quickly. "Yes, I see what you +mean. So we'll have our _déjeuner_ here, breathing our own nice +atmosphere, and eating and drinking what was grown on the soil of dear +old Mother Earth. It's a wee bit paralysing to think of, isn't it, dear? +Two hundred and forty thousand miles across the gulf of Space--and we +sitting here at our breakfast table just as comfortable as though we +were in the Cecil in London, or the Waldorf-Astoria in New York!" + +"There's nothing much in that, I mean as regards distance. You see, +before we've finished we shall probably, at least I hope we shall, be +eating a breakfast or a dinner together a thousand million miles or more +from New York or London. Your Ladyship must remember that this is only +the first stage on the journey, the jumping-off place as you called it. +You see the distance from Washington to New York is--well, it isn't even +a hop, skip and a jump in comparison with----" + +"Oh yes, I see what you mean of course, and so I suppose I had better +cut off or short-circuit such sympathies with Mother Earth as are not +connected with your noble self, and get breakfast ready. How's that?" + +"Well," said Lord Redgrave, looking at her as she rose from the table, +"I think our honeymoon in Space is young enough yet to make it possible +for me to say that your Ladyship's opinion is exactly right." + +"That's a hopeless commonplace! Really, Lenox, I thought you were +capable of something better than that." + +"My dear Zaidie, it has been my fate to have many friends who have had +honeymoons on earth, and some of their experience seems to be that the +man who contradicts his wife during the first six weeks of matrimony +simply makes an ass of himself. He offends her and makes himself +unhappy, and it sometimes takes six months or more to get back to +bearings." + +"What a lot of silly men and women you must have known, Lenox. Is that +the way Englishmen start marriage in England? If it is, I don't wonder +at Englishmen coming across the Atlantic in liners and air-ships and so +on to get American wives. I guess you can't understand your own +womenfolk." + +"Or perhaps they don't understand us; but anyhow, I don't think I've +made any great mistake." + +"No, I don't think you have. Of course if I thought so I wouldn't be +here now. But this is very well for a breakfast talk; all the same, I +should like to know how we are going to take the promenade you promised +me on the surface of the moon?" + +"Your Ladyship has only to finish her breakfast, and then everything +shall be made plain to her, even the deepest craters of the mountains of +the moon." + +"Very well, then, I will eat swiftly and in obedience; and meanwhile, as +your Lordship seems to have finished, perhaps----" + +"Yes, I will go and see to the mechanical necessities," said Redgrave, +swallowing his last cup of coffee, and getting up. "If you'll come down +to the lower deck when you've finished, I'll have your breathing-suit +ready for you, and then we'll go into the air-chamber." + +"Thanks, dear, yes," she said, putting out her hand to him as he left +the table, "the ante-chamber to other worlds. Isn't it just lovely? +Fancy me being able to leave one world and land on another, and have you +to say just those few words which make it all possible. I wonder what +all the girls of all the civilised countries of earth would give just to +be me right now." + +"They could none of them give what you gave me, Zaidie, because you see +from my point of view there's only one Zaidie in the world--or as +perhaps I ought to say just now, in the Solar System." + +"Very prettily said, sir!" she laughed, when she had given him his due +reward for his courtly speech. "I am too dazed with all these wonders +about me to----" + +"To reply to it? You've given me the most convincing reply possible. Now +finish your breakfast, and I'll tell you when the breathing-dresses and +the air-chamber are ready. By the way, don't forget your cameras. It's +quite possible we may find something worth taking pictures of, and you +needn't trouble much about the weight. You know, you and I and all that +we carry will only weigh about a sixth of what we did on the earth." + +"Very well, then, I'll take the whole-plate apparatus as well as the +kodak and the panorama camera. When I'm ready, Murgatroyd will tell you +to come down." + +"But isn't he coming with us too?" + +"My dear girl, if I were to ask Murgatroyd to leave the _Astronef_ +there'd be a mutiny on board--a mutiny of one against one. No, he's left +his native world; but he says he's done it in a ship that's made with +British steel out of English iron mines, smelted, forged and fashioned +in English works, and so to him it's a bit of England, however far away +from Mother Earth it may be; and if you ever see Andrew Murgatroyd's big +head and good, ungainly body outside the _Astronef_ in any of the +worlds, dead or alive, that we're going to visit--well, when we get back +to Mother Earth you may ask me----" + +"I don't think I'll have to ask you for anything, Lenox. I believe if I +wanted anything you'd know before I did, so go away and get those +breathing-dresses ready. I didn't come to the moon to talk commonplaces +with a husband I've been married to for nearly three days." + +"Is it really as long as that?" + +"Oh, don't be ridiculous, even if you are beyond the limits of earthly +conventionalities. Anyhow, I've been married long enough to want my own +way, and just now I want a promenade on the moon." + +"The will of her Ladyship is a law unto her servant, and that which she +hath said shall be done! If you come down on to the lower deck in ten +minutes everything shall be ready." + +With this he disappeared down the companion-way. + +About five minutes afterwards Andrew Murgatroyd showed his grizzled, +long-bearded face with its high forehead, heavy brows, and broad-set +eyes, long nose and shaven upper lip, just above the stairway and said, +for all the world as though he might have been giving out the number of +the hymn in his beloved Ebenezer at Smeaton: + +"If it pleases yer Ladyship, his Lordship is ready, and if you'll please +come down I'll show you the way." + +"Oh, thank you, Mr. Murgatroyd!" said Zaidie, getting up and going +towards the companion-way; "but I'm afraid you don't think that--I mean +you don't seem to take very much interest----" + +"If your Ladyship will pardon me," said the old man, standing aside to +let her go down, "it is not my business to think on board his Lordship's +vessel. I am his servant, and my fathers have been his fathers' servants +for more years than I'd like to count. If it wasn't that way I wouldn't +be here. Will your Ladyship please to come down?" + +Zaidie bowed her beautiful head in recognition of this ages-old +devotion, and said as she passed him, more sweetly than he had ever +heard human lips speak: + +"Thank you, Mr. Murgatroyd. You've taught me something in those few +words that we have no knowledge of in the States. Good service is as +honourable as good mastership. Thank you." + +Murgatroyd put up his lower lip and half smiled with his upper, for he +was not yet quite sure of this radiant beauty, who, according to his +ideas, should have been English and wasn't. Then, with a rather clumsy +and yet eloquent gesture, he showed her the way down to the air-chamber. + +She nodded to him with a smile as she passed in through the air-tight +door, and when she heard the levers swing to and the bolts shoot into +their places she felt as though, for the time being, she had said +goodbye to a friend. + +Her husband was waiting for her almost fully clad in his +breathing-dress. He had hers all ready to put on, and when the necessary +changes and investments had been made, Zaidie found herself clad in a +costume which was not by any means unlike the diving-dresses of common +use, save that they were very much lighter in construction. + +The helmets were smaller, and not having to withstand outside pressure +they were made of welded aluminum, lined thickly with asbestos, not to +keep the cold out, but the heat in. On the back of the dress there was a +square case, looking like a knapsack, containing the expanding +apparatus, which would furnish breathable air for an almost unlimited +time as long as the liquefied air from a cylinder hung below it passed +through the cells in which the breathed air had been deprived of its +carbonic acid gas and other noxious ingredients. + +The pressure of air inside the helmet automatically regulated the +supply, which was not permitted to circulate through the other portions +of the dress. The reasons for this precaution were very simple. Granted +the absence of atmosphere on the moon, any air in the dress, which was +woven of a cunning compound of silk and asbestos, would instantly expand +with irresistible force, burst the covering, and expose the limbs of the +explorers to a cold which would be infinitely more destructive than the +hottest of earthly fires. It would wither them to nothing in a moment. + +A human hand or foot--we won't say anything about faces--exposed to the +summer or winter temperature of the moon--that is to say, to its +sunlight and its darkness--would be shrivelled into dry bone in a +moment, and therefore Lord Redgrave, foreseeing this, had provided the +breathing-dresses. Lastly, the two helmets were connected, for purposes +of conversation, by a light wire, the two ends of which were connected +with a little telephonic receiver and transmitter inside each of the +head-dresses. + +"Well, now I think we're ready," said Redgrave, putting his hand on the +lever which opened the outer door. + +His voice sounded a little queer and squeaky over the wire, and for the +matter of that so did Zaidie's as she replied: + +"Yes, I'm ready, I think. I hope these things will work all right." + +"You may be quite sure that I shouldn't have put _you_ into one of them +if I hadn't tested them pretty thoroughly," he replied, swinging the +door open and throwing out a light folding iron ladder which was hinged +to the floor. + +They were in the shade cast by the hull of the _Astronef_. For about ten +yards in front of her Zaidie saw a dense black shadow, and beyond it a +stretch of grey-white sand lit up by a glare of sunlight which would +have been intolerable if it had not been for the smoke-coloured slips of +glass which had been fitted behind the glass visors of the helmets. + +Over it were thickly scattered boulders and pieces of rock bleached and +desiccated, and each throwing a black shadow, fantastically shaped and +yet clearly defined on the grey-white sand behind it. There was no soil, +and all the softer kind of rock and stone had crumbled away ages ago. +Every particle of moisture had long since evaporated; even chemical +combinations had been dissolved by the alternations of heat and cold +known only on earth to the chemist in his laboratory. + +Only the hardest rocks, such as granites and basalts, remained. +Everything else had been reduced to the universal grey-white impalpable +powder into which Zaidie's shoes sank when she, holding her husband's +hand, went down the ladder and stood at the foot of it--first of the +earth-dwellers to set foot on another world. + +Redgrave followed her with a little spring from the centre of the ladder +which landed him with strange gentleness beside her. He took both her +gloved hands and pressed them hard in his. He would have kissed his +welcome to the World that Had Been if he could, but that of course was +out of the question, and so he had to be content with telling her that +he wanted to. + +Then, hand in hand, they crossed the little plateau towards the edge of +the tremendous gulf, fifty-four miles across and nearly twenty thousand +feet deep, which forms the crater of Tycho. In the middle of it rose a +conical mountain about five thousand feet high, the summit of which was +just beginning to catch the solar rays. Half of the vast plain was +already brilliantly illuminated, but round the central cone was a +semicircle of shadow of impenetrable blackness. + +"Day and night in this same valley, actually side by side!" said Zaidie. +Then she stopped and pointed down into the brightly lit distance, and +went on hurriedly, "Look, Lenox; look at the foot of the mountain there! +Doesn't that seem like the ruins of a city?" + +"It does," he said, "and there's no reason why it shouldn't be. I've +always thought that, as the air and water disappeared from the upper +parts of the moon, the inhabitants, whoever they were, must have been +driven down into the deeper parts. Shall we go down and see?" + +"But how?" she said. + +He pointed towards the _Astronef_. She nodded her helmeted head, and +they went back towards the vessel. + +A few minutes later the Space-Navigator had risen from her resting-place +with an impetus which rapidly carried her over half of the vast crater, +and then she began to drop slowly into the depths. She grounded gently, +and presently they were standing on the ground about a mile from the +central cone. This time, however, Redgrave had taken the precaution to +bring a magazine rifle and a couple of revolvers with him in case any +strange monsters, relics of the vanished fauna of the moon, might still +be taking refuge in these mysterious depths. Zaidie, although like a +good many American girls she could shoot excellently well, carried no +weapon more offensive than the photographic apparatus aforesaid. + +The first thing that Redgrave did when they stepped out on to the sandy +surface of the plain was to stoop down and strike a wax match. There was +a tiny glimmer of light, which was immediately extinguished. + +"No air here," he said, "so we shall find no living beings--at any rate, +none like ourselves." + +They found the walking exceedingly easy, although their boots were +purposely weighted in order to counteract, to some extent, the great +difference in gravity. A few minutes brought them to the outskirts of +the city. It had no walls and exhibited no signs of any devices for +defence. Its streets were broad and well-paved, and the houses, built of +great blocks of grey stone joined together with white cement, looked as +fresh and unworn as though they had only been built a few months, +whereas they had probably stood for hundreds of thousands of years. They +were flat-roofed, all of one storey and practically of one type. + +There were very few public buildings, and absolutely no attempt at +ornamentation was visible. Round some of the houses were spaces which +might once have been gardens. In the midst of the city, which appeared +to cover an area of about four square miles, was an enormous square +paved with flag-stones, which were covered to the depth of a couple of +inches with a light grey dust, which, as they walked across it, remained +perfectly still save for the disturbance caused by their footsteps. +There was no air to support it, otherwise it might have risen in clouds +about them. + +From the centre of this square rose a huge pyramid nearly a thousand +feet in height, the sole building of the great silent city which +appeared to have been raised most probably as a temple by the hands of +its long-dead inhabitants. + +When they got nearer they saw a white fringe round the steps by which it +was approached, and they soon found that this fringe was composed of +millions of white-bleached bones and skulls, shaped very much like those +of terrestrial men, save that they were very much larger, and that the +ribs were out of all proportion to the rest of the skeleton. + +They stopped awe-stricken before this strange spectacle. Redgrave +stooped down and took hold of one of the bones, a huge femur. It broke +in two as he tried to lift it, and the piece which remained in his hand +crumbled instantly to white powder. + +"Whoever they were," he said, "they were giants. When air and water +failed above, they came down here by some means and built this city. You +see what enormous chests they must have had. That would be Nature's last +struggle to enable them to breathe the diminishing atmosphere. These, of +course, were the last descendants of the fittest to breathe it; this was +their temple, I suppose, and here they came to die--I wonder how many +thousand years ago--perishing of heat, and cold, and hunger, and thirst; +the last tragedy of a race, which, after all, must have been something +like ourselves." + +"It's just too awful for words," said Zaidie. "Shall we go into the +temple? That seems one of the entrances up there, only I don't like +walking over all those bones." + +"I don't suppose they'll mind if we do," replied Redgrave, "only we +mustn't go far in. It may be full of cross passages and mazes, and we +might never get out. Our lamps won't be much use in there, you know, for +there's no air. They'll just be points of light, and we shan't see +anything but them. It's very aggravating, but I'm afraid there's no help +for it. Come along." + +They ascended the steps, crushing the bones and skulls to powder beneath +their feet, and entered the huge, square doorway, which looked like a +rectangle of blackness against the grey-white of the wall. Even through +their asbestos-woven clothing they felt a sudden shock of icy cold. In +those few steps they had passed from a temperature of tenfold summer +heat into one below that of the coldest spots on earth. They turned on +the electric lamps which were fitted to the breastplates of their +dresses, but they could see nothing save the thin thread of light +straight in front of them. It did not even spread. It was like a +polished needle on a background of black velvet. + +All about them was darkness impenetrable, and so they reluctantly turned +back to the doorway, leaving all the mysteries which that vast temple of +a long-vanished people might contain to remain mysteries to the end of +time. + +They passed down the steps again and crossed the square, and for the +next half-hour Zaidie was busy taking photographs of the pyramid with +its ghastly surroundings, and a few general views of this strange City +of the Dead. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +When they got back they found Murgatroyd pacing up and down the floor of +the deck-chamber, looking about him with serious eyes, but betraying no +other visible sign of anxiety. The _Astronef_ was at once his home and +his idol, and, as Redgrave had said, even his own direct orders would +hardly have induced him to leave her even in a world in which there was +not a living human being to dispute possession of her. + +When they had resumed their ordinary clothing the _Astronef_ rose from +the surface of the plain, crossed the encircling wall at the height of a +few hundred feet, and made her way at a speed of about fifty miles an +hour towards the regions of the South Pole. + +Behind them to the north-west they could see from their elevation of +nearly thirty thousand feet the vast expanse of the Sea of Clouds. +Dotted here and there were the shining points and ridges of light +marking the peaks and crater-walls which the rays of the rising sun had +already touched. Before them and to the right and left rose a vast maze +of ragged, splintery peaks and huge ramparts of mountain-walls enclosing +plains so far below their summits that the light of neither sun nor +earth ever reached them. + +By directing the force exerted by what might now be called the +propelling part of the engines against the mountain masses which they +crossed to right and left and behind, Redgrave was able to take a zigzag +course that carried them over many of the walled plains which were +wholly or partially lit up by the sun, and in nearly all of the deepest +their telescopes revealed something like what they had found within the +crater of Tycho. At length, pointing to a gigantic circle of white light +fringing an abyss of utter darkness, he said: + +"There is Newton, the greatest mystery of the moon. Those inner walls +are twenty-four thousand feet high; that means that the bottom, which +has never been seen by human eyes, is about five thousand feet below the +surface of the moon. What do you say, dear--shall we go down and see if +the searchlight will show us anything? You know there may be something +like breathable air down there, and perhaps living creatures who can +breathe it." + +"Certainly!" replied Zaidie decisively; "haven't we come to see things +that nobody else has ever seen?" + +Redgrave went down to the engine-room, and presently the _Astronef_ +changed her course, and in a few minutes was hanging with her polished +hull bathed in sunlight, like a star suspended over the unfathomable +gulf of darkness below. + +As they sank below the level of the sun-rays, Murgatroyd turned on both +the searchlights. They dropped down ever slowly and more slowly until +gradually the two long, thin streams of light began to spread themselves +out; the lower they went the more the beams spread out, and by the time +the _Astronef_ came gently to a rest they were swinging round her in +broad fans of diffused light over a dark, marshy surface, with scattered +patches of grey moss and reeds, with dull gleams of stagnant water +showing between them. + +"Air and water at last! I thought so," said Redgrave, as he rejoined her +on the upper deck; "air and water and eternal darkness! Well, we shall +find life on the moon here if anywhere." + +"I suppose we had better put on our breathing-dresses, hadn't we?" asked +Zaidie. + +"Certainly," he replied, "because, although there is some sort of air, +we don't know yet whether we shall be able to breathe it. It may be half +carbon-dioxide for all we know; but a few matches will soon tell us +that." + +Within a quarter of an hour they were again standing on the surface. +Murgatroyd had orders to follow them as far as possible with the head +searchlight, which, in the comparatively rarefied atmosphere, appeared +to have a range of several miles. Redgrave struck a match, and held it +up level with his head; it burnt with a clear, steady, yellow flame. + +"Where a match will burn a man should be able to breathe," he said. "I'm +going to see what lunar air is like." + +"For Heaven's sake be careful, dear," came the reply in pleading tones +across the wire. + +"All right; but don't open your helmet till I tell you." + +He then raised the hermetically closed slide of glass, which formed the +front of the helmets, half an inch or so. Instantly he felt a sensation +like the drawing of a red-hot iron across his skin. He snapped the visor +down and clasped it in its place. For a moment or two he gasped for +breath, and then he said rather faintly: + +"It's no good, it's too cold. It would freeze the blood of a salamander. +I think we'd better go back and explore this place under cover. We can't +do anything in the dark, and we can see just as well from the upper deck +with the searchlights. Besides, as there's air and water here, there's +no telling but there may be inhabitants of sorts such as we shouldn't +care to meet." + +He took her hand, and to Murgatroyd's great relief they went back to the +vessel. + +Redgrave then raised the _Astronef_ a couple of hundred feet and, by +directing the repulsive force against the mountain walls, developed just +sufficient energy to keep them moving at about twelve miles an hour. + +They began to cross the plain with their searchlights flashing out in +all directions. They had scarcely gone a mile before the head-light fell +upon a moving form half walking, half crawling among some stunted +brown-leaved bushes by the side of a broad, stagnant stream. + +"Look!" said Zaidie, clasping his arm, "is that a gorilla, or--no, it +_can't_ be a man." + +The light was turned full upon the object. If it had been covered with +hair it might have passed for some strange type of the ape tribe, but +its skin was smooth and of a livid grey. Its lower limbs were evidently +more powerful than its upper; its chest was enormously developed, but +the stomach was small. The head was big and round and smooth. As they +came nearer they saw that in place of fingernails it had long white +feelers which it kept extended and constantly waving about as it groped +its way towards the water. As the intense light flashed full on it, it +turned its head towards them. It had a nose and a mouth--the nose, long +and thick, with huge mobile nostrils; the mouth forming an angle +something like a fish's lips. Teeth there seemed none. At either side of +the upper part of the nose there were two little sunken holes--in which +this thing's ancestors of countless thousands of years ago had once had +eyes. + +As she looked upon this awful parody of what had once perhaps been a +human face, Zaidie covered hers with her hands and uttered a little moan +of horror. + +"Horrible, isn't it?" said Redgrave. "I suppose that's what the last +remnants of the Lunarians have come to. Evidently once men and women, +something like ourselves. I daresay the ancestors of that thing have +lived here in coldness and darkness for hundreds of generations. It +shows how tremendously tenacious Nature is of life. + +"Ages ago, no doubt, that brute's ancestors lived up yonder when there +were seas and rivers, fields and forests, just as we have them on earth, +among men and women who could see and breathe and enjoy everything in +life and had built up civilisations like ours! + +"Look, it's going to fish or something. Now we shall see what it feeds +on. I wonder why the water isn't frozen. I suppose there must be some +internal heat left still. A few patches with lakes of lava under them. +Perhaps this valley is just over one, and that's why these creatures +have managed to survive. + +"Ah! there's another of them, smaller, not so strongly formed. That +thing's mate, I suppose--female of the species. Ugh! I wonder how many +hundred of thousands of years it will take for _our_ descendants to come +to that." + +"I hope our dear old earth will hit something else and be smashed to +atoms before that happens!" exclaimed Zaidie, whose curiosity had now +partly overcome her horror. "Look, it's trying to catch something!" + +The larger of the two creatures had groped its way to the edge of the +sluggish, oily water and dropped, or rather rolled, quietly into it. It +was evidently cold-blooded, or nearly so, for no warm-blooded animal +would have taken to such water so naturally. Presently the other dropped +in too, and both disappeared for some moments. Then, in the midst of a +violent commotion in the water a few yards away, they rose to the +surface of the water, the larger with a wriggling, eel-like fish between +its jaws. + +They both groped their way towards the edge, and had just reached it and +were pulling themselves out when a hideous shape rose out of the water +behind them. It was like the head of an octopus joined to the body of a +boa-constrictor, but head and neck were both of the same ghastly, livid +grey as the other two creatures. It was evidently blind, too, for it +took no notice of the brilliant glare of the searchlight, but it moved +rapidly towards the two scrambling forms, its long white feelers +trembling out in all directions. Then one of them touched the smaller of +the two shapes. Instantly the rest shot out and closed round it, and +with scarcely a struggle it was dragged beneath the water and vanished. + +[Illustration: _A hideous shape rose out of the water behind them._] + +Zaidie uttered a little low scream and covered her face again, and +Redgrave said: + +"The same old brutal law you see, life preying upon life even on a dying +world, a world that is more than half dead itself. Well, I think we've +seen enough of this place. I suppose those are about the only types of +life we should meet anywhere, and I don't want to know much more about +them. I vote we go and see what the invisible hemisphere is like." + +"I have had all I want of this side," said Zaidie, looking away from the +scene of the hideous tragedy, "so the sooner we go, the better I shall +like it." + +A few minutes later the _Astronef_ was again rising towards the stars +with her searchlights still flashing down into the Valley of Expiring +Life, which had seemed to them even worse than the Valley of Death. As +he followed the rays with a pair of powerful field glasses, Redgrave +fancied that he saw huge, dim shapes moving about the stunted shrubbery +and through the slimy pools of the stagnant rivers, and once or twice he +got a glimpse of what might well have been the ruins of towns and +cities, but the gloom soon became too deep and dense for the +searchlights to pierce and he was glad when the _Astronef_ soared up +into the brilliant sunlight once more. Even the ghastly wilderness of +the lunar landscape was welcome after the nameless horrors of that +hideous abyss. + +After a couple of hours' rapid travelling, Redgrave pointed down to a +comparatively small, deep crater, and said: + +"There, that is Malapert. It is almost exactly at the south pole of the +moon, and there," he went on, pointing ahead, "is the horizon of the +hemisphere which no earthborn eyes have ever seen." + +"Except ours," said Zaidie somewhat inconsequently, "and I wonder what +_we_ shall see." + +"Probably something very like what we have seen on this side," replied +Redgrave, and as the event proved, he was right. + +Contrary to many ingenious speculations which have been indulged in by +both scientist and romancer, they found that the hemisphere, which for +countless ages had never been turned towards the earth, was almost an +exact replica of the visible one. Fully three-fourths of it was +brilliantly illuminated by the sun, and what they saw through their +glasses was practically the same as what they had beheld on the +earthward side; huge groups of enormous craters and ringed mountains, +long, irregular chains crowned with sharp, splintery peaks, and between +these vast, deeply depressed areas, ranging in colour from dazzling +white to grey-brown, marking the beds of the vanished lunar seas. + +As they crossed one of these, Redgrave allowed the _Astronef_ to sink to +within a few thousand feet of the surface, and then he and Zaidie swept +it with their telescopes. Their chance search was rewarded by something +they had not seen in the sea-beds of the other hemisphere. + +These depressions were far deeper than the others, evidently many +thousands of feet below the average surface, but the sun's rays were +blazing full into this one, and, dotted round its slopes at varying +elevations, they made out little patches which seemed to differ from the +general surface. + +"I wonder if those are the remains of cities," said Zaidie. "Isn't it +possible that the old peoples of the moon might have built their cities +along the seas just as we do, and that their descendants may have +followed the waters as they retreated, I mean as they either dried up or +disappeared into the centre?" + +"Very probable indeed, dearest of philosophers," he said, picking her up +with one arm and kissing the smiling lips which had just uttered this +most reasonable deduction. "Now we'll go down and see." + +He diminished the vertically repulsive force a little, and the +_Astronef_ dropped slantingly towards the bed of what might once have +been the Pacific of the Moon. + +When they were within about a couple of thousand feet of the surface it +became perfectly plain that Zaidie was correct in her hypothesis. The +vast sea floor was thickly strewn with the ruins of countless cities and +towns, which had been inhabited by an equally countless series of +generations of men and women, who had perhaps lived and loved in the +days when our own world was a glowing mass of molten rock, surrounded by +the envelope of vapours which has since condensed to form our oceans. + +They dropped still lower and ran diagonally across the ocean-bed, and as +they did so Zaidie's proposition was more and more completely confirmed, +for they saw that the towns and cities which stood highest were the most +dilapidated, and that the buildings had evidently been torn and crumbled +away by the action of wind and water, snow and ice. + +The nearer they approached to the central and deepest depression, the +better preserved and the simpler the buildings became, until down in the +lowest depths they found a collection of low-built square edifices, +scarcely better than huts, which had clustered round the little lake +into which, ages before, the ocean had dwindled. But where the lake had +been there was now only a shallow depression covered with grey sand and +brown rock. + +Into this they descended and touched the lunar surface for the last +time. A couple of hours' excursion among the houses proved that they had +been the last refuge of the last descendants of a dying race, a race +which had socially degenerated just as the succession of cities had done +architecturally, age by age, as the long-drawn struggle for mere +existence had become keener and keener until the two last essentials, +air and water, had failed--and then the end had come. + +The streets, like the square of the great Temple of Tycho, were strewn +with myriads and myriads of bones, and there were myriads more scattered +round what had once been the shores of the dwindling lake. Here, as +elsewhere, there was not a sign or a record of any kind--carving or +sculpture. If there were any such on the surface of the moon they had +not discovered them. The buildings which they had seen evidently +belonged to the decadent period during which the dwindling remnants of +the Selenites asked only to eat and drink and breathe. + +Inside the great Pyramid of the City of Tycho they might, perhaps, have +found something--some stone or tablet which bore the mark of the +artist's hand; elsewhere, perhaps, they might have found cities reared +by older races, which might have rivalled the creations of Egypt and +Babylon, but they had neither time nor inclination to look for these. + +All that they had seen of the Dead World had only sickened and saddened +them. The untravelled regions of Space peopled by living worlds more +akin to their own were before them. The red disc of Mars was glowing in +the zenith among the diamond-white clusters which gemmed the black sky +behind him. + +More than a hundred millions of miles had to be traversed before they +would be able to set foot on his surface, and so, after one last look +round the Valley of Death about them, Redgrave turned on the full energy +of the repulsive force in a vertical direction, and the _Astronef_ leapt +upwards in a straight line for her new destination. The Unknown +Hemisphere spread out in a vast plain beneath them, the blazing sun rose +on their left, and the brilliant silver orb of the earth on their right, +and so, full of wonder and yet without regret, they bade farewell to the +World that Had Been. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +The earth and the moon had been left more than a hundred million miles +behind in the depths of Space, and the _Astronef_ had crossed this +immense gap in eleven days and a few hours; but this apparently +inconceivable speed was not altogether due to the powers of the +Space-Navigator, for her commander had taken advantage of the passage of +the planet along its orbit towards that of the earth. Hence, while the +_Astronef_ was approaching Mars with ever-increasing speed, Mars was +travelling towards the _Astronef_ at the rate of sixteen miles a second. + +The great silver disc of the earth had diminished until it looked only a +little larger than Venus appears to human eyes. In fact the planet Terra +is to the inhabitants of Mars what Venus is to us, the Star of the +Morning and the Evening. + +Breakfast on the morning of the twelfth day--or, since there is neither +day nor night in Space, it would be more correct to say the twelfth +period of twenty-four earth-hours as measured by the chronometers--was +just over, and Redgrave was standing with Zaidie in the forward end of +the deck-chamber, looking downwards at a vast crescent of rosy light +which stretched out over an arc of more than ninety degrees. Two tiny +black spots were travelling towards each other across it. + +"Ah," she said, going towards one of the telescopes, "there are the +moons. I was reading my Gulliver last night. I wonder what the old Dean +would have given to be here, and see how true his guess was. Are we +going to land on them?" + +"I don't see why we shouldn't," he said. "I think we might find them +convenient stopping places; besides, you know this isn't only a +pleasure-trip. We have to add as much as we can to the sum of human +knowledge, and so of course we shall have to find out whether the moons +of Mars have atmospheres and inhabitants." + +"What, people living on those wee things!" she laughed. "Why they're +only about thirty or forty miles round, aren't they?" + +"About," he said, "but then that's just one of the points I want to +solve; and as for life, it doesn't always mean people, you know. We are +only a few hundred miles away from Deimos, the outer one, and he is +twelve thousand five hundred miles from Mars. I vote we drop on him +first and let him carry us towards Phobos. And then when we've examined +him we'll pay a visit to his brother and take a trip round Mars on him. +Phobos does the journey in about seven hours and a half, and as he's +only three thousand seven hundred miles above the surface, we ought to +get a very good view of our next stopping-place." + +"That ought to be quite delightful," said Zaidie. "But how commonplace +you are getting, Lenox. That's so like you Englishmen. We are doing what +has only been dreamt of before, and here you are talking about moons and +planets as if they were railway stations." + +"Well, if your Ladyship prefers it, we will call them undiscovered +islands and continents in the Ocean of Space. That does sound a little +bit better, doesn't it? Now I think I had better go down and see to my +engines." + +When he had gone, Zaidie sat down to the telescope again and kept it +focussed on one of the little black spots travelling across the crescent +of Mars. Both it and the other spot rapidly grew larger, and the +features of the planet itself became more distinct. Soon even with her +unaided eyes she could make out the seas and continents and the +mysterious canals quite plainly through the clear, rosy atmosphere, and, +with the aid of the telescope, she could even see the glimmering +twilight which the inner moon threw upon the unlighted portion of the +planet's disc. + +Deimos grew bigger and bigger, and in about half an hour the _Astronef_ +grounded gently on what looked to Zaidie like a dimly lighted circular +plain, but which, when her eyes became accustomed to the light, was more +like the summit of a conical mountain. Redgrave raised the keel a little +from the surface again and steered towards a thin circle of light on the +tiny horizon. + +As they crossed into the sunlit portion it became quite plain that +Deimos, at any rate, was as airless and lifeless as the moon. The +surface was composed of brown rock and red sand broken up into miniature +hills and valleys. There were a few traces of bygone volcanic action, +but it was evident that the internal fires of this tiny world must have +burnt themselves out very quickly. + +"Not much to be seen here," said Redgrave, as he came up the +companion-way, "and I don't think it would be safe to go out. The +attraction is so weak here that we might find ourselves falling off with +very little exertion. Still, you may as well take a couple of +photographs of the surface, and then we'll be off to Phobos." + +Zaidie got her apparatus to work, and when she had taken her slides down +to the dark-room, Redgrave turned the R. Force on very slightly and +Phobos began to sink away beneath them. The attraction of Mars now began +to make itself strongly felt, and the _Astronef_ dropped rapidly through +the eight thousand miles which separate the inner and outer satellites. + +As they approached Phobos they saw that half the little disc was +brilliantly lighted by the same rays of the sun which were glowing on +the rapidly increasing crescent of Mars beneath them. By careful +manipulation of his engines Redgrave managed to meet the approaching +satellite with a hardly perceptible shock about the centre of its +lighted portion, that is to say the side turned towards the planet. + +Mars now appeared as a gigantic rosy moon filling the whole vault of the +heavens above them. Their telescopes brought the three thousand seven +hundred and fifty miles down to about ten. The rapid motion of the tiny +satellite afforded them a spectacle which might be compared to the +rising of a moon glowing with rosy light and hundreds of times larger +than the earth. The speed of the vehicle of which they had taken +possession, something like four thousand two hundred miles an hour, +caused the surface of the planet to apparently sweep away from below +them, just as the earth seems to glide from under the car of a balloon. + +Neither of them left the telescopes for more than a few minutes during +this aerial circumnavigation. Murgatroyd, outwardly impassive, but +inwardly filled with solemn fears for the fate of this impiously daring +voyage, brought them wine and sandwiches, and later on tea and toast and +more sandwiches; but they took no moment's heed of these, so absorbed +were they in the wonderful spectacle which was swiftly passing under +their eyes. + +The main armament of the _Astronef_ consisted of four pneumatic guns, +which could be mounted on swivels, two ahead and two astern, which +carried a shell containing either one of two kinds of explosives +invented by her creator. + +One of these was a solid, and burst on impact with an explosive force +equal to about twenty pounds of lyddite. The other consisted of two +liquids separated by a partition in the shell, and these, when mixed by +the breaking of the partition, burst into a volume of flame which could +not be extinguished by any known human means. It would burn even in a +vacuum, since it supplied its own elements of combustion. The guns would +throw these shells to a distance of about seven terrestrial miles. On +the upper deck there were also stands for a couple of light machine guns +capable of discharging seven hundred explosive bullets a minute. + +Professor Rennick, although a man of peace, had little sympathy with the +laws of "civilised" warfare which permit men to be blown into rags of +flesh and splinters of bone by explosive shells of a pound weight and +upward, and only allow projectiles of less weight to be used against +"savages." There was no humbug about him. He believed that when war +_was_ necessary it had to _be_ war--and the sooner it was over the +better for everybody concerned. + +The small arms consisted of a couple of heavy ten-bore elephant guns +carrying three-ounce melinite shells; a dozen rifles and fowling-pieces +of different makes of which three, a single and a double-barrelled rifle +and a double-barrelled shot-gun, belonged to her Ladyship, as well as a +dainty brace of revolvers, one of half a dozen braces of various +calibres which completed the minor armament of the _Astronef_. + +The guns were got up and mounted while the attraction of the planet was +comparatively feeble, and the weapons themselves therefore of very +little weight. On the surface of the earth a score of men could not have +done the work, but on board the _Astronef_, suspended in Space, her crew +of three found the work easy. Zaidie herself picked up a Maxim and +carried it about as though it were a toy sewing-machine. + +"Now I think we can go down," said Redgrave, when everything had been +put in position as far as possible. "I wonder whether we shall find the +atmosphere of Mars suitable for terrestrial lungs. It will be rather +awkward if it isn't." + +A very slight exertion of repulsive force was sufficient to detach the +_Astronef_ from the body of Phobos. She dropped rapidly towards the +surface of the planet, and within three hours they saw the sunlight, for +the first time since they had left the earth, shining through an +unmistakable atmosphere, an atmosphere of a pale, rosy hue, instead of +the azure of the earthly skies. An angular observation showed that they +were within fifty miles of the surface of the undiscovered world. + +"Well, we shall find air here of some sort, there's no doubt. We'll drop +a bit further and then Andrew shall start the propellers. They'll very +soon give us an idea of the density. Do you notice the change in the +temperature? That's the diffused rays instead of the direct ones. Twenty +miles! I think that will do. I'll stop her now and we'll prospect for a +landing place." + +He went down to apply the repulsive force directly to the surface of +Mars, so as to check the descent, and then he put on his +breathing-dress, went into the exit-chamber, closed one door behind him, +opened the other and allowed it to fill with Martian air; then he shut +it again, opened his visor and took a cautious breath. + +It may, perhaps, have been the idea that he, the first of all the sons +of Earth, was breathing the air of another world, or it might have been +some property peculiar to the Martian atmosphere, but he immediately +experienced a sensation such as usually follows the drinking of a glass +of champagne. He took another breath, and another, then he opened the +inner door and went back to the lower deck, saying to himself: "Well, +the air's all right if it is a bit champagney; rich in oxygen, I +suppose, with perhaps a trace of nitrous-oxide in it. Still, it's +certainly breathable, and that's the principal thing." + +"It's all right, dear," he said as he reached the upper deck where +Zaidie was walking about round the sides of the glass dome gazing with +all her eyes at the strange scene of mingled cloud and sea and land +which spread for an immense distance on all sides of them. "I have +breathed the air of Mars, and even at this height it is distinctly +wholesome, though of course it's rather thin, and I had it mixed with +some of our own atmosphere. Still I think it will agree all right with +us lower down." + +"Well, then," said Zaidie, "suppose we get below those clouds and see +what there really is to be seen." + +"As there's a fairly big problem to be solved shortly I'll see to the +descent myself," he replied, going towards the stairway. + +In a couple of minutes she saw the cloud-belt below them rising rapidly. +When Redgrave returned the _Astronef_ was plunging into a sea of rosy +mist. + +"The clouds of Mars!" she exclaimed. "Fancy a world with pink clouds! I +wonder what there is on the other side." + +The next moment they saw. Just below them at a distance of about five +earth-miles lay an irregularly triangular island, a detached portion of +the Continent of Huygens almost equally divided by the Martian Equator, +and lying with another almost similarly shaped island between the +fortieth and the fiftieth meridians of west longitude. The two islands +were divided by a broad, straight stretch of water about the width of +the English Channel between Folkestone and Boulogne. Instead of the +bright blue-green of terrestrial seas, this connecting link between the +great Northern and Southern Martian oceans had an orange tinge. + +The land immediately beneath them was of a gently undulating character, +something like the Downs of South-Eastern England. No mountains were +visible in any direction. The lower portions, particularly along the +borders of the canals and the sea, were thickly dotted with towns and +cities, apparently of enormous extent. To the north of the Island +Continent there was a peninsula, which was covered with a vast +collection of buildings, which, with the broad streets and spacious +squares which divided them, must have covered an area of something like +two hundred square miles. + +"There's the London of Mars!" said Redgrave, pointing down towards it; +"where the London of Earth will be in a few thousand years, close to the +Equator. And, you see, all those other towns and cities are crowded +round the canals! I daresay when we go across the northern and southern +temperate zones we shall find them in about the state that Siberia or +Antarctica are in." + +"I daresay we shall," replied Zaidie; "Martian civilisation is crowding +towards the Equator, though I should call that place down there the +greater New York of Mars, and--see--there's Brooklyn just across the +canal. I wonder what they're thinking about us down there." + +Phobos revolves from west to east almost along the plane of its +primary's equator. To left and right they saw the huge ice-caps of the +South and North Poles gleaming through the red atmosphere with a pale +sunset glimmer. Then came the great stretches of sea, often obscured by +vast banks of clouds, which, as the sunlight fell upon them, looked +strangely like earth-clouds at sunset. + +Then, almost immediately underneath them, spread out the great land +areas of the equatorial region. The four continents of Halle, Galileo, +and Tycholand; then Huygens--which is to Mars what Europe, Asia, and +Africa are to the Earth, then Herschell and Copernicus. Nearly all of +these land masses were split up into semi-regular divisions by the +famous canals which have so long puzzled terrestrial observers. + +"Well, there is one problem solved at any rate," said Redgrave, when, +after a journey of nearly four hours, they had crossed the western +hemisphere. "Mars is getting very old, her seas are diminishing, and her +continents are increasing. Those canals are the remains of gulfs and +straits which have been widened and deepened and lengthened by human, or +I should say Martian, labour, partly, I've no doubt, for purposes of +navigation and partly to keep the inhabitants of the interior of the +continents within measurable distance of the sea. There's not the +slightest doubt about that. Then, you see, there are scarcely any +mountains to speak of so far, only ranges of low hills." + +"And that means, I suppose," said Zaidie, "that they've all been worn +down as the mountains of the earth are being. I was reading Flammarion's +'End of the World' last night, and he, you know, describes the earth at +the last as just one big plain of land, no hills or mountains, no seas, +and only sluggish rivers draining into marshes. + +"I suppose that is what they're coming to down yonder. Now, I wonder +what sort of civilisation we shall find. Perhaps we shan't find any at +all. Suppose all their civilisations have worn out and they are +degenerating into the same struggle for sheer existence those poor +creatures in the moon must have had." + +"Or suppose," said Redgrave rather seriously, "we find that they have +passed the zenith of civilisation, and are dropping back into savagery, +but still have the use of weapons and means of destruction which we, +perhaps, have no notion of, and are inclined to use them? We'd better be +careful, dear." + +"What do you mean, Lenox?" she said. "They wouldn't try to do us any +harm, would they? Why should they?" + +"I don't say they would," he replied; "but still you never know. You +see, their ideas of right and wrong and hospitality and all that sort of +thing may be quite different to what we have on the earth. In fact, they +may not be men at all, but just a sort of monster with perhaps a +superhuman intellect with all sorts of extra-human ideas in it. + +"Then there's another thing," he went on. "Suppose they fancied a trip +through Space, and thought that they had as good a right to the +_Astronef_ as we have? I daresay they've seen us by this time if they've +got telescopes, as no doubt they have, perhaps a good deal more powerful +than ours, and they may be getting ready to receive us now. I think I'll +get the guns in place before we go down, in case their moral ideas, as +dear old Hans Breitmann called them, are not quite the same as ours." + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The words were hardly out of his mouth before Zaidie, who still had her +glasses to her eyes, and was looking down towards the great city whose +glazed roofs were flashing with a thousand tints in the pale crimson +sunlight, said with a little tremor in her voice: + +"Look, Lenox, down there--don't you see something coming up? That little +black thing. Just look how fast it's coming up; it's quite distinct +already. It's a sort of flying-ship, only it has wings and, I think, +masts too. Yes, I can see three masts, and there's something glittering +on the tops of them. I wonder if they're coming to pay us a polite +morning call, or whether they're going to treat us like trespassers in +their atmosphere." + +"There's no telling, but those things on the top of the masts look like +revolving helices," replied Redgrave, after a long look through his +telescope. "He's screwing himself up into the air. That shows that they +must either have stronger and lighter machinery than we have, or, as the +astronomers have thought, this atmosphere is denser than ours, and +therefore easier to fly in. Then, of course, things are only half their +earthly weight here. + +"Well, whether it's peace or war, I suppose we may as well let them come +and reconnoitre. Then we shall see what kind of creatures they are. Ah, +there are a lot more of them, some coming from Brooklyn, too, as you +call it. Come up into the conning-tower, and I'll relieve Murgatroyd, so +that he can go and look after his engines. We shall have to give these +gentlemen a lesson in flying. Meanwhile, in case of accidents, we may as +well make ourselves as invulnerable as possible." + +A few minutes later they were in the conning-tower again, watching the +approach of the Martian fleet through the thick windows of toughened +glass which enabled them to look in every direction except straight +down. The steel coverings had been drawn down over the glass dome of the +deck-chamber, and Murgatroyd had gone down to the engine-room. Fifty +feet ahead of them stretched out the long, shining spur, of which ten +feet were solid steel, a ram which no floating structure built by human +hands could have resisted. + +Redgrave was standing with his hand on the steering-wheel, looking more +serious than he had done so far during the voyage. Zaidie stood beside +him with a powerful binocular telescope watching, with cheeks a little +paler than usual, the movements of the Martian air-ships. She counted +twenty-five vessels rising round them in a wide circle. + +"I don't like the idea of a whole fleet coming up," said Redgrave, as he +watched them rising, and the ring narrowing round the still motionless +_Astronef_. "If they only wanted to know who and what we are, or to +leave their cards on us, as it were, and bid us welcome to the world, +one ship could have done that just as well as a fleet. This lot coming +up looks as if they wanted to get round and capture us." + +"It does look like it," said Zaidie, with her glasses fixed on the +nearest of the vessels; "and now I can see they've guns too, something +like ours, and perhaps, as you said just now, they may have explosives +that we don't know anything about. Oh, Lenox, suppose they were able to +smash us up with a single shot." + +"You needn't be afraid of that, dear," he said, putting his arm round +her shoulders. "Of course it's perfectly natural that they should look +upon us with a certain amount of suspicion, dropping like this on them +from the stars. Can you see anything like men on board them yet?" + +"No, they're all closed in just as we are," she replied; "but they've +got conning-towers like this, and something like windows along the +sides. That's where the guns are, and the guns are moving. They're +pointing them at us. Lenox, I'm afraid they're going to shoot." + +"Then we may as well spoil their aim," he said, pressing one of the +buttons on the signal-board three times, and then once more after a +little interval. + +In obedience to the signal Murgatroyd turned on the repulsive force to +half power, and the _Astronef_ leapt up vertically a couple of thousand +feet. Then Redgrave pressed the button once and she stopped. Another +signal set the propellers in motion, and as she sprang forward across +the circle formed by the Martian air-ships, they looked down and saw +that the place which they had just left was occupied by a thick +greenish-yellow cloud. + +"Look, Lenox, what on earth is that?" exclaimed Zaidie, pointing down to +it. + +"What on Mars would be nearer the point, dear," he said, with what she +thought a somewhat vicious laugh. "That, I'm afraid, means anything but +a friendly reception for us. That cloud is one of two things--it's the +smoke of the explosion of twenty or thirty shells, or else it's made of +gases intended to either poison us or make us insensible, so that they +can take possession of the ship. In either case I should say that the +Martians are not what we should call gentlemen." + +"I should think not," she said angrily. "They might at least have taken +us for friends till they had proved us enemies, which they wouldn't have +done. Nice sort of hospitality that, considering how far we've come, and +we can't shoot back, because we haven't got the ports open." + +"And a very good thing too!" laughed Redgrave; "if we had had them open, +and that volley had caught us unawares, the _Astronef_ would probably +have been full of poisonous gases by this time, and your honeymoon, +dear, would have come to a somewhat untimely end. Ah, they're trying to +follow us! Well, now we'll see how high they can fly." + +He sent another signal to Murgatroyd, and the _Astronef_, still beating +the Martian air with the fans of her propellers, and travelling forward +at about fifty miles an hour, rose in a slanting direction through a +dense bank of rosy-tinted clouds, which hung over the bigger of the two +cities--New York, as Zaidie had named it. + +When they reached the golden-red sunlight above it the _Astronef_ +stopped her ascent, and then, with half a turn of the steering-wheel, +her commander sent her sweeping round in a wide circle. A few minutes +later they saw the Martian fleet rise almost simultaneously through the +clouds. They seemed to hesitate a moment, and then the prow of every +vessel was directed towards the swiftly moving _Astronef_. + +"Well, gentlemen," said Redgrave, "you evidently don't know anything +about Professor Rennick and the R. Force; and yet you ought to know that +we couldn't have come through Space without being able to get beyond +this little atmosphere of yours. Now let us see how fast you can fly." + +Another signal went down to Murgatroyd, the whirling propellers became +two intersecting circles of light. The speed of the _Astronef_ increased +to a hundred-and-fifty miles an hour, and the Martian fleet began to +drop behind and trail out into a triangle like a flock of huge birds. + +"That's lovely; we're leaving them!" exclaimed Zaidie, leaning forward +with the glasses to her eyes and tapping the floor of the conning-tower +with her foot as if she wanted to dance, "and their wings are working +faster than ever. They don't seem to have any screws." + +"Probably because they've solved the problem of bird's flight," said +Redgrave. "They're not gaining on us, are they?" + +"No, they're at about the same distance." + +"Then we'll see how they can soar." + +Another signal went down the tube. The _Astronef's_ propellers slowed +down and stopped, and the vessel began to rise swiftly towards the +zenith, which the sun was now approaching. The Martian fleet continued +the impossible chase until the limits of the navigable atmosphere, about +eight earth-miles above the surface, was reached. Here the air was +evidently too rarefied for their wings to act upon. They came to a +standstill, looking like links of a broken chain, their occupants no +doubt looking up with envious eyes upon the shining body of the +_Astronef_ glittering like a tiny star in the sunlight ten thousand feet +above them. + +"Well, gentlemen," said Redgrave, after a swift glance round, "I think +we have shown you that we can fly faster and soar higher than you can. +Perhaps you'll be a bit more civil now. If you're not we shall have to +teach you manners." + +"But you're not going to fight them all, dear, are you? Don't let us be +the first to bring war and bloodshed with us into another world." + +"Don't trouble about that, little woman, it's here already," he replied, +a trifle savagely. "People don't have air-ships and guns which fire +shells or poison-bombs, or whatever they were, without knowing what war +is. From what I've seen, I should say these Martians have civilised +themselves out of all emotions, and, I daresay, have fought pitilessly +for the possession of the last habitable lands of the planet. + +"They've preyed upon each other till only the fittest are left, and +those, I suppose, were the ones who invented the air-ships and finally +got possession of all that was worth having. Of course that would give +them the command of the planet, land and sea. In fact, if we are able to +make the personal acquaintance of the Martians, we shall probably find +them a set of over-civilised savages." + +"That's a rather striking paradox, isn't it, dear?" said Zaidie, +slipping her hand through his arm; "but still it's not at all bad. You +mean, of course, that they may have civilised themselves out of all the +emotions until they're just a set of cold, calculating, scientific +animals. After all they must be something of the sort, for I'm quite +sure we should not have done anything like that on earth if we'd had a +visitor from Mars. We shouldn't have got out cannons and shot at him +before we'd even made his acquaintance. + +"Now, if he, or they, had dropped in America as we were going down +there, we should have received them with deputations, given them +banquets, which they might not have been able to eat, and speeches, +which they would not understand, and photographed them, and filled the +newspapers with everything that we could imagine about them, and then +put them in a palace car and hustled them round the country for +everybody to look at." + +"And meanwhile," laughed Redgrave, "some of your smart engineers, I +suppose, would have gone over the vessel they had come in, found out how +she was worked, and taken out a dozen patents for her machinery." + +"Very likely," replied Zaidie, with a saucy little toss of her chin; +"and why not? We like to learn things down there--and anyhow that would +be much more really civilised than shooting at them." + +While this little conversation was going on, the _Astronef_ was dropping +rapidly into the midst of the Martian fleet, which had again arranged +itself in a circle. Zaidie soon made out through her glasses that the +guns were pointed upwards. + +"Oh, that's your little game, is it!" said Redgrave, when she had told +him of this. "Well, if you want a fight, you can have it." + +As he said this, his jaws came together, and Zaidie saw a look in his +eyes that she had never seen there before. He signalled rapidly two or +three times to Murgatroyd. The propellers began to whirl at their utmost +speed, and the _Astronef_, making a spiral downward course, swooped down +on to the Martian fleet with terrific velocity. Her last curve coincided +almost exactly with the circle occupied by the ships. Half-a-dozen +spouts of greenish flame came from the nearest vessel, and for a moment +the _Astronef_ was enveloped in a yellow mist. + +"Evidently they don't know that we are air-tight, and they don't use +shot or shell. They've got past that. Their projectiles kill by poison +or suffocation. I daresay a volley like that would kill a regiment. Now +I'll give that fellow a lesson which he won't live to remember." + +They swept through the poison-mist. Redgrave swung the wheel round. The +_Astronef_ dropped to the level of the ring of Martian vessels, which +had now got up speed again. Her steel ram was directed straight at the +vessel which had fired the last shot. Propelled at a speed of nearly two +hundred miles an hour, it took the strange-winged craft amidships. As +the shock came, Redgrave put his arm round Zaidie's waist and held her +close to him, otherwise she would have been flung against the forward +wall of the conning-tower. + +[Illustration: _It took the strange-winged craft amidships._] + +The Martian vessel stopped and bent up. They saw human figures more than +half as large again as men inside her staring at them through the +windows in the sides. There were others at the breaches of the guns in +the act of turning the muzzles on the _Astronef_; but this was only a +momentary glimpse, for in a second the _Astronef's_ spur had pierced +her, the Martian air-ship broke in twain, and her two halves plunged +downwards through the rosy clouds. + +"Keep her at full speed, Andrew," said Redgrave down the speaking-tube, +"and stand by to jump if we want to." + +"All ready, my Lord!" came back up the tube. + +The old Yorkshireman during the last few minutes had undergone a +transformation which he himself hardly understood. He recognised that +there was a fight going on, that it was a case of "burn, sink and +destroy," and the thousand-year-old Berserker awoke in him just, as a +matter of fact, it had done in his lordship. + +"They can pick up the pieces down there, what there is left of them," +said Redgrave, still holding Zaidie tight to his side with one hand and +working the wheel with the other, "and now we'll teach them another +lesson." + +"What are you going to do, dear?" she said, looking up at him with +somewhat frightened eyes. + +"You'll see in a moment," he said, between his shut teeth. "I don't care +whether these Martians are degenerate human beings or only animals; but +from my point of view the reception they have given us justifies any +kind of retaliation. If we'd had a single port-hole open during the +first volley you and I would have been dead by this time, and I'm not +going to stand anything like that without reprisals. They've declared +war on us, and killing in war isn't murder." + +"Well, no, I suppose not," she said; "but it's the first fight I've been +in, and I don't like it. Still, they did receive us pretty meanly, +didn't they?" + +"Meanly? If there was anything like a code of interplanetary morals or +manners one might call it absolutely caddish. I don't believe even Stead +himself could stand that--unless, of course, he wasn't here." + +He sent another message to Murgatroyd. The _Astronef_ sprang a thousand +feet towards the zenith; another touch on the button, and she stopped +exactly over the biggest of the Martian air-ships; another, and she +dropped on to it like a stone and smashed it to fragments. Then she +stopped and mounted again above the broken circle of the fleet, while +the pieces of the air-ship and what was left of her crew plunged +downwards through the crimson clouds in a fall of nearly thirty thousand +feet. + +Within the next few moments the rest of the Martian fleet had followed +it, sinking rapidly down through the clouds and scattering in all +directions. + +"They seem to have had enough of it," laughed Redgrave, as the +_Astronef_, in obedience to another signal, began to drop towards the +surface of Mars. "Now we'll go down and see if they're in a more +reasonable frame of mind. At any rate we've won our first scrimmage, +dear." + +"But it was rather brutal, Lenox, wasn't it?" + +"When you are dealing with brutes, little woman, it is sometimes +necessary to be brutal." + +"And you look a wee bit brutal right now," she replied, looking up at +him with something like a look of fear in her eyes. "I suppose that is +because you have just killed somebody--or somethings--whichever they +are." + +"Do I, really?" + +The hard-set jaw relaxed and his lips melted into a smile under his +moustache, and he bent down and kissed her. + +"Well, what do you suppose I should have thought of them if _you_ had +had a whiff of that poison?" + +"Yes, dear," she whispered in between the kisses, "I see now." + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +The _Astronef_ dropped swiftly down through the crimson-tinged clouds, +and a few minutes later they saw that the rest of the fleet had +scattered in units in all directions, apparently with the intention of +getting as far as possible out of reach of that terrible ram. Only one +of them, the largest, which carried what looked like a flag of woven +gold at the top of its centre mast, remained in sight after a few +minutes. It was almost immediately below them when they had passed +through the clouds, and they could see it sinking straight down towards +the centre of what appeared to be the principal square of the bigger of +the two cities which Zaidie had named New York and Brooklyn. + +"That fellow has gone to report, evidently," said Redgrave. "We'll +follow him just to see what he's up to, but I don't think we'd better +open the ports even then. There's no telling when they might give us a +whiff of that poison-mist, or whatever it is." + +"But how are you going to talk to them, then, if they can talk?--I mean, +if they know any language that we do?" + +"They're something like men, and so I suppose they understand the +language of signs, at any rate. Still, if you don't fancy it, we'll go +somewhere else." + +"No, thanks," she said. "That's not my father's daughter. I haven't come +a hundred million miles from home to go away before the first act's +finished. We'll go down to see if we can make them understand." + +By this time the _Astronef_ was hanging suspended over an enormous +square about half the size of Hyde Park. It was laid out just as a +terrestrial park would be, in grass land, flower-beds, and avenues, and +patches of trees, only the grass was a reddish yellow, the leaves of the +trees were like those of a beech in autumn, and the flowers were nearly +all a deep violet, or a bright emerald green. + +As they descended they saw that the square, or Central Park, as Zaidie +at once christened it, was flanked by enormous blocks of buildings, +palaces built of a dazzlingly white stone, and topped by domed roofs and +lofty cupolas of glass. + +"Isn't that just lovely!" she said, swinging her binoculars in every +direction. "Talk about your Park Lane and the houses round Central Park; +why, it's the Chicago Exposition, and the Paris one, and your Crystal +Palace, multiplied by about ten thousand, and all spread out just round +this one place. If we don't find these people nice, I guess we'd better +go back and build a fleet like this, and come and take it." + +"There spoke the new American imperialism," laughed Redgrave. "Well, +we'll go and see what they're like first, shall we?" + +The _Astronef_ dropped a little more slowly than the air-ship had done, +and remained suspended a hundred feet or so above her after she had +reached the ground. Swarms of human figures but of more than human +stature, clad in tunics and trousers or knickerbockers, came out of the +glass-domed palaces from all sides into the park. They were nearly all +of the same stature, and there appeared to be no difference whatever +between the sexes. Their dress was absolutely plain; there was no +attempt at ornament or decoration of any kind. + +"If there are any of the Martian women among those people," said her +ladyship, "they've taken to rationals, and they've grown about as big as +the men." + +"That's exactly what's happening on earth, you know, dear. I don't mean +about the rationals, but the women growing up, especially in America. I +come of a pretty long family----but, look!" + +"Well, I only come to your ear," she said. + +"And our descendants of ten thousand years hence----" + +"Oh, don't bother about them!" she said. "Look; there's some one who +seems to want to communicate with us. Why, they're all bald! They +haven't got a hair among them--and what a size their heads are!" + +"That's brains--too much brains, in fact. These people have lived too +long. I daresay they've ceased to be animals--civilised themselves out +of everything in the way of passions and emotions, and are just purely +intellectual beings, with as much human nature about them as Russian +diplomacy or those things we saw at the bottom of the Newton Crater. I +don't like the look of them." + +The orderly swarms of figures, which were rapidly filling the park, +divided as he was speaking, making a broad lane from one of its +entrances to where the _Astronef_ was hanging above the air-ship. A +light four-wheeled vehicle, whose framework and wheels glittered like +burnished gold, sped towards them, driven by some invisible agency. + +Its only occupant was a huge man, dressed in the universal costume, +saving only a scarlet sash in place of the cord-girdle which the others +wore round their waists. The vehicle stopped near the air-ship, over +which the _Astronef_ was hanging, and, as the figure dismounted, a door +opened in the side of the vessel and three other figures, similar both +in stature and attire, came out and entered into conversation with him. + +"The Admiral of the Fleet is evidently making his report," said +Redgrave. "Meanwhile, the crowd seems to be taking a considerable amount +of interest in us." + +"And very naturally, too!" replied Zaidie. "Don't you think we might go +down now and see if we can make ourselves understood in any way? You can +have the guns ready in case of accidents, but I don't think they'll try +and hurt us now. Look, the gentleman with the red sash is making signs." + +"I think we can go down now all right," replied Redgrave, "because it's +quite certain they can't use the poison-guns on us without killing +themselves as well. Still, we may as well have our own ready. Andrew, +get that port Maxim ready. I hope we shan't want it, but we may. I don't +quite like the look of these people." + +"They're very ugly, aren't they?" said Zaidie; "and really you can't +tell which are men and which are women. I suppose they've civilised +themselves out of everything that's nice, and are just scientific and +utilitarian and everything that's horrid." + +"I shouldn't wonder. They look to me as if they've just got common +sense, as we call it, and hadn't any other sense; but, at any rate, if +they don't behave themselves, we shall be able to teach them manners of +a sort, though we may possibly have done that to some extent already." + +As he said this Redgrave went into the conning-tower, and the _Astronef_ +moved from above the air-ship, and dropped gently into the crimson grass +about a hundred feet from her. Then the ports were opened, the guns, +which Murgatroyd had loaded, were swung into position, and they armed +themselves with a brace of revolvers each, in case of accident. + +"What delicious air this is!" said her ladyship, as the ports were +opened and she took her first breath of the Martian atmosphere. "It's +ever so much nicer than ours. Oh, Lenox, it's just like breathing +champagne." + +Redgrave looked at her with an admiration which was tempered by a sudden +apprehension. Even in his eyes she had never seemed so lovely before. +Her cheeks were glowing and her eyes were gleaming with a brightness +that was almost feverish, and he was himself sensible of a strange +feeling of exultation, both mental and physical, as his lungs filled +with the Martian air. + +"Oxygen," he said, shortly, "and too much of it! Or I shouldn't wonder +if it was something like nitrous-oxide--you know, laughing gas." + +"Don't!" she laughed; "it may be very nice to breathe, but it reminds +one of other things which aren't a bit nice. Still, if it is anything of +that sort it might account for these people having lived so fast. I know +I feel just now as if I was living at the rate of thirty-six hours a +day, and so, I suppose, the fewer hours we stop here the better." + +"Exactly!" said Redgrave, with another glance of apprehension at her. +"Now, there's his Royal Highness, or whatever he is, coming. How are we +going to talk to him? Are you all ready, Andrew?" + +"Yes, my Lord, all ready," replied the old Yorkshireman, dropping his +huge, hairy hand on the breech of the Maxim. + +"Very well, then, shoot the moment you see them doing anything +suspicious, and don't let any one except his Royal Highness come nearer +than a hundred yards." + +As he said this Redgrave went to the door, from which the gangway steps +had been lowered, and, in reply to a singularly expressive gesture from +the huge Martian, who seemed to stand nearly nine feet high, he beckoned +to him to come up on to the deck. + +As he mounted the steps the crowd closed round the _Astronef_ and the +Martian air-ship; but, as though in obedience to orders which had +already been given, they kept at a respectful distance of a little over +a hundred yards away from the strange vessel which had wrought such +havoc with their fleet. When the Martian reached the deck, Redgrave held +out his hand and the giant recoiled, as a man on earth might have done +if, instead of the open palm, he had seen a clenched hand gripping a +knife. + +"Take care, Lenox," exclaimed Zaidie, taking a couple of steps towards +him, with her right hand on the butt of one of her revolvers. The +movement brought her close to the open door, and in full view of the +crowd outside. + +If a seraph had come on earth and presented itself thus before a throng +of human beings, there might have happened some such miracle as was +wrought when the swarm of Martians beheld the strange beauty of this +radiant daughter of the earth. + +As it seemed to the space-voyagers, when they discussed it afterwards, +ages of purely utilitarian civilisation had brought all conditions of +Martian life up--or down--to the same level. There was no apparent +difference between the males and females in stature; their faces were +all the same, with features of mathematical regularity, pale skin, +bloodless cheeks, and an expression, if such it could be called, utterly +devoid of emotion. + +But still these creatures were human, or at least their forefathers had +been. Hearts beat in their breasts, blood of a sort still flowed through +their veins, and so the magic of this marvellous vision instantly awoke +the long-slumbering elementary instincts of a bygone age. A low murmur +ran through the vast throng, a murmur half-human, half-brutish, which +swiftly rose to a hoarse screaming roar. + +"Look out, my Lord! Quick! Shut the door, they're coming! It's her +ladyship they want; she must look like an angel from Heaven to them. +Shall I fire?" + +"Yes," said Redgrave, gripping the lever, and bringing the door down. +"Zaidie, if this fellow moves put a bullet through him. I'm going to +talk to that air-ship before he gets his poison-guns to work." + +As the last word left his lips Murgatroyd put his thumb on the spring on +the Maxim. A roar such as Martian ears had never heard before resounded +through the vast square, and was flung back with a thousand echoes from +the walls of the huge palaces on every side. A stream of smoke and flame +poured out of the little port-hole, and then the onward-swarming throng +seemed to stop, and the front ranks of it began to sink down silently in +long rows. + +Then through the roaring rattle of the Maxim sounded the deep, sharp +bang of Redgrave's gun, as he sent ten pounds weight of Rennickite, as +he had christened it, into the Martian air-ship. There was the roar of +an explosion which shook the air for miles around. A blaze of greenish +flame and a huge cloud of steamy smoke showed that the projectile had +done its work, and, when the smoke drifted away, the spot on which the +air-ship had lain was only a deep, red, jagged gash in the ground. There +was not even a fragment of the ship to be seen. + +This done, Redgrave went and turned the starboard Maxim on to another +swarm which was approaching the _Astronef_ from that side. When he had +got the range he swung the gun slowly from side to side. The moving +throng stopped, as the other one had done, and sank down to the red +grass, now dyed with a deeper red. + +Meanwhile, Zaidie had been holding the Martian at something more than +arm's length with her revolver. He seemed to understand perfectly that, +if she pulled the trigger, the revolver would do something like what the +Maxims had done. He appeared to take no notice whatever either of the +destruction of the air-ship or of the slaughter that was going on around +the _Astronef_. His big, pale blue eyes were fixed upon her face. They +seemed to be devouring a loveliness such as they had never seen before. +A dim, pinky flush stole for the first time into his waxy cheeks, and +something like a light of human passion came into his eyes. + +Then, to the utter astonishment of both Redgrave and Zaidie, he said +slowly and deliberately, and with only just enough tinge of emotion in +his voice to make Redgrave want to shoot him: + +"Beautiful. Perfect. More perfect than ours. I want it. Give Palace and +Garden of Eternal Summer for it. Two thousand work-slaves and fifty----" + +"And I'll see you damned first, sir, whoever you are!" said Redgrave, +clapping his hand on to the butt of his revolver, and forgetting for the +moment that he was speaking in another world than his own. "What the +devil do you mean, sir, by insulting my wife----?" + +"Insulting. Wife. What is that? We have no words like those." + +"But you speak English," exclaimed Zaidie, going a little nearer to him, +but still keeping the muzzle of her revolver pointing up to his hairless +head. "No, Lenox, don't be afraid about me, and don't get angry. Can't +you see that this person hasn't got any temper? I suppose it was +civilised out of his ancestors ages ago. He doesn't know what a wife or +an insult is. He just looks upon me as a desirable piece of property to +be bought, and I daresay he offered you a very handsome price. Now, +don't look so savage, because you know bargains like that have been made +even on our dear old virtuous Mother Earth. For instance, if you hadn't +met us in the middle of the Atlantic----" + +"That'll do, Zaidie," Redgrave interrupted almost roughly. "That's not +exactly the question, but I see what you mean, and it was a bit silly of +me to get angry." + +"Silly? Angry? What do those words mean?" said the Martian in his slow, +passionless, mechanical voice. "Who are you? Whence come you?" + +"I'll answer the last part first," said Redgrave. "We come from the +earth, the planet which you see after sunset and before sunrise." + +"Yes, the Silver Star," said the Martian without any note of wonder or +surprise in his voice. "Are all the dwellers there like the gods and +angels our children read about in the old legends?" + +"Gods and angels!" laughed Zaidie. "There, Lenox, there's a compliment +for you. I really think we ought to be as civil to his Royal Highness +after that as possible." Then she went on, addressing the Martian, "No, +we are not all gods and angels on earth. There are no gods and very few +angels. In fact there are none except those which exist in the fancy of +certain prejudiced persons. But that doesn't matter, at least not just +now," she continued with American directness. "What we want to know just +now is, why you speak English, and what sort of a world this Mars is?" + +The Martian evidently only understood the most direct essentials of her +speech. He saw that she asked two questions, and he answered them. + +"Speak English?" he replied, with a little shake of his huge head. "We +know not English, but there is no other speech. There is only ours. +Cycles ago there were other speeches here, but those who spoke them were +killed. It was inconvenient. One speech for a world is best." + +"I see what he means," said Redgrave, looking towards Zaidie. "The +Martian people have developed along practically the same lines as we are +doing, but they have done it faster and got a long way ahead of us. We +are finding out that the speech we call English is the shortest and most +convenient. The Martians found it out long ago and killed everybody who +spoke anything else. After all, what we call speech is only the +translation of thoughts into sounds. These people have been thinking for +ages with the same sort of brains as ours, and they've translated their +thoughts into the same sounds. What we call English they, I daresay, +call Martian, and that's all there is in it that I can see." + +"Of course," laughed Zaidie. "Wonderful until you know how, eh? Like +most things. Still I must say that our friend here speaks English +something like a phonograph, and if he'll excuse me saying so, which of +course he will, he doesn't seem to have much more human nature about +him." + +"I'm not quite so sure on that point," said Redgrave, "but----" + +"Oh, never mind about that now!" she interrupted, and then, turning +towards the Martian, who had been listening intently as though he was +trying to make sense out of what they had been saying, she went on +speaking slowly and very plainly---- + +"Tell me, sir, if you please, do you know what 'angry' means? Are you +not angry with us for destroying your air-ships up there in the clouds, +and the one that came down, and for shooting all those people of yours?" + +The Martian looked at her with a little light in his big blue eyes, and +two faint little spots of red just under them, and said: + +"Anger! Yes, I remember, that is what we called brain-heat. Our teachers +found it to be madness and it was abolished. It was not convenient. The +air-ships were not convenient to you, so you abolished them. The folk, +too, that you abolished with those things," pointing to the guns, "they +were not convenient. If you hadn't done that they would have abolished +you. There is no more to say." + +"What brutes," said Zaidie, turning away from him, her head thrown back +and her lips curling in unutterable disgust. "Well, if these people have +civilised themselves along the same lines that we are doing, thinking +the same things and speaking something like the same speech, thank God +we shall be dead before our civilisation reaches a stage like this. +That's not a man. It's only a machine of flesh and bone and nerves, and +I suppose it has blood of some sort." + +A beautiful woman always looks most beautiful when she is just a little +angry. Redgrave had never seen Zaidie look quite so lovely as she did +just then. The Martian, whose ancestors had for generations forgotten +what human emotion was like, only saw in her anger a miracle which made +her a thousand times more beautiful than before, and as he looked upon +her glowing cheeks and gleaming eyes some instinct insensibly +transmitted through many generations awoke to sudden life in some unused +corner of his brain. + +His pale clear eyes lit up with something like a glow of human passion. +The pink spots under his eyes spread downwards over his cheeks. Some +half-articulate sounds came from between his thin lips. Then they were +drawn back and showed his smooth, toothless gums. He took a couple of +long, swift strides towards her, and then bent forward, towering over +her with long, outstretched arms, huge, hideous, and half-human. + +Zaidie sprang backwards as he came towards her, her right hand went up, +and, just as Redgrave levelled his revolver, and Murgatroyd, true to the +old Berserk instinct, took a rifle by the barrel and swung the stock +above his head, Zaidie pulled her trigger. The bullet cut a clean hole +through the smooth, hairless skull of the Martian. A dark, red spot came +just between his eyes, his huge frame shrank together and collapsed in a +heap on the deck. + +"Oh, I've killed him! God forgive me, killed a man!" she whispered, as +her hand fell to her side, and the revolver dropped from her fingers. +"But, Lenox, do you really think it was a man?" + +"That thing a man!" he replied between his clenched teeth. "He wanted +you, and spoke English of a sort, so there was something human about +him, but anyhow he's better dead. Here, Andrew, open that door again and +help me to heave this thing overboard. Then I think we'd better be off +before we have the rest of the fleet with their poison guns round us. +Zaidie, I think you'd better go to your room for the present. Take a nip +of cognac and then lie down, and mind you keep the door tight shut. +There's no telling what these animals might do if they had a chance, and +just now it's my business and Andrew's to see that they don't." + +Though she would much rather have remained on deck to see anything more +that might happen, she saw that he was really in earnest, and so like a +wise wife who commands by obeying, she obeyed, and went below. + +Then the dead body of the Martian was tumbled out of the side door. The +windows through which the guns had been fired were hermetically closed, +and a few minutes later the _Astronef_ vanished from the surface of +Mars, to remain a memory and a marvel to the dwindling generations of +the worn-out world which is as this may be in the far-off days that are +to come. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +"How very different Venus looks now to what it does from the earth," +said Zaidie, a couple of mornings later, by earth-time, as she took her +eye away from the telescope through which she had been examining an +enormous golden crescent which spanned the dark vault of Space ahead of +and slightly below the _Astronef_. + +"Yes," replied Redgrave, "she looks----" + +"How do you know that she is a she?" said Zaidie, getting up and laying +a hand on his shoulder as he sat at his own telescope. "Of course I know +what you mean, that according to our own ideas on earth, it is the +planet or the world which has been supposed for ages to, as it were, +shine upon the lovers of earth with the light reflected from +the--the--well, I suppose you know what I mean." + +"Seeing that you are the most perfect terrestrial incarnation of the +said goddess that I have seen yet," he replied, slipping his arm round +her waist and pulling her down on to his knees, "I don't think that that +is quite the view you ought to take. Surely if Venus ever had a +daughter----" + +"Oh, nonsense! After we've travelled all these millions of miles +together do you really expect me to believe stuff like that?" + +"My dear girl-graduate," he said, tightening his grip round her waist a +little, "you know perfectly well that if we had travelled beyond the +limits of the Solar System, if we had outsailed old Halley's Comet +itself, and dived into the uttermost depths of Space outside the Milky +Way, you and I would still be a man and a woman, and, being, as may be +presumed, more or less in love with each other----" + +"Less indeed!" said Zaidie; "you're speaking for yourself, I hope." + +And then when she had partially disengaged herself and sat up straight, +she said between her laughs---- + +"Really, Lenox, you're quite absurd for a person who has been married as +long as you have, I don't mean in time, but in Space. Was it a thousand +years or a couple of hundred million miles ago that we were married? +Really I am getting my ideas of time and space quite mixed up. + +"But never mind that! What I was going to say is that, according to all +the authorities which your girl-graduate has been reading since we left +Mars, Venus--oh, doesn't she look just gorgeous, and our old friend the +Sun behind there blazing out of darkness like one of the furnaces at +Pittsburg--I beg your pardon, Lenox, I'm afraid I'm getting quite +provincial. I suppose we're considerably more than a hundred million +miles away?" + +"Yes, dear; we're about a hundred and fifty millions, and at that +distance, if you'll excuse me saying so, even the United States would +seem almost like a province, wouldn't they?" + +"Well, yes; that's just where distance doesn't lend enchantment to the +view, I suppose." + +"But what was it you were going to say before that----" + +"The interlude, eh? Well, before the interlude you were accusing me of +being a graduate as well as a girl. Of course I can't help that, but +what I was going to say was----" + +"If you are going to talk science, dear, perhaps we'd better sit on +different chairs. I may have been married for a hundred and fifty +million miles, but the honeymoon isn't half way through yet, you know." + +Then there was another interlude of a few seconds' duration. When Zaidie +was seated beside her own telescope again, she said, after another +glance at the splendid crescent which, as the _Astronef_ approached at a +speed of over forty miles a second, increased in size and distinctness +every moment: + +"What I mean is this. All the authorities are agreed that on Venus, her +axis of revolution being so very much inclined to the plane of her +orbit, the seasons are so severe that half the year its temperate zone +and its tropics have a summer about twice as hot as ours and the other +half they have a winter twice as cold as our coldest. I'm afraid, after +all, we shall find the Love-Star a world of salamanders and seals; +things that can live in a furnace and bask on an iceberg; and when we +get back home it will be our painful duty, as the first explorers of the +fields of Space, to dispel another dearly-cherished popular delusion." + +"I'm not so very sure about that," said Lenox, glancing from the rapidly +growing crescent, to the sweet, smiling face beside him. "Don't you see +something very different there to what we saw either on the Moon or +Mars? Now just go back to your telescope and let us take an +observation." + +"Well," said Zaidie, rising, "as our trip is, partly at least, in the +interests of science, I will;" and then when she had got her own +telescope into focus again--for the distance between the _Astronef_ and +the new world they were about to visit was rapidly lessening--she took a +long look through it, and said: + +"Yes, I think I see what you mean. The outer edge of the crescent is +bright, but it gets greyer and dimmer towards the inside of the curve. +Of course Venus has an atmosphere. So had Mars; but this must be very +dense. There's a sort of halo all round it. Just fancy that splendid +thing being the little black spot we saw going across the face of the +Sun a few days ago! It makes one feel rather small, doesn't it?" + +"That is one of the things which a woman says when she doesn't want to +be answered; but, apart from that, you were saying----" + +"What a very unpleasant person you can be when you like! I was going to +say that on the Moon we saw nothing but black and white, light and +darkness. There was no atmosphere, except in those awful places I don't +want to think about. Then, as we got near Mars, we saw a pinky +atmosphere, but not very dense; but this, you see, is a sort of +pearl-grey white shading from silver to black. You notice how much paler +it grows as we get nearer. But look--what are those tiny bright spots? +There are hundreds of them." + +"Do you remember as we were leaving the Earth, how bright the mountain +ranges looked; how plainly we could see the Rockies and the Andes?" + +"Oh, yes, I see; they're mountains; thirty-seven miles high, some of +them, they say; and the rest of the silver-grey will be clouds, I +suppose. Fancy living under clouds like those." + +"Only another case of the adaptation of life to natural conditions, I +expect. When we get there I daresay we shall find that these clouds are +just what make it possible for the inhabitants of Venus to stand the +extremes of heat and cold. Given elevations three or four times as high +as the Himalayas, it would be quite possible for them to choose their +temperature by shifting their altitude. + +"But I think it's about time to drop theory and see to the practice," he +continued, getting up from his chair and going to the signal board in +the conning-tower. "Whatever the planet Venus may be like, we don't want +to charge it at the rate of sixty miles a second. That's about the speed +now, considering how fast she's travelling towards us." + +"And considering that, whether it is a nice world or not it's nearly as +big as the Earth, I guess we should get rather the worst of the charge," +laughed Zaidie as she went back to her telescope. + +Redgrave sent a signal down to Murgatroyd to reverse engines, as it +were, or, in other words, to direct the "R. Force" against the planet, +from which they were now only a couple of hundred thousand miles +distant. The next moment the sun and stars seemed to halt in their +courses. The great golden-grey crescent, which had been increasing in +size every moment, appeared to remain stationary, and then, when he was +satisfied that the engines were developing the Force properly, he sent +another signal down, and the _Astronef_ began to descend. + +The half-disc of Venus seemed to fall below them, and in a few minutes +they could see it from the upper deck spreading out like a huge +semi-circular plain of light ahead and on both sides of them. The +_Astronef_ was falling at the rate of about a thousand miles a minute +towards the centre of the half-crescent, and every moment the brilliant +spots above the cloud-surface grew in size and brightness. + +"I believe the theory about the enormous height of the mountains of +Venus must be correct after all," said Redgrave, tearing himself with an +evident wrench away from his telescope. "Those white patches can't be +anything else but the summits of snow-capped mountains. You know how +brilliantly white a snow-peak looks on earth against the whitest of +clouds." + +"Oh, yes," said Zaidie, "I've often seen that in the Rockies. But it's +lunch-time, and I must go down and see how my things in the kitchen are +getting on. I suppose you'll try and land somewhere where it's morning, +so that we can have a good day before us. Really, it's very convenient +to be able to make your own morning or night as you like, isn't it? I +hope it won't make us too conceited when we get back, being able to +choose our mornings and our evenings; in fact, our sunrises and sunsets +on any world we like to visit in a casual way like this." + +"Well," laughed Redgrave, as she moved away towards the companion +stairs, "after all, if you find the United States, or even the Planet +Terra, too small for you, we've always got the fields of Space open to +us. We might take a trip across the Zodiac or down the Milky Way." + +"And meanwhile," she replied, stopping at the top of the stairs and +looking round, "I'll go down and get lunch. You and I may be king and +queen of the realms of Space, and all that sort of thing, but we've got +to eat and drink, after all." + +"And that reminds me," said Redgrave, getting up and following her, "we +must celebrate our arrival on a new world as usual. I'll go down and get +out the wine. I shouldn't be surprised if we found the people of the +Love-World living on nectar and ambrosia, and as fizz is our nearest +approach to nectar----" + +"I suppose," said Zaidie, as she gathered up her skirts and stepped +daintily down the companion stairs, "if you find anything human, or at +least human enough to eat and drink, you'll have a party and give them +champagne. I wonder what those wretches on Mars would have thought of it +if we'd only made friends with them?" + +Lunch on board the _Astronef_ was about the pleasantest meal of the day. +Of course, there was neither day nor night, in the ordinary sense of the +word, except as the hours were measured off by the chronometers. +Whichever side or end of the vessel received the direct rays of the sun, +was bathed in blazing heat and dazzling light. Elsewhere there was black +darkness and the more than icy cold of Space; but lunch was a convenient +division of the waking hours, which began with a stroll on the upper +deck and a view of the ever-varying splendours about them, and ended +after dinner in the same place with coffee and cigarettes and +speculations as to the next day's happenings. + +This lunch-hour passed even more pleasantly and rapidly than others had +done, for the discussion as to the possibilities of Venus was continued +in a quite delightful mixture of scientific disquisition and that +converse which is common to most human beings on their honeymoon. + +As there was nothing more to be done or seen for an hour or two, the +afternoon was spent in a pleasant siesta in the luxurious deck-saloon; +because evening to them would be morning on that portion of Venus to +which they were directing their course, and, as Zaidie said, when she +subsided into her hammock: + +It would be breakfast-time before they could get dinner. + +As the _Astronef_ fell with ever-increasing velocity towards the +cloud-covered surface of Venus, the remainder of her disc, lit up by the +radiance of her sister-worlds, Mercury, Mars, and the Earth, and also by +the pale radiance of an enormous comet, which had suddenly shot into +view from behind its southern limb, became more or less visible. + +Towards six o'clock it became necessary to exert nearly the whole +strength of her engines to check the velocity of her fall. By eight she +had entered the atmosphere of Venus, and was dropping slowly towards a +vast sea of sunlit cloud, out of which, on all sides, towered thousands +of snow-clad peaks, rounded summits, and widespread stretches of upland +about which the clouds swept and surged like the silent billows of some +vast ocean in Ghostland. + +"I thought so!" said Redgrave, when the propellers had begun to revolve +and Murgatroyd had taken his place in the conning-tower. "A very dense +atmosphere loaded with clouds. There's the Sun just rising, so your +ladyship's wishes are duly obeyed." + +"And doesn't it seem nice and homelike to see him rising through an +atmosphere above the clouds again? It doesn't look a bit like the same +sort of dear old Sun just blazing like a red-hot Moon among a lot of +white-hot stars and planets. Look, aren't those peaks lovely, and that +cloud-sea?--why, for all the world we might be in a balloon above the +Rockies or the Alps. And see," she continued, pointing to one of the +thermometers fixed outside the glass dome which covered the upper deck, +"it's only sixty-five even here. I wonder if we can breathe this air, +and--oh--I do wonder what we shall see on the other side of those +clouds." + +"You shall have both questions answered in a few minutes," replied +Redgrave, going towards the conning-tower. "To begin with, I think we'll +land on that big snow-dome yonder, and do a little exploring. Where +there are snow and clouds there is moisture, and where there is moisture +a man ought to be able to breathe." + +[Illustration: _Snow peaks and cloud seas._] + +The _Astronef_, still falling, but now easily under the command of the +helmsman, shot forwards and downwards towards a vast dome of snow which, +rising some two thousand feet above the cloud-sea, shone with dazzling +brilliance in the light of the rising Sun. She landed just above the +edge of the clouds. Meanwhile they had put on their breathing-suits, and +Redgrave had seen that the air chamber through which they had to pass +from their own little world into the new ones that they visited was in +working order. When the outer door was opened and the ladder lowered he +stood aside, as he had done on the Moon, and Zaidie's was the first +human foot which made an imprint on the virgin snows of Venus. + +The first thing Redgrave did was to raise the visor of his helmet and +taste the air of the new world. It was cool, and fresh, and sweet, and +the first draught of it sent the blood tingling and dancing through his +veins. Perfect as the arrangements of the _Astronef_ were in this +respect, the air of Venus tasted like clear running spring water would +have done to a man who had been drinking filtered water for several +days. He threw the visor right up and motioned to Zaidie to do the same. +She obeyed, and, after drawing a long breath, she said: + +"That's glorious! It's like wine after water, and rather stagnant water +too. But what a world, snow-peaks and cloud-seas, islands of ice and +snow in an ocean of mist! Just look at them! Did you ever see anything +so lovely and unearthly in your life? I wonder how high this mountain +is, and what there is on the other side of the clouds. Isn't the air +delicious! Not a bit too cold after all--but, still, I think we may as +well go back and put on something more becoming. I shouldn't quite like +the ladies of Venus to see me dressed like a diver." + +"Come along, then," laughed Lenox, as he turned back towards the vessel. +"That's just like a woman. You're about a hundred and fifty million +miles away from Broadway or Regent Street. You are standing on the top +of a snow mountain above the clouds of Venus, and the moment that you +find the air is fit to breathe you begin thinking about dress. How do +you know that the inhabitants of Venus, if there are any, dress at all?" + +"What nonsense! Of course they do--at least, if they are anything like +us." + +As soon as they got back on board the _Astronef_ and had taken their +breathing-dresses off, Redgrave and the old engineer, who appeared to +take no visible interest in their new surroundings, threw open all the +sliding doors on the upper and lower decks so that the vessel might be +thoroughly ventilated by the fresh sweet air. Then a gentle repulsion +was applied to the huge snow mass on which the _Astronef_ rested. She +rose a couple of hundred feet, her propellers began to whirl round, and +Redgrave steered her out towards the centre of the vast cloud-sea which +was almost surrounded by a thousand glittering peaks of ice and domes of +snow. + +"I think we may as well put off dinner, or breakfast as it will be now, +until we see what the world below is like," he said to Zaidie, who was +standing beside him on the conning-tower. + +"Oh, never mind about eating just now, this is altogether too wonderful +to be missed for the sake of ordinary meat and drink. Let's go down and +see what there is on the other side." + +He sent a message down the speaking tube to Murgatroyd, who was below +among his beloved engines, and the next moment sun and clouds and +ice-peaks had disappeared and nothing was visible save the +all-enveloping silver-grey mist. + +For several minutes they remained silent, watching and wondering what +they would find beneath the veil which hid the surface of Venus from +their view. Then the mist thinned out and broke up into patches which +drifted past them as they descended on their downward slanting course. + +Below them they saw vast, ghostly shapes of mountains and valleys, lakes +and rivers, continents, islands, and seas. Every moment these became +more and more distinct, and soon they were in full view of the most +marvellous landscape that human eyes had ever beheld. The distances were +tremendous. Mountains, compared with which the Alps or even the Andes +would have seemed mere hillocks, towered up out of the vast depths +beneath them. + +Up to the lower edge of the all-covering cloud-sea they were clad with a +golden-yellow vegetation, fields and forests, open, smiling valleys, and +deep, dark ravines through which a thousand torrents thundered down from +the eternal snows beyond, to spread themselves out in rivers and lakes +in the valleys and plains which lay many thousands of feet below. + +"What a lovely world!" said Zaidie, as she at last found her voice after +what was almost a stupor of speechless wonder and admiration. "And the +light! Did you ever see anything like it? It's neither moonlight nor +sunlight. See, there are no shadows down there, it's just all lovely +silvery twilight. Lenox, if Venus is as nice as she looks from here I +don't think I shall want to go back. It reminds me of Tennyson's Lotus +Eaters, 'the Land where it is always afternoon.' + +"I think you are right after all. We are thirty million miles nearer to +the Sun than we were on the Earth, and the light and heat have to filter +through those clouds. They are not at all like Earth clouds from this +side. It's the other way about. The silver lining is on this side. Look, +there isn't a black or a brown one, or even a grey one, within sight. +They are just like a thin mist, lighted by a million of electric lamps. +It's a delicious world, and if it isn't inhabited by angels it ought to +be." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +While Zaidie was talking the _Astronef_ was sweeping swiftly down +towards the surface of Venus, through scenery of whose almost +inconceivable magnificence no human words could convey any adequate +idea. Underneath the cloud-veil the air was absolutely clear and +transparent, clearer, indeed, than terrestrial air at the highest +elevations reached by mountain-climbers, and, moreover, it seemed to be +endowed with a strange, luminous quality, which made objects, no matter +how distant, stand out with almost startling distinctness. + +The rivers and lakes and seas which spread out beneath them, seemed +never to have been ruffled by blast of storm or breath of wind, and +their surfaces shone with a soft, silvery light, which seemed to come +from below rather than from above. + +"If this isn't heaven it must be the half-way house," said Redgrave, +with what was, perhaps, under the circumstances, a pardonable +irreverence. "Still, after all, we don't know what the inhabitants may +be like, so I think we'd better close the doors, and drop on the top of +that mountain-spur running out between the two rivers into the bay. Do +you notice how curious the water looks after the Earth seas; bright +silver, instead of blue and green?" + +"Oh, it's just lovely," said Zaidie. "Let's go down and have a walk. +There's nothing to be afraid of. You'll never make me believe that a +world like this can be inhabited by anything dangerous." + +"Perhaps, but we mustn't forget what happened on Mars, _Madonna mia_. +Still, there's one thing, we haven't been tackled by any aerial fleets +yet." + +"I don't think the people here want air-ships. They can fly themselves. +Look! there are a lot of them coming to meet us. That was a rather +wicked remark of yours, Lenox, about the half-way house to heaven; but +those certainly do look something like angels." + +As Zaidie said this, after a somewhat lengthy pause, during which the +_Astronef_ had descended to within a few hundred feet of the +mountain-spur, she handed her field-glasses to her husband, and pointed +downwards towards an island which lay a couple or miles or so off the +end of the spur. + +He put the glasses to his eyes, and took a long look through them. +Moving them slowly up and down, and from side to side, he saw hundreds +of winged figures rising from the island and floating towards them. + +"You were right, dear," he said, without taking the glass from his eyes, +"and so was I. If those aren't angels, they're certainly something like +men, and, I suppose, women too who can fly. We may as well stop here and +wait for them. I wonder what sort of an animal they take the _Astronef_ +for." + +He sent a message down the tube to Murgatroyd and gave a turn and a half +to the steering-wheel. The propellers slowed down and the _Astronef_ +dropped with a hardly-perceptible shock in the midst of a little plateau +covered with a thick, soft moss of a pale yellowish green, and fringed +by a belt of trees which seemed to be over three hundred feet high, and +whose foliage was a deep golden bronze. + +They had scarcely landed before the flying figures reappeared over the +tree tops and swept downwards in long spiral curves towards the +_Astronef_. + +"If they're not angels, they're very like them," said Zaidie, putting +down her glasses. + +"There's one thing, they fly a lot better than the old masters' angels +or Doré's could have done, because they have tails--or at least +something that seems to serve the same purpose, and yet they haven't got +feathers." + +"Yes, they have, at least round the edges of their wings or whatever +they are, and they've got clothes, too, silk tunics or something of that +sort--and there are men and women." + +"You're quite right, those fringes down their legs are feathers, and +that's how they can fly. They seem to have four arms." + +The flying figures which came hovering near to the _Astronef_, without +evincing any apparent sign of fear, were the strangest that human eyes +had looked upon. In some respects they had a sufficient resemblance for +them to be taken for winged men and women, while in another they bore a +decided resemblance to birds. Their bodies and limbs were human in +shape, but of slenderer and lighter build; and from the shoulder-blades +and muscles of the back there sprang a second pair of arms arching up +above their heads. Between these and the lower arms, and continued from +them down the side to the ankles, there appeared to be a flexible +membrane covered with a light feathery down, pure white on the inside, +but on the back a brilliant golden yellow, deepening to bronze towards +the edges, round which ran a deep feathery fringe. + +The body was covered in front and down the back between the wings with a +sort of divided tunic of a light, silken-looking material, which must +have been clothing, since there were many different colours all more or +less of different hue among them. Below this and attached to the inner +sides of the leg from the knee downward, was another membrane which +reached down to the heels, and it was this which Redgrave somewhat +flippantly alluded to as a tail. Its obvious purpose was to maintain the +longitudinal balance when flying. + +In stature the inhabitants of the Love-Star varied from about five feet +six to five feet, but both the taller and the shorter of them were all +of nearly the same size, from which it was easy to conclude that this +difference in stature was on Venus as well as on the Earth, one of the +broad distinctions between the sexes. + +They flew round the _Astronef_ with an exquisite ease and grace which +made Zaidie exclaim: + +"Now, why weren't we made like that on Earth?" + +To which Redgrave, after a look at the barometer, replied: + +"Partly, I suppose, because we weren't built that way, and partly +because we don't live in an atmosphere about two and a half times as +dense as ours." + +Then several of the winged figures alighted on the mossy covering of the +plain and walked towards the vessel. + +"Why, they walk just like us, only much more prettily!" said Zaidie. +"And look what funny little faces they've got! Half bird, half human, +and soft, downy feathers instead of hair. I wonder whether they talk or +sing. I wish you'd open the doors again, Lenox. I'm sure they can't +possibly mean us any harm; they are far too pretty for that. What lovely +soft eyes they have, and what a thousand pities it is we shan't be able +to understand them." + +They had left the conning-tower, and both his lordship and Murgatroyd +were throwing open the sliding-doors and, to Zaidie's considerable +displeasure, getting the deck Maxims ready for action in case they +should be required. As soon as the doors were open Zaidie's judgment of +the inhabitants of Venus was entirely justified. + +Without the slightest sign of fear, but with very evident astonishment +in their round golden-yellow eyes, they came walking close up to the +sides of the _Astronef_. Some of them stroked her smooth, shining sides +with their little hands, which Zaidie now found had only three fingers +and a thumb. Many ages before they might have been birds' claws, but now +they were soft and pink and plump, utterly strange to manual work as it +is understood upon Earth. + +"Just fancy getting Maxim guns ready to shoot those delightful things," +said Zaidie, almost indignantly, as she went towards the doorway from +which the gangway ladder ran down to the soft, mossy turf. "Why, not one +of them has got a weapon of any sort; and just listen," she went on, +stopping in the opening of the doorway, "have you ever heard music like +that on Earth? I haven't. I suppose it's the way they talk. I'd give a +good deal to be able to understand them. But still, it's very lovely, +isn't it?" + +"Ay, like the voices of syrens," said Murgatroyd, speaking for the first +time since the _Astronef_ had landed; for this big, grizzled, taciturn +Yorkshireman, who looked upon the whole cruise through Space as a mad +and almost impious adventure, which nothing but his hereditary loyalty +to his master's name and family could have persuaded him to share in, +had grown more and more silent as the millions of miles between the +_Astronef_ and his native Yorkshire village had multiplied day by day. + +"Syrens--and why not, Andrew?" laughed Redgrave. "At any rate, I don't +think they look likely to lure us and the _Astronef_ to destruction." +Then he went on: "Yes, Zaidie, I never heard anything like that before. +Unearthly, of course it is, but then we're not on Earth. Now, Zaidie, +they seem to talk in song-language. You did pretty well on Mars with +your American, suppose we go out and show them that you can speak the +song-language, too." + +"What do you mean?" she said; "sing them something?" + +"Yes," he replied; "they'll try to talk to you in song, and you won't be +able to understand them; at least, not as far as words and sentences go. +But music is the universal language on Earth, and there's no reason why +it shouldn't be the same through the Solar System. Come along, tune up, +little woman!" + +They went together down the gangway stairs, he dressed in an ordinary +suit of grey, English tweed, with a golf cap on the back of his head, +and she in the last and daintiest of the costumes which the art of Paris +and London and New York had produced before the _Astronef_ soared up +from far-off Washington. + +The moment that she set foot on the golden-yellow sward she was +surrounded by a swarm of the winged, and yet strangely human creatures. +Those nearest to her came and touched her hands and face, and stroked +the folds of her dress. Others looked into her violet-blue eyes, and +others put out their queer little hands and stroked her hair. + +This and her clothing seemed to be the most wonderful experience for +them, saving always the fact that she had only two arms and no wings. +Redgrave kept close beside her until he was satisfied that these +exquisite inhabitants of the new-found fairyland were innocent of any +intention of harm, and when he saw two of the winged daughters of the +Love-Star put up their hands and touch the thick coils of her hair, he +said: + +"Take those pins and things out and let it down. They seem to think that +your hair's part of your head. It's the first chance you've had to work +a miracle, so you may as well do it. Show them the most beautiful thing +they've ever seen." + +"What babies you men can be when you get sentimental!" laughed Zaidie, +as she put her hands up to her head. "How do you know that this may not +be ugly in their eyes?" + +"Quite impossible!" he replied. "They're a great deal too pretty +themselves to think _you_ ugly. Let it down!" + +While he was speaking Zaidie had taken off a Spanish mantilla which she +had thrown over her head as she came out, and which the ladies of Venus +seemed to think was part of her hair. Then she took out the comb and one +or two hairpins which kept the coils in position, deftly caught the +ends, and then, after a few rapid movements of her fingers, she shook +her head, and the wondering crowd about her saw, what seemed to them a +shimmering veil, half gold, half silver, in the soft reflected light +from the cloud-veil, fall down from her head over her shoulders. + +They crowded still more closely round her, but so quietly and so gently +that she felt nothing more than the touch of wondering hands on her +arms, and dress, and hair. As Redgrave said afterwards, he was +"absolutely out of it." They seemed to imagine him to be a kind of +uncouth monster, possibly the slave of this radiant being which had come +so strangely from somewhere beyond the cloud-veil. They looked at him +with their golden-yellow eyes wide open, and some of them came up rather +timidly and touched his clothes, which they seemed to think were his +skin. + +Then one or two, more daring, put their little hands up to his face and +touched his moustache, and all of them, while both examinations were +going on, kept up a running conversation of cooing and singing which +evidently conveyed their ideas from one to the other on the subject of +this most marvellous visit of these two strange beings with neither +wings nor feathers, but who, most undoubtedly, had other means of +flying, since it was quite certain that they had come from another +world. + +Their ordinary speech was a low crooning note, like the language in +which doves converse, mingled with a twittering current of undertone. +But every moment it rose into higher notes, evidently expressing wonder +or admiration, or both. + +"You were right about the universal language," said Redgrave, when he +had submitted to the stroking process for a few moments. "These people +talk in music, and, as far as I can see or hear, their opinion of us, +or, at least, of you, is distinctly flattering. I don't know what they +take _me_ for, and I don't care, but as we'd better make friends with +them suppose you sing them 'Home, Sweet Home,' or the 'Swanee River.' I +shouldn't wonder if they consider our talking voices most horrible +discords, so you might as well give them something different." + +While he was speaking the sounds about them suddenly hushed, and, as +Redgrave said afterwards, it was something like the silence that follows +a cannon shot. Then, in the midst of the hush, Zaidie put her hands +behind her, looked up towards the luminous silver surface which formed +the only visible sky of Venus, and began to sing "The Swanee River." + +The clear, sweet notes rang up through the midst of a sudden silence. +The sons and daughters of the Love-Star instantly ceased their own soft +musical conversation, and Zaidie sang the old plantation song through +for the first time that a human voice had sung it to ears other than +human. + +As the last note thrilled sweetly from her lips she looked round at the +crowd of queer half-human shapes about her, and something in their +unlikeness to her own kind brought back to her mind the familiar scenes +which lay so far away, so many millions of miles across the dark and +silent Ocean of Space. + +Other winged figures, attracted by the sound of her singing, had crossed +the trees, and these, during the silence which came after the singing of +the song, were swiftly followed by others, until there were nearly a +thousand of them gathered about the side of the _Astronef_. + +There was no crowding or jostling among them. Each one treated every +other with the most perfect gentleness and courtesy. No such thing as +enmity or ill-feeling seemed to exist among them, and, in perfect +silence, they waited for Zaidie to continue what they thought was her +long speech of greeting. The temper of the throng somehow coincided +exactly with the mood which her own memories had brought to her, and the +next moment she sent the first line of "Home, Sweet Home" soaring up to +the cloud-veiled sky. + +As the notes rang up into the still, soft air a deeper hush fell on the +listening throng. Heads were bowed with a gesture almost of adoration, +and many of those standing nearest to her bent their bodies forward, and +expanded their wings, bringing them together over their breasts with a +motion which, as they afterwards learnt, was intended to convey the idea +of wonder and admiration, mingled with something like a sentiment of +worship. + +Zaidie sang the sweet old song through from end to end, forgetting for +the time being everything but the home she had left behind her on the +banks of the Hudson. As the last notes left her lips, she turned round +to Redgrave and looked at him with eyes dim with the first tears that +had filled them since her father's death, and said, as he caught hold of +her outstretched hand: + +"I believe they've understood every word of it." + +"Or, at any rate, every note. You may be quite certain of that," he +replied. "If you had done that on Mars it might have been even more +effective than the Maxims." + +"For goodness sake don't talk about things like that in a heaven like +this! Oh, listen! They've got the tune already!" + +It was true! The dwellers of the Love-Star, whose speech was song, had +instantly recognised the sweetness of the sweetest of all earthly songs. +They had, of course, no idea of the meaning of the words; but the music +spoke to them and told them that this fair visitant from another world +could speak the same speech as theirs. Every note and cadence was +repeated with absolute fidelity, and so the speech, common to the two +far-distant worlds, became a link connecting this wandering son and +daughter of the Earth with the sons and daughters of the Love-Star. + +The throng fell back a little and two figures, apparently male and +female, came to Zaidie and held out their right hands and began +addressing her in perfectly harmonised song, which, though utterly +unintelligible to her in the sense of speech, expressed sentiments which +could not possibly be mistaken, as there was a faint suggestion of the +old English song running through the little song-speech that they made, +and both Zaidie and her husband rightly concluded that it was intended +to convey a welcome to the strangers from beyond the cloud-veil. + +And then the strangest of all possible conversations began. Redgrave, +who had no more notion of music than a walrus, perforce kept silence. In +fact, he noticed with a certain displeasure which vanished speedily with +a musical, and half-malicious little laugh from Zaidie, that when he +spoke the Bird-Folk drew back a little and looked in something like +astonishment at him; but Zaidie was already in touch with them, and half +by song and half by signs she very soon gave them an idea of what they +were and where they had come from. Her husband afterwards told her that +it was the best piece of operatic acting he had ever seen, and, +considering all the circumstances, this was very possibly true. + +In the end the two who had come to give her what seemed to be the formal +greeting, were invited into the _Astronef_. They went on board without +the slightest sign of mistrust and with only an expression of mild +wonder on their beautiful and strangely childlike faces. + +Then, while the other doors were being closed, Zaidie stood at the open +one above the gangway and made signs showing that they were going up +beyond the clouds and then down into the valley, and as she made the +signs she sang through the scale, her voice rising and falling in +harmony with her gestures. The Bird-Folk understood her instantly, and +as the door closed and the _Astronef_ rose from the ground, a thousand +wings were outspread and presently hundreds of beautiful soaring forms +were circling about the Navigator of the Stars. + +"Don't they look lovely!" said Zaidie. "I wonder what they would think +if they could see us flying above New York or London or Paris with an +escort like this. I suppose they're going to show us the way. Perhaps +they have a city down there. Suppose you were to go and get a bottle of +champagne and see if Master Cupid and Miss Venus would like a drink. +We'll see then if our nectar is anything like theirs." + +Redgrave went below. Meanwhile, for lack of other possible conversation, +Zaidie began to sing the last verse of "Never Again." The melody almost +exactly described the upward motion of the _Astronef_, and she could see +that it was instantly understood, for when she had finished their two +voices joined in an almost exact imitation of it. + +When Redgrave brought up the wine and the glasses they looked at them +without any sign of surprise. The pop of the cork did not even make them +look round. + +"Evidently a semi-angelic people, living on nectar and ambrosia, with +nectar very like our own," he said, as he filled the glasses. "Perhaps +you'd better give it to them. They seem to understand you better than +they do me--you being, of course, a good bit nearer to the angels than I +am." + +"Thanks!" she said, as she took a couple of glasses up, wondering a +little what their visitors would do with them. Somewhat to her surprise, +they took them with a little bow and a smile and sipped at the wine, +first with a swift glint of wonder in their eyes, and then with smiles +which are unmistakable evidence of perfect appreciation. + +"I thought so," said Redgrave, as he raised his own glass, and bowed +gravely towards them. "This is our nearest approach to nectar, and they +seem to recognise it." + +"And don't they just look like the sort of people who live on it, and, +of course, other things?" added Zaidie, as she too lifted her glass, and +looked with laughing eyes across the brim at her two guests. + +But meanwhile Murgatroyd had been applying the repulsive force a little +too strongly. The _Astronef_ shot up with a rapidity which soon left her +winged escort far below. She entered the cloud-veil and passed beyond +it. The instant that the unclouded sun-rays struck the glass-roofing of +the deck-chamber their two guests, who had been moving about examining +everything with a childlike curiosity, closed their eyes and clasped +their hands over them, uttering little cries, tuneful and musical, but +still with a note of strange discord in them. + +"Lenox, we must go down again," exclaimed Zaidie. "Don't you see they +can't stand the light; it hurts them. Perhaps, poor dears, it's the +first time they've ever been hurt in their lives. I don't believe they +have any of our ideas of pain or sorrow or anything of that sort. Take +us back under the clouds--quick, or we may blind them." + +Before she had ceased speaking, Redgrave had sent a signal down to +Murgatroyd, and the _Astronef_ began to drop back again towards the +surface of the cloud-sea. Zaidie had, meanwhile, gone to her lady guest +and dropped the black lace mantilla over her head, and, as she did so, +she caught herself saying: + +"There, dear, we shall soon be back in your own light. I hope it hasn't +hurt you. It was very stupid of us to do a thing like that." + +The answer came in a little cooing murmur, which said, "Thank you!" +quite as effectively as any earthly words could have done, and then the +_Astronef_ passed through the cloud-sea. The soaring forms of her lost +escort came into view again and clustered about her; and, surrounded by +them, she dropped, in obedience to their signs, down between the +tremendous mountains and towards the island, thick with golden foliage, +which lay two or three Earth-miles out in a bay, where four converging +rivers spread out through a vast estuary into the sea. + +As Lady Redgrave said afterwards to Mrs. Van Stuyler, she could have +filled a whole volume with a description of the exquisitely arcadian +delights with which the hours of the next ten days and nights were +filled. Possibly if she had been able to do justice to them, even her +account might have been received with qualified credence; but still some +idea of them may be gathered from this extract of a conversation which +took place in the saloon of the _Astronef_ on the eleventh evening. + +"But look here, Zaidie," said Redgrave, "as we've found a world which is +certainly much more delightful than our own, why shouldn't we stop here +a bit? The air suits us and the people are simply enchanting. I think +they like us, and I'm sure you're in love with every one of them, male +and female. Of course, it's rather a pity that we can't fly unless we do +it in the _Astronef_. But that's only a detail. You're enjoying yourself +thoroughly, and I never saw you looking better or, if possible, more +beautiful; and why on Earth--or Venus--do you want to go?" + +She looked at him steadily for a few moments, and with an expression +which he had never seen on her face or in her eyes before, and then she +said slowly and very sweetly, although there was something like a note +of solemnity running through her tone: + +"I altogether agree with you, dear; but there is something which you +don't seem to have noticed. As you say, we have had a perfectly +delightful time. It's a delicious world, and just everything that one +would think it to be; but if we were to stop here we should be +committing one of the greatest of crimes, perhaps the greatest, that +ever was committed within the limits of the Solar System." + +"My dear Zaidie, what, in the name of what we used to call morals on the +Earth, _do_ you mean?" + +"Just this," she replied, leaning a little towards him in her +deck-chair. "These people, half angels, and half men and women, welcomed +us after we dropped through their cloud-veil, as friends; we were a +little strange to them, certainly, but still they welcomed us as +friends. They had no suspicions of us; they didn't try to poison us or +blow us up as those wretches on Mars did. They're just like a lot of +grown-up children with wings on. In fact they're about as nearly angels +as anything we can think of. They've taken us into their palaces, +they've given us, as one might say, the whole planet. Everything was +ours that we liked to take. You know we have two or three hundredweight +of precious stones on board now, which they would make me take just +because they saw my rings. + +"We've been living with them ten days now, and neither you nor I, nor +even Murgatroyd, who, like the old Puritan that he is, seems to see sin +or wrong in everything that looks nice, has seen a single sign among +them that they know anything about what we call sin or wrong on Earth. +There's no jealousy, no selfishness. In short, no envy, hatred, malice, +and all uncharitableness; no vice, or meanness, or cheating, or any of +the abominations of the planet Terra, and _we come from that planet_. Do +you see what I mean now?" + +"I think I understand what you're driving at," said Redgrave; "you mean, +I suppose, that this world is something like Eden before the fall, and +that you and I--oh--but that's all rubbish you know. I've got my own +share of original sin, of course, but here it doesn't seem to come in; +and as for you, the very idea of _you_ imagining yourself a feminine +edition of the Serpent in Eden. Nonsense!" + +She got up out of her chair and, leaning over his, put her arm round his +shoulder. Then she said very softly: + +"I see you understand what I mean, Lenox. That's just it--original sin. +It doesn't matter how good you think me or I think you, but we have it. +You're an Earth-born man and I'm an Earth-born woman, and, as I'm your +wife, I can say it plainly. We may think a good bit of each other, but +that's no reason why we might not be a couple of plague-spots in a +sinless world like this. Surely you see what I mean, I needn't put it +plainer, need I?" + +Their eyes met, and he read her meaning in hers. He put his arm up over +her shoulder and drew her down towards him. Their lips met, and then he +got up and went down to the engine-room. + +A couple of minutes later the _Astronef_ sprang upwards from the midst +of the delightful valley in which she was resting. No lights were shown. +In five minutes she had passed through the cloud-veil, and the next +morning when their new friends came to visit them and found that they +had vanished back into Space, there was sorrow for the first time among +the sons and daughters of the Love-Star. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +"Five hundred million miles from the Earth, and forty-seven million +miles from Jupiter," said Redgrave as he came into breakfast on the +morning of the twenty-eighth day after leaving Venus. + +During this brief period the _Astronef_ had recrossed the orbits of the +Earth and Mars and had passed through that marvellous region of the +Solar System, the Belt of the Asteroides. Nearly a hundred million miles +of their journey had lain through this zone in which hundreds and +possibly thousands of tiny planets revolve in vast orbits round the Sun. + +Then had come a world less void of over three hundred million miles, +through which they voyaged alone, surrounded by the ever-constant +splendours of the heavens, and visited only now and then by one of those +Spectres of Space, which we call comets. + +Astern the disc of the Sun steadily diminished and ahead the grey-blue +shape of Jupiter, the Giant of the Solar System, had grown larger and +larger until now they could see it as it had never been seen before--a +gigantic three-quarter moon filling up the whole heavens in front of +them almost from zenith to nadir. Three of its satellites, Europa, +Ganymede, and Calisto, were distinctly visible even to the naked eye, +and Europa and Ganymede, happened to be in such a position in regard to +the _Astronef_ that her crew could see not only the bright sides turned +towards the Sun, but also the black shadow-spots which they cast on the +cloud-veiled face of the huge planet. Calisto was above the horizon +hanging like a tiny flicker of yellowish-red light above the rounded +edge of Jupiter, and Io was invisible behind the planet. + +"Five hundred million miles!" said Zaidie, with a little shiver; "that +seems an awful long way from home--I mean America--doesn't it? I often +wonder what they are thinking about us on the dear old Earth. I don't +suppose any one ever expects to see us again. However, it's no good +getting homesick in the middle of a journey when you're outward bound. +And now what is the programme as regards His Majesty King Jove? We shall +visit the satellites of course?" + +"Certainly," replied Redgrave; "in fact, I shouldn't be surprised if our +visit was confined to them." + +"What! do you mean to say we shan't land on Jupiter after coming nearly +six hundred million miles to see him? That would be disappointing. But +why not? don't you think he's ready to be visited yet?" + +"I can't say that, but you must remember that no one has the remotest +notion of what there is behind the clouds or whatever they are which +form those bands. All we really know about Jupiter is that he is of +enormous size, for instance, he's over twelve hundred times bigger than +the Earth and that his density isn't much greater than that of +water--and my humble opinion is that if we're able to go through the +clouds without getting the _Astronef_ red-hot we shall find that Jupiter +is in the same state as the Earth was a good many million years ago." + +"I see," said Zaidie, "you mean just a mass of blazing, boiling rock and +metal which will make islands and continents some day; and that what we +call the cloud-bands are the vapours which will one day make its seas. +Well, if we can get through these clouds we ought to see something worth +seeing. Just fancy a whole world as big as that all ablaze like molten +iron! Do you think we shall be able to see it, Lenox?" + +"I'm not so sure about that, little woman. We shall have to go to work +rather cautiously. You see Jupiter is far bigger than any world we've +visited yet, and if we got too close to him the _Astronef's_ engines +might not be powerful enough to drive us away again. Then we should +either stop there till the R. Force was exhausted or be drawn towards +him and perhaps drop into an ocean of molten rock and metal." + +"Thanks!" said Zaidie, with a shrug of her shapely shoulders. "That +_would_ be an ignominious end to a journey like this, to say nothing of +the boiling oil part of it; so I suppose you'll make stopping-places of +the satellites and use their attraction to help you to resist His +Majesty's." + +"Your Ladyship's reasoning is perfect. I propose to visit them in turn, +beginning with Calisto. I shouldn't be at all surprised if we found +something interesting on them. You know they're quite little worlds of +themselves. They're all bigger than our moon, except Europa. Ganymede, +in fact, is two-thirds bigger than Mercury, and if old Jupiter is still +in a state of fiery incandescence there's no reason why we shouldn't +find on Ganymede or one of the others the same state of things that +existed on our moon when the Earth was blazing hot." + +"I shouldn't wonder," said Zaidie; "I've often heard my father say that +that was probably what happened. It's all very marvellous, isn't it? +death in one place, life in another, all beginnings and endings, and yet +no actual beginning or end of anything anywhere. That's eternity, I +suppose." + +"It's just about as near as the finite intellect can get to it, I should +say," replied Redgrave. "But I don't think metaphysics are much in our +line. If you've finished we may as well go and have a look at the +realities." + +"Which the metaphysicians," laughed Zaidie as she rose, "would tell you +are not realities at all, or only realities so far as you can think +about them. 'Thinks,' in short, instead of real things. But meanwhile +I've got the breakfast _things_ to put away, so you can go up on deck +and put the telescopes in order." + +When she joined him a few minutes later in the deck-chamber the +three-quarter disc of Jupiter was rapidly approaching the full. + +Its phases are invisible from the Earth owing to the enormous distance; +but from the deck of the _Astronef_ they had been plainly visible for +some days, and, since the huge planet turns on its axis in less than ten +hours, or with more than twice the speed of the Earth's rotation, the +phases followed each other very rapidly. + +Thus at twelve o'clock noon by _Astronef_ time they might have seen a +gigantic rim of silver-blue overarching the whole vault of heaven in +front of them. By five o'clock it would be a hemisphere, and by five +minutes to ten the vast sphere would be once more shining full-orbed +upon them. By eight o'clock next morning they would find Jupiter "new" +again. + +They were now falling very rapidly towards the huge planet, and, since +there is no up or down in Space, the nearer they got to it the more it +appeared to sink below them and become, as it were, the floor of the +Celestial Sphere. As the crescent approached the full they were able to +examine the mysterious bands as human observers had never examined them +before. For hours they sat almost silent at their telescopes, trying to +probe the mystery which has baffled human science since the days of +Galileo, and gradually it became plain that Redgrave was correct in the +hypothesis which he had derived from Flammarion and one or two others of +the more advanced astronomers. + +"I believe I was right, or, in other words, those that I got the idea +from are," he said, as they approached the orbit of Calisto, which +revolves at a distance of about eleven hundred thousand miles from the +surface of Jupiter. + +"Those belts are made of clouds or vapour in some stage or other. The +highest--the ones along the Equator and what we should call the +Temperate Zones--are the highest, and therefore coolest and whitest. The +dark ones are the lowest and hottest. I daresay they are more like what +we should call volcanic clouds. Do you see how they keep changing? +That's what's bothered our astronomers. Look at that big one yonder a +bit to the north, going from brown to red. I suppose that's something +like the famous red spot which they have been puzzling about. What do +you make of it?" + +"Well," said Zaidie, looking up from her telescope, "it's quite certain +that the glare must come from underneath. It can't be sunlight, because +the poor old Sun doesn't seem to have strength enough to make a decent +sunset or sunrise here, and look how it's running along to the westward! +What does that mean, do you think?" + +"I should say it means that some half-formed Jovian Continent has been +flung sky high by a big burst-up underneath, and that's the blaze of the +incandescent stuff running along. Just fancy a continent, say ten times +the size of Asia, being split up and sent flying in a few moments like +that. Look! there's another one to the north! On the whole, dear, I +don't think we should find the climate on the other side of those clouds +very salubrious. Still, as they say the atmosphere of Jupiter is about +ten thousand miles thick, we may be able to get near enough to see +something of what's going on. + +"Meanwhile, here comes Calisto. Look at his shadow flying across the +clouds. And there's Ganymede coming up after him, and Europa behind him. +Talk about eclipses! they must be about as common here as thunderstorms +are with us." + +"We don't have a thunderstorm every day--at least not at home," +corrected Zaidie, "but on Jupiter they must have two or three eclipses +every day. Meanwhile, there goes Jupiter himself. What a difference +distance makes! This little thing is only a trifle larger than our Moon, +and it's hiding everything else." + +As she was speaking the full-orbed disc of Calisto, measuring nearly +three thousand miles across, swept between them and the planet. It shone +with a clear, somewhat reddish light like that of Mars. The _Astronef_ +was feeling his attraction strongly, and Redgrave went to the levers and +turned on about a fifth of the R. Force to avoid too sudden contact with +it. + +"Another dead world!" said Redgrave, as the surface of Calisto revolved +swiftly beneath them, "or at any rate a dying one. There must be an +atmosphere of some sort, or else that snow and ice wouldn't be there, +and everything would be either black or white as it was on the Moon. We +may as well land, however, and get a specimen of the rocks and soil to +add to the museum, though I don't expect there will be very much to see +in the way of life." + +In another hour or so the _Astronef_ had dropped gently on to the +surface of Calisto at the foot of a range of mountains crowded with +jagged and splintery peaks, and a mile or two from the edge of a sea of +snow and ice which stretched away in a vast expanse of rugged frozen +billows beyond the horizon. Redgrave, as usual, went into the +air-chamber and tried the atmosphere. A second's experience of it was +enough for him. It was unbreathably thin and unbearably cold, although, +when mixed with the air of the _Astronef_, it distinctly freshened it +up. This proved that its composition was, or had been, fit for human +respiration. + +"There's only one fault about it," he said, when he rejoined Zaidie in +the sitting-room. "You know what the schoolboy said when he started +kissing his first sweetheart, 'It takes too long to get enough of it.'" + +"You seem to be very fond of referring to that particular subject, +Lenox." + +"Well, yes; to tell you the truth I am," and then he referred to it +again in another form. + +After this they went and put on their breathing-dresses and went for a +welcome stroll along the arid shores of the frozen sea after their +lengthy confinement to the decks of the _Astronef_. The Sun was still +powerful enough to keep them comfortably warm in their dresses, and +there was enough atmosphere to make this warmth diffused instead of +direct. So they were able to step out briskly, and every now and then +open their visors a little and take in a breath or two of the thin, +sharp air, which they found quite exhilarating when mixed with the air +supplied by their own oxygen apparatus. + +The attraction of the satellite being only a little more than that of +the Moon--or, say, about a fifth of that of the Earth--they were able to +get along with a series of hops, skips, and jumps which might have +looked rather ridiculous to terrestrial eyes, but which they found a +very pleasant mode of locomotion. They were also able to climb the +steepest mountainsides with no more trouble than they would have had in +walking along a terrestrial plain. + +On the heights they found no sign either of animal or vegetable +life--only rocks and gravel and sand of a brownish red, apparently +uniform in composition. They took a few lumps of rock and a canvas bag +full of sand back with them from the mountain-side. In the valley +sloping towards the ice-sea they found what had once been watercourses +opening out into rivers towards the sea; and in the lowest parts there +was a kind of lichen-growth clinging to the rocks under the snow. On the +surface of the snow they saw traces of what might have been the tracks +of animals, but, as there was no breath of wind in the attenuated +atmosphere, it was quite possible that these might have been frozen into +permanent shape hundreds or thousands of years before. It was also +possible that if they had explored long enough they might have found +some low forms of animal life, but as they had landed almost on the +equator of the satellite, under the full rays of the Sun, and seen +nothing, this was hardly likely. + +"I don't think it is worth while stopping here any longer," said Zaidie, +who was getting a little bit _blasé_ with her interplanetary +experiences. "We've got lots to see further on, so if you don't mind I +think I'll just take two or three photographs, then we can get back to +the ship and have dinner and go on and see what Ganymede is like. He's +bigger than Mercury, and nearly as big as Mars, so we ought to find +something interesting there. This is only a sort of combination of the +Moon and the polar regions and I don't think very much of it. Suppose we +go back." + +"Just as your Ladyship pleases," laughed Redgrave over the wire which +connected their helmets, as, with joined hands, they turned back and +danced along the snow-covered ocean shore towards the _Astronef_. + +Zaidie took a couple of photographs of the mountain range and the +ice-sea and another one of the general landscape of Calisto as they rose +from the surface. Then, while she went to get lunch ready, Redgrave took +the pieces of rock and the bag of dust into the laboratory which opened +out of the main engine-room and analysed them. When he came out about an +hour later he saw Murgatroyd going through his beloved engines with an +oil-can and a piece of common cotton-waste which had come from a faraway +Yorkshire mill. + +"Andrew," he said, "should you be surprised if I told you that that moon +we've just left seems to be mostly made of a spongy sort of alloy of +gold and silver?" + +"My lord," said the old engineer, straightening himself up and looking +at him with eyes in which this announcement had not seemed to kindle a +spark of interest, "after what I have seen so far there's nothing +that'll surprise me unless it be that the grace of God allows us to get +back safely." + +"Amen, Andrew, that's well said," replied Redgrave, and then he went +back to the saloon and Murgatroyd went on with his oiling. + +When he told her ladyship of his discovery she just looked up from the +table she was laying and said: + +"Oh, indeed! Well, I'm very glad that it's five or six hundred million +miles from the Earth. A dead world bigger than the Moon, and made of +gold and silver sponge, wouldn't be a nice thing to have too near the +Earth. There's trouble enough about that sort of thing at home as it is. +Still, it'll be a nice addition to the museum, and if you'll put it away +and go and wash your hands lunch will be ready." + +When they got back to the deck-chamber Calisto was already a half moon +in the upper sky nearly five hundred thousand miles away, and the full +orb of Ganymede, shining with a pale golden light, lay outspread beneath +them. A thin, bluish-grey arc of the giant planet overarched its western +edge. + +"I think we shall find something like a world here," said her ladyship, +when she had taken her first look through her telescope; "there's an +atmosphere and what look like thin clouds. Continents and oceans too, or +something like them, and what is that light shining up between the +breaks? Isn't it something like our Aurora?" + +"It might be," replied Redgrave, turning his own telescope towards the +northern pole of Ganymede, "though I never heard of a satellite having +an aurora. Perhaps it's the Sun shining on the ice." + +As the _Astronef_ fell towards the surface of Ganymede she crossed his +northern pole, and the nearer they got the plainer it became that a +light very like the terrestrial Aurora was playing about it, +illuminating the thin, yellow clouds with a bluish-violet light, which +made magnificent contrasts of colouring amongst them. + +"Let us go down there and see what it's like," said Zaidie. "There must +be something nice under all those lovely colours." + +Redgrave checked the R. Force and the _Astronef_ fell obliquely across +the pole towards the equator. As they approached the luminous clouds +Redgrave turned it on again, and they sank slowly through a glowing mist +of innumerable colours, until the surface of Ganymede came into plain +view about ten miles below them. + +What they saw then was the strangest sight they had beheld since they +had left the Earth. As far as their eyes could reach the surface of the +Ganymede was covered with vast orderly patches, mostly rectangular, of +what they at first took for ice, but which they soon found to be a +something that was self-illuminating. + +"Glorified hot-houses, as I'm alive," exclaimed Redgrave. "Whole cities +under glass, fields, too, and lit by electricity or something very like +it. Zaidie, we shall find human beings down there." + +"Well, if we do I hope they won't be like the half-human things we found +on Mars! But isn't it all just lovely! Only there doesn't seem to be +anything outside the cities, at least nothing but bare, flat ground with +a few rugged mountains here and there. See, there's a nice level plain +there near the big glass city, or whatever it is. Suppose we go down +there." + +Redgrave checked the after engine which was driving them obliquely over +the surface of the satellite, and the _Astronef_ fell vertically towards +a bare, flat plain of what looked like deep yellow sand, which spread +for miles alongside one of the glittering cities of glass. + +"Oh, look, they've seen us!" exclaimed Zaidie. "I do hope they're going +to be as friendly as those dear people on Venus were." + +"I hope so," replied Redgrave, "but if they're not we've got the guns +ready." + +As he said this about twenty streams of an intense bluish light suddenly +shot up all round them, concentrating themselves upon the hull of the +_Astronef_, which was now about a mile and a half from the surface. The +light was so intense that the rays of the Sun were lost in it. They +looked at each other, and found that their faces looked almost perfectly +white in it. The plain and the city below had vanished. + +To look downwards was like staring straight into the focus of a ten +thousand candle-power electric arc lamp. It was so intolerable that +Redgrave closed the lower shutters, and meanwhile he found that the +_Astronef_ had ceased to descend. He shut off more of the R. Force, but +it produced no effect. The _Astronef_ remained stationary. Then he +ordered Murgatroyd to set the propellers in motion. The engineer pulled +the starting-levers, and then came up out of the engine-room and said to +him: + +"It's no good, my Lord; I don't know what devil's world we've got into +now, but they won't work. If I thought that engines could be +bewitched----" + +"Oh, nonsense, Andrew!" said his lordship rather testily. "It's +perfectly simple: those people down there, whoever they are, have got +some way of demagnetising us, or else they've got the R. Force too, and +they're applying it against us to stop us going down. Apparently they +don't want us. No, that's just to show us that they can stop us if they +want to. The light's going down. Begin dropping a bit. Don't start the +propellers, but just go and see that the guns are all right in case of +accidents." + +The old engineer nodded and went back to his engines, looking +considerably scared. As he spoke the brilliancy of the light faded +rapidly, and the _Astronef_ began to sink slowly towards the surface. + +As a precaution against their being allowed to drop with force enough to +cause a disaster, Redgrave turned the R. Force on again and they fell +slowly towards the plain, through what seemed like a halo of perfectly +white light. When she was within a couple of hundred yards of the ground +a winged car of exquisitely graceful shape rose from the roof of one of +the huge glass buildings nearest to them, flew swiftly towards them, and +after circling once round the dome of the upper deck, ran close +alongside. + +The car was occupied by two figures of distinctly human form but rather +more than human stature. Both were dressed in long, close-fitting +garments of what seemed like a golden brown fleece. Their heads were +covered with a close hood and their hands with gloves. + +"What an exceedingly handsome man!" said Zaidie, as one of them stood +up. "I never saw such a noble-looking face in my life; it's half +philosopher, half saint. Of course, you won't be jealous?" + +"Oh, nonsense!" he laughed. "It would be quite impossible to imagine +_you_ in love with either. But he is handsome, and evidently +friendly--there's no mistaking that. Answer him, Zaidie; you can do it +better than I can." + +The car had now come close alongside. The standing figure stretched its +hands out, palms upward, smiled a smile which Zaidie thought was very +sweetly solemn, next the head was bowed, and the gloved hands brought +back and crossed over his breast. Zaidie imitated the movements exactly. +Then, as the figure raised its head she raised hers, and she found +herself looking into a pair of large, luminous eyes such as she could +have imagined under the brows of an angel. As they met hers a look of +unmistakable wonder and admiration came into them. Redgrave was standing +just behind her; she took him by the hand and drew him beside her, +saying, with a little laugh: + +"Now, please look as pleasant as you can; I am sure they are very +friendly. A man with a face like that couldn't mean any harm." + +The figure repeated the motions to Redgrave, who returned them, perhaps +a trifle awkwardly. + +Then the car began to descend, and the figure beckoned to them to +follow. + +"You'd better go and wrap up, dear. From the gentleman's dress it seems +pretty cold outside; though the air is evidently quite breathable," said +Redgrave, as the _Astronef_ began to drop in company with the car. "At +any rate, I'll try it first, and if it isn't we can put on our +breathing-dresses." + +When Zaidie had made her winter toilet, and Redgrave had found the air +to be quite respirable, but of Arctic cold, they went down the gangway +ladder about twenty minutes later. The figure had got out of the car, +which was laying a few yards from them on the sandy plain, and came +forward to meet them with both hands outstretched. + +[Illustration: _Came forward to meet them with both hands outstretched._] + +Zaidie unhesitatingly held out hers, and a strange thrill ran through +her as she felt them for the first time clasped gently by other than +earthly hands, for the Venus folk had only been able to pat and stroke +with their gentle little paws, somewhat as a kitten might do. The figure +bowed its head again and said something in a low, melodious voice, which +was, of course, quite unintelligible save for the evident friendliness +of its tone. Then, releasing her hands, he took Redgrave's in the same +fashion, and then led the way towards a vast, domed building of +semi-opaque glass, or rather a substance that seemed to be something +like a mixture of glass and mica, which appeared to be one of the +entrance gates of the city. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +The wondering visitors from far-off Terra had hardly halted before the +magnificent portal when a huge sheet of frosted glass rose silently from +the ground. They passed through and it fell behind them. They found +themselves in a great oval ante-chamber along each side of which stood +triple rows of strangely shaped trees whose leaves gave off a subtle and +most agreeable scent. The temperature here was several degrees higher, +in fact about that of an English spring day, and Zaidie immediately +threw open her big fur cloak, saying: + +"These good people seem to live in Winter Gardens, don't they? I don't +think I shall want these things much while we're inside. I wonder what +dear old Andrew would have thought of this if we could have persuaded +him to leave the ship." + +They followed their host through the ante-chamber towards a magnificent +pointed arch raised on clusters of small pillars each of a differently +coloured, highly polished stone, which shone brilliantly in a light +which seemed to come from nowhere. Another door, this time of pale +transparent blue glass, rose as they approached; they passed under it, +and as it fell behind them half a dozen figures, considerably shorter +and slighter than their host, came forward to meet them. He took off his +gloves and cape and thick outer covering, and they were glad to follow +his example for the atmosphere was now that of a warm June day. + +The attendants, as they evidently were, took their wraps from them, +looking at the furs and stroking them with evident wonder; but with +nothing like the wonder which came into their big soft grey eyes when +they looked at Zaidie, who, as usual when she arrived on a new world, +was arrayed in one of her daintiest costumes. + +Their host was now dressed in a tunic of a light blue material, which +glistened with a lustre greater than that of the finest silk. It reached +a little below his knees, and was confined at the waist by a sash of the +same colour but of somewhat deeper hue. His feet and legs were covered +with stockings of the same material and colour, and his feet, which were +small for his stature and exquisitely shaped, were shod with thin +sandals of a material which looked like soft felt, and which made no +noise as he walked over the delicately coloured mosaic pavement of the +street--for such it actually was--which ran past the gate. + +When he removed his cape they expected to find that he was bald like the +Martians, but they were mistaken. His well-shaped head was covered with +long, thick hair of a colour something between bronze and grey. A broad +band of metal looking like light gold passed round the upper part of his +forehead, and from under this the hair fell in gentle waves to below his +shoulders. + +For a few moments Zaidie and Redgrave stared about them in frank and +silent wonder. They were standing in a broad street running in a +straight line to what seemed to be several miles along the edge of a +city of crystal. It was lined with double rows of trees with beds of +brilliantly coloured flowers between them. From this street others went +off at right angles and at regular intervals. The roof of the city +appeared to be composed of an infinity of domes of enormous extent, +supported by tall clusters of slender pillars standing at the street +corners. The general level of the roof seemed about three hundred feet +above the ground, and the summits of the domes some fifty feet higher. + +The houses, which were all square, were, as a rule, about forty feet +high. The roofs were covered with gardens and shrubberies, from which +creepers, bearing brillantly coloured leaves and flowers, hung down +about the windows in carefully arranged festoons. The walls were +composed of the opaque mica-like glass, relieved by pillars and arched +doorways and windows. The windows, of French form, were of clear glass, +and mostly stood open. A sweet, cool zephyr of hardly perceptible +strength appeared to be blowing along the street and over the house-tops +and in the vast airy space above the roofs. + +Brightly plumaged birds were flitting about among the branches of giant +trees, and keeping up a perpetual chorus of song. + +Presently their host touched Redgrave on the shoulder and pointed to a +four-wheeled car of light framework and exquisite design, containing +seats for four besides the driver, or guide, who sat behind. He held out +his hand to Zaidie, and handed her to one of the front seats just as an +Earth-born gentleman might have done. Then he motioned to Redgrave to +sit beside her, and mounted behind them. + +The car immediately began to move silently, but with considerable speed, +along the left-hand side of the outer street, which, like all the +others, was divided by narrow strips of russet-coloured grass and +flowering shrubs. + +In a few minutes it swung round to the right, crossed the road, and +entered a magnificent avenue, which, after a run of some four miles, +ended in a vast, park-like square, measuring at least a mile each way. + +The two sides of the avenue were busy with cars like their own, some +carrying six people, and others only the driver. Those on each side of +the road all went in the same direction. Those nearest to the broad +side-walks between the houses and the first row of trees went at a +moderate speed of five or six miles an hour, but along the inner sides, +near the central line of trees, they seemed to be running as high as +thirty miles an hour. Their occupants were nearly all dressed in clothes +made of the same glistening, silky fabric as their host wore, but the +colourings were of infinite variety. + +It was quite easy to distinguish between the sexes, although in stature +they were almost equal. The men were nearly all clothed as their host +was. The colours of their garments were quieter, and there was little +attempt at personal adornment, though many wore bands of an intensely +bright, sky-blue metal round their arms above the elbow, and others wore +belts and necklaces of links composed of this and two other metals +resembling gold and aluminum, but of an exceedingly high lustre. + +The women were dressed in flowing garments something after the Greek +style, but they were of brighter hues and much more lavishly embroidered +than the men's tunics were. They also wore much more jewellery. Indeed, +some of the younger ones glittered from head to foot with polished metal +and gleaming stones. There was one more difference which they quickly +noticed. The men's hair, like their host's, was nearly always wavy, but +that of the women, especially the younger, was a mass of either natural +or artificial curls, short and crisp about the head, and flowing down in +glistening ringlets to their waists. + +"Could any one ever have dreamt of such a lovely place?" said Zaidie, +after their wondering eyes had become accustomed to the marvels about +them, "and yet--oh dear, now I know what it reminds me of! Flammarion's +book, 'The End of the World,' where he describes the remnants of the +human race dying of cold and hunger on the Equator in places something +like this. I suppose the life of poor Ganymede is giving out, and that's +why they've got to live in magnified exposition buildings, poor things!" + +"Poor things!" laughed Redgrave. "I'm afraid I can't agree with you +there, dear. I never saw a jollier-looking lot of people in my life. I +daresay you're quite right, but they certainly seem to view their +approaching end with considerable equanimity." + +"Don't be horrid, Lenox! Fancy talking in that cold-blooded way about +such delightful-looking people as these, why, they are even nicer than +our dear bird-folk on Venus, and of course they are a great deal more +like ourselves." + +"Wherefore it stands to reason that they must be a great deal nicer!" he +replied, with a glance which brought a brighter flush to her cheeks. +Then he went on, "Ah, now I see the difference." + +"What difference? Between what?" + +"Between the daughter of Earth and the daughters of Ganymede," he +replied. "You can blush, and I don't think they can. Haven't you noticed +that, although they have the most exquisite skins and beautiful eyes and +hair and all that sort of thing, not a man or woman of them has any +colouring? I suppose that's the result of living for generations in a +hothouse." + +"Very likely," she said; "but has it struck you also that all the girls +and women are either beautiful or handsome, and all the men, except the +ones that seem to be servants or slaves, are something like Greek gods, +or, at least, the sort of men you see on the Greek sculptures?" + +"Survival of the fittest, I presume. These are probably the descendants +of the highest races of Ganymede; the people who conceived the idea of +prolonging the life of their race and were able to carry it out. The +inferior races would either perish of starvation or become their +servants. That's what will happen on Earth, and there is no reason why +it shouldn't have happened here." + +As he said this the car swung out round a broad curve into the centre of +the great square, and a little cry of amazement broke from Zaidie's lips +as her glance roamed over the multiplying splendours about her. + +In the centre of the square, in the midst of smooth lawns and +flower-beds of every conceivable shape and colour, and groves of +flowering trees, stood a great domed building, which they approached +through an avenue of overarching trees interlaced with flowering +creepers. + +The car stopped at the foot of a triple flight of stairs of dazzling +whiteness which led up to a broad arched doorway. Several groups of +people were sprinkled about the avenue and steps and the wide terrace +which ran along the front of the building. They looked with keen, but +perfectly well-mannered surprise at their strange visitors, and seemed +to be discussing their appearance; but not a step was taken towards +them, nor was there the slightest sign of anything like vulgar +curiosity. + +"What perfect manners these dear people have!" said Zaidie, as they +dismounted at the foot of the staircase. "I wonder what would happen if +a couple of them were to be landed from a motor-car in front of the +Capitol at Washington. I suppose this is their Capitol, and we've been +brought here to be put through our facings. What a pity we can't talk to +them! I wonder if they'd believe our story if we could tell it." + +"I've no doubt they know something of it already," replied Redgrave; +"they're evidently people of immense intelligence. Intellectually, I +daresay, we're mere children compared with them, and it's quite possible +that they have developed senses which we have no idea of." + +"And perhaps," added Zaidie, "all the time that we are talking to each +other our friend here is quietly reading everything that is going on in +our minds." + +Whether this was so or not their host gave no sign of comprehension. He +led them up the steps and through the great doorway, where he was met by +three splendidly dressed men even taller than himself. + +"I feel beastly shabby among all these gorgeously attired personages," +said Redgrave, looking down at his plain tweed suit, as they were +conducted with every manifestation of politeness along the magnificent +vestibule into which the door opened. + +"And I'm sure I am quite a dowdy in comparison with these lovely +creatures," added Zaidie, "although this dress was made in Paris. Lenox, +if things are for sale here you'll have to buy me one of those costumes, +and we'll take it back and get one made like it. I wonder what they'd +think of me dressed in one of those costumes at a ball at the +Waldorf-Astoria." + +Before he could make a suitable reply, a door at the end of the +vestibule opened and they were ushered into a large hall which was +evidently a council-chamber. At the further end of it were three +semi-circular rows of seats made of a polished silvery metal, and in the +centre and raised slightly above them another under a canopy of sky-blue +silk. This seat and six others were occupied by men of most venerable +aspect, in spite of the fact their hair was just as long and thick and +glossy as their host's or even as Zaidie's own. + +The ceremony of introduction was exceedingly simple. Though they could +not, of course, understand a word he said, it was evident from his +eloquent gestures that their host described the way in which they had +come from Space and landed on the surface of the World of the Crystal +Cities, as Zaidie subsequently re-christened Ganymede. + +The President of the Senate or Council spoke a few sentences in a deep +musical tone. Then their host, taking their hands, led them up to his +seat, and the President rose and took them by both hands in turn. Then, +with a grave smile of greeting, he bent his head and resumed his seat. +They joined hands in turn with each of the six senators present, bowed +their farewells in silence, and then went back with their host to the +car. + +They ran down the avenue, made a curving sweep round to the left--for +all the paths in the great square were laid in curves, apparently to +form a contrast to the straight streets--and presently stopped before +the porch of one of the hundred palaces which surrounded it. This was +their host's house, and their home during the rest of their sojourn on +Ganymede. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +The period of Ganymede's revolution round its gigantic primary is seven +days, three hours, and forty-three minutes, practically a terrestrial +week, and on their return to their native world both the daring +navigators of Space described this as the most interesting and +delightful week in their lives, excepting always the period which they +spent in the Eden of the Morning Star. Yet in one sense, it was even +more interesting. + +There the inhabitants had never learnt to sin; here they had learnt the +lesson that sin is mere foolishness, and that no really sensible or +properly educated man or woman thinks crime worth committing. + +The life of the Crystal Cities, of which they visited four in different +parts of the satellite, using the _Astronef_ as their vehicle, was one +of peaceful industry and calm, innocent enjoyment. It was quite plain +that their first impressions of this aged world were correct. Outside +the cities spread a universal desert on which life was impossible. There +was hardly any moisture in the thin atmosphere. The rivers had dwindled +into rivulets and the seas into vast, shallow marshes. The heat received +from the Sun was only about a twenty-fifth of that which falls on the +surface of the Earth, and this was drawn to the cities and collected and +preserved under their glass domes by a number of devices which displayed +superhuman intelligence. + +The dwindling supplies of water were hoarded in vast subterranean +reservoirs, and, by means of a perfect system of redistillation, the +priceless fluid was used over and over again both for human purposes and +for irrigating the land within the cities. Still the total quantity was +steadily diminishing, for it was not only evaporating from the surface, +but, as the orb cooled more and more rapidly towards its centre, it +descended deeper and deeper below the surface, and could now only be +reached by means of marvellously constructed borings and pumping +machinery which extended several miles below the surface. + +The fast-failing store of heat in the centre of the little world, which +had now cooled through more than half its bulk, was utilised for warming +the air of the cities, and to drive the machinery which propelled it +through the streets and squares. All work was done by electric energy +developed directly from this source, which also actuated the repulsive +engines which had prevented the _Astronef_ from descending. + +In short, the inhabitants of Ganymede were engaged in a steady, +ceaseless struggle to utilise the expiring natural forces of their world +to prolong their own lives and the exquisitely refined civilisation to +which they had attained to the latest possible date. They were, indeed, +in exactly the same position in which the distant descendants of the +human race may one day be expected to find themselves. + +Their domestic life, as Zaidie and Redgrave saw it while they were the +guests of their host, was the perfection of simplicity and comfort, and +their public life was characterised by a quiet but intense +intellectuality which, as Zaidie had said, made them feel very much like +children who had only just learnt to speak. + +As they possessed magnificent telescopes, far surpassing any on Earth, +their guests were able to survey, not only the Solar System, but the +other systems far beyond its limits as no others of their kind had ever +been able to do before. They did not look through or into the +telescopes. The lens was turned upon the object, and this was thrown, +enormously magnified, upon screens of what looked something like ground +glass some fifty feet square. It was thus that they saw, not only the +whole visible surface of Jupiter as he revolved above them and they +about him, but also their native Earth, sometimes a pale silver disc or +crescent close to the edge of the Sun, visible only in the morning and +the evening of Jupiter, and at other times like a little black spot +crossing the glowing surface. + +But there was another development of the science of the Crystal Cities +which interested them far more than this--for after all they could not +only see the Worlds of Space for themselves, but circumnavigate them if +they chose. + +During their stay they were shown on these same screens the pictorial +history of the world whose guests they were. These pictures, which they +recognised as an immeasurable development of what is called the +cinematograph process on Earth, extended through the whole gamut of the +satellite's life. They formed, in fact, the means by which the children +of Ganymede were taught the history of their world. + +It was, of course, inevitable that the _Astronef_ should prove an object +of intense interest to their hosts. They had solved the problem of the +Resolution of Forces, as Professor Rennick had done, and, as they were +shown pictorially, a vessel had been made which embodied the principles +of attraction and repulsion. It had risen from the surface of Ganymede, +and then, possibly because its engines could not develop sufficient +repulsive force, the tremendous pull of the giant planet had dragged it +away. It had vanished through the cloud-belts towards the flaming +surface beneath--and the experiment had never been repeated. + +Here, however, was a vessel which had actually, as Redgrave had +convinced his hosts by means of celestial maps and drawings of his own, +left a planet close to the Sun, and safely crossed the tremendous gulf +of six hundred and fifty million miles which separated Jupiter from the +centre of the system. Moreover, he had twice proved her powers by taking +his host and two of his newly-made friends, the chief astronomers of +Ganymede, on a short trip across Space to Calisto and Europa, the second +satellite of Jupiter, which, to their very grave interest, they found +had already passed the stage in which Ganymede was, and had lapsed into +the icy silence of death. + +It was these two journeys which led to the last adventure of the +_Astronef_ in the Jovian System. Both Redgrave and Zaidie had +determined, at whatever risk, to pass through the cloud-belts of +Jupiter, and catch a glimpse, if only a glimpse, of a world in the +making. Their host and the two astronomers, after a certain amount of +quiet discussion, accepted their invitation to accompany them, and on +the morning of the eighth day after their landing on Ganymede, the +_Astronef_ rose from the plain outside the Crystal City, and directed +her course towards the centre of the vast disc of Jupiter. + +She was followed by the telescopes of all the observatories until she +vanished through the brilliant cloud-band, eighty-five thousand miles +long and some five thousand miles broad, which stretched from east to +west of the planet. At the same moment the voyagers lost sight of +Ganymede and his sister satellites. + +The temperature of the interior of the _Astronef_ began to rise as soon +as the upper cloud-belt was passed. Under this, spread out a vast field +of brown-red cloud, rent here and there into holes and gaps like those +storm-cavities in the atmosphere of the Sun, which are commonly known as +sun-spots. This lower stratum of cloud appeared to be the scene of +terrific storms, compared with which the fiercest earthly tempests were +mere zephyrs. + +After falling some five hundred miles further they found themselves +surrounded by what seemed an ocean of fire, but still the internal +temperature had only risen from seventy to ninety-five. The engines were +well under control. Only about a fourth of the total R. Force was being +developed, and the _Astronef_ was dropping swiftly, but steadily. + +Redgrave, who was in the conning-tower controlling the engines, beckoned +to Zaidie and said: + +"Shall we go on?" + +"Yes," she said. "Now we've got as far as this I want to see what +Jupiter is like, and where you are not afraid to go, I'll go." + +"If I'm afraid at all it's only because you are with me, Zaidie," he +replied, "but I've only got a fourth of the power turned on yet, so +there's plenty of margin." + +The _Astronef_, therefore, continued to sink through what seemed to be a +fathomless ocean of whirling, blazing clouds, and the internal +temperature went on rising slowly but steadily. Their guests, without +showing the slightest sign of any emotion, walked about the upper deck +now, singly and now together, apparently absorbed by the strange scene +about them. + +At length, after they had been dropping for some five hours by +_Astronef_ time, one of them, uttering a sharp exclamation, pointed to +an enormous rift about fifty miles away. A dull, red glare was streaming +up out of it. The next moment the brown cloud-floor beneath them seemed +to split up into enormous wreaths of vapour, which whirled up on all +sides of them, and a few minutes later they caught their first glimpse +of the true surface of Jupiter. + +It lay, as nearly as they could judge, some two thousand miles beneath +them, a distance which the telescopes reduced to less than twenty; and +they saw for a few moments the world that was in the making. Through +floating seas of misty steam they beheld what seemed to them to be vast +continents shape themselves and melt away into oceans of flames. Whole +mountain ranges of glowing lava were hurled up miles high to take shape +for an instant and then fall away again, leaving fathomless gulfs of +fiery mist in their place. + +[Illustration: _Whole mountain ranges of glowing lava were hurled up +miles high._] + + +Then waves of molten matter rose up again out of the gulfs, tens of +miles high and hundreds of miles long, surged forward, and met with a +concussion like that of millions of earthly thunder-clouds. Minute after +minute they remained writhing and struggling with each other, flinging +up spurts of flaming matter far above their crests. Other waves followed +them, climbing up their bases as a sea-surge runs up the side of a +smooth, slanting rock. Then from the midst of them a jet of living fire +leapt up hundreds of miles into the lurid atmosphere above, and then, +with a crash and a roar which shook the vast Jovian firmament, the +battling lava-waves would split apart and sink down into the +all-surrounding fire-ocean, like two grappling giants who had strangled +each other in their final struggle. + +"It's just Hell let loose!" said Murgatroyd to himself as he looked down +upon the terrific scene through one of the port-holes of the +engine-room; "and, with all respect to my lord and her ladyship, those +that come this near almost deserve to stop in it." + +Meanwhile, Redgrave and Zaidie and their three guests were so absorbed +in the tremendous spectacle, that for a few moments no one noticed that +they were dropping faster and faster towards the world which Murgatroyd, +according to his lights, had not inaptly described. As for Zaidie, all +her fears were for the time being lost in wonder, until she saw her +husband take a swift glance round upwards and downwards, and then go up +into the conning-tower. She followed him quickly, and said: + +"What is the matter, Lenox, are we falling too quickly?" + +"Much faster than we should," he replied, sending a signal to Murgatroyd +to increase the force by three-tenths. + +The answering signal came back, but still the _Astronef_ continued to +fall with terrific rapidity, and the awful landscape beneath them--a +landscape of fire and chaos--broadened out and became more and more +distinct. + +He sent two more signals down in quick succession. Three-fourths of the +whole repulsive power of the engines was now being exerted--a force +which would have been sufficient to hurl the _Astronef_ up from the +surface of the Earth like a feather in a whirlwind. Her downward course +became a little slower, but still she did not stop. Zaidie, white to the +lips, looked down upon the hideous scene beneath and slipped her hand +through Redgrave's arm. He looked at her for an instant and then turned +his head away with a jerk, and sent down the last signal. + +The whole energy of the engines was now directing the maximum of the R. +Force against the surface of Jupiter, but still, as every moment passed +in a speechless agony of apprehension, it grew nearer and nearer. The +fire-waves mounted higher and higher, the roar of the fiery surges grew +louder and louder. Then in a momentary lull, he put his arm round her, +drew her close up to him and kissed her and said: + +"That's all we can do, dear. We've come too close and he's too strong +for us." + +She returned his kiss and said quite steadily: + +"Well, at any rate, I'm with you, and it won't last long, will it?" + +"Not very long now, I'm afraid," he said between his clenched teeth. And +then he pulled her close to him again, and together they looked down +into the storm-tossed hell towards which they were falling at the rate +of nearly a hundred miles a minute. + +Almost the next moment they felt a little jerk beneath their feet--a +jerk upwards; and Redgrave shook himself out of the half stupor into +which he was falling and said: + +"Hullo, what's that? I believe we're stopping--yes, we are--and we're +beginning to rise, too. Look, dear, the clouds are coming down upon +us--fast too! I wonder what sort of miracle that is. Ay, what's the +matter, little woman?" + +Zaidie's head had dropped heavily on his shoulder. A glance showed him +that she had fainted. He could do nothing more in the conning-tower, so +he picked her up and carried her towards the companion-way, past his +three guests, who were standing in the middle of the upper deck round a +table on which lay a large sheet of paper. + +He took her below and laid her on her bed, and in a few minutes he had +brought her to and told her that it was all right. Then he gave her a +drink of brandy-and-water and went back to the upper deck. As he reached +the top of the stairway one of the astronomers came towards him with a +sheet of paper in his hand, smiling gravely, and pointing to a sketch +upon it. + +He took the paper under one of the electric lights and looked at it. The +sketch was a plan of the Jovian System. There were some signs written +along one side, which he did not understand, but he divined that they +were calculations. Still, there was no mistaking the diagram. There was +a circle representing the huge bulk of Jupiter; there were four smaller +circles at varying distances in a nearly straight line from it, and +between the nearest of these and the planet was the figure of the +_Astronef_, with an arrow pointing upwards. + +"Ah, I see!" he said, forgetting for a moment that the other did not +understand him, "that was the miracle! The four satellites came into +line with us just as the pull of Jupiter was getting too much for our +engines, and their combined pull just turned the scale. Well, thank God +for that, sir, for in a few minutes more we should have been cinders!" + +The astronomer smiled again as he took the paper back. Meanwhile the +_Astronef_ was rushing upward like a meteor through the clouds. In ten +minutes the limits of the Jovian atmosphere were passed. Stars and suns +and planets blazed out of the black vault of Space, and the great disc +of the World that Is to Be once more covered the floor of Space beneath +them--an ocean of cloud, covering continents of lava and seas of flame, +the scene of the natal throes of a world which some day will be. + +They passed Io and Europa, which changed from new to full moons as they +sped by towards the Sun, and then the golden yellow crescent of Ganymede +also began to fill out to the half and full disc, and by the tenth hour +of Earth-time, after they had risen from its surface, the _Astronef_ was +once more lying beside the gate of the Crystal City. + +At midnight on the second night after their return, the ringed shape of +Saturn, attended by his eight satellites, hung in the zenith +magnificently inviting. The _Astronef's_ engines had been replenished +after the exhaustion of their struggle with the might of Jupiter. They +said farewell to their friends of the dying world. The doors of the +air-chamber closed. The signal tinkled in the engine-room, and a few +moments later a blurr of white lights on the brown background of the +surrounding desert was all they could see of the Crystal City under +whose domes they had seen and learnt so much. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +The relative position of the two giants of the Solar System at the +moment when the _Astronef_ left the surface of Ganymede, was such that +she had to make a journey of rather more than 340,000,000 miles before +she passed within the confines of the Saturnine System. + +At first her speed, as shown by the observations which Redgrave took +with the instruments which Professor Rennick had designed for the +purpose, was comparatively slow. This was due to the tremendous pull of +Jupiter and its four moons on the fabric of the vessel. The backward +drag rapidly decreased as the pull of Saturn and his system began to +overmaster that of Jupiter. + +It so happened, too, that Uranus, the next outer planet of the Solar +System, 1,700,000,000 miles away from the Sun, was approaching its +conjunction with Saturn, and so assisted in producing a constant +acceleration of speed. + +Jupiter and his satellites dropped behind, sinking, as it seemed to the +wanderers, down into the bottomless gulf of Space, but still forming by +far the most brilliant and splendid object in the skies. The far-distant +Sun, which, seen from the Saturnian System, has only about a nineteenth +of the superficial extent which it presents to the Earth, dwindled away +rapidly until it began to look like a huge planet, with the Earth, +Venus, Mars, and Mercury as satellites. Beyond the orbit of Saturn, +Uranus, with his eight moons, was shining with the lustre of a star of +the first magnitude, and far above and beyond him again hung the pale +disc of Neptune, the Outer Guard of the Solar System, separated from the +Sun by a gulf of more than 2,750,000,000 miles. + +When two-thirds of the distance between Jupiter and Saturn had been +traversed, Ringed Orb lay beneath them like a vast globe surrounded by +an enormous circular ocean of many-coloured fire, divided, as it were, +by circular shores of shade and darkness. On the side opposite to them a +gigantic conical shadow extended beyond the confines of the ocean of +light. It was the shadow of half the globe of Saturn cast by the Sun +across his rings. Three little dark spots were also travelling across +the surface of the rings. They were the shadows of Mimas, Enceladus, and +Tethys, the three inner satellites. Japetus, the most distant, which +revolves at a distance ten times greater than that of the Moon from the +Earth, was rising to their left above the edge of the rings, a pale, +yellow, little disc shining feebly against the black background of +Space. The rest of the eight satellites were hidden behind the enormous +bulk of the planet and the infinitely vaster area of the rings. + +Day after day Zaidie and her husband had been exhausting the +possibilities of the English language in attempting to describe to each +other the multiplying marvels of the wondrous scene which they were +approaching at a speed of more than a hundred miles a second, and at +length Zaidie, after nearly an hour's absolute silence, during which +they sat with eyes fastened to their telescopes, looked up and said: + +"It's no use, Lenox, all the fine words that we've been trying to think +of have just been wasted. The angels may have a language that you could +describe that in, but we haven't. If it wouldn't be something like +blasphemy I should drop down to the commonplace, and call Saturn a +celestial spinning-top, with bands of light and shadow instead of +colours all round it." + +"Not at all a bad simile either," laughed Redgrave, as he got up from +his chair with a yawn and a stretch of his long limbs, "still, it's as +well that you said celestial, for, after all, that's about the best word +we've found yet. Certainly the Ringed World is the most nearly heavenly +thing we've seen so far. + +"But," he went on, "I think it's about time we were stopping this +headlong fall of ours. Do you see how the landscape is spreading out +round us? That means that we are dropping pretty fast. Whereabouts would +you like to land? At present we're heading straight for Saturn's north +pole." + +"I think I'd rather see what the rings are like first," said Zaidie; +"couldn't we go across them?" + +"Certainly we can," he replied, "only we'll have to be a bit careful." + +"Careful, what of--collisions? Are you thinking of Proctor's hypothesis +that the rings are formed of multitudes of tiny satellites?" + +"Yes, but I should go a little farther than that, I should say that his +rings and his eight satellites are to Saturn what the planets generally +and the ring of the Asteroides are to the Sun, and if that is the +case--I mean if we find the rings made up of myriads of tiny bodies +flying round with Saturn--it might get a bit risky. + +"You see the outside ring is a bit over 160,000 miles across, and it +revolves in less than eleven hours. In other words we might find the +ring a sort of celestial maelstrom, and if we once got into the whirl, +and Saturn exerted his full pull on us, we might become a satellite, +too, and go on swinging round with the rest for a good bit of eternity." + +"Very well then," she said, "of course we don't want to do anything of +that sort, but there's something else I think we could do," she went on, +taking up a copy of Proctor's "Saturn and its System," which she had +been reading just after breakfast. "You see those rings are, all +together, about 10,000 miles broad; there's a gap of about 1,700 miles +between the big dark one and the middle bright one, and it's nearly +10,000 miles from the edge of the bright ring to the surface of Saturn. +Now why shouldn't we get in between the inner ring and the planet? If +Proctor was right and the rings are made of tiny satellites and there +are myriads of them, of course they'll pull up while Saturn pulls down. +In fact Flammarion says somewhere that along Saturn's equator there is +no weight at all." + +"Quite possible," replied Redgrave, "and, if you like, we'll go and +prove it. Of course, if the _Astronef_ weighs absolutely nothing between +Saturn and the rings, we can easily get away. The only thing that I +object to is getting into this 170,000-mile vortex, being whizzed round +with Saturn every ten and a half hours, and sauntering round the Sun at +21,000 miles an hour." + +"Don't!" she said. "Really it isn't good to think about these things, +situated as we are. Fancy, in a single year of Saturn there are nearly +25,000 Earth-days. Why, we should each of us be about thirty years older +when we got round, even if we lived, which, of course, we shouldn't. By +the way, how long could we live for, if the worst came to the worst?" + +"Given water, about one Earth-year at the outside;" "but, of course, we +shall be home long before that." + +"If we don't become one of the satellites of Saturn," she replied, "or +get dragged away by something into the outer depths of Space." + +Meanwhile the downward speed of the _Astronef_ had been considerably +checked. The vast circle of the rings seemed to suddenly expand, and +soon it covered the whole floor of the Vault of Space. + +As she dropped towards what might be called the limit of the northern +tropic of Saturn, the spectacle presented by the rings became every +minute more and more marvellous--purple and silver, black and gold, +dotted with myriads of brilliant points of many-coloured light, they +stretched upwards like vast rainbows into the Saturnian sky as the +_Astronef's_ position changed with regard to the horizon of the planet. +The nearer they approached the surface, the nearer the gigantic arch of +the many-coloured rings approached the zenith. Sun and stars sank down +behind it, for now they were dropping through the fifteen-year-long +twilight that reigns over that portion of the globe of Saturn which, +during half of his year of thirty terrestrial years, is turned away from +the Sun. + +The further they fell towards the rings the more certain it became that +the theory of the great English astronomer was the correct one. Seen +through the telescopes at a distance of only thirty or forty thousand +miles, it became perfectly plain that the outer or darker ring as seen +from the Earth was composed of myriads of tiny bodies so far separated +from each other that the rayless blackness of Space could be seen +through them. + +"It's quite evident," said Redgrave, after a long look through his +telescope, "that those are rings of what we should call meteorites on +Earth, atoms of matter which Saturn threw off into Space after the +satellites were formed." + +"And I shouldn't wonder, if you will excuse my interrupting you," said +Zaidie, "if the moons themselves have been made up of a lot of these +things going together when they were only gas, or nebula, or something +of that sort. In fact, when Saturn was a good deal younger than he is +now, he may have had a lot more rings and no moons, and now these +aerolites, or whatever they are, can't come together and make moons, +because they've got too solid." + +Meanwhile the _Astronef_ was rapidly approaching that portion of +Saturn's surface which was illuminated by the rays of the Sun, streaming +under the lower arch of the inner ring. + +As they passed under it the whole scene suddenly changed. The rings +vanished. Overhead was an arch of brilliant light a hundred miles thick, +spanning the whole of the visible heavens. Below lay the sunlit surface +of Saturn divided into light and dark bands of enormous breadth. + +The band immediately below them was of a brilliant silver-grey, very +much like the central zone of Jupiter. North of this on the one side +stretched the long shadow of the rings, and southward other bands of +alternating white and gold and deep purple succeeded each other till +they were lost in the curvature of the vast planet. The poles were of +course invisible since the _Astronef_ was now too near the surface; but +on their approach they had seen unmistakable evidence of snow and ice. + +As soon as they were exactly under the Ring-arch, Redgrave shut off the +R. Force, and, somewhat to their astonishment, the _Astronef_ began to +revolve slowly on its axis, giving them the idea that the Saturnian +System was revolving round them. The arch seemed to sink beneath their +feet while the belts of the planet rose above them. + +"What on earth is the matter?" said Zaidie. "Everything has gone upside +down." + +"Which shows," replied Redgrave, "that as soon as the _Astronef_ became +neutral the rings pulled harder than the planet, I suppose because we're +so near to them, and, instead of falling on to Saturn, we shall have to +push up at him." + +"Oh yes, I see that," said Zaidie, "but after all it does look a little +bit bewildering, doesn't it, to be on your feet one minute and on your +head the next?" + +"It is, rather; but you ought to be getting accustomed to that sort of +thing now. In a few minutes neither you, nor I, nor anything else will +have any weight. We shall be just between the attraction of the rings +and Saturn, so you'd better go and sit down, for if you were to give a +bit of an extra spring in walking you might be knocking that pretty head +of yours against the roof," said Redgrave, as he went to turn the R. +Force on to the edge of the rings. + +A vast sea of silver cloud seemed now to descend upon them. Then they +entered it, and for nearly half an hour the _Astronef_ was totally +enveloped in a sea of pearl-grey luminous mist. + +"Atmosphere!" said Redgrave, as he went to the conning-tower and +signalled to Murgatroyd to start the propellers. They continued to rise +and the mist began to drift past them in patches, showing that the +propellers were driving them ahead. + +They now rose swiftly towards the surface of the planet. The cloud-wrack +got thinner and thinner, and presently they found themselves floating in +a clear atmosphere between two seas of cloud, the one above them being +much less dense than the one below. + +"I believe we shall see Saturn on the other side of that," said Zaidie, +looking up at it. "Oh dear, there we are going round again." + +"Reaching the point of neutral attraction," said Redgrave; "once more +you'd better sit down in case of accidents." + +Instead of dropping into her deck-chair as she would have done on Earth, +she took hold of the arms and pulled herself into it, saying: + +"Really, it seems rather absurd to have to do this sort of thing. Fancy +having to hold yourself into a chair. I suppose I hardly weigh anything +at all now." + +"Not much," said Redgrave, stooping down and taking hold of the end of +the chair with both hands. Without any apparent effort he raised her +about five feet from the floor, and held her there while the _Astronef_ +made another revolution. For a moment he let go, and she and the chair +floated between the roof and the floor of the deck-chamber. Then he +pulled the chair away from under her, and as the floor of the vessel +once more turned towards Saturn, he took hold of her hands and brought +her to her feet on deck again. + +[Illustration: _Without any apparent effort he raised her about five +feet from the floor._] + +"I ought to have had a photograph of you like that!" he laughed. "I +wonder what they'd think of it at home?" + +"If you had taken one I should certainly have broken the negative. The +very idea--a photograph of me standing on nothing! Besides, they'd never +believe it on Earth." + +"We might have got old Andrew to make an affidavit as to the true +circumstances," he began. + +"Don't talk nonsense, Lenox! Look! there's something much more +interesting. There's Saturn at last. Now I wonder if we shall find any +sort of life there--and shall we be able to breathe the air?" + +"I hardly think so," he said, as the _Astronef_ dropped slowly through +the thin cloud-veil. "You know spectrum analysis has proved that there +is a gas in Saturn's atmosphere which we know nothing about, and, +however good it may be for the Saturnians, it's not very likely that it +would agree with us, so I think we'd better be content with our own. +Besides, the atmosphere is so enormously dense that even if we could +breathe it it might squash us up. You see we're only accustomed to +fifteen pounds on the square inch, and it may be hundreds of pounds +here." + +"Well," said Zaidie, "I haven't got any particular desire to be +flattened out, or squeezed dry like an orange. It's not at all a nice +idea, is it? But look, Lenox," she went on, pointing downwards, "surely +this isn't air at all, or at least it's something between air and water. +Aren't those things swimming about in it--something like fish in the +sea? They can't be clouds, and they aren't either fish or birds. They +don't fly or float. Well, this is certainly more wonderful than anything +else we've seen, though it doesn't look very pleasant. They're not +nice-looking, are they? I wonder if they are at all dangerous!" + +While she was saying this Zaidie had gone to her telescope, and was +sweeping the surface of Saturn, which was now about a hundred miles +distant. Her husband was doing the same. In fact, for the time being +they were all eyes, for they were looking on a stranger sight than man +or woman had ever seen before. + +Underneath the inner cloud-veil the atmosphere of Saturn appeared to +them somewhat as the lower depths of the ocean would appear to a diver, +granted that he was able to see for hundreds of miles about him. Its +colour was a pale greenish yellow. The outside thermometers showed that +the temperature was a hundred and seventy-five Fahrenheit. In fact, the +interior of the _Astronef_ was getting uncomfortably like a Turkish +bath, and Redgrave took the opportunity of at once freshening and +cooling the air by releasing a little oxygen from the cylinders. + +From what they could see of the surface of Saturn it seemed to be a dead +level, greyish brown in colour, and not divided into oceans and +continents. In fact there were no signs whatever of water within range +of their telescopes. There was nothing that looked like cities, or any +human habitations, but the ground, as they got nearer to it, seemed to +be covered with a very dense vegetable growth, not unlike gigantic forms +of seaweed, and of somewhat the same colour. In fact, as Zaidie +remarked, the surface of Saturn was not at all unlike what the floors of +the ocean of the Earth might be if they were laid bare. + +It was evident that the life of this portion of Saturn was not what, for +want of a more exact word, might be called terrestrial. Its inhabitants, +however they were constituted, floated about in the depths of this +semi-gaseous ocean as the denizens of earthly seas did in the +terrestrial oceans. Already their telescopes enabled them to make out +enormous moving shapes, black and grey-brown and pale red, swimming +about, evidently by their own volition, rising and falling and often +sinking down on to the gigantic vegetation which covered the surface, +possibly for the purpose of feeding. But it was also evident that they +resembled the inhabitants of earthly oceans in another respect, since it +was easy to see that they preyed upon each other. + +"I don't like the look of those creatures at all," said Zaidie, when the +_Astronef_ had come to a stop and was floating about ten miles above the +surface. "They're altogether too uncanny. They look to me something like +jelly-fish about the size of whales, only they have eyes and mouths. Did +you ever see such awful-looking eyes, bigger than soup-plates and as +bright as a cat's. I suppose that's because of the dim light. And the +nasty wormy sort of way they swim, or fly, or whatever it is. Lenox, I +don't know what the rest of Saturn may be like, but I certainly don't +like this part. It's quite too creepy and unearthly for my taste. Look +at the horrors fighting and eating each other. That's the only bit of +earthly character they've got about them; the big ones eating the little +ones. I hope they won't take the _Astronef_ for something nice to eat." + +"They'd find her a pretty tough morsel if they did," laughed Redgrave, +"but still we may as well get some steering way on her in case of +accident." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +A few moments later he sent a signal to Murgatroyd in the engine-room. +The propellers began to revolve slowly, beating the dense air and +driving the _Astronef_ at a speed of about twenty miles an hour through +the depths of this strangely peopled ocean. + +They approached nearer and nearer to the surface, and as they did so the +uncanny creatures about them grew more and more numerous. They were +certainly the most extraordinary living things that human eyes had ever +looked upon. Zaidie's comparison to the whale and the jelly-fish was by +no means incorrect; only when they got near enough to them they found, +to their astonishment, that they were double-headed--that is to say, +they had a head with a mouth, nostrils, ear-holes, and eyes at each end +of their bodies. + +The larger of the creatures appeared to have a certain amount of respect +for each other. Now and then they witnessed a battle-royal between two +of the monsters who were pursuing the same prey. Their method of attack +was as follows: The assailant would rise above his opponent or prey, and +then, dropping on to its back, envelop it and begin tearing at its sides +and under parts with huge beak-like jaws, somewhat resembling those of +the largest kind of the earthly octopus, only infinitely more +formidable. The substance composing their bodies appeared to be not +unlike that of a terrestrial jelly-fish, but much denser. It seemed from +their motions to have the tenacity of soft indiarubber save at the +headed ends, where it was much harder. The necks were protected for +about fifty feet by huge scales of a dull, greenish hue. + +When one of them had overpowered an enemy or a victim the two sank down +into the vegetation, and the victor began to eat the vanquished. Their +means of locomotion consisted of huge fins, or rather half-fins, +half-wings, of which they had three laterally arranged behind each head, +and four much longer and narrower, above and below, which seemed to be +used mainly for steering purposes. + +They moved with equal ease in either direction, and they appeared to +rise or fall by inflating or deflating the middle portions of their +bodies, somewhat as fish do with their swimming bladders. + +The light in the lower regions of this strange ocean was dimmer than +earthly twilight, although the _Astronef_ was steadily making her way +beneath the arch of the rings towards the sunlit hemisphere. + +"I wonder what the effect of the searchlight would be on these fellows!" +said Redgrave. "Those huge eyes of theirs are evidently only suited to +dim light. Let's try and dazzle some of them." + +"I hope it won't be a case of the moths and the candle!" said Zaidie. +"They don't seem to have taken much interest in us so far. Perhaps they +haven't been able to see properly, but suppose they were attracted by +the light and began crowding round us and fastening on to us, as the +horrible things do with each other. What should we do then? They might +drag us down and perhaps keep us there; but there's one thing, they'd +never eat us, because we could keep closed up and die respectably +together." + +"Not much fear of that, little woman," he said, "we're too strong for +them. Hardened steel and toughened glass ought to be more than a match +for a lot of exaggerated jelly-fish like these," said Redgrave, as he +switched on the head searchlight. "We've come here to see strange things +and we may as well see them. Ah, would you, my friend. No, this is not +one of your sort, and it isn't meant to eat." + +An enormous double-headed monster, apparently some four hundred feet +long, came floating towards them as the searchlight flashed out, and +others began instantly to crowd about them, just as Zaidie had feared. + +"Lenox, for Heaven's sake be careful!" cried Zaidie, shrinking up beside +him as the huge, hideous head, with its saucer eyes and enormous +beak-like jaws wide open, came towards them. "And look! there are more +coming. Can't we go up and get away from them?" + +"Wait a minute, little woman," replied Redgrave, who was beginning to +feel the passion of adventure thrilling along his nerves. "If we fought +the Martian air fleet and licked it I think we can manage these things. +Let's see how he likes the light." + +As he spoke he flashed the full glare of the five thousand candle-power +lamp full on to the creature's great cat-like eyes. Instantly it bent +itself up into an arc. The two heads, each the exact image of the other, +came together. The four eyes glared half-dazzled into the conning-tower, +and the four fearful jaws snapped viciously together. + +"Lenox, Lenox, for goodness' sake let us go up!" cried Zaidie, shrinking +still closer to him. "That thing's too horrible to look at." + +"It is a beast, isn't it?" he said; "but I think we can cut him in two +without much trouble." + +He signalled for full speed. The _Astronef_ ought to have sprung forward +and driven her ram through the huge, brick-red body of the hideous +creature which was now only a couple of hundred yards from them; but +instead of that a slow, jarring, grinding thrill seemed to run through +her, and she stopped. The next moment Murgatroyd put his head up through +the companion-way which led from the upper deck to the conning-tower, +and said, in a tone whose calm indicated, as usual, resignation to the +worst that could happen: + +"My Lord, two of those beasts, fishes or live balloons, or whatever they +are, have come across the propellers. They're cut up a good bit, but +I've had to stop the engines, and they're clinging all round the after +part. We're going down, too. Shall I disconnect the propellers and turn +on the repulsion?" + +"Yes, certainly, Andrew!" cried Zaidie, "and all of it, too. Look, +Lenox, that horrible thing is coming. Suppose it broke the glass, and we +couldn't breathe this atmosphere!" + +As she spoke the enormous, double-headed body advanced until it +completely enveloped the forward part of the _Astronef_. The two hideous +heads came close to the sides of the conning-tower; the huge, palely +luminous eyes looked in upon them. Zaidie, in her terror, even thought +that she saw something like human curiosity in them. + +[Illustration: _The huge palely luminous eyes looked in upon them._] + +Then, as Murgatroyd disappeared to obey the orders which Redgrave had +sanctioned with a quick nod, the heads approached still closer, and she +heard the ends of the pointed jaws, which she now saw were armed with +shark-like teeth, striking against the thick glass walls of the +conning-tower. + +"Don't be frightened, dear!" he said, putting his arm round her, just as +he had done when they thought they were falling into the fiery seas of +Jupiter. "You'll see something happen to this gentleman soon. Big and +all as he is there won't be much left of him in a few minutes. They are +like those monsters they found in the lowest depths of our own seas. +They can only live under tremendous pressure. That's why we didn't find +any of them up above. This chap'll burst like a bubble presently. +Meanwhile, there's no use in stopping here. Suppose you go below and +brew some coffee and bring it up on deck while I go and see how things +are looking aft. It doesn't do you any good, you know, to be looking at +monsters of this sort. You can see what's left of them later on. You +might bring the cognac decanter up too." + +Zaidie was not at all sorry to obey him, for the horrible sight had +almost sickened her. + +They were still under the arch of the rings, and so, when the full +strength of the R. Force was directed against the body of Saturn, the +vessel sprang upwards like a projectile fired from a cannon. + +Redgrave went back into the conning-tower to see what happened to their +assailant. It was already trying to detach itself and sink back into a +more congenial element. As the pressure of the atmosphere decreased its +huge body swelled up into still huger proportions. The scaly skin on the +two heads and necks puffed up as though air was being pumped in under +it. The great eyes protruded out of their sockets; the jaws opened +widely as though the creature were gasping for breath. + +Meanwhile Murgatroyd was seeing something very similar at the after end, +and wondering what was going to happen to his propellers, the blades of +which were deeply imbedded in the jelly-like flesh of the monsters. + +The _Astronef_ leaped higher and higher, and the hideous bodies which +were clinging to her swelled out huger and huger. Redgrave even fancied +that he heard something like the cries of pain from both heads on either +side of the conning-tower. They passed through the inner cloud-veil, and +then the _Astronef_ began to turn on her axis, and, just as the outer +envelope came into view the enormously distended bulk of the monsters +collapsed, and their fragments, seeming now like the tatters of a burst +balloon than portions of a once living creature, dropped from the body +of the _Astronef_, and floated away down into what had been their native +element. + +"Difference of environment means a lot, after all," said Redgrave to +himself. "I should have called that either a lie or a miracle if I +hadn't seen it, and I'm jolly glad I sent Zaidie down below." + +"Here's your coffee, Lenox," said her voice from the upper deck the next +moment, "only it doesn't seem to want to stop in the cups, and the cups +keep getting off the saucers. I suppose we're turning upside down +again." + +Redgrave stepped somewhat gingerly on to the deck, for his body had so +little weight under the double attraction of Saturn and the Rings that a +very slight effort would have sent him flying up to the roof of the +deck-chamber. + +"That's exactly as you please," he said, "just hold that table steady a +minute. We shall have our centre of gravity back soon. And now, as to +the main question, suppose we take a trip across the sunlit hemisphere +of Saturn to, what I suppose we should call on Earth, the South Pole. We +can get resistance from the Rings, and as we are here we may as well see +what the rest of Saturn is like. You see, if our theory is correct as to +the Rings gathering up most of the atmosphere of Saturn about its +equator, we shall get to higher latitudes where the air is thinner and +more like our own, and therefore it's quite possible that we shall find +different forms of life in it too--or if you've had enough of Saturn and +would prefer a trip to Uranus----" + +"No, thanks," said Zaidie quickly. "To tell you the truth, Lenox, I've +had almost enough star-wandering for one honeymoon, and though we've +seen nice things as well as horrible things--especially those ghastly, +slimy creatures down there--I'm beginning to feel a bit homesick for +good old Mother Earth. You see, we're nearly a thousand million miles +from home, and, even with you, it makes one feel a bit lonely. I vote we +explore the rest of this hemisphere up to the pole, and then, as they +say at sea--I mean our sea--'bout ship, and try if we can find our own +old world again. After all, it _is_ more homelike than any of these, +isn't it?" + +"Just take our telescope and look at it," said Redgrave, pointing +towards the Sun, with its little cluster of attendant planets. "It looks +something like one of Jupiter's little moons down there, doesn't it, +only not quite as big?" + +"Yes, it does, but that doesn't matter. The fact is that it's there, and +we know what it's like, and it's _home_, if it _is_ a thousand million +miles away, and that's everything." + +By this time they had passed through the outer band of clouds. The vast, +sunlit arch of the Rings towered up to the zenith, apparently spanning +the whole visible heavens. Below and in front of them lay the enormous +semicircle of the hemisphere which was turned towards the Sun, shrouded +by its many-coloured bands of clouds. The R. Force was directed strongly +against the lower ring, and the _Astronef_ descended rapidly in a +slanting direction through the cloud-bands towards the southern +temperate zone of the planet. + +They passed through the second, or dark, cloud-band at the rate of about +three thousand miles an hour, aided by the repulsion against the Rings +and the attraction of the planets, and soon after lunch, the materials +of which now consented to remain on the table, they passed through the +clouds and found themselves in a new world of wonders. + +On a far vaster scale, it was the Earth during that period of its +development which is called the Reptilian Age. The atmosphere was still +dense and loaded with aqueous vapour, but the waters had already been +divided from the land. + +They passed over vast, marshy continents and islands, and warm seas, +above which thin clouds of steam still hung, and as they swept southward +with the propellers working at their utmost speed they caught glimpses +of giant forms rising out of the steamy waters near the land, of others +crawling slowly over it, dragging their huge bulk through a tremendous +vegetation, which they crushed down as they passed, as a sheep on Earth +might push its way through a field of standing corn. + +Other and even stranger shapes, broad-winged and ungainly, fluttered +with a slow, bat-like motion through the lower strata of the atmosphere. + +Every now and then during the voyage across the temperate zone the +propellers were slowed down to enable them to witness some Titanic +conflict between the gigantic denizens of land and sea and air. But +Zaidie had had enough of horrors on the Saturnian equator, and so she +was content to watch this phase of evolution working itself out (as it +had done on the Earth thousands of ages ago) from a convenient distance. +Wherefore the _Astronef_ sped on without approaching the surface nearer +than was necessary to get a clear general view. + +"It'll be all very nice to see and remember and dream about afterwards," +she said, "but I don't think I can stand any more monsters just now, at +least not at close quarters, and I'm quite sure that if those things can +live there we couldn't, any more than we could have lived on Earth a +million years or so ago. No, really I don't want to land, Lenox; let's +go on." + +They went on at a speed of about a hundred miles an hour, and, as they +progressed southward, both the atmosphere and the landscape rapidly +changed. The air grew clearer and the clouds lighter. Land and sea were +more sharply divided, and both teeming with life. The seas still swarmed +with serpentine monsters of the saurian type, and the firmer lands were +peopled by huge animals, mastodons, bears, giant tapirs, mylodons, +deinotheriums, and a score of other species too strange for them to +recognise by any Earthly likeness, which roamed in great herds through +the vast twilit forests and over boundless plains covered with grey-blue +vegetation. + +Here, too, they found mountains for the first time on Saturn; mountains +steep-sided, and many Earth-miles high. + +As the _Astronef_ was skirting the side of one of these ranges Redgrave +allowed it to approach more closely than he had so far done to the +surface of Saturn. + +"I shouldn't wonder if we found some of the higher forms of life up +here," he said. "If there is any kind of being that is going to develop +some day into the human race of Saturn it would naturally get up here." + +"I should hope so," said Zaidie, "and just as far as possible out of the +reach of those unutterable horrors on the equator. That would be one of +the first signs they would show of superior intelligence. Look! I +believe there are some of them. Do you see those holes in the +mountain-side there? And there they are, something like gorillas, only +twice as big, and up the trees, too--and what trees! They must be seven +or eight hundred feet high." + +"Tree-men and cave-dwellers, and ancestors of the future royal race of +Saturn, I suppose!" said Redgrave. "They don't look very nice, do they? +Still, there's no doubt about their being far superior in intelligence +to those other brutes we saw. Evidently this atmosphere is too thin for +the two-headed jelly-fishes and the saurians to breathe. These creatures +have found that out in a few hundreds of generations, and so they have +come to live up here out of the way. Vegetarians, I suppose, or perhaps +they live on smaller monkeys and other animals, just as our ancestors +did." + +"Really, Lenox," said Zaidie, turning round and facing him, "I must say +that you have a most unpleasant way of alluding to one's ancestors. They +couldn't help what they were." + +"Well, dear," he said, going towards her, "marvellous as the miracle +seems, I'm heretic enough to believe it possible that your ancestors +even, millions of years ago, perhaps, may have been something like +those; but then, of course, you know I'm a hopeless Darwinian." + +"And, therefore, entirely horrid, as I've often said before, when you +get on subjects like these. Not, of course, that I'm ashamed of my poor +relations; and then, after all, your Darwin was quite wrong when he +talked about the descent of man--and woman. We--especially the +women--have _as_cended from that sort of thing, if there's any truth in +the story at all; though, personally, I must say I prefer dear old +Mother Eve." + +"Who never had a sweeter daughter than----!" he replied, drawing her +towards him. + +"Very prettily put, my Lord," she laughed, releasing herself with a +gentle twirl; "and now I'll go and get dinner ready. After all, it +doesn't matter what world one's in, one gets hungry all the same." + +The dinner, which was eaten somewhere in the middle of the +fifteen-year-long day of Saturn, was a more than usually pleasant one, +because they were now nearing the turning-point of their trip into the +depths of Space, and thoughts of home and friends were already beginning +to fly back across the thousand-million-mile gulf which lay between them +and the Earth which they had left only a little more than two months +ago. + +While they were at dinner the _Astronef_ rose above the mountains and +resumed her southward course. Zaidie brought the coffee up on deck as +usual after dinner, and, while Redgrave smoked his cigar and Zaidie her +cigarette, they luxuriated in the magnificent spectacle of the sunlit +side of the Rings towering up, rainbow built on rainbow, to the zenith +of their visible heavens. + +"What a pity there aren't any words to describe it!" said Zaidie. "I +wonder if the descendants of the ancestors of the future human race on +Saturn will invent anything like a suitable language. I wonder how +they'll talk about those Rings millions of years hence." + +"By that time there may not be any Rings," Lenox replied, blowing one of +blue smoke from his own lips. "Look at that--made in a moment and gone +in a moment--and yet on exactly the same principle, it gives one a dim +idea of the difference between time and eternity. After all it's only +another example of Kelvin's theory of vortices. Nebulæ, and asteroids, +and planet-rings, and smoke-rings are really all made on the same +principle." + +"My dear Lenox, if you're going to get as philosophical and as +commonplace as that, I'm going to bed. Now that I come to think of it, +I've been up about fifteen Earth-hours, so it's about time I went and +had a sleep. It's your turn to make the coffee in the morning--our +morning, I mean--and you'll wake me in time to see the South Pole of +Saturn, won't you? You're not coming yet, I suppose?" + +"Not just yet, dear. I want to see a bit more of this, and then I must +go through the engines and see that they're all right and ready for that +thousand million mile homeward voyage you're talking about. You can have +a good ten hours' sleep without missing much, I think, for there doesn't +seem to be anything more interesting than our own Arctic life down +there. So good-night, little woman, and don't have too many nightmares." + +"Good-night!" she said; "if you hear me shout you'll know that you're to +come and protect me from monsters. Weren't those two-headed brutes just +too horrid for words? Good-night, dear!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +A little before six (Earth time) on the fourth morning after they had +cleared the confines of the Saturnian System, Redgrave went as usual +into the conning-tower to examine the instruments, and to see that +everything was in order. To his intense surprise he found, on looking at +the gravitational compass, which was to the _Astronef_ what the ordinary +compass is to a ship at sea, that the vessel was a long way out of her +course. + +Such a thing had never yet occurred. Up to now the _Astronef_ had obeyed +the laws of gravitation and repulsion with absolute exactness. He made +another examination of the instruments; but no, all were in perfect +order. + +"I wonder what the deuce is the matter," he said, after he had looked +for a few moments with frowning eyes at the multitude of orbs ahead. "By +Jove, we're swinging more. This is getting serious." + +He went back to the compass. The long, slender needle was slowly +swinging farther and farther out of the middle line of the vessel. + +"There can only be two explanations of that," he went on, thrusting his +hands deep into his trousers pockets; "either the engines are not +working properly, or some enormous and invisible body is pulling us +towards it out of our course. Let's have a look at the engines first." + +When he reached the engine-room he said to Murgatroyd, who was indulging +in his usual pastime of cleaning and polishing his beloved charges: + +"Have you noticed anything wrong during the last hour or so, +Murgatroyd?" + +"No, my Lord; at least not so far as concerns the engines. They're all +right. Hark, now, they're not making more noise than a lady's sewing +machine," replied the old Yorkshireman, with a note of resentment in his +voice. The suspicion that anything could be wrong with his shining +darlings was almost a personal offence to him. "But is anything the +matter, my Lord, if I might ask?" + +"We're a long way off our course, and for the life of me I can't +understand it," replied Redgrave. "There's nothing about here to pull us +out of our line. Of course the stars--good Lord, I never thought of +that! Look here, Murgatroyd, not a word about this to her ladyship, and +stand by to raise the power by degrees, as I signal to you." + +"Ay, my lord. I hope it's nothing bad!" + +Redgrave went back to the conning-tower without replying. The only +possible solution of the mystery of the deviation had suddenly dawned +upon him, and a very serious solution it was. He remembered there were +such things as dead suns--the derelicts of the Ocean of Space--vast, +invisible orbs, lightless and lifeless, too distant from any living sun +to be illumined by its rays, and yet exercising the only force left to +them--the force of attraction. Might not one of these have wandered near +enough to the confines of the Solar System to exert this force, a force +of absolutely unknown magnitude, upon the _Astronef_? + +He went to the desk beside the instrument-table and plunged into a maze +of mathematics, of masses and weights, angles and distances. Half an +hour later he stood looking at the last symbol on the last sheet of +paper with something like fear. It was the fatal _x_ which remained to +satisfy the last equation, the unknown quantity which represented the +unseen force that was dragging them into the outer wilderness of +insterstellar space, into far-off regions from which, with the remaining +force at his disposal, no return would be possible. + +He signalled to Murgatroyd to increase the development of the R. Force +from a tenth to a fifth. Then he went to the lower saloon, where Zaidie +was busy with her usual morning tidy-up. Now that the mystery was +explained there was no reason to keep her in the dark. Indeed, he had +given her his word that he would conceal from her no danger, however +great, that might threaten them when he had once assured himself of its +existence. + +She listened to him in silence and without a sign of fear beyond a +little lifting of the eyelids and a little fading of the colour in her +cheeks. + +"And if we can't resist this force," she said, when he had finished, "it +will drag us millions--perhaps millions of millions--of miles away from +our own system into outer space, and we shall either fall on the surface +of this dead sun and be reduced to a puff of lighted gas in an instant, +or some other body will pull us away from it, and then another away from +that, and so on, and we shall wander among the stars for ever and ever +until the end of time!" + +"If the first happens, darling, we shall die--together--without knowing +it. It's the second that I'm most afraid of. The _Astronef_ may go on +wandering among the stars for ever--but we have only water enough for +three weeks more. Now come into the conning-tower and we'll see how +things are going." + +As they bent their heads over the instrument-table Redgrave saw that the +remorseless needle had moved two degrees more to the right. The keel of +the _Astronef_, under the impulse of the R. Force, was continually +turning. The pull of the invisible orb was dragging her slowly but +irresistibly out of her line. + +"There's nothing for it but this," said Redgrave, putting out his hand +to the signal-board, and signalling to Murgatroyd to put the engines to +their highest capacity. "You see, dear, our greatest danger is this: we +had to exert such a tremendous lot of power getting away from Jupiter +and Saturn, that we haven't any too much to spare, and if we have to +spend it in counteracting the pull of this dead sun, or whatever it is, +we may not have enough of what I call the R. fluid left to get home +with." + +"I see," she said, staring with wide-open eyes at the needle. "You mean +that we may not have enough to keep us from falling into one of the +planets or perhaps into the Sun itself. Well, supposing the dangers are +equal, this one is the nearest, and so I guess we've got to fight it +first." + +"Spoken like a good American!" he said, putting his arm across her +shoulders and looking at once with infinite pride and infinite regret at +the calm, proud face which the glory of resignation had adorned with a +new beauty. + +She bowed her head and then looked away again so that he should not see +that there were tears in her eyes. He took his hand from her shoulder +and stared in silence down at the needle. It was stationary again. + +"We've stopped!" he said, after a pause of several moments. "Now, if the +body that's taken us out of our course is moving away from us we win, if +it's coming towards us we lose. At any rate, we've done all we can. Come +along, Zaidie, let's go and have a walk on deck." + +They had scarcely reached the upper deck when something happened which +dwarfed all the other experiences of their marvellous voyage into utter +insignificance. + +Above and around them the constellations blazed with a splendour +inconceivable to an observer on Earth, but ahead of them gaped the vast, +black void which sailors call "the Coal Hole," and in which the most +powerful telescopes have only discovered a few faintly luminous bodies. +Suddenly, out of the midst of this infinity of darkness, there blazed a +glare of almost intolerably brilliant radiance. Instantly the forward +end of the _Astronef_ was bathed in light and heat--the light and heat +of a re-created sun, whose elements had been dark and cold for uncounted +ages. + +Hundreds of tiny points of light, unknown worlds which had been dark for +myriads of years, twinkled out of the blackness. Then the fierce glare +grew dimmer. A vast mantle of luminous mist spread out with +inconceivable rapidity, and in the midst of this blazed the central +nucleus--the sun which in far-off ages to come would be the giver of +light and heat, of life and beauty to worlds unborn, to planets which +were now only little eddies of atoms whirling in that ocean of nebulous +flame. + +For more than an hour the two wanderers from the far-off Earth stood +motionless and silent, gazing on the indescribable splendours of the +fearfully magnificent spectacle before them. Every mundane thought +seemed burnt out of their souls by the glory and the wonder of it. It +was almost as though they were standing in the very presence of God. +Indeed, were they not witnessing the supreme act of Omnipotence, a new +creation? Their peril, a peril such as had never threatened mortals +before, was utterly forgotten. They had even forgotten each other's +presence. For the time being they existed only to look and to wonder. + +They were called at length out of their trance by the matter-of-fact +voice of Murgatroyd saying-- + +"My Lord, she's back to her course. Will I keep the power on full?" + +"Eh! What's that?" exclaimed Redgrave, as they both turned quickly +round. "Oh, it's you, Murgatroyd. The power? Yes, keep it on full till I +have taken the bearings." + +"Ay, my Lord, very good," replied the engineer. + +As he left the deck Redgrave put his arm round Zaidie and drew her +gently towards him and said, "Zaidie, truly you are favoured among +women! You have seen the beginning of a new creation. You will certainly +be saved somehow after that." + +"Yes, and you too, dear," she murmured, as though still half-dreaming. +"It is very glorious and wonderful; but what is it all--I mean, what is +the explanation of it?" + +"The merely scientific explanation, dear, is very simple. I see it all +now. The force that was dragging us out of our course was the united +pull of two dead stars approaching each other in the same orbit. They +may have been doing that for millions of years. The shock of their +meeting has transformed their motion into light and heat. They have +united to form a single sun and a nebula, which will some day condense +into a system of planets like ours. To-night the astronomers on Earth +will discover a new star--a variable star as they'll call it--for it +will grow dimmer as it moves away from our system. It has often happened +before." + +Then they turned back to the conning-tower. + +The needle had swung to its old position. The new star, henceforth to be +known in the annals of astronomy as Lilla-Zaidie, had already set for +them to the right of the _Astronef_ and risen on the left, and, at a +distance of more than nine hundred million miles from the Earth, the +corner was turned, and the homeward voyage began. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +A week later they crossed the path of Jupiter, but the giant was +invisible, far away on the other side of the Sun. Redgrave laid his +course so as to avail himself to the utmost of the "pull" of the planets +without going near enough to them to be compelled to exert too much of +the priceless R. Force, which the indicators showed to be running +perilously low. + +Between the orbits of Jupiter and Mars they made a most valuable economy +by landing on Ceres, one of the largest of the asteroids, and travelling +about fifty million miles on her towards the orbit of the Earth without +any expenditure of force whatever. They found that the tiny world +possessed a breathable atmosphere and a fluid resembling water, but +nearly as dense as mercury. A couple of flasks of it form the greatest +treasures of the British Museum and the National Museum at Washington. +The vegetable world was represented by coarse grass, lichens, and dwarf +shrubs, and the animal by different species of worms, lizards, flies, +and small burrowing animals of the rodent type. + +As the orbit of Ceres, like that of the other asteroids, is considerably +inclined to that of the Earth, the _Astronef_ rose from its surface when +the plane of the Earth's revolution was reached, and the glittering +swarm of miniature planets plunged away into space beneath them. + +"Where to now?" said Zaidie, as her husband came down on deck from the +conning-tower. + +"I am going to try to steer a middle course between the orbits of +Mercury and Venus," he replied. "They just happen to be so placed now +that we ought to be able to get the advantage of the pull of both of +them as we pass, and that will save us a lot of power. The only thing +I'm afraid of is the pull of the Sun, equal to goodness knows how many +times the attraction of all the planets put together. You see, little +woman, it's like this," he went on, taking out a pencil and going down +on one knee on the deck: "Here's the _Astronef_; there's Venus; there's +Mercury; there's the Sun; and there, away on the other side of him, is +Mother Earth. If we can turn that corner safely and without expending +too much power we ought to be all right." + +"And if we can't, what will happen?" + +"It will be a choice between morphine and cremation in the atmosphere of +the Sun, dear, or rather gradually roasting as we fall towards it." + +"Then, of course, it will be morphine," she said quite quietly, as she +turned away from his diagram and looked at the now fast-increasing disc +of the Sun. A well-balanced mind speedily becomes accustomed even to the +most terrible perils, and Zaidie had now looked this one so long and so +steadily in the face that for her it had already become merely the +choice between two forms of death with just a chance of escape hidden in +the closed hand of Fate. + +Thirty-six Earth-hours later the glorious golden disc of Venus lay broad +and bright beneath them. Above was the blazing orb of the Sun, nearly +half as big again as it appears from the Earth, with Mercury, a round +black spot, travelling slowly across it. + +"My dear Bird-Folk!" said Zaidie, looking down at the lovely world below +them. "If home wasn't home----" + +"We can be back among them in a few hours with absolute safety," +interrupted her husband, catching at the suggestion. "I've told you the +truth about the bare possibility of getting back to the Earth. It's only +a chance at best, and even if we pass the Sun we may not have force +enough left to prevent the _Astronef_ from being smashed to dust or +burnt up in the atmosphere. After all we might do worse----" + +"What would you do if you were alone, Lenox?" she said, interrupting him +in turn. + +"I should take my chance and go on. After all home's home and worth a +struggle. But you, dear----" + +"I'm you, and so I take the same chances as you do. Besides, we're not +perfect enough for a world where there isn't any sin. We should probably +get quite miserable there. No, home's home, as you say." + +"Then home it is, dear!" he replied. + +The resplendent hemisphere of the Love-Star sank swiftly down into the +vault of Space, growing smaller and dimmer as the _Astronef_ sped +towards the little black spot on the face of the Sun, which to them was +like a buoy marking a place of utter and hopeless shipwreck in the Ocean +of Immensity. + +The chronometer, still set to Earth-time, had now begun to mark the last +hours of the _Astronef's_ voyage. She was not only travelling at a speed +of which figures could give no comprehensible idea, but the Sun, +Mercury, and the Earth were rushing towards her with a compound +velocity, composed of the movement of the Solar System through Space and +of the movement of the two planets round the Sun. + +Murgatroyd was at his post in the engine-room. Redgrave and Zaidie had +gone into the conning-tower, perhaps for the last time. For good fortune +or evil, for life or death, they would see the end of the voyage +together. + +"How far yet, dear?" she said, as Venus began to slip away behind them, +rising like a splendid moon in their wake. + +"Only sixty million miles or so, a matter of a few hours, more or +less--it all depends," he replied, without taking his eyes off the +compass. + +"Sixty millions! Why I feel almost at home again." + +"But we have to turn the corner of the street yet, dear, and after that +there's a fall of more than twenty-five million miles on to the more or +less kindly breast of Mother Earth." + +"A fall! It does sound rather awful when you put it that way; but I am +not going to let you frighten me. I believe Mother Earth will receive +her wandering children quite as kindly as they deserve." + +The moon-like disc of Venus grew swiftly smaller, and the black spot on +the face of the Sun larger and larger as the _Astronef_ rushed silently +and imperceptibly, and yet with almost inconceivable velocity towards +doom or fortune. Neither Zaidie nor Redgrave spoke again for nearly +three hours--hours which to them seemed to pass like so many minutes. +Their eyes were fixed on the black disc of Mercury, which, as they +approached it, expanded with magical rapidity till it completely +eclipsed the blazing orb behind it. Their thoughts were far away on the +still invisible Earth and all the splendid possibilities that it held +for two young lives like theirs. + +As the sunlight vanished they looked at each other in the golden +moonlight of Venus, and Zaidie let her head rest for a moment on her +husband's shoulder. Then a swiftly broadening gleam of light shot out +from behind the black circle of Mercury. The first crisis had come. +Redgrave put out his hand to the signal-board and rang for full power. +The planet seemed to swing round as the _Astronef_ rushed into the +blaze. In a few minutes it passed through the phases from "new" to +"full." Venus became eclipsed in turn as they swung between Mercury and +the Sun, and then Redgrave, after a rapid glance to either side, said: + +"If we can only keep the two pulls balanced we shall do it. That will +keep us in a straight line, and our own momentum ought to carry us into +the Earth's attraction." + +Zaidie did not reply. She was shading her eyes with her hand from the +almost intolerable brilliance of the Sun's rays, and looking straight +ahead to catch the first glimpse of the silver-grey orb. Her husband +read her thoughts and respected them. But a few minutes later he +startled her out of her dream of home by exclaiming: + +"Good God, we're turning!" + +"What do you say, dear? Turning what?" + +"On our own centre. Look! I'm afraid only a miracle can save us now, +darling." + +She glanced to the left-hand side where he was pointing. The Sun, no +longer now a sun, but a vast ocean of flame filling nearly a third of +the vault of Space, was sinking beneath them. On the right Mercury was +rising. Zaidie knew only too well what this meant. It meant that the +keel of the _Astronef_ was being dragged out of the straight line which +would cut the Earth's orbit some forty million miles away. It meant +that, in spite of the exertion of the full power that the engines could +develop, they had begun to fall into the Sun. + +Redgrave laid his hand on hers, and their eyes met. There was no need +for words. Perhaps speech just then would have been impossible. In that +mute glance each looked into the other's soul and was content. Then he +left the conning-tower, and Zaidie dropped on to her knees before the +instrument-table and laid her forehead upon her clasped hands. + +Her husband went to the saloon, unlocked a little cupboard in the wall +and took out a blue bottle of corrugated glass labelled "Morphine, +Poison." He took another empty bottle of white glass and measured fifty +drops into it. Then he went to the engine-room and said abruptly: + +"Murgatroyd, I'm afraid it's all up with us. We're falling into the +Sun, and you know what that means. In a few hours the _Astronef_ will be +red-hot. So it's roasting alive--or this. I recommend this." + +"And what might that be, my Lord?" said the old engineer, looking at the +bottle which his master held out towards him. + +"That's morphine--poison. Fill that up with water, drink it, and in half +an hour you'll be dead without knowing it. Of course, you won't take it +until there's absolutely no hope; but, granted that, you'll find this a +better death than roasting or baking alive." Then his voice changed +suddenly as he went on, "Of course, I need not say now, Murgatroyd, how +deeply I regret now that I asked you to come in the _Astronef_." + +"My Lord, my people have served yours for seven hundred years, and, +whether on Earth or among the stars, where you go it is my duty to go +also. But don't ask me to take the poison. It is not for me to say that +a journey like this is tempting Providence, but, by my lights, if I am +to die I shall die the death that Providence in its wisdom sends." + +"I daresay you're right in one way, Murgatroyd, but it's no time to +argue about beliefs now. There's the bottle. Do as you think right. And +now, in case the miracle doesn't happen, goodbye." + +"Goodbye, my Lord, if it is to be," replied the old Yorkshireman, taking +the hand which Redgrave held out to him. "I'll keep the power on to the +last, I suppose?" + +"Yes, you may as well. If it doesn't keep us away from the Sun it won't +be much use to us in two or three hours." + +He left the engine-room and went back to the conning-tower. Zaidie was +still on her knees. Beneath and around them the awful gulf of flame was +broadening and deepening. Mercury was rising higher and growing smaller. +He put the bottle down on the table and waited. Then Zaidie looked up. +Her eyes were clear, and her face was perfectly calm. She rose and put +her arm through his, and said: + +"Well, is there any hope, dear? There can't be now, can there? Is that +the morphine?" + +"Yes," he replied, slipping his arm beneath hers and round her waist. +"I'm afraid there's not much chance now, little woman. We're using up +the last of the power, and you see----" + +As he said this he looked at the thermometer. The mercury had risen from +65 degrees Fahrenheit, the normal temperature of the interior of the +_Astronef_, to 93 degrees, and during the half-minute that he watched it +rose another degree. There was no mistaking such a warning as that. He +had brought two little liqueur glasses in his pocket from the saloon. He +divided the morphine between them, and filled them up with water. + +"Not until the last moment, dear," said Zaidie, as he set one of them +before her. "We have no right to do it until then." + +"Very well. When the mercury reaches a hundred and fifty. After that it +will go up ten and fifteen degrees at a jump, and we----" + +"Yes, at a hundred and fifty," she replied, cutting short a speech she +dared not hear the end of. "I understand. It will be impossible to hope +any more." + +Now, side by side, they stood and watched the thermometer. + +Ninety-five--ninety-eight--a hundred and three--a hundred and +ten--eighteen--twenty-four--thirty-two--forty-one. + +The silent minutes passed, and with each the silver thread--for them the +thread of life--grew, with strange contradiction, longer and longer, and +with every minute it grew more quickly. + +A hundred and forty-six. + +With his right arm Redgrave drew Zaidie still closer to him. He put out +his left hand and took up the little glass. She did the same. + +"Goodbye, dear, till we have slept and wake again!" + +"Goodbye, darling, God grant that we may!" But the agony of that last +farewell was more than Zaidie could bear. She looked away at the little +glass in her hand, a hand which even now did not tremble. Then she +raised her eyes again to take one last look at the glory of the stars, +and at the Fate Incarnate in Flame which lay beneath them. Then, even as +the end of the last minute came, a cry broke through her white, +half-parted lips: + +"The Earth, the Earth--thank God, the Earth!" + +With the hand that held the draught of Lethe--which in another moment +she would have swallowed--she caught at her husband's hand, pulled the +glass out of it, and then with a little sigh she dropped senseless on +the floor of the conning-tower. Redgrave looked for a moment in the +direction that her eyes had taken. A pale, silver-grey crescent, with a +little white spot near it, was rising out of the blackness beyond the +edge of the solar ocean of flame. Home was in sight at last, but would +they reach it--and how? + +He picked her up and carried her to their room and laid her on the bed. +Then he went to the medicine chest again, this time for a very different +purpose. + +An hour later, they were on the upper deck with their telescopes turned +on to the rapidly growing crescent of the Home-World, which, in its +eternal march through Space, had come into the line of direct attraction +just in time to turn the scale in which the lives of the Space-voyagers +were trembling. The higher it rose, the bigger and broader and brighter +it grew, and, at last, Zaidie--forgetting in her transport of joy all +the perils that were yet to come--sprang to her feet and clapped her +hands, and cried: + +"There's America!" + +Then she dropped back into her long deck-chair and began a good, hearty, +healthy cry. + + + + +EPILOGUE + + +There is little now to be told that all the world does not already know +as well as it knows the circumstances of Lord and Lady Redgrave's +departure from the Earth, at the beginning of that marvellous voyage, +that desperate plunge into the unknown immensities of Space which began +so happily, and yet with so many grave misgivings in the hearts of their +friends, and which, after passing many perils, the adventurous voyagers +finished even more happily than they had begun. + +As I said at the beginning of this narrative the sole purpose of writing +it has been to place before the reading public an account of the +adventures experienced by Lord Redgrave and his beautiful Countess from +the time of their departure from the Earth to the hour of their return +to it. Therefore there is no need to re-tell a tale already told, and +one that has been read and re-read a thousand times. Every one who has +read his or her newspaper from Chamskatska to Cape Horn, and from Alaska +to South Australia, knows how the Commander of the _Astronef_ so nursed +the remains which were left to him of the R. Force after overcoming the +attraction of the Sun, that he was able to steer an oblique course +between the Moon and the Earth, and to counteract what Zaidie called the +all too-loving attraction of the Mother Planet, and, after sixty hours +of agonising suspense, at last re-entered their native atmosphere. + +The expenditure of the last few units of the R. Force enabled them to +just clear the summits of the Bolivian Andes, to cross the foothills and +western slopes of Peru, and finally to let the _Astronef_ drop quietly +on to the bosom of the broad Pacific about twenty miles westward of the +Port of Mollendo. + +All this time thousands of anxious eyes had been peering through +telescopes every night in quest of the wanderers who must now be +returning if ever they were to return, and a reward of ten thousand +dollars, offered conjointly by the British and United States Governments +for the first authentic tidings of the _Astronef_, was won by a smart +young Californian, who was Assistant Astronomer at the Harvard +University Observatory at Arequipa. + +One night when he was on duty watching a lunar occultation, he saw +something sweep across the disc of the full moon just as the captain and +officers of the _St. Louis_ had seen that same something sweep across +the disc of the rising sun. What else could it be if not the _Astronef_? +He rang for another assistant to go on with the occultation, and wired +down to the coast requesting the British Consul at Mollendo to look out +for an arrival from the skies. + +Three hours later the gleam of an electric searchlight flickered down +over the huge black cone of the Misti, and by dawn the next morning one +of Her Majesty's cruisers--most appropriately named _Astræa_--attached +to the Pacific Squadron then _en route_ from Lima to Valparaiso, steamed +out westward from Mollendo and found the long, shining hull of the +_Astronef_ waiting quietly on the unrippled rollers of the Pacific, and +Lord and Lady Redgrave having breakfast in the deck-chamber. + +Compliments and congratulations having been duly exchanged, she was +taken in tow by the cruiser, and so reached Valparaiso. Here she lay for +a few days while the wires of the world were being kept hot with +telegraphic accounts of her return to Earth, and while her Commander, +with the assistance of the officers of the National Laboratory, was +replenishing his stock of the R. Fluid from the chemicals which they had +placed at his disposal. + +It would, of course, have been quite possible for him and Zaidie to have +taken steamer northward to Panama, crossed the Isthmus, and returned to +New York and Washington _viâ_ Jamaica. The British Admiral even offered +to place his fastest cruiser at their disposal for a run to San +Francisco, whence the Overland Limited would have landed them in New +York in four days and a half, but Zaidie vetoed this as quickly as she +had done the other proposition. If she had her way the _Astronef_ should +go back to Washington as she had left it, by means of her own motive +force, and so, of course, it came to pass. + +Even Murgatroyd's grim and homely features seemed irradiated by a glow +of what he afterwards thought unholy pride when he once more stood by +his levers and heard the familiar signal coming from the conning-tower. + +"A tenth." + +And then--"Stand by steering-gear." + +The next moment there was another tinkle in the engine-room. + +Redgrave, standing with Zaidie in the conning-tower, moved the +power-wheel through ten degrees, and then to the amazement of tens of +thousands of spectators, the hull of the _Astronef_ rose perpendicularly +from the waters of the Bay. The British Squadron and a detachment of the +Chilian fleet thundered out a salute which was answered a few moments +later by the shore batteries, Redgrave went down into the deck-chamber +and fired twenty-one shots from one of the Maxim-Nordenfelts--the same +with which he had mown down the crowds of Martians in the square of +their great city a hundred and thirty million miles away, and while he +was doing this Zaidie in the conning-tower ran the White Ensign up to +the top of the flagstaff. + +Then the glass doors were closed again, the propellers began to revolve +at their utmost speed, and the Space-Navigator with one tremendous leap +cleared the double chain of the Andes and vanished to the +north-eastward. + +To describe the reception of Lord and Lady Redgrave when the _Astronef_ +dropped a few hours later, on to the very spot in front of the steps of +the Capitol at Washington from which she had risen just four months +before, would only be to repeat what has already been told in the Press +of the world, and especially of the United States, with a far more +luxuriant wealth of detail than could possibly be emulated here. Suffice +it to say that the first human form that Zaidie embraced after her long +wanderings was that of Mrs. Van Stuyler, whom the President of the +United States had escorted to the gangway. + +The most marvellous of human adventures become commonplace by +repetition, and Mrs. Van Stuyler had already spent nearly a fortnight +devouring every item, whether of fact or fancy, with which the American +Press had embroidered the adventures of the _Astronef_ and her crew. And +so when the first embracings and emotions were over, all she could find +to say was: + +"Well, Zaidie dear, and how did you enjoy it, after all?" + +"It was just gorgeous, Mrs. Van, and if there was a more gorgeous word +than that in the American language I'd use it," replied Zaidie, with +another hug, "Why didn't you come? You'd have been--well no, perhaps I'd +better not say what you would have been. But just think of it, or try +to--A honeymoon trip of over two thousand million miles, and +back--safe--thank God!" + +As she said this, Zaidie threw her arm over Mrs. Van Stuyler's shoulder, +and drew her away towards the forward end of the deck-chamber. At the +same moment the President's hand met Lord Redgrave's in a long, strong +grip. They didn't say anything just then. Men seldom do under such +circumstances. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A HONEYMOON IN SPACE*** + + +******* This file should be named 19476-8.txt or 19476-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/4/7/19476 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: A Honeymoon in Space</p> +<p>Author: George Griffith</p> +<p>Release Date: October 5, 2006 [eBook #19476]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A HONEYMOON IN SPACE***</p> +<p> </p> +<h4>E-text prepared by the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (http://www.pgdp.net/)</h4> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + + + + +<h1>A Honeymoon in Space</h1> + +<h2>George Griffith</h2> + +<h3><i>Author of</i> "Valdar the Oft-Born," "The Virgin of the Sun," "The Rose of +Judah," &c., &c.</h3> + +<h3>ILLUSTRATED BY STANLEY WOOD AND HAROLD PIFFARD</h3> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + +<h4>London<br /> +C. Arthur Pearson Ltd.<br /> +Henrietta Street<br /> +1901</h4> + + +<h4>ARNO PRESS<br /> +A New York Times Company<br /> +New York—1975</h4> + +<h4>Reprint Edition 1974 by Arno Press Inc.</h4> + +<h4>Reprinted from a copy in The Library of the University of California, Riverside</h4> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span class="smcap">A Honeymoon in Space</span></h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i007" id="i007"></a> +<img src="images/i007.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>Illustration: <i>"The Earth, the Earth—thank God, the Earth!"</i></h3> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. --> +<p> +<a href="#List_of_Illustrations">List of Illustrations</a><br /> +<a href="#PROLOGUE">PROLOGUE—The First Cruise of the <i>Astronef</i></a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">CHAPTER XVI</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">CHAPTER XVII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">CHAPTER XIX</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XX">CHAPTER XX</a><br /> +<a href="#EPILOGUE">EPILOGUE</a><br /> +</p> +<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. --> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="List_of_Illustrations" id="List_of_Illustrations"></a>List of Illustrations</h2> + + + +<p><a href="#i007">"THE EARTH, THE EARTH—THANK GOD, THE EARTH!"</a></p> + +<p><a href="#i114">A HIDEOUS SHAPE ROSE OUT OF THE WATER BEHIND THEM</a></p> + +<p><a href="#i146">IT TOOK THE STRANGE-WINGED CRAFT AMIDSHIPS</a></p> + +<p><a href="#i176">SNOW PEAKS AND CLOUD SEAS</a></p> + +<p><a href="#i218">CAME FORWARD TO MEET THEM WITH BOTH HANDS OUTSTRETCHED</a></p> + +<p><a href="#i238">WHOLE MOUNTAIN RANGES OF GLOWING LAVA WERE HURLED UP MILES HIGH</a></p> + +<p><a href="#i256">WITHOUT ANY APPARENT EFFORT HE RAISED HER ABOUT FIVE FEET FROM THE FLOOR</a></p> + +<p><a href="#i266">THE HUGE PALELY LUMINOUS EYES LOOKED IN UPON THEM</a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="PROLOGUE" id="PROLOGUE"></a>PROLOGUE</h2> + +<h3>THE FIRST CRUISE OF THE <i>ASTRONEF</i></h3> + + +<p>About eight o'clock on the morning of the 5th of November, 1900, those +of the passengers and crew of the American liner <i>St. Louis</i> who +happened, whether from causes of duty or of their own pleasure, to be on +deck, had a very strange—in fact a quite unprecedented experience.</p> + +<p>The big ship was ploughing her way through the long, smooth rollers at +her average twenty-one knots towards the rising sun, when the officer in +charge of the navigating bridge happened to turn his glasses straight +ahead. He took them down from his eyes, rubbed the two object-glasses +with the cuff of his coat, and looked again. The sun was shining through +a haze which so far dimmed the solar disc that it was possible to look +straight at it without inconvenience to the eyes.</p> + +<p>The officer took another long squint, put his glasses down, rubbed his +eyes and took another, and murmured, "Well I'm damned!"</p> + +<p>Just then the Fourth Officer came up on to the bridge to relieve his +senior while he went down for a cup of coffee and a biscuit. The Second +took him away to the other end of the bridge, out of hearing of the +helmsman and the quartermaster standing by, and said almost in a +whisper:</p> + +<p>"Say, Norton, there's something ahead there that I can't make out. Just +as the sun got clear above the horizon I saw a black spot go straight +across it, right through the upper and lower limbs. I looked again, and +it was plumb in the middle of the disc. Look," he went on, speaking +louder in his growing excitement, "there it is again! I can see it +without the glasses now. See?"</p> + +<p>The Fourth did not reply at once. He had the glasses close to his eyes, +and was moving them slowly about as though he were following some +shifting object in the sky. Then he handed them back, and said:</p> + +<p>"If I didn't believe the thing was impossible I should say that's an +air-ship; but, for the present, I guess I'd rather wait till it gets a +bit nearer, if it's coming. Still, there <i>is</i> something. Seems to be +getting bigger pretty fast, too. Perhaps it would be as well to notify +the old man. What do you think?"</p> + +<p>"Guess we'd better," said the Second. "S'pose you go down. Don't say +anything except to him. We don't want any more excitement among the +people than we can help."</p> + +<p>The Fourth nodded and went down the steps, and the Second began walking +up and down the bridge, every now and then taking another squint ahead. +Again and again the mysterious shape crossed the disc of the sun, always +vertically as though, whatever it might be, it was steering a direct +course from the sun to the ship, its apparent rising and falling being +due really to the dipping of her bows into the swells.</p> + +<p>"Well, Mr. Charteris, what's the trouble?" said the Skipper as he +reached the bridge. "Nothing wrong, I hope? Have you sighted a derelict, +or what? Ay, what in hell's that!"</p> + +<p>His hands went up to his eyes and he stared for a few moments at the +pale yellow oblate shape of the sun.</p> + +<p>At this moment the <i>St. Louis'</i> head dipped again, and the Captain saw +something like a black line swiftly drawn across the sun from bottom to +top.</p> + +<p>"That's what I wanted to call your attention to, sir," said the Second +in a low tone. "I first noticed it crossing the sun as it rose through +the mist. I thought it was a spot of dirt on my glasses, but it has +crossed the sun several times since then, and for some minutes seemed to +remain dead in the middle of it. Later on it got quite a lot larger, and +whatever it is it's approaching us pretty rapidly. You see it's quite +plain to the naked eye now."</p> + +<p>By this time several of the crew and of the early loungers on deck had +also caught sight of the strange thing which seemed to be hanging and +swinging between the sky and the sea. People dived below for their +glasses, knocked at their friends' state-room doors and told them to get +up because something was flying towards the ship through the air; and in +a very few minutes there were hundreds of passengers on deck in all +varieties of early morning costume, and scores of glasses, held to +anxious eyes, were being directed ahead.</p> + +<p>The glasses, however, soon became unnecessary, for the passengers had +scarcely got up on deck before the mysterious object to the eastward at +length took definite shape, and as it did so mouths were opened as well +as eyes, for the owners of the eyes and mouths beheld just then the +strangest sight that travellers by sea or land had ever seen.</p> + +<p>Within the distance of about a mile it swung round at right angles to +the steamer's course with a rapidity which plainly showed that it was +entirely obedient to the control of a guiding intelligence, and hundreds +of eager eyes on board the liner saw, sweeping down from the grey-blue +of the early morning sky, a vessel whose hull seemed to be constructed +of some metal which shone with a pale, steely lustre.</p> + +<p>It was pointed at both ends, the forward end being shaped something like +a spur or ram. At the after end were two flickering, interlacing circles +of a glittering greenish-yellow colour, apparently formed by two +intersecting propellers driven at an enormous velocity. Behind these was +a vertical fan of triangular shape. The craft appeared to be +flat-bottomed, and for about a third of her length amidships the upper +half of her hull was covered with a curving, domelike roof of glass.</p> + +<p>"She's an air-ship of some sort, there's no doubt about that," said the +Captain, "so I guess the great problem has got solved at last. And yet +it ain't a balloon, because it's coming against the wind, and it's +nothing of the æroplane sort neither, because it hasn't planes or kites +or any fixings of that kind. Still it's made of something like metal and +glass, and it must take a lot of keeping up. It's travelling at a pretty +healthy speed too. Getting on for a hundred miles an hour, I should +guess. Ah! he's going to speak us! Hope he's honest."</p> + +<p>Everybody on board the <i>St. Louis</i> was up on deck by this time, and the +excitement rose to fever-heat as the strange vessel swept down towards +them from the middle sky, passed them like a flash of light, swung round +the stern, and ranged up alongside to starboard some twenty feet from +the bridge rail.</p> + +<p>She was about a hundred and twenty feet long, with some twenty feet of +depth and thirty of beam, and the Captain and many of his officers and +passengers were very much relieved to find that, as far as could be +seen, she carried no weapons of offence.</p> + +<p>As she ranged up alongside, a sliding door opened in the glass-domed +roof amidships, just opposite to the end of the <i>St. Louis'</i> bridge. A +tall, fair-haired, clean-featured man, of about thirty, in grey +flannels, tipped up his golf cap with his thumb, and said:</p> + +<p>"Good morning, Captain! You remember me, I suppose? Had a fine passage, +so far? I thought I should meet you somewhere about here."</p> + +<p>The Captain of the <i>St. Louis</i>, in common with every one else on board, +had already had his credulity stretched about as far as it would go, and +he was beginning to wonder whether he was really awake; but when he +heard the hail and recognised the speaker he stared at him in blank and, +for the moment, speechless bewilderment. Then he got hold of his voice +again and said, keeping as steady as he could:</p> + +<p>"Good morning, my Lord! Guess I never expected to meet even you like +this in the middle of the Atlantic! So the newspaper men were right for +once in a way, and you <i>have</i> got an air-ship that will fly?"</p> + +<p>"And a good deal more than that, Captain, if she wants to. I am just +taking a trial trip across the Atlantic before I start on a run round +the Solar System. Sounds like a lie, doesn't it? But it's coming off. +Oh, good morning, Miss Rennick! Captain, may I come on board?"</p> + +<p>"By all means, my Lord, only I'm afraid I daren't stop Uncle Sam's +mails, even for you."</p> + +<p>"There's no need for that, Captain, on a smooth sea like this," was the +reply. "Just keep on as you are going and I'll come alongside."</p> + +<p>He put his head inside the door and called something up a speaking-tube +which led to a glass-walled chamber in the forward part of the roof, +where a motionless figure stood before a little steering wheel.</p> + +<p>The craft immediately began to edge nearer and nearer to the liner's +rail, keeping speed so exactly with her that the threshold of the door +touched the end of the bridge without a perceptible jar. Then the +flannel-clad figure jumped on to the bridge and held out his hand to the +Captain.</p> + +<p>As they shook hands he said in a low tone, "I want a word or two in +private with you, as soon as possible."</p> + +<p>The commander saw a very serious meaning in his eyes. Besides, even if +he had not made his appearance under such extraordinary circumstances, +it was quite impossible that one of his social position and his wealth +and influence could have made such a request without good reason for it, +so he replied:</p> + +<p>"Certainly, my Lord. Will you come down to my room?"</p> + +<p>Hundreds of anxious, curious eyes looked upon the tall athletic figure +and the regular-featured, bronzed, honest English face as Rollo Lenox +Smeaton Aubrey, Earl of Redgrave, Baron Smeaton in the Peerage of +England, and Viscount Aubrey in the Peerage of Ireland, followed the +Captain to his room through the parting crowd of passengers. He nodded +to one or two familiar faces in the crowd, for he was an old Atlantic +ferryman, and had crossed five times with Captain Hawkins in the <i>St. +Louis</i>.</p> + +<p>Then he caught sight of a well and fondly remembered face which he had +not seen for over two years. It was a face which possessed at once the +fair Anglo-Saxon skin, the firm and yet delicate Anglo-Saxon features, +and the wavy wealth of the old Saxon gold-brown hair; but a pair of big, +soft, pansy eyes, fringed with long, curling, black lashes, looked out +from under dark and perhaps just a trifle heavy eyebrows. Moreover, +there was that indescribable expression in the curve of her lips and the +pose of her head; to say nothing of a lissome, vivacious grace in her +whole carriage which proclaimed her a daughter of the younger branch of +the Race that Rules.</p> + +<p>Their eyes met for an instant, and Lord Redgrave was startled and even a +trifle angered to see that she flushed up quickly, and that the +momentary smile with which she greeted him died away as she turned her +head aside. Still, he was a man accustomed to do what he wanted: and +what he wanted to do just then was to shake hands with Lilla Zaidie +Rennick, and so he went straight towards her, raised his cap, and held +out his hand saying, first with a glance into her eyes, and then with +one upward at the <i>Astronef</i>:</p> + +<p>"Good morning again, Miss Rennick! You see it is done."</p> + +<p>"Good morning, Lord Redgrave!" she replied, he thought, a little +awkwardly. "Yes, I see you have kept your promise. What a pity it is too +late! But I hope you will be able to stop long enough to tell us all +about it. This is Mrs. Van Stuyler, who has taken me under her +protection on my journey to Europe."</p> + +<p>His lordship returned the bow of a tall, somewhat hard-featured matron +who looked dignified even in the somewhat nondescript costume which most +of the ladies were wearing. But her eyes were kindly, and he said:</p> + +<p>"Very pleased to meet, Mrs. Van Stuyler. I heard you were coming, and I +was in hopes of catching you on the other side before you left. And now, +if you will excuse me, I must go and have a chat with the Skipper." He +raised his cap again and presently vanished from the curious eyes of the +excited crowd, through the door of the Captain's apartment.</p> + +<p>Captain Hawkins closed the door of his sitting-room as he entered, and +said:</p> + +<p>"Now, my Lord, I'm not going to ask you any questions to begin with, +because if I once began I should never stop; and besides, perhaps you'd +like to have your own say right away."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps that will be the shortest way," said his lordship. "The fact +is, we've not only the remains of this Boer business on our hands, but +we've had what is practically a declaration of war from France and +Russia. Briefly it's this way. A few weeks ago, while the Allies thought +they were fighting the Boxers, it came to the knowledge of my brother, +the Foreign Secretary, that the Tsung-li-Yamen had concluded a secret +treaty with Russia which practically annulled all our rights over the +Yang-tse Valley, and gave Russia the right to bring her Northern Railway +right down through China.</p> + +<p>"As you know, we've stood a lot too much in that part of the world +already, but we couldn't stand this; so about ten days ago an ultimatum +was sent declaring that the British Government would consider any +encroachment on the Yang-tse Valley as an unfriendly act.</p> + +<p>"Meanwhile France chipped in with a notification that she was going to +occupy Morocco as a compensation for Fashoda, and added a few nasty +things about Egypt and other places. Of course we couldn't stand that +either, so there was another ultimatum, and the upshot of it all was +that I got a wire late last night from my brother telling me that war +would almost certainly be declared to-day, and asking me for the use of +this craft of mine as a sort of dispatch-boat if she was ready. She is +intended for something very much better than fighting purposes, so he +couldn't ask me to use her as a war-ship; besides, I am under a solemn +obligation to her inventor—her creator, in fact, for I've only built +her—to blow her to pieces rather than allow her to be used as a +fighting machine except, of course, in sheer personal self-defence.</p> + +<p>"There is the telegram from my brother, so you can see there's no +mistake, and just after it came a messenger asking me, if the machine +was a success, to bring this with me across the Atlantic as fast as I +could come. It is the duplicate of an offensive and defensive alliance +between Great Britain and the United States, of which the details had +been arranged just as this complication arose. Another is coming across +by a fast cruiser, and, of course, the news will have got to Washington +by cable by this time.</p> + +<p>"By the time you get to the entrance of the Channel you will probably +find it swarming with French cruisers and torpedo-destroyers, so if +you'll be advised by me, you'll leave Queenstown out and get as far +north as possible."</p> + +<p>"Lord Redgrave," said the Captain, putting out his hand, "I'm +responsible for a good bit right here, and I don't know how to thank you +enough. I guess that treaty's been given away back to France by some of +our Irish statesmen by now, and it'd be mighty unhealthy for the <i>St. +Louis</i> to fall in with a French or Russian cruiser——"</p> + +<p>"That's all right, Captain," said Lord Redgrave, taking his hand. "I +should have warned any other British or American ship. At the same time, +I must confess that my motives in warning you were not entirely +unselfish. The fact is, there's some one on board the <i>St. Louis</i> whom I +should decidedly object to see taken off to France as a prisoner of +war."</p> + +<p>"And may I ask who that is?" said Captain Hawkins.</p> + +<p>"Why not?" replied his lordship. "It's the young lady I spoke to on deck +just now, Miss Rennick. Her father was the inventor of that craft of +mine. No one would believe his theories. He was refused patents both in +England and America on the ground of lack of practical utility. I met +him about two years ago, that is to say rather more than a year before +his death, when I was stopping at Banff up in the Canadian Rockies. We +made a travellers' acquaintance, and he told me about this idea of his. +I was very much interested, but I'm afraid I must confess that I might +not have taken it up practically if the Professor hadn't happened to +possess an exceedingly beautiful daughter. However, of course I'm pretty +glad now that I did do it; though the experiments cost nearly five +thousand pounds and the craft herself close on a quarter of a million. +Still, she is worth every penny of it, and I was bringing her over to +offer to Miss Rennick as a wedding present, that is to say if she'd have +it—and me."</p> + +<p>Captain Hawkins looked up and said rather seriously:</p> + +<p>"Then, my Lord, I presume you don't know——"</p> + +<p>"Don't know what?"</p> + +<p>"That Miss Rennick is crossing in the care of Mrs. Van Stuyler, to be +married in London next month."</p> + +<p>"The devil she is! And to whom, may I ask?" exclaimed his lordship, +pulling himself up very straight.</p> + +<p>"To the Marquis of Byfleet, son of the Duke of Duncaster. I wonder you +didn't hear of it. The match was arranged last fall. From what people +say she's not very desperately in love with him, but—well, I fancy it's +like rather too many of these Anglo-American matches. A couple of +million dollars on one side, a title on the other, and mighty little +real love between them."</p> + +<p>"But," said Redgrave between his teeth, "I didn't understand that Miss +Rennick ever had a fortune; in fact I'm quite certain that if her father +had been a rich man he'd have worked out his invention himself."</p> + +<p>"Oh, the dollars aren't his. In fact they won't be hers till she +marries," replied the Captain. "They belong to her uncle, old Russell +Rennick. He got in on the ground floor of the New York and Chicago ice +trusts, and made millions. He's going to spend some of them on making +his niece a Marchioness. That's about all there is to it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, indeed!" said Redgrave, still between his teeth. "Well, considering +that Byfleet is about as big a wastrel as ever disgraced the English +aristocracy, I don't think either Miss Rennick or her uncle will make a +very good bargain. However, of course that's no affair of mine now. I +remember that this Russell Rennick refused to finance his brother when +he really wanted the money. He made a particularly bad bargain, too, +then, though he didn't know it; for a dozen crafts like that, properly +armed, would simply smash up the navies of the world, and make sea-power +a private trust. After all, I'm not particularly sorry, because then it +wouldn't have belonged to me. Well now, Captain, I'm going to ask you to +give me a bit of breakfast when it's ready, and then I must be off. I +want to be in Washington to-night."</p> + +<p>"To-night! What, twenty-one hundred miles!"</p> + +<p>"Why not?" said Redgrave; "I can do about a hundred and fifty an hour +through the atmosphere, and then, you see, if that isn't fast enough I +can rise outside the earth's attraction, let it spin round, and then +come down where I want to."</p> + +<p>"Great Scott!" remarked Captain Hawkins inadequately, but with emphasis. +"Well, my Lord, I guess we'll go down to breakfast."</p> + +<p>But breakfast was not quite ready, and so Lord Redgrave rejoined Miss +Rennick and her chaperon on deck. All eyes and a good many glasses were +still turned on the <i>Astronef</i>, which had now moved a few feet away from +the liner's side, and was running along, exactly keeping pace with her.</p> + +<p>"It's so wonderful, that even seeing doesn't seem believing," said the +girl, when they had renewed their acquaintance of two years before.</p> + +<p>"Well," he replied, "it would be very easy to convince you. She shall +come alongside again, and if you and Mrs. Van Stuyler will honour her by +your presence for half an hour while breakfast is getting ready, I think +I shall be able to convince you that she is not the airy fabric of a +vision, but simply the realisation in metal and glass and other things +of visions which your father saw some years ago."</p> + +<p>There was no resisting an invitation put in such a way. Besides, the +prospect of becoming the wonder and envy of every other woman on board +was altogether too dazzling for words.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Stuyler looked a little aghast at the idea at first, but she +too had something of the same feeling as Zaidie, and besides, there +could hardly be any impropriety in accepting the invitation of one of +the wealthiest and most distinguished noblemen in the British Peerage. +So, after a little demur and a slight manifestation of nervousness, she +consented.</p> + +<p>Redgrave signalled to the man at the steering wheel. The <i>Astronef</i> +slackened pace a little, dropped a yard or so, and slid up quite close +to the bridge-rail again. Lord Redgrave got in first and ran a light +gangway down on to the bridge. Zaidie and Mrs. Van Stuyler were +carefully handed up. The next moment the gangway was drawn up again, the +sliding glass doors clashed to, the <i>Astronef</i> leapt a couple of +thousand feet into the air, swept round to the westward in a magnificent +curve, and vanished into the gloom of the upper mists.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2> + + +<p>The situation was one which was absolutely without parallel in all the +history of courtship from the days of Mother Eve to those of Miss Lilla +Zaidie Rennick. The nearest approach to it would have been the +old-fashioned Tartar custom which made it lawful for a man to steal his +best girl, if he could get her first, fling her across his horse's +crupper and ride away with her to his tent.</p> + +<p>But to the shocked senses of Mrs. Van Stuyler the present adventure +appeared a great deal more terrible than that. Both Zaidie and herself +had sprung to their feet as soon as the upward rush of the <i>Astronef</i> +had slackened and they were released from their seats. They looked down +through the glass walls of what may be called the hurricane deck-chamber +of the <i>Astronef</i>, and saw below them a snowy sea of clouds just +crimsoned by the rising sun.</p> + +<p>In this cloud-sea, which spread like a wide-meshed veil between them and +the earth, there were great irregular rifts which looked as big as +continents on a map. These had a blue-grey background, or it might be +more correct to say under-ground, and in the midst of one of these they +saw a little black speck which after a moment or two took the shape of a +little toy ship, and presently they recognised it as the +eleven-thousand-ton liner which a few moments ago had been their ocean +home.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Stuyler was shaking in every muscle, afflicted by a sort of St. +Vitus' dance induced by physical fear and outraged propriety. Quite +apart from these, however, she experienced a third sensation which made +for a nameless inquietude. She was a woman of the world, well versed in +most of its ways, and she fully recognised that that single bound from +the bridge-rail of the <i>St. Louis</i> to the other side of the clouds had +already carried her and her charge beyond the pale of human law.</p> + +<p>The same thought, mingled with other feelings, half of wonder and half +of re-awakened tenderness, was just then uppermost in Miss Zaidie's +mind. It was quite obvious that the man who could create and control +such a marvellous vehicle as this could, morally as well as physically, +lift himself beyond the reach of the conventions which civilised society +had instituted for its own protection and government.</p> + +<p>He could do with them exactly as he pleased. They were utterly at his +mercy. He might carry them away to some unexplored spot on one of the +continents, or to some unknown island in the midst of the wide Pacific. +He might even transport them into the midst of the awful solitudes which +surround the Poles. He could give them the choice between doing as he +wished, submitting unconditionally to his will, or committing suicide by +starvation.</p> + +<p>They had not even the option of jumping out, for they did not know how +to open the sliding doors; and even if they had done, what feminine +nerves could have faced a leap into that awful gulf which lay below +them, a two-thousand-foot dive through the clouds into the waters of the +wintry Atlantic?</p> + +<p>They looked at each other in speechless, dazed amazement. Far away below +them on the other side of the clouds the <i>St. Louis</i> was steaming +eastward, and with her were going the last hopes of the coronet which +was to be the matrimonial equivalent of Miss Zaidie's beauty and Russell +Rennick's millions.</p> + +<p>They were no longer of the world. Its laws could no longer protect them. +Anything might happen, and that anything depended absolutely on the will +of the lord and master of the extraordinary vessel which, for the +present, was their only world.</p> + +<p>"My dearest Zaidie," Mrs. Van Stuyler gasped, when she at length +recovered the power of articulate speech, "what an entirely too awful +thing this is! Why, it's abduction and nothing less. Indeed it's worse, +for he's taken us clean off the earth, and there's no more chance of +rescue than if he took us to one of those planets he said he could go +to. If I didn't feel a great responsibility for you, dear, I believe I +should faint."</p> + +<p>By this time Miss Zaidie had recovered a good deal of her usual +composure. The excitement of the upward rush, and what was left of the +momentary physical fear, had flushed her cheeks and lighted her eyes. +Even Mrs. Van Stuyler thought her looking, if possible, more beautiful +than she had done under the most favourable of terrestrial +circumstances. There was a something else too, which she didn't +altogether like to see, a sort of resignation to her fate which, in a +young lady situated as she was then, Mrs. Van Stuyler considered to be +distinctly improper.</p> + +<p>"It is rather startling, isn't it?" she said, with hardly a trace of +emotion in her voice; "but I have no doubt that everything will be all +right in the end."</p> + +<p>"Everything all right, my dear Zaidie! What on earth, or I might say +under heaven, do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"I mean," replied Zaidie even more composedly than before, and also with +a little tightening of her lips, "that Lord Redgrave is the owner of +this vessel, and that therefore it is quite impossible that anything out +of the way could happen to us—I mean anything more out of the way than +this wonderful jump from the sea to the sky has been, unless, of course, +Lord Redgrave is going to take us for a voyage among the stars."</p> + +<p>"Zaidie Rennick!" said Mrs. Van Stuyler, bridling up into her most +frigid dignity, "I am more than surprised to hear you talk in such a +strain. Perfectly safe, indeed! Has it not struck you that we are +absolutely at this man's—this Lord Redgrave's, mercy, that he can take +us where he likes, and treat us just as he pleases?"</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Van," replied Zaidie, dropping back into her familiar form +of address, but speaking even more frigidly than her chaperon had done, +"you seem to forget that, however extraordinary our situation may be +just now, we are in the care of an English gentleman. Lord Redgrave was +a friend of my father's, the only man who believed in his ideals, the +only man who realised them, the only man——"</p> + +<p>"That you were ever in love with, eh?" said Mrs. Van Stuyler with a snap +in her voice. "Is that so? Ah, I begin to see something now."</p> + +<p>"And I think, if you possess your soul in patience, you will see +something more before long," snapped Miss Zaidie in reply. Then she +stopped abruptly and the flush on her cheek deepened, for at that moment +Lord Redgrave came up the companion way from the lower deck carrying a +big silver tray with a coffee pot, three cups and saucers, a rack of +toast, and a couple of plates of bread and butter and cake.</p> + +<p>Just then a sort of social miracle happened. The fact was that Mrs. Van +Stuyler had never before had her early coffee brought to her by a peer +of the British Realm. She thought it a little humiliating afterwards, +but for the moment all sorts of conventional barriers seemed to melt +away. After all she was a woman, and some years ago she had been a young +one. Lord Redgrave was an almost perfect specimen of English manhood in +its early prime. He was one of the richest peers in England, and he was +bringing her her coffee. As she said afterwards, she wilted, and she +couldn't help it.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid I have kept you waiting a long time for your coffee, +ladies," said Redgrave, as he balanced the tray on one hand and drew a +wicker table towards them with the other. "You see there are only two of +us on board this craft, and as my engineer is navigating the ship, I +have to attend to the domestic arrangements."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Stuyler looked at him in the silence of mental paralysis. Miss +Zaidie frowned, smiled, and then began to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Well, of all the cold-blooded English ways of putting things——" she +began.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon?" said Lord Redgrave as he put the tray down on the +table.</p> + +<p>"What Miss Rennick means, Lord Redgrave," interrupted Mrs. Van Stuyler, +struggling out of her paralytic condition, "and what I, too, should like +to say, is that under the circumstances——"</p> + +<p>"You think that I am not as penitent as I ought to be. Is that so?" said +Redgrave, with a glance and a smile mostly directed towards Miss Zaidie. +"Well, to tell you the truth," he went on, "I am not a bit penitent. On +the contrary, I am very glad to have been able to assist the Fates as +far as I have done."</p> + +<p>"Assist the Fates!" gasped Mrs. Van Stuyler, helping herself shakingly +to sugar, while Miss Zaidie folded a gossamer slice of bread and butter +and began to eat it; "I think, Lord Redgrave, that if you knew <i>all</i> the +circumstances, you would say that you were working against them."</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler," he replied, as he filled his own coffee cup, +"I quite agree with you as to certain fates, but the Fates which I mean +are the ones which, with good or bad reason, I think are working on my +side. Besides, I <i>do</i> know all the circumstances, or at least the most +important of them. That knowledge is, in fact, my principal excuse for +bringing you so unceremoniously above the clouds."</p> + +<p>As he said this he took a sideway glance at Miss Zaidie. She dropped her +eyelids and went on eating her bread and butter; but there was a little +deepening of the flush on her cheeks which was to him as the first flush +of sunrise to a benighted wanderer.</p> + +<p>There was a rather awkward silence after this. Miss Zaidie stirred the +coffee in her cup with a dainty Queen Anne spoon, and seemed to +concentrate the whole of her attention upon the operation. Then Mrs. Van +Stuyler took a sip out of her cup and said:</p> + +<p>"But really, Lord Redgrave, I feel that I must ask you whether you think +that what you have done during the last few minutes (which already, I +assure you, seem hours to me) is—well, quite in accordance with +the—what shall I say—ah, the rules that we have been accustomed to +live under?"</p> + +<p>Lord Redgrave looked at Miss Zaidie again. She didn't even raise her +eyelids, only a very slight tremor of her hand as she raised her cup to +her lips told that she was even listening. He took courage from this +sign, and replied:</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler, the only answer that I can make to that just +now is to remind you that, by the sanction of ages, everything is +supposed to be fair under two sets of circumstances, and, whatever is +happening on the earth down yonder, we, I think, are not at war."</p> + +<p>The next moment Miss Zaidie's eyelids lifted a little. There was a +tremor about her lips almost too faint to be perceptible, and the +slightest possible tinge of colour crept upwards towards her eyes. She +put her cup down and got up, walked towards the glass walls of the +deck-chamber, and looked out over the cloud-scape.</p> + +<p>The shortness of her steamer skirt made it possible for Lord Redgrave +and Mrs. Van Stuyler to see that the sole of her right boot was swinging +up and down on the heel ever so slightly. They came simultaneously to +the conclusion that if she had been alone she would have stamped, and +stamped pretty hard. Possibly also she would have said things to herself +and the surrounding silence. This seemed probable from the almost +equally imperceptible motion of her shapely shoulders.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Stuyler recognised in a moment that her charge was getting +angry. She knew by experience that Miss Zaidie possessed a very proper +spirit of her own, and that it was just as well not to push matters too +far. She further recognised that the circumstances were extraordinary, +not to say equivocal, and that she herself occupied a distinctly +peculiar position.</p> + +<p>She had accepted the charge of Miss Zaidie from her Uncle Russell for a +consideration counted partly by social advantages and partly by dollars. +In the most perfect innocence she had permitted not only her charge but +herself to be abducted—for, after all, that was what it came to—from +the deck of an American liner, and carried, not only beyond the clouds, +but also beyond the reach of human law, both criminal and conventional.</p> + +<p>Inwardly she was simply fuming with rage. As she said afterwards, she +felt just like a bottled volcano which would like to go off and daren't.</p> + +<p>About two minutes of somewhat surcharged silence passed. Mrs. Van +Stuyler sipped her coffee in ostentatiously small sips. Lord Redgrave +took his in slower and longer ones, and helped himself to bread and +butter. Miss Zaidie appeared perfectly contented with her contemplation +of the clouds.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2> + + +<p>At length Mrs. Van Stuyler, being a woman of large experience and some +social deftness, recognised that a change of subject was the easiest way +of retreat out of a rather difficult situation. So she put her cup down, +leant back in her chair, and, looking straight into Lord Redgrave's +eyes, she said with purely feminine irrelevance:</p> + +<p>"I suppose you know, Lord Redgrave, that, when we left, the machine +which we call in America Manhood Suffrage—which, of course, simply +means the selection of a government by counting noses which may or may +not have brains above them—was what some of our orators would call in +full blast. If you are going to New York after Washington, as you said +on the boat, we might find it a rather inconvenient time to arrive. The +whole place will be chaos, you know; because when the citizen of the +United States begins electioneering, New York is not a very nice place +to stop in except for people who want excitement, and so if you will +excuse me putting the question so directly, I should like to know what +you just do mean to do——"</p> + +<p>Lord Redgrave saw that she was going to add "with us," but before he had +time to say anything, Miss Zaidie turned round, walked deliberately +towards her chair, sat down, poured herself out a fresh cup of coffee, +added the milk and sugar with deliberation, and then after a preliminary +sip said, with her cup poised half-way between her dainty lips and the +table:</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Van, I've got an idea. I suppose it's inherited, for dear old Pop +had plenty. Anyhow we may as well get back to common-sense subjects. Now +look here," she went on, switching an absolutely convincing glance +straight into her host's eyes, "my father may have been a dreamer, but +still he was a Sound Money man. He believed in honest dealings. He +didn't believe in borrowing a hundred dollars gold and paying back in +fifty dollars silver. What's your opinion, Lord Redgrave; you don't do +that sort of thing in England, do you? Uncle Russell is a Sound Money +man too. He's got too much gold locked up to want silver for it."</p> + +<p>"My dear Zaidie," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, "what <i>have</i> democratic and +republican politics and bimetalism got to do with——"</p> + +<p>"With a trip in this wonderful vessel which Pop told me years ago could +go up to the stars if it ever was made? Why just this, Lord Redgrave is +an Englishman and too rich to believe in anything but sound money, so is +Uncle Russell, and there you have it, or should have."</p> + +<p>"I think I see what you mean, Miss Rennick," said their host, leaning +back in his chair and folding his hands behind his head, as steamboat +travellers are wont to do when seas are smooth and skies are blue. "The +<i>Astronef</i> might come down like a vision from the clouds and preach the +Gospel of Gold in electric rays of silver through the commonplace medium +of the Morse Code. How's that for poetry and practice?"</p> + +<p>"I quite agree with his lordship as regards the practice," said Mrs. Van +Stuyler, talking somewhat rudely across him to Zaidie. "It would be an +excellent use to put this wonderful invention to. And then, I am sure +his lordship would land us in Central Park, so that we could go to your +Uncle's house right away."</p> + +<p>"No, no, I'm afraid I must ask you to excuse me there, Mrs. Van +Stuyler," said Redgrave, with a change of tone which Miss Zaidie +appreciated with a swiftly veiled glance. "You see, I have placed myself +beyond the law. I have, as you have been good enough to intimate, +abducted—to put it brutally—two ladies from the deck of an Atlantic +liner. Further, in doing so I have selfishly spoiled the prospects of +one of the ladies. But, seriously, I really must go to Washington +first——"</p> + +<p>"I think, Lord Redgrave," interrupted Mrs. Van Stuyler, ignoring the +last unfinished sentence and assuming her best Knickerbocker dignity, +"if you will forgive me saying so, that that is scarcely a subject for +discussion here."</p> + +<p>"And if that's so," interrupted Miss Zaidie, "the less we say about it +the better. What I wanted to say was this. We all want the Republicans +in, at least all of us that have much to lose. Now, if Lord Redgrave was +to use this wonderful air-ship of his on the right side—why there +wouldn't be any standing against it."</p> + +<p>"I must say that until just now I had hardly contemplated turning the +<i>Astronef</i> into an electioneering machine. Still, I admit that she might +be made use of in a good cause, only I hope——"</p> + +<p>"That we shan't want you to paste her over with election bills, eh?—or +start handbill-snowstorms from the deck—or kidnap Croker and Bryan just +as you did us, for instance?"</p> + +<p>"If I could, I'm quite sure that I shouldn't have as pleasant guests as +I have now on board the <i>Astronef</i>. What do you think, Mrs. Van +Stuyler?"</p> + +<p>"My dear Lord Redgrave," she replied, "that would be quite impossible. +The idea of being shut up in a ship like this which can soar not only +from earth, but beyond the clouds, with people who would find out your +best secrets and then perhaps shoot you so as to be the only possessors +of them—well, that would be foolishness indeed."</p> + +<p>"Why, certainly it would," said Zaidie; "the only use you could have for +people like that would be to take them up above the clouds and drop them +out. But suppose we—I mean Lord Redgrave—took the <i>Astronef</i> down over +New York and signalled messages from the sky at night with a +searchlight——"</p> + +<p>"Good," said their host, getting up from his deck-chair and stretching +himself up straight, looking the while at Miss Zaidie's averted profile. +"That's gorgeously good! We might even turn the election. I'm for sound +money all the time, if I may be permitted to speak American."</p> + +<p>"English is quite good enough for us, Lord Redgrave," said Miss Zaidie a +little stiffly. "We may have improved on the old language a bit, still +we understand it, and—well, we can forgive its shortcomings. But that +isn't quite to the point."</p> + +<p>"It seems to me," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, "that we are getting nearly as +far from the original subject as we are from the <i>St. Louis</i>. May I ask, +Zaidie, what you really propose to do?"</p> + +<p>"<i>Do</i> is not for us to say," said Miss Zaidie, looking straight up to +the glass roof of the deck-chamber. "You see, Mrs. Van, we're not free +agents. We are not even first-class passengers who have paid their fares +on a contract ticket which is supposed to get them there."</p> + +<p>"If you'll pardon me saying so," said Lord Redgrave, stopping his walk +up and down the deck, "that is not quite the case. To put it in the most +brutally material form, it is quite true that I have kidnapped you two +ladies and taken you beyond the reach of earthly law. But there is +another law, one which would bind a gentleman even if he were beyond the +limits of the Solar System, and so if you wish to be landed either in +Washington or New York it shall be done. You shall be put down within a +carriage drive of your own residence, or of Mr. Russell Rennick's. I +will myself see you to his door, and there we may say goodbye, and I +will take my trip through the Solar System alone."</p> + +<p>There was another pause after this, a pause pregnant with the fate of +two lives. They looked at each other—Mrs. Van Stuyler at Zaidie, Zaidie +at Lord Redgrave, and he at Mrs. Van Stuyler again. It was a kind of +three-cornered duel of eyes, and the eyes said a good deal more than +common human speech could have done.</p> + +<p>Then Lord Redgrave, in answer to the last glance from Zaidie's eyes, +said slowly and deliberately:</p> + +<p>"I don't want to take any undue advantage, but I think I am justified in +making one condition. Of course I can take you beyond the limits of the +world that we know, and to other worlds that we know little or nothing +of. At least I could do so if I were not bound by law as strong as +gravitation itself; but now, as I said before, I just ask whether or not +my guests or, if you think it suits the circumstances better, my +prisoners, shall be released unconditionally wherever they choose to be +landed."</p> + +<p>He paused for a moment and then, looking straight into Zaidie's eyes, he +added:</p> + +<p>"The one condition I make is that the vote shall be unanimous."</p> + +<p>"Under the circumstances, Lord Redgrave," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, rising +from her seat and walking towards him with all the dignity that would +have been hers in her own drawing-room, "there can only be one answer to +that. Your guests or your prisoners, as you choose to call them, must be +released unconditionally."</p> + +<p>Lord Redgrave heard these words as a man might hear words in a dream. +Zaidie had risen too. They were looking into each other's eyes, and many +unspoken words were passing between them. There was a little silence, +and then, to Mrs. Van Stuyler's unutterable horror, Zaidie said, with +just the suspicion of a gasp in her voice:</p> + +<p>"There's one dissentient. We are prisoners, and I guess I'd better +surrender at discretion."</p> + +<p>The next moment her captor's arm was round her waist, and Mrs. Van +Stuyler, with her twitching fingers linked behind her back, and her nose +at an angle of sixty degrees, was staring away through the blue +immensity, dumbly wondering what on earth or under heaven was going to +happen next.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h2> + + +<p>After a couple of minutes of silence which could be felt, Mrs. Van +Stuyler turned round and said angrily:</p> + +<p>"Zaidie, you will excuse me, perhaps, if I say that your conduct is +not—I mean has not been what I should have expected—what I did, +indeed, expect from your uncle's niece when I undertook to take you to +Europe. I must say——"</p> + +<p>"If I were you, Mrs. Van, I don't think I'd say much more about that, +because, you see, it's fixed and done. Of course, Lord Redgrave's only +an earl, and the other is a marquis, but, you see, he's a man, and I +don't quite think the other one is—and that's about all there is to +it."</p> + +<p>Their host had just left the deck-saloon, taking the early coffee +apparatus with him, and Miss Zaidie, in the first flush of her pride and +re-found happiness, was taking a promenade of about twelve strides each +way, while Mrs. Van Stuyler, after partially relieving her feelings as +above, had seated herself stiffly in her wicker-chair, and was following +her with eyes which were critical and, if they had been twenty years +younger, might also have been envious.</p> + +<p>"Well, at least I suppose I must congratulate you on your ability to +accommodate yourself to most extraordinary circumstances. I must say +that as far as that goes I quite envy you. I feel as though I ought to +choke or take poison, or something of that sort."</p> + +<p>"Sakes, Mrs. Van, please don't talk like that!" said Zaidie, stopping in +her walk just in front of her chaperon's chair. "Can't you see that +there's nothing extraordinary about the circumstances except this +wonderful ship? I have told you how Pop and I met Lord Redgrave in our +tour through the Canadian Rockies two or three years ago. No, it's two +years and nine months next June; and how he took an interest in Pop's +theories and ideas about this same ship that we are on now——"</p> + +<p>"Oh yes," said Mrs. Van Stuyler rather acidly, "and not only in the +abstract ideas, but apparently in a certain concrete reality."</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Van," laughed Zaidie, with a cunning twist on her heel, "I know +you don't mean to be rude, but—well, now did any one ever call <i>you</i> a +concrete reality? Of course it's correct just as a scientific +definition, perhaps—still, anyhow, I guess it's not much good going on +about that. The facts are just this way. I consented to marry that +Byfleet marquis just out of sheer spite and blank ignorance. Lord +Redgrave never actually asked me to marry him when we were in the +Rockies, but he did say when he went back to England that as soon as he +had realised my father's ideal he would come over and try and realise +one of his own. He was looking at me when he said it, and he looked a +good deal more than he said. Then he went away, and poor Pop died. Of +course I couldn't write and tell him, and I suppose he was too proud to +write before he'd done what he undertook to do, and I, like most +girl-fools in the same place would have done, thought that he'd given +the whole thing up and just looked upon the trip as a sort of interlude +in globe-trotting, and thought no more about Pop's ideas and inventions +than he did about his daughter."</p> + +<p>"Very natural, of course," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, somewhat mollified by +the subdued passion which Zaidie had managed to put into her commonplace +words; "and so as you thought he had forgotten you and was finding a +wife in his own country, and a possible husband came over from that same +country with a coronet——"</p> + +<p>"That'll do, Mrs. Van, thank you," interrupted Miss Zaidie, bringing her +daintily-shod foot down on the deck this time with an unmistakable +stamp. "We'll consider that incident closed if you please. It was a +miserable, mean, sordid business altogether; I am utterly, hopelessly +ashamed of it and myself too. Just to think that I could ever——"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Stuyler cut short her indignant flow of words by a sudden +uplifting of her eyelids and a swift turn of her head towards the +companion way. Zaidie stamped again, this time more softly, and walked +away to have another look at the clouds.</p> + +<p>"Why, what on earth is the matter?" she exclaimed, shrinking back from +the glass wall. "There's nothing—we're not anywhere!"</p> + +<p>"Pardon me, Miss Rennick, you are on board the <i>Astronef</i>," said Lord +Redgrave, as he reached the top of the companion way, "and the +<i>Astronef</i> is at present travelling at about a hundred and fifty miles +an hour above the clouds towards Washington. That is why you don't see +the clouds and sea as you did after we left the <i>St. Louis</i>. At a speed +like this they simply make a sort of grey-green blur. We shall be in +Washington this evening, I hope."</p> + +<p>"To-night, sir—I beg your pardon, my Lord!" gasped Mrs. Van Stuyler. "A +hundred and fifty miles an hour! Surely that's impossible."</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler," said Redgrave, with a side-look at Zaidie, +"nowadays 'impossible' is hardly an English or even an American word. In +fact, since I have had the honour of realising some of Professor +Rennick's ideas it has been relegated to the domain of mathematics. Not +even he could make two and two more or less than four, but—well, would +you like to come into the conning-tower and see for yourselves? I can +show you a few experiments that will, at any rate, help to pass the time +between here and Washington."</p> + +<p>"Lord Redgrave," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, dropping gracefully back into +her wicker armchair, "if I may say so, I have seen quite enough +impossibilities, and—er, well—other things since we left the deck of +the <i>St. Louis</i> to keep me quite satisfied until, with your lordship's +permission, I set foot on solid ground again, and I should also like to +remind you that we have left everything behind us on the <i>St. Louis</i>, +everything except what we stand up in, and—and——"</p> + +<p>"And therefore it will be a point of honour with me to see that you want +for nothing while you are on board the <i>Astronef</i>, and that you shall be +released from your durance——"</p> + +<p>"Now don't say vile, Lenox—I mean——"</p> + +<p>"It is perfectly plain what you mean, Zaidie," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, in +a tone which seemed to send a chill through the deck-chamber. "Really, +the American girl——"</p> + +<p>"Just wants to tell the truth," laughed Zaidie, going towards Redgrave. +"Lord Redgrave, if you like it better, says he wants to marry me, and, +peer or peasant, I want to marry him, and that's all there is to it. You +don't suppose I'd have——"</p> + +<p>"My dear girl, there's no need to go into details," interrupted Mrs. Van +Stuyler, inspired by fond memories of her own youth; "we will take that +for granted, and as we are beyond the social region in which chaperons +are supposed to be necessary, I think I will have a nap."</p> + +<p>"And we'll go to the conning-tower, eh?"</p> + +<p>"Breakfast will be ready in about half an hour," said Redgrave, as he +took Zaidie by the arm and led her towards the forward end of the +deck-chamber. "Meanwhile, <i>au revoir</i>! If you want anything, touch the +button at your right hand, just as you would on board the <i>St. Louis</i>."</p> + +<p>"I thank your lordship," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, half melting and half +icy still. "I shall be quite content to wait until you come back. Really +I feel quite sleepy."</p> + +<p>"That's the effect of the elevation on the dear old lady's nerves," +Redgrave whispered to Zaidie as he helped her up the narrow stairway +which led to the glass-domed conning-tower, in which in days to come she +was destined to pass some of the most delightful and the most terrible +moments of her life.</p> + +<p>"Then why doesn't it affect me that way?" said Zaidie, as she took her +place in the little chamber, steel-walled and glass-roofed, and half +filled with instruments of which she, Vassar girl and all as she was, +could only guess the use.</p> + +<p>"Well, to begin with, you are younger, which is an absolutely +unnecessary observation; and in the second place, perhaps you were +thinking about something else."</p> + +<p>"By which I suppose you mean your lordship's noble self."</p> + +<p>This was said in such a tone and with such an indescribable smile that +there immediately ensued a gap in the conversation, and a silence which +was a great deal more eloquent than any words could have made it.</p> + +<p>When Miss Zaidie had got free again she put her hands up to her hair, +and while she was patting it into something like shape again she said:</p> + +<p>"But I thought you brought me here to show me some experiments, and not +to——"</p> + +<p>"Not to take advantage of the first real opportunity of tasting some of +the dearest delights that mortal man ever stole from earth or sea? Do +you remember that day when we were coming down from the big +glacier—when your foot slipped and I just caught you and saved a +sprained ankle?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, you wretch, and went away next day and left something like a +broken heart behind you! Why didn't you—Oh what idiots you men can be +when you put your minds to it!"</p> + +<p>"It wasn't quite that, Zaidie. You see, I'd promised your father the day +before—of course I was only a younger son then—that I wouldn't say +anything about realising <i>my</i> ideal until I had realised his, and +so——"</p> + +<p>"And so I might have gone to Europe with Uncle Russell's millions to buy +that man Byfleet's coronet, and pay the price——"</p> + +<p>"Don't, Zaidie, don't! That is quite too horrible to think of, and as +for the coronet, well, I think I can give you one about as good as his, +and one that doesn't want re-gilding. Good Lord, fancy you married to a +thing like that! What could have made you think of it?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't think," she said angrily; "I didn't think and I didn't feel. +Of course I thought that I'd dropped right out of your life, and after +that I didn't care. I was mad right through, and I'd made up my mind to +do what others did—take a title and a big position, and have the +outside as bright as I could get it, whatever the inside might be like. +I'd made up my mind to be a society queen abroad, and a miserable woman +at home—and, Lenox, thank God and you, that I wasn't!"</p> + +<p>Then there was another interlude, and at the end of it Redgrave said:</p> + +<p>"Wait till we've finished our honeymoon in space, and come back to +earth. You won't want any coronets then, although you'll have one, for +all the lands of earth won't hold another woman like yourself—your own +sweet self! Of course it doesn't now, but—there, you know what I mean. +You'll have been to other worlds, you'll have made the round trip of the +Solar System, so to say, and——"</p> + +<p>"And I think, dear, that is about promise of wonders enough, and of +other things too—no, you are really quite too exacting. I thought you +brought me here to show me some of the wonders that this marvellous ship +of yours can work."</p> + +<p>"Then just one more and I'll show you. Now you stand up there on that +step so that you can see all round, and watch with all your eyes, +because you are going to see something that no woman ever saw before."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2> + + +<p>Above a tiny little writing-desk fixed to the wall of the conning-tower +there was a square mahogany board with six white buttons in pairs. On +one side of the board hung a telephone and on the other a speaking-tube. +To the right hand opposite where Zaidie stood were two nickel-plated +wheels and behind each of them a white disc, one marked off into 360 +degrees, and the other into 100 with subdivisions of tens. Overhead hung +an ordinary tell-tale compass, and compactly placed on other parts of +the wall were barometers, thermometers, barographs, and, in fact, +practically every instrument that the most exacting of aeronauts or +Space-explorers could have asked for.</p> + +<p>"You see, Zaidie, this is what one might call the cerebral chamber of +the <i>Astronef</i>, and, granted that my engines worked all right, I could +make her do anything I wanted without moving out of here, but as a rule, +of course, Murgatroyd is in the engine-room. If he wasn't the most +whole-souled Wesleyan that Yorkshire ever produced, I believe he'd +become an idolater and worship the <i>Astronef's</i> engines."</p> + +<p>"And who is Murgatroyd, please?"</p> + +<p>"In the first place he is what I might call an hereditary retainer of +the House of Redgrave. His ancestors have served mine for the last seven +hundred years. When my ancestors were burglar-barons, his were +men-at-arms. When we went on the Crusades they went too; when we raised +a regiment for the King against the Parliament they were naturally the +first to enlist in it; and as we gradually settled down into peaceful +respectability they did the same. Lastly, when we went into trade as +ironmasters and engineers they went in too. This Murgatroyd, for +instance, was master-foreman of my works at Smeaton, and he was the only +man I dared trust with the secrets of the <i>Astronef</i>, and the only one I +would trust myself on board her with, and that's why we're a crew of +two. You see the command of a vessel like this is a fairly big business, +and if it got into the wrong sort of hands——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I see," said Zaidie with a little nod. "It would be just too awful +to think about. Why you might keep the world in terror with it; but I +know you wouldn't do that, because, for one thing, I wouldn't let you."</p> + +<p>"Gently, gently, Ma'm'selle; permit me most humbly to remind you that +you are still my prisoner, and that I am still Commander of the +<i>Astronef</i>."</p> + +<p>"Oh, very well then," said Zaidie, interrupting him with a pretty little +gesture of impatience, "and now suppose you let me see what the +<i>Astronef's</i> commander can do with her."</p> + +<p>"Certainly," replied Redgrave, "and with the greatest pleasure—but, by +the way, that reminds me you haven't paid your footing yet."</p> + +<p>When due payment had been given and taken, or perhaps it would be more +correct to say taken and given, Redgrave put his finger on one of the +buttons.</p> + +<p>Immediately Zaidie heard the swish of the air past the smooth wall of +the conning-tower grow fainter and fainter. Then there came a little +check which nearly upset her balance, and presently the clouds beneath +them began to take shape and great white continents of them with grey +oceans in between went sweeping silently and swiftly away behind them.</p> + +<p>Redgrave turned the wheel in front of the 100-degree disc a little to +the left. The next instant the clouds rose up. For a moment Zaidie could +see nothing but white mist on all sides. Then the atmosphere cleared +again, and she saw far below her what looked like a vast expanse of +ocean that had been suddenly frozen solid.</p> + +<p>There were the long Atlantic rollers tipped with snowy foam. Here and +there at wide intervals were little black dots, some of them with brown +trails behind them, others with little patches of white which showed up +distinctly against the dark grey-blue of the sea. Every moment they grew +bigger. Then the white-crested waves began to move, and the big ocean +steamers and full-rigged sailing ships looked less and less like toys. +Just under them there was a very big one with four funnels pouring out +dense volumes of black smoke. Redgrave took up a pair of glasses, looked +at her for a moment and said:</p> + +<p>"That's the <i>Deutschland</i>, the new Hamburg-American record-breaker. +Suppose we go down and have a lark with her. I wonder if she's taking +news of the war. We're in with Germany, and they may know something +about it."</p> + +<p>"That would be just too lovely!" said Zaidie. "Let's go and show them +how <i>we</i> can break records. I suppose they've seen us by this time and +are just wondering with all their wits what we are. I guess they'll feel +pretty tired about poor Count Zeppelin's balloon when they see <i>us</i>."</p> + +<p>Redgrave noted the "we" and the "us" with much secret satisfaction.</p> + +<p>"All right," he said, "we'll go and give them a bit of a startler."</p> + +<p>In front of the conning-tower there was a steel flagstaff about ten feet +high, with halliards rove through a sheer in the top. He took a little +roll of bunting out of a locker under the desk, opened a glass slide, +brought in the halliards and bent the flag on.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the long shape of the great liner was getting bigger and +bigger. Her decks were black, with people staring up at this strange +apparition which was dropping upon them from the clouds. Another minute +and the <i>Astronef</i> had dropped to within five hundred feet of the water, +and about half a mile astern of the <i>Deutschland</i>. Redgrave turned the +wheel back two or three inches and touched a second button.</p> + +<p>The <i>Astronef</i> stopped her descent instantly, and then she shot forward. +The new greyhound was making her twenty-two and a half knots, hurling a +broad white torrent of foam away from under her counters. But in half a +minute the <i>Astronef</i> was alongside her.</p> + +<p>Redgrave ran the roll of bunting up to the top of the flagstaff, pulled +one of the halliards, and the White Ensign of England floated out. +Almost at the same moment the German flag went up to the staff at the +stern of the <i>Deutschland</i>, and they heard a roar of cheers, mingled +with cries of wonder, come up from her swarming decks.</p> + +<p>Each flag was dipped thrice in due course. Redgrave took off his cap and +bowed to the Captain on the bridge. Zaidie nodded and fluttered her +handkerchief in reply to hundreds of others that were waving on the +decks. Mrs. Van Stuyler woke up in wonder and waved hers instinctively, +half longing to change crafts. In fact, if it hadn't been for her +absolute devotion to the proprieties she would have obeyed her first +impulse and asked Lord Redgrave to put her on board the steamer.</p> + +<p>While the officers and crew and passengers of the <i>Deutschland</i> were +staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the graceful glittering shape of +the <i>Astronef</i>, Redgrave touched the first button in the second row +once, moved the 100-degree wheel on a few degrees, and then gave the +other a quarter turn. Then he closed the window slide, and the next +moment Zaidie saw the great liner sink down beneath them in a curious +twisting sort of way. She seemed to stop still and then spin round on +her centre, getting smaller and smaller every moment.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter, Lenox?" she said, with a little gasp. "What's the +<i>Deutschland</i> doing? She seems to be spinning round on her own axis like +a top."</p> + +<p>"That's only the point of view, dear. She's just plugging along straight +on her way to New York, and we've been making rings round her and going +up all the time. But of course you don't notice the motion here any more +than you would if you were in a balloon."</p> + +<p>"But I thought you were going to speak them. Surely you don't mean to +say that you intended that just as a little bit of showing off?"</p> + +<p>"That's about what it comes to, I suppose, but you must not think it was +altogether vanity. You see the German Government has bought Count +Zeppelin's air-ship or steerable balloon, as it ought to be called, +always supposing that they can steer it in a wind, and of course their +idea is to make a fighting machine of it. Now Germany is engaged to +stand by us in this trouble that's coming, and by way of cementing the +alliance I thought it was just as well to let the wily Teuton know that +there's something flying the British flag which could make very small +mincemeat of their gas-bags."</p> + +<p>"And what about Old Glory?" said Miss Zaidie. "The <i>Astronef</i> was built +with English money and English skill, but——"</p> + +<p>"She is the creature of American genius. Of course she is. In fact she +is the first concrete symbol of the Anglo-American Alliance, and when +the daughter of her creator has gone into partnership with the man who +made her we'll have two flagstaff's, and the Jack and Old Glory will +float side by side."</p> + +<p>"And meanwhile where are we going?" asked Zaidie, after a moment's +interval. "Ah, there we are through the clouds again. What makes us +rise? Is that the force that Pop told me he discovered?"</p> + +<p>"I'll answer the last question first," said Redgrave. "That was the +greatest of your father's discoveries. He got at the secret of +gravitation, and was able to analyse it into two separate forces just as +Volta did with electricity—positive and negative, or, to put it better, +attractive and repulsive.</p> + +<p>"Three out of the five sets of engines in the <i>Astronef</i> develop the R. +Force, as I call it for short. This wheel with the hundred degrees +marked behind it regulates the development. The further I turn it this +way to the right, the more the R. Force overcomes the attractive force +of the earth or any other planet that we may visit. Turn it back, and +gravitation asserts itself. If I put this arrow-head on the wheel +opposite zero the weight of the <i>Astronef</i> is about a hundred and fifty +tons, and of course she would go down like a stone, and a very big one +at that. At ten she weighs nothing; that is to say the R. Force exactly +counteracts gravitation. At eleven she begins to rise. At a hundred she +would be hurled away from the earth like a shell from a twelve-inch gun, +or even faster. Now, watch."</p> + +<p>He took up the speaking-tube. "Is she all tight everywhere, Andrew?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, my Lord," came gurgling through the tube.</p> + +<p>Then Redgrave slowly turned the wheel till the indicator pointed to +twenty-five. Zaidie, all eyes and wonder, saw a vast sea of glittering +white spread out beneath them, an ocean of snow with grey-blue patches +here and there. It sank away from under them till the patches became +spots and the sunlit clouds a vast, luminous blur. The air about them +grew marvellously clear and limpid. The sun blazed down on them with a +tenfold intensity of light, but Zaidie was astonished to find that very +little heat penetrated the glass walls and roof of the conning-tower.</p> + +<p>"What an awful height!" she exclaimed, looking round at him with +something like fear in her eyes. "How high are we, Lenox?"</p> + +<p>"You'll find afterwards that the <i>Astronef</i> doesn't take any account of +high or low or up or down," he replied, looking at the dial of an +aneroid barometer by the side of him. "Roughly speaking, we're rather +over 60,000 feet—say ten miles—from the surface of the Atlantic. +That's why I asked Andrew whether everything was tight. You see we +couldn't breathe the air there is outside there—too thin and cold—and +so the <i>Astronef</i> makes her own atmosphere as we go along. But I won't +spoil what you're going to see by any more of this. So if you please, +we'll go down now and get along to Washington. Anyhow, I hope I've +convinced you so far that I've kept my promise."</p> + +<p>"Yes, dear, you have, and splendidly! I've only one regret. If <i>he</i> was +only here now, what a happy man he'd be! Still, I daresay he knows all +about it and is just as happy. In fact he must be. I feel certain he +must. The very soul of his intellect was in the dream of this ship, and +now that it's a reality he must be here still. Isn't it part of himself? +Isn't it his mind that's working in these wonderful engines of yours, +and isn't it his strength that lifts us up from the earth and takes us +down again just as you please to turn that wheel?"</p> + +<p>"There's little doubt about that, Zaidie," said Redgrave quietly, but +earnestly. "You know we North-country folk all have our traditions and +our ghosts; and what more likely than that the spirit of a dead man or a +man gone to other worlds should watch over the realisation of his +greatest work on earth? Why shouldn't we believe that, we who are going +away from this world to other ones?"</p> + +<p>"Why not?" interrupted Zaidie, "why, of course we will. And now suppose +we come down in more ways than one and go and give poor Mrs. Van Stuyler +something to eat and drink. The dear old girl must be frightened half +out of her wits by this time."</p> + +<p>"Very well," replied Redgrave; "but we'll come down literally first, so +that we can get the propellers to work."</p> + +<p>He turned the wheel back till the indicator pointed to five. The +cloud-sea came up with a rush. They passed through it, and stopped about +a thousand feet above the sea. Redgrave touched the first button twice, +and then the next one twice. The air began to hiss past the walls of the +conning-tower. The crest-crowned waves of the Atlantic seemed to sweep +in a hurrying torrent behind them, and then Redgrave, having made sure +that Murgatroyd was at the after-wheel, gave him the course for +Washington, and then went down to induct his bride-elect into the art +and mystery of cooking by electricity as it was done in the kitchen of +the <i>Astronef</i>.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h2> + + +<p>As this narrative is the story of the personal adventures of Lord +Redgrave and his bride, and not an account of events at which all the +world has already wondered, there is no necessity to describe in any +detail the extraordinary sequence of circumstances which began when the +<i>Astronef</i> dropped without warning from the clouds in front of the White +House at Washington, and his lordship, after paying his respects to the +President, proceeded to the British Embassy and placed the copy of the +Anglo-American agreement in Lord Pauncefote's hands.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Stuyler's spirits had risen as the <i>Astronef</i> descended towards +the lights of Washington, and when the President and Lord Pauncefote +paid a visit to the wonderful craft, the joint product of American +genius and English capital and constructive skill, she immediately +assumed, at Redgrave's request, the position of lady of the house <i>pro +tem.</i>, and described the "change of plans," as she called it, which led +to their transfer from the <i>St. Louis</i> to the <i>Astronef</i> with an +imaginative fluency which would have done credit to the most +enterprising of American interviewers.</p> + +<p>"You see, my dear," she said to Zaidie afterwards, "as everything turned +out so very happily, and as Lord Redgrave behaved in such a splendid +way, I thought it was my duty to make everything appear as pleasant to +the President and Lord Pauncefote as I could."</p> + +<p>"It was real good of you, Mrs. Van," said Zaidie. "If I hadn't been +paralysed with admiration I believe I should have laughed. Now if you'll +just come with us on our trip, and write a book about it afterwards just +as you told—I mean as you described what happened between the <i>St. +Louis</i> and Washington, to the President and Lord Pauncefote, you'd make +a million dollars out of it. Say now, won't you come?"</p> + +<p>"My dear Zaidie," Mrs. Van Stuyler replied, "you know that I am very +fond of you. If I'd only had a daughter I should have wanted her to be +just like you, and I should have wanted her to marry a man just like +Lord Redgrave. But there's a limit to everything. You say that you are +going to the moon and the stars, and to see what the other planets are +like. Well, that's your affair. I hope God will forgive you for your +presumption, and let you come back safe, but I——No. Ten—twenty +millions wouldn't pay me to tempt Providence like that."</p> + +<p>The <i>Astronef</i> had landed in front of the White House, as everybody +knows, on the eve of the Presidential election. After dinner in the +deck-saloon, as the Space Navigator lay in the midst of a square of +troops, outside which a huge crowd surged and struggled to get a look at +the latest miracle of constructive science, the President and the +British Ambassador said goodbye, and as soon as the gangway ladder was +drawn in the <i>Astronef</i>, moved by no visible agency, rose from the +ground amidst a roar of cheers coming from a hundred thousand throats. +She stopped at a height of about a thousand feet, and then her forward +searchlight flashed out, swept the horizon, and vanished. Then it +flashed out again intermittently in the longs and shorts of the Morse +Code, and these, when translated, read:</p> + +<p>"Vote for sound men and sound money!"</p> + +<p>In five minutes the wires of the United States were alive with the +terse, pregnant message, and under the ocean in the dark depths of the +Atlantic ooze, vivid narratives of the coming of the miracle went +flashing to a hundred newspaper offices in England and on the Continent. +The New York correspondent of the London <i>Daily Express</i> added the +following paragraph to his account of the strange occurrence:</p> + +<p>"The secret of this amazing vessel, which has proved itself capable of +traversing the Atlantic in a day, and of soaring beyond the limits of +the atmosphere at will, is possessed by one man only, and that man is an +English nobleman. The air is full of rumours of universal war. One +vessel such as this could scatter terror over a continent in a few days, +demoralise armies and fleets, reduce Society to chaos, and establish a +one-man despotism on the ruins of all the Governments of the world. The +man who could build one ship like this could build fifty, and, if his +country asked him to do it, no doubt he would. Those who, as we are +almost forced to believe, are even now contemplating a serious attempt +to dethrone England from her supreme place among the nations of Europe, +will do well to take this latest potential factor in the warfare of the +immediate future into their most serious consideration."</p> + +<p>This paragraph was not perhaps as absolutely correct as a proposition in +Euclid, but it stopped the war. The <i>Deutschland</i> came in the next day, +and again the press was flooded, this time with personal narratives, and +brilliantly imaginative descriptions of the Vision which had descended +from the clouds, made rings round the great liner going at her best +speed, and then vanished in an instant beyond the range of field-glasses +and telescopes.</p> + +<p>Thus did the creature of Professor Rennick's inventive genius play its +first part as the peacemaker of the world.</p> + +<p>When the <i>Astronef's</i> message had been duly given and recorded, her +propellers began to revolve, and her head swung round to the north-east. +So began, as all the world now knows, the most extraordinary +electioneering trip that ever was known. First Baltimore, then +Philadelphia, and then New York saw the flashes in the sky. There were +illuminations, torchlight processions, and all the machinery of American +electioneering going at full blast. But when people saw, far away up in +the starlit night, those swiftly-changing beams glittering down, as it +were, out of infinite Space, and when the telegraph operators caught on +to the fact that they were signals, a sort of awe seemed to come over +both Republicans and Democrats alike. Even Tammany's thoughts began to +lift above the sordid level of boodle. It was almost like a message from +another world. There was something supernatural about it, and when it +was translated and rushed out in extra editions of the evening papers: +"Vote for sound men and sound money" became the watchword of millions.</p> + +<p>From New York to Boston, Boston to Albany, and then across country to +Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Omaha—then westward to St. Paul and +Minneapolis, and northward to Portland and Seattle, southward to San +Francisco and Monterey, then eastward again to Salt Lake City, and then, +after a leap across the Rockies which frightened Mrs. Van Stuyler almost +to fainting point and made Zaidie gasp for breath, away southward to +Santa Fé and New Orleans.</p> + +<p>Then northward again up the Mississippi Valley to St. Louis, and thence +eastward across the Alleghanies back to Washington—such was the famous +night-voyage of the <i>Astronef</i>, and so by means of that long silver +tongue of light did she spread the message of common-sense and +commercial honesty throughout the length and breadth of the Great +Republic. The world knows how America received and interpreted it the +next day.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile Mr. Russell Rennick had taken train to Washington, and the day +after the election he willingly took back all that he had intended with +regard to the Marquis of Byfleet, accepted Lord Redgrave in his stead, +and bestowed his avuncular blessing at the wedding breakfast held in the +deck-chamber of the <i>Astronef</i> poised in mid-air, five hundred feet +above the dome of the Capitol, a week later. To this he added a cheque +for a million dollars—payable to the Countess of Redgrave on her return +from her wedding trip.</p> + +<p>Breakfast over, the wedding party made an inspection of the wonderful +vessel under the guidance of her Commander. After this, while they were +drinking their coffee and liqueurs, and the men were smoking their +cigars in the deck-chamber, a score of the most distinguished men and +women in the United States experienced the novel sensation of sitting +quietly in deck-chairs while they were being hurled at the rate of a +hundred and fifty miles an hour through the atmosphere.</p> + +<p>They ran up to Niagara, dropped to within a few feet of the surface of +the Falls, passed over them, fell to the Rapids, and drifted down them +within a couple of yards of the raging waters. Then in an instant they +leapt up into the clouds, dropped again, and took a slanting course for +Washington at a speed incredible, but to them quite imperceptible, save +for the blurred rush of the half-visible earth behind them.</p> + +<p>That night the <i>Astronef</i> rested again in front of the steps of the +White House, and Lord and Lady Redgrave were the guests at a +semi-official banquet given by the newly re-elected President. The +speech of the evening was made by the President himself in proposing the +health of the bride and bridegroom, and this is the way he ended:</p> + +<p>"There is something more in the ceremony which we have been privileged +to witness than the union of a man and a woman in the bonds of holy +matrimony. Lord Redgrave, as you know, is the descendant of one of the +noblest and most ancient families in the Motherland of New Nations. Lady +Redgrave is the daughter of the oldest and, I hope I may be allowed to +say without offence, the greatest of those nations. It is, perhaps, +early days to talk about a formal federation of the Anglo-Saxon people, +but I think I am only voicing the sentiments of every good American when +I say that, if the rumours which have drifted over and under the +Atlantic, rumours of a determined attempt on the part of certain +European powers to assault and, if possible, destroy that magnificent +fortress of individual liberty and collective equity which we call the +British Empire should unhappily prove to be true, then it may be that +the rest of the world will find that America does not speak English for +nothing.</p> + +<p>"But I must also remind you that a few yards from the doors of the White +House there lies the greatest marvel, I had almost said the greatest +miracle, that has ever been accomplished by human genius and human +industry. That wonderful vessel in which some of us have been privileged +to take the most marvellous journey in the history of mechanical +locomotion was thought out by an American man of science, the man whose +daughter sits on my right hand to-night. In her concrete material form +this vessel, destined to navigate the shoreless Ocean of Space, is +English. But she is also the result of the belief and the faith of an +Englishman in an American ideal.... So when she leaves this earth, as +she will do in an hour or so, to enter the confines of other worlds than +this—and, it may be, to make the acquaintance of peoples other than +those who inhabit the earth—she will have done infinitely more than she +has already done, incredible as that seems. She will not only have +convinced this world that the greatest triumph of human genius is of +Anglo-Saxon origin, but she will carry to other worlds than this the +truth which this world will have learnt before the nineteenth century +ends.</p> + +<p>"England in the person of Lord Redgrave, and America in the person of +his Countess, leave this world to-night to tell the other worlds of our +system, if haply they may find some intelligible means of communication, +what this world, good and bad, is like. And it is within the bounds of +possibility that in doing so they may inaugurate a wider fellowship of +created beings than the limits of this world permit; a fellowship, a +friendship, and, as the <i>Astronef</i> entitles us to believe, even a +physical communication of world with world which, in the dawn of the +twentieth century, may transcend in sober fact the wildest dreams of all +the philanthropists and the philosophers who have sought to educate +humanity from Socrates to Herbert Spencer."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h2> + + +<p>After the <i>Astronef's</i> forward searchlight had flashed its farewells to +the thronging, cheering crowds of Washington, her propellers began to +whirl, and she swung round northward on her way to say goodbye to the +Empire City.</p> + +<p>A little before midnight her two lights flashed down over New York and +Brooklyn, and were almost instantly answered by hundreds of electric +beams streaming up from different parts of the Twin Cities, and from +several men-of-war lying in the bay and the river.</p> + +<p>"Goodbye for the present! Have you any messages for Mars?" flickered out +from above the <i>Astronef's</i> conning-tower.</p> + +<p>What Uncle Sam's message was, if he had one, was never deciphered, for +fifty beams began dotting and dashing at once, and the result was that +nothing but a blur of many mingled rays reached the conning-tower from +which Lord Redgrave and his bride were taking their last look at human +habitations.</p> + +<p>"You might have known that they would all answer at once," said Zaidie. +"I suppose the newspapers, of course, want interviews with the leading +Martians, and the others want to know what there is to be done in the +way of trade. Anyhow, it would be a feather in Uncle Sam's cap if he +made the first Reciprocity Treaty with another world."</p> + +<p>"And then proceeded to corner the commerce of the Solar System," laughed +Redgrave. "Well, we'll see what can be done. Although I think, as an +Englishman, I ought to look after the Open Door."</p> + +<p>"So that the Germans could get in before you, eh? That's just like you +dear, good-natured English. But look," she went on, pointing downwards, +"they're signalling again, all at once this time."</p> + +<p>Half a dozen beams shone out together from the principal newspaper +offices of New York. Then simultaneously they began the dotting and +dashing again. Redgrave took them down in pencil, and when the +signalling had stopped he read off:</p> + +<p>"No war. Dual Alliance climbs down. Don't like idea of <i>Astronef</i>. +Cables just received. Goodbye, and good luck! Come back soon, and safe!"</p> + +<p>"What? We have stopped the war!" exclaimed Zaidie, clasping his arm. +"Well, thank God for that. How could we begin our voyage better? You +remember what we were saying the other day, Lenox. If that's only true, +my father somewhere knows now what a blessing he has given his brother +men! We've stopped a war which might have deluged the world in blood. +We've saved perhaps hundreds of thousands of lives, and kept sorrow from +thousands of homes. Lenox, when we get back, you and the States and the +British Government will have to build a fleet of these ships, and then +the Anglo-Saxon race must say to the rest of the world——"</p> + +<p>"The millennium has come and its presiding goddess is Zaidie Redgrave. +If you don't stop fighting, disband your armies and turn your fleets +into liners and cargo boats, she'll proceed to sink your ships and +decimate your armies until you learn sense. Is that what you mean, +dear?" laughed Redgrave, as he slipped his left hand round her waist and +laid his right on the searchlight-switch to reply to the message.</p> + +<p>"Don't be ridiculous, Lenox. Still, I suppose that is something like it. +They wouldn't deserve anything else if they were fools enough to go on +fighting after they knew we could wipe them out."</p> + +<p>"Exactly. I perfectly agree with your Ladyship, but still sufficient +unto the day is the Armageddon thereof. Now I suppose we'd better say +goodbye and be off."</p> + +<p>"And what a goodbye," whispered Zaidie, with an upward glance into the +starlit ocean of Space which lay above and around them. "Goodbye to the +world itself! Well, say it, Lenox, and let us go; I want to see what the +others are like."</p> + +<p>"Very well then; goodbye it is," he said, beginning to jerk the switch +backwards and forwards with irregular motions, sending short flashes and +longer beams down towards the earth.</p> + +<p>The Empire City read the farewell message.</p> + +<p>"Thank God for the peace. Goodbye for the present. We shall convey the +joint compliments of John Bull and Uncle Sam to the peoples of the +planets when we find them. <i>Au revoir!</i>"</p> + +<p>The message was answered by the blaze of the concentrated searchlights +from land and sea all directed on the <i>Astronef</i>. For a moment her +shining shape glittered like a speck of diamond in the midst of the +luminous haze far up in the sky, and then it vanished for many an +anxious day from mortal sight.</p> + +<p>A few moments later Zaidie pointed over the stern and said:</p> + +<p>"Look, there's the moon! Just fancy—our first stopping place! Well, it +doesn't look so very far off at present."</p> + +<p>Redgrave turned and saw the pale yellow crescent of the new moon +swimming high above the eastern edge of the Atlantic Ocean.</p> + +<p>"It almost looks as if we could steer straight to it right over the +water—only, of course, it wouldn't wait there for us," she went on.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it'll be there when we want it, never fear," he laughed, "and, +after all, it's only a mere matter of about two hundred and forty +thousand miles away, and what's that in a trip that will cover hundreds +of millions? It will just be a sort of jumping-off place into Space for +us."</p> + +<p>"Still, I shouldn't like to miss seeing it," she said. "I want to see +what there is on that other side which nobody has ever seen yet, and +settle that question about air and water. Won't it just be heavenly to +be able to come back and tell them all about it at home? But just fancy +me talking stuff like this when we are going, perhaps, to solve some of +the hidden mysteries of Creation, and, may be, look upon things that +human eyes were never meant to see," she went on, with a sudden change +in her voice.</p> + +<p>He felt a little shiver in the arm that was resting upon his, and his +hand went down and caught hers.</p> + +<p>"Well, we shall see a good many marvels, and, perhaps, miracles, before +we come back, but why should there be anything in Creation that the eyes +of created beings should not look upon? Anyhow, there's one thing we +shall do I hope, we shall solve once and for all the great problem of +the worlds.</p> + +<p>"Look, for instance," he went on, turning round and pointing to the +west, "there is Venus following the sun. In a few days I hope you and I +will be standing on her surface, perhaps trying to talk by signs with +her inhabitants, and taking photographs of her scenery. There's Mars +too, that little red one up yonder. Before we come back we shall have +settled a good many problems about him, too. We shall have navigated the +rings of Saturn, and perhaps graphed them from his surface. We shall +have crossed the bands of Jupiter, and found out whether they are clouds +or not; perhaps we shall have landed on one of his moons and taken a +voyage round him.</p> + +<p>"Still, that's not the question just now, and if you are in a hurry to +circumnavigate the moon we'd better begin to get a wriggle on us as they +say down yonder; so come below and we'll shut up. A bit later I'll show +you something that no human eyes have ever seen."</p> + +<p>"What's that?" she asked as they turned away towards the companion +ladder.</p> + +<p>"I won't spoil it by telling you," he said, stopping at the top of the +stairs and taking her by the shoulders. "By the way," he went on, "I may +remind your Ladyship that you are just now drawing the last breaths of +earthly air which you will taste for some time, in fact until we get +back. And you may as well take your last look at earth as earth, for the +next time you see it it will be a planet."</p> + +<p>She turned to the open window and looked over into the enormous void +beneath, for all this time the <i>Astronef</i> had been mounting swiftly +towards the zenith.</p> + +<p>She could see, by the growing moonlight, vast, vague shapes of land and +sea. The myriad lights of New York and Brooklyn were mingled in a tiny +patch of dimly luminous haze. The air about her had suddenly grown +bitterly cold, and she saw that the stars and planets were shining with +a brilliancy she had never seen before. Redgrave came back to her, and +laying his arm across her shoulder, said:</p> + +<p>"Well, have you said goodbye to your native world? It is a bit solemn, +isn't it, saying goodbye to a world that you have been born on; which +contains everything that has made up your life, everything that is dear +to you?"</p> + +<p>"Not quite everything," she said, looking up at him—"at least I don't +think so."</p> + +<p>He lost no time in making the only reply which was appropriate under the +circumstances; and then he said, drawing her close to him:</p> + +<p>"Nor I, as <i>you</i> know, darling. This is our world, a world travelling +among worlds, and since I have been able to bring the most delightful of +the daughters of Terra with me, I, at any rate, am perfectly happy. Now, +I think it's getting on to supper time, so if your Ladyship will go to +your household duties, I'll have a look at my engines and make +everything snug for the voyage."</p> + +<p>The first thing he did when he left the conning-tower was to +hermetically close every external opening in the ship. Then he went and +carefully inspected the apparatus for purifying the air and supplying it +with fresh oxygen from the tanks in which it was stored in liquid form. +Lastly he descended into the lower hold and turned on the energy of +repulsion to its fullest extent, at the same time stopping the engines +which had been working the propellers.</p> + +<p>It was now no longer necessary or even possible to steer the <i>Astronef</i>. +She was directed solely by the repulsive force which would carry her +with ever-increasing swiftness, as the attraction of the earth +diminished, towards that neutral point at which the attraction of the +earth is exactly balanced by the moon. Her momentum would carry her past +this point, and then the "R. Force" would be gradually brought into play +in order to avert the unpleasant consequences of a fall of some forty +odd thousand miles.</p> + +<p>Andrew Murgatroyd, relieved from his duties in the wheel-house, made a +careful inspection of the auxiliary machinery, which was under his +special charge, and then retired to his quarters in the after end of the +vessel to prepare his own evening meal.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, her Ladyship, with the help of the ingenious contrivances +with which the kitchen of the <i>Astronef</i> was stocked, had prepared a +dainty little <i>souper à deux</i>. Her husband opened a bottle of the finest +champagne that the cellars of Smeaton could supply, to drink to the +prosperity of the voyage, and the health of his beautiful +fellow-voyager. When he had filled the two tall glasses the wine began +to run over the side which was toward the stern of the vessel. They took +no notice of this at first, but when Zaidie put her glass down she +stared at it for a moment, and said, in a half-frightened voice:</p> + +<p>"Why, what's the matter, Lenox? look at the wine! It won't keep +straight, and yet the table's perfectly level—and see! the water in the +jug looks as though it were going to run up the side."</p> + +<p>Redgrave took up the glass and held it balanced in his hand. When he had +got the surface of the wine level the glass was no longer perpendicular +to the table.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I see what it is," he said, taking another sip and putting the +glass down. "You notice that, although the wine isn't lying straight in +the glass, it isn't moving about. It's just as still as it would be on +earth. That means that our centre of gravity is not exactly in line with +the centre of the earth. We haven't quite swung into our proper +position, and that reminds me, dear. You will have to be prepared for +some rather curious experiences in that way. For instance, just see if +that jug of water is as heavy as it ought to be."</p> + +<p>She took hold of the handle, and exerting, as she thought, just enough +force to lift the jug a few inches, was astonished to find herself +holding it out at arm's length with scarcely any effort. She put it down +again very carefully as though she were afraid it would go floating off +the table, and said, looking rather scared:</p> + +<p>"That's very strange, but I suppose it's all perfectly natural?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly; it merely means that we have left Mother Earth a good long +way behind us."</p> + +<p>"How far?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"I can't tell you exactly," he replied, "until I go to the +instrument-room and take the angles, but I should say roughly about +seventy thousand miles. When we've finished we'll go and have coffee on +the upper deck, and then we shall see something of the glories of Space +as no human eyes have ever seen them before."</p> + +<p>"Seventy thousand miles away from home already, and we only started a +couple of hours ago!" Zaidie found the idea a trifle terrifying, and +finished her meal almost in silence. When she got up she was not a +little disconcerted when the effort she made not only took her off her +chair but off her feet as well. She rose into the air nearly to the +surface of the table.</p> + +<p>"Sakes!" she said, "this is getting quite a little embarrassing; I shall +be hitting my head against the roof next."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you'll soon get used to it," he laughed, pulling her down on to her +feet by the skirt of her dress; "always remember to exert very little +strength in everything you do, and don't forget to do everything very +slowly."</p> + +<p>When the coffee was made he carried the apparatus up into the +deck-chamber. Then he came back and said:</p> + +<p>"You'd better wrap yourself up warmly. It's a good deal colder up there +than it is here."</p> + +<p>When she reached the deck and took a first glance about her, Zaidie +seemed suddenly to lapse into a state of somnambulism.</p> + +<p>The whole heavens above and around were strewn with thick clusters of +stars which she had never seen before. The stars she remembered seeing +from the earth were only pin-points in the darkness compared with the +myriads of blazing orbs which were now shooting their rays across the +black void of Space.</p> + +<p>So many millions of new ones had come into view, that she looked in vain +for the familiar constellations. She saw only vast clusters of living +gems of every colour crowding the heavens on every side of her.</p> + +<p>She walked slowly round the deck, gazing to right and left and above, +incapable for the moment either of thought or speech, but only of dumb +wonder, mingled with a dim sense of overwhelming awe. Presently she +craned her neck backwards and looked straight up to the zenith. A huge +silver crescent, supporting, as it were, a dim greenish-coloured body in +its arms, stretched overhead across nearly a sixth of the heavens.</p> + +<p>Then Redgrave came to her side, took her in his arms, lifted her as if +she had been a little child, and laid her in a long, low deck-chair, so +that she could look at it without inconvenience.</p> + +<p>The splendid crescent seemed to be growing visibly bigger, and as she +lay there in a trance of wonder and admiration she saw point after point +of dazzling white light flash out in the dark portions, and then begin +to send out rays as though they were gigantic volcanoes in full +eruption, and were pouring torrents of living fire from their blazing +craters.</p> + +<p>"Sunrise on the Moon!" said Redgrave, who had stretched himself on +another chair beside her. "A glorious sight, isn't it? But nothing to +what we shall see to-morrow morning—only there doesn't happen to be any +morning just about here."</p> + +<p>"Yes," she said dreamily, "glorious, isn't it? That and all the +stars—but I can't think anything yet, Lenox, it's all too mighty and +too marvellous. It doesn't seem as though human eyes were meant to look +upon things like this. But where's the earth? We must be able to see +that still."</p> + +<p>"Not from here," he said, "because it's underneath us. Come below now, +and you shall see what I promised you."</p> + +<p>They went down into the lower part of the vessel and to the after end +behind the engine-room. Redgrave switched on a couple of electric +lights, and then pulled a lever attached to one of the side-walls. A +part of the flooring about six feet square slid noiselessly away; then +he pulled another lever on the opposite side and a similar piece +disappeared, leaving a large space covered only by a thick plate of +absolutely transparent glass. He switched off the lights again and led +her to the edge of it, and said:</p> + +<p>"There is your native world, dear. That is your Mother Earth."</p> + +<p>Wonderful as the moon had seemed, the gorgeous spectacle which lay +seemingly at her feet was infinitely more magnificent. A vast disc of +silver grey, streaked and dotted with lines and points of dazzling +lights, and more than half covered with vast, glimmering, greyish-green +expanses, seemed to form the floor of the tremendous gulf beneath them. +They were not yet too far away to make out the general features of the +continents and oceans, and fortunately the hemisphere presented to them +happened to be singularly free from clouds.</p> + +<p>To the right spread out the majestic outlines of the continents of North +and South America, and to the left Asia, the Malay Archipelago, and +Australia. At the top was a vast, roughly circular area of dazzling +whiteness, and Redgrave, pointing to this, said:</p> + +<p>"There, look up a little further north than the middle of that white +patch, and you'll see what no eyes but yours and mine have ever +seen—the North Pole! When we come back we shall see the South Pole, +because we shall approach the earth from the other end, as it were.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you recognise a good deal of the picture. All that bright +part up to the north, with the black spots on it, is Canada. The black +spots are forests. That long white line to the left is the Rockies. You +see they're all bright at the north, and as you go south you only see a +few bright dots. Those are the snow-peaks.</p> + +<p>"Those long thin white lines in South America are the tops of the Andes, +and the big, dark patches to the right of them are the forests and +plains of Brazil and the Argentine. Not a bad way of studying geography, +is it? If we stopped here long enough we should see the whole earth spin +right round under us, but we haven't time for that. We shall be in the +moon before it's morning in New York, but we shall probably get a +glimpse of Europe to-morrow."</p> + +<p>Zaidie stood gazing for nearly an hour at this marvellous vision of the +home-world which she had left so far behind her before she could tear +herself away and allow her husband to shut the slides again. The greatly +diminished weight of her body destroyed the fatigue of standing almost +entirely. In fact, on board the <i>Astronef</i> just then it was almost as +easy to stand as it was to lie down.</p> + +<p>There was of course very little sleep for the travellers on this first +night of their wonderful voyage, but towards the sixth hour after +leaving the earth, Zaidie, overcome as much by the emotions which had +been awakened within her as by physical fatigue, went to bed, after +making her husband promise that he would wake her in good time to see +the descent upon the moon. Two hours later she was awake and drinking +the coffee which he had prepared for her. Then she went on to the upper +deck.</p> + +<p>To her astonishment she found, on one hand, day more brilliant than she +had ever seen it before, and on the other hand darkness blacker than the +blackest earthly night. On the right was an intensely brilliant orb, +about half as large again as the full moon seen from the earth, shining +with inconceivable brightness out of a sky black as midnight and +thronged with stars. It was the Sun; the Sun shining in the midst of +airless Space.</p> + +<p>The tiny atmosphere enclosed in the glass-domed deck-space was lighted +brilliantly, but it was not perceptibly warmer, though Redgrave warned +her not to touch anything upon which the sun's rays fell directly, as +she might find it uncomfortably hot. On the other side was the same +black immensity which she had seen the night before, an ocean of +darkness clustered with islands of light. High above in the zenith +floated the great silver-grey disc of earth, a good deal smaller now. +But there was another object beneath them which was at present of far +more interest to her.</p> + +<p>Looking down to the left, she saw a vast semi-luminous area in which not +a star was to be seen. It was the earth-lit portion of the long familiar +and yet mysterious orb which was to be their resting place for the next +few hours.</p> + +<p>"The sun hasn't risen over there yet," said Redgrave, as she was peering +down into the void. "It's earth-light still. Now look at the other +side."</p> + +<p>She crossed the deck, and saw the strangest scene she had yet beheld. +Apparently only a few miles below her was a huge crescent-shaped plain +arching away for hundreds of miles on either side. The outer edge had a +ragged look, and little excrescences, which soon took the shape of +flat-topped mountains, projected from it and stood out bright and sharp +against the black void beneath, out of which the stars shone up, as it +seemed, a few feet beyond the edge of the disc.</p> + +<p>The plain itself was a scene of awful and utter desolation. Huge +mountain-walls, towering to immense heights and enclosing great circular +and oval plains, one side of them blazing with intolerable light, and +the other side black with impenetrable obscurity; enormous valleys +reaching down from brilliant day into rayless night—perhaps down into +the very bowels of the dead world itself; vast grey-white plains lying +round the mountains, crossed by little ridges and by long black lines, +which could only be immense fissures with perpendicular sides—but all +hard, grey-white and black, all intolerable brightness or inky gloom; +not a sign of life anywhere; no shady forests, no green fields, no +broad, glittering oceans; only a ghastly wilderness of dead mountains +and dead plains.</p> + +<p>"What an awful place," Zaidie whispered. "Surely we can't land there. +How far are we from it?"</p> + +<p>"About fifteen hundred miles," replied Redgrave, who was sweeping the +scene below him with one of the two powerful telescopes which stood on +the deck. "No, it doesn't look very cheerful, does it? But it's a +marvellous sight for all that, and one that a good many people on earth +would give one of their eyes to see from here. I'm letting her drop +pretty fast, and we shall probably land in a couple of hours or so. +Meanwhile you may as well get out your moon atlas, and study your +lunography. I'm going to turn the power a bit astern so that we shall go +down obliquely, and see more of the lighted disc. We started at new moon +so that you should have a look at the full earth, and also so that we +could get round to the invisible side while it is lighted up."</p> + +<p>They both went below, he to deflect the repulsive force so that one set +of engines should give them a somewhat oblique direction, while the +other, acting directly on the surface of the moon, simply retarded their +fall; and she to get out her maps.</p> + +<p>When they got back the <i>Astronef</i> had changed her apparent position, +and, instead of falling directly on to the moon, was descending towards +it in a slanting direction. The result of this was that the sunlit +crescent rapidly grew in breadth. Peak after peak and range after range +rose up swiftly out of the black gulf beyond. The sun climbed quickly up +through the star-strewn, mid-day heavens, and the full earth sank more +swiftly still behind them.</p> + +<p>Another hour of silent, entranced wonder and admiration followed, and +then Redgrave said:</p> + +<p>"Don't you think it's about time we were beginning to think of +breakfast, dear—or do you think you can wait till we land?"</p> + +<p>"Breakfast on the moon!" she exclaimed. "That would be just too lovely +for words—of course we'll wait!"</p> + +<p>"Very well," he said; "you see that big black ring nearly below +us?—that, as I suppose you know, is the celebrated Mount Tycho. I'll +try and find a convenient spot on the top of the ring to drop on, and +then you will be able to survey the scenery from seventeen or eighteen +thousand feet above the plains."</p> + +<p>About two hours later a slight, jarring tremor ran through the frame of +the vessel, and the first stage of the voyage was ended. After a passage +of less than twelve hours the <i>Astronef</i> had crossed a gulf of nearly +two hundred and fifty thousand miles, and rested on the untrodden +surface of the lunar world.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</h2> + + +<p>"Well, Madame, we've arrived. This is the moon and there is the earth. +To put it into plain figures, you are now two hundred and forty thousand +odd miles away from home. I think you said you would like breakfast on +the surface of the World that Has Been, and so, as it's about eleven +o'clock earth-time, we'll call it a <i>déjeuner</i>, and then we'll go and +see what this poor old skeleton of a world is like."</p> + +<p>"Oh, then we shan't actually have breakfast on the moon?"</p> + +<p>"My dear child, of course you will. Isn't the <i>Astronef</i> resting +now—right now as they say in some parts of the States—on the top of +the crater wall of Tycho? Aren't we really and actually on the surface +of the moon? Just look at this frightful black and white, god-forsaken +landscape! Isn't it like everything that you've ever learnt about the +moon? Nothing but light and shade, black and white, peaks of mountains +blazing in sunlight, and valleys underneath them as black as the hinges +of——"</p> + +<p>"Tophet," said Zaidie, interrupting him quickly. "Yes, I see what you +mean. So we'll have our <i>déjeuner</i> here, breathing our own nice +atmosphere, and eating and drinking what was grown on the soil of dear +old Mother Earth. It's a wee bit paralysing to think of, isn't it, dear? +Two hundred and forty thousand miles across the gulf of Space—and we +sitting here at our breakfast table just as comfortable as though we +were in the Cecil in London, or the Waldorf-Astoria in New York!"</p> + +<p>"There's nothing much in that, I mean as regards distance. You see, +before we've finished we shall probably, at least I hope we shall, be +eating a breakfast or a dinner together a thousand million miles or more +from New York or London. Your Ladyship must remember that this is only +the first stage on the journey, the jumping-off place as you called it. +You see the distance from Washington to New York is—well, it isn't even +a hop, skip and a jump in comparison with——"</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I see what you mean of course, and so I suppose I had better +cut off or short-circuit such sympathies with Mother Earth as are not +connected with your noble self, and get breakfast ready. How's that?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said Lord Redgrave, looking at her as she rose from the table, +"I think our honeymoon in Space is young enough yet to make it possible +for me to say that your Ladyship's opinion is exactly right."</p> + +<p>"That's a hopeless commonplace! Really, Lenox, I thought you were +capable of something better than that."</p> + +<p>"My dear Zaidie, it has been my fate to have many friends who have had +honeymoons on earth, and some of their experience seems to be that the +man who contradicts his wife during the first six weeks of matrimony +simply makes an ass of himself. He offends her and makes himself +unhappy, and it sometimes takes six months or more to get back to +bearings."</p> + +<p>"What a lot of silly men and women you must have known, Lenox. Is that +the way Englishmen start marriage in England? If it is, I don't wonder +at Englishmen coming across the Atlantic in liners and air-ships and so +on to get American wives. I guess you can't understand your own +womenfolk."</p> + +<p>"Or perhaps they don't understand us; but anyhow, I don't think I've +made any great mistake."</p> + +<p>"No, I don't think you have. Of course if I thought so I wouldn't be +here now. But this is very well for a breakfast talk; all the same, I +should like to know how we are going to take the promenade you promised +me on the surface of the moon?"</p> + +<p>"Your Ladyship has only to finish her breakfast, and then everything +shall be made plain to her, even the deepest craters of the mountains of +the moon."</p> + +<p>"Very well, then, I will eat swiftly and in obedience; and meanwhile, as +your Lordship seems to have finished, perhaps——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I will go and see to the mechanical necessities," said Redgrave, +swallowing his last cup of coffee, and getting up. "If you'll come down +to the lower deck when you've finished, I'll have your breathing-suit +ready for you, and then we'll go into the air-chamber."</p> + +<p>"Thanks, dear, yes," she said, putting out her hand to him as he left +the table, "the ante-chamber to other worlds. Isn't it just lovely? +Fancy me being able to leave one world and land on another, and have you +to say just those few words which make it all possible. I wonder what +all the girls of all the civilised countries of earth would give just to +be me right now."</p> + +<p>"They could none of them give what you gave me, Zaidie, because you see +from my point of view there's only one Zaidie in the world—or as +perhaps I ought to say just now, in the Solar System."</p> + +<p>"Very prettily said, sir!" she laughed, when she had given him his due +reward for his courtly speech. "I am too dazed with all these wonders +about me to——"</p> + +<p>"To reply to it? You've given me the most convincing reply possible. Now +finish your breakfast, and I'll tell you when the breathing-dresses and +the air-chamber are ready. By the way, don't forget your cameras. It's +quite possible we may find something worth taking pictures of, and you +needn't trouble much about the weight. You know, you and I and all that +we carry will only weigh about a sixth of what we did on the earth."</p> + +<p>"Very well, then, I'll take the whole-plate apparatus as well as the +kodak and the panorama camera. When I'm ready, Murgatroyd will tell you +to come down."</p> + +<p>"But isn't he coming with us too?"</p> + +<p>"My dear girl, if I were to ask Murgatroyd to leave the <i>Astronef</i> +there'd be a mutiny on board—a mutiny of one against one. No, he's left +his native world; but he says he's done it in a ship that's made with +British steel out of English iron mines, smelted, forged and fashioned +in English works, and so to him it's a bit of England, however far away +from Mother Earth it may be; and if you ever see Andrew Murgatroyd's big +head and good, ungainly body outside the <i>Astronef</i> in any of the +worlds, dead or alive, that we're going to visit—well, when we get back +to Mother Earth you may ask me——"</p> + +<p>"I don't think I'll have to ask you for anything, Lenox. I believe if I +wanted anything you'd know before I did, so go away and get those +breathing-dresses ready. I didn't come to the moon to talk commonplaces +with a husband I've been married to for nearly three days."</p> + +<p>"Is it really as long as that?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't be ridiculous, even if you are beyond the limits of earthly +conventionalities. Anyhow, I've been married long enough to want my own +way, and just now I want a promenade on the moon."</p> + +<p>"The will of her Ladyship is a law unto her servant, and that which she +hath said shall be done! If you come down on to the lower deck in ten +minutes everything shall be ready."</p> + +<p>With this he disappeared down the companion-way.</p> + +<p>About five minutes afterwards Andrew Murgatroyd showed his grizzled, +long-bearded face with its high forehead, heavy brows, and broad-set +eyes, long nose and shaven upper lip, just above the stairway and said, +for all the world as though he might have been giving out the number of +the hymn in his beloved Ebenezer at Smeaton:</p> + +<p>"If it pleases yer Ladyship, his Lordship is ready, and if you'll please +come down I'll show you the way."</p> + +<p>"Oh, thank you, Mr. Murgatroyd!" said Zaidie, getting up and going +towards the companion-way; "but I'm afraid you don't think that—I mean +you don't seem to take very much interest——"</p> + +<p>"If your Ladyship will pardon me," said the old man, standing aside to +let her go down, "it is not my business to think on board his Lordship's +vessel. I am his servant, and my fathers have been his fathers' servants +for more years than I'd like to count. If it wasn't that way I wouldn't +be here. Will your Ladyship please to come down?"</p> + +<p>Zaidie bowed her beautiful head in recognition of this ages-old +devotion, and said as she passed him, more sweetly than he had ever +heard human lips speak:</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Mr. Murgatroyd. You've taught me something in those few +words that we have no knowledge of in the States. Good service is as +honourable as good mastership. Thank you."</p> + +<p>Murgatroyd put up his lower lip and half smiled with his upper, for he +was not yet quite sure of this radiant beauty, who, according to his +ideas, should have been English and wasn't. Then, with a rather clumsy +and yet eloquent gesture, he showed her the way down to the air-chamber.</p> + +<p>She nodded to him with a smile as she passed in through the air-tight +door, and when she heard the levers swing to and the bolts shoot into +their places she felt as though, for the time being, she had said +goodbye to a friend.</p> + +<p>Her husband was waiting for her almost fully clad in his +breathing-dress. He had hers all ready to put on, and when the necessary +changes and investments had been made, Zaidie found herself clad in a +costume which was not by any means unlike the diving-dresses of common +use, save that they were very much lighter in construction.</p> + +<p>The helmets were smaller, and not having to withstand outside pressure +they were made of welded aluminum, lined thickly with asbestos, not to +keep the cold out, but the heat in. On the back of the dress there was a +square case, looking like a knapsack, containing the expanding +apparatus, which would furnish breathable air for an almost unlimited +time as long as the liquefied air from a cylinder hung below it passed +through the cells in which the breathed air had been deprived of its +carbonic acid gas and other noxious ingredients.</p> + +<p>The pressure of air inside the helmet automatically regulated the +supply, which was not permitted to circulate through the other portions +of the dress. The reasons for this precaution were very simple. Granted +the absence of atmosphere on the moon, any air in the dress, which was +woven of a cunning compound of silk and asbestos, would instantly expand +with irresistible force, burst the covering, and expose the limbs of the +explorers to a cold which would be infinitely more destructive than the +hottest of earthly fires. It would wither them to nothing in a moment.</p> + +<p>A human hand or foot—we won't say anything about faces—exposed to the +summer or winter temperature of the moon—that is to say, to its +sunlight and its darkness—would be shrivelled into dry bone in a +moment, and therefore Lord Redgrave, foreseeing this, had provided the +breathing-dresses. Lastly, the two helmets were connected, for purposes +of conversation, by a light wire, the two ends of which were connected +with a little telephonic receiver and transmitter inside each of the +head-dresses.</p> + +<p>"Well, now I think we're ready," said Redgrave, putting his hand on the +lever which opened the outer door.</p> + +<p>His voice sounded a little queer and squeaky over the wire, and for the +matter of that so did Zaidie's as she replied:</p> + +<p>"Yes, I'm ready, I think. I hope these things will work all right."</p> + +<p>"You may be quite sure that I shouldn't have put <i>you</i> into one of them +if I hadn't tested them pretty thoroughly," he replied, swinging the +door open and throwing out a light folding iron ladder which was hinged +to the floor.</p> + +<p>They were in the shade cast by the hull of the <i>Astronef</i>. For about ten +yards in front of her Zaidie saw a dense black shadow, and beyond it a +stretch of grey-white sand lit up by a glare of sunlight which would +have been intolerable if it had not been for the smoke-coloured slips of +glass which had been fitted behind the glass visors of the helmets.</p> + +<p>Over it were thickly scattered boulders and pieces of rock bleached and +desiccated, and each throwing a black shadow, fantastically shaped and +yet clearly defined on the grey-white sand behind it. There was no soil, +and all the softer kind of rock and stone had crumbled away ages ago. +Every particle of moisture had long since evaporated; even chemical +combinations had been dissolved by the alternations of heat and cold +known only on earth to the chemist in his laboratory.</p> + +<p>Only the hardest rocks, such as granites and basalts, remained. +Everything else had been reduced to the universal grey-white impalpable +powder into which Zaidie's shoes sank when she, holding her husband's +hand, went down the ladder and stood at the foot of it—first of the +earth-dwellers to set foot on another world.</p> + +<p>Redgrave followed her with a little spring from the centre of the ladder +which landed him with strange gentleness beside her. He took both her +gloved hands and pressed them hard in his. He would have kissed his +welcome to the World that Had Been if he could, but that of course was +out of the question, and so he had to be content with telling her that +he wanted to.</p> + +<p>Then, hand in hand, they crossed the little plateau towards the edge of +the tremendous gulf, fifty-four miles across and nearly twenty thousand +feet deep, which forms the crater of Tycho. In the middle of it rose a +conical mountain about five thousand feet high, the summit of which was +just beginning to catch the solar rays. Half of the vast plain was +already brilliantly illuminated, but round the central cone was a +semicircle of shadow of impenetrable blackness.</p> + +<p>"Day and night in this same valley, actually side by side!" said Zaidie. +Then she stopped and pointed down into the brightly lit distance, and +went on hurriedly, "Look, Lenox; look at the foot of the mountain there! +Doesn't that seem like the ruins of a city?"</p> + +<p>"It does," he said, "and there's no reason why it shouldn't be. I've +always thought that, as the air and water disappeared from the upper +parts of the moon, the inhabitants, whoever they were, must have been +driven down into the deeper parts. Shall we go down and see?"</p> + +<p>"But how?" she said.</p> + +<p>He pointed towards the <i>Astronef</i>. She nodded her helmeted head, and +they went back towards the vessel.</p> + +<p>A few minutes later the Space-Navigator had risen from her resting-place +with an impetus which rapidly carried her over half of the vast crater, +and then she began to drop slowly into the depths. She grounded gently, +and presently they were standing on the ground about a mile from the +central cone. This time, however, Redgrave had taken the precaution to +bring a magazine rifle and a couple of revolvers with him in case any +strange monsters, relics of the vanished fauna of the moon, might still +be taking refuge in these mysterious depths. Zaidie, although like a +good many American girls she could shoot excellently well, carried no +weapon more offensive than the photographic apparatus aforesaid.</p> + +<p>The first thing that Redgrave did when they stepped out on to the sandy +surface of the plain was to stoop down and strike a wax match. There was +a tiny glimmer of light, which was immediately extinguished.</p> + +<p>"No air here," he said, "so we shall find no living beings—at any rate, +none like ourselves."</p> + +<p>They found the walking exceedingly easy, although their boots were +purposely weighted in order to counteract, to some extent, the great +difference in gravity. A few minutes brought them to the outskirts of +the city. It had no walls and exhibited no signs of any devices for +defence. Its streets were broad and well-paved, and the houses, built of +great blocks of grey stone joined together with white cement, looked as +fresh and unworn as though they had only been built a few months, +whereas they had probably stood for hundreds of thousands of years. They +were flat-roofed, all of one storey and practically of one type.</p> + +<p>There were very few public buildings, and absolutely no attempt at +ornamentation was visible. Round some of the houses were spaces which +might once have been gardens. In the midst of the city, which appeared +to cover an area of about four square miles, was an enormous square +paved with flag-stones, which were covered to the depth of a couple of +inches with a light grey dust, which, as they walked across it, remained +perfectly still save for the disturbance caused by their footsteps. +There was no air to support it, otherwise it might have risen in clouds +about them.</p> + +<p>From the centre of this square rose a huge pyramid nearly a thousand +feet in height, the sole building of the great silent city which +appeared to have been raised most probably as a temple by the hands of +its long-dead inhabitants.</p> + +<p>When they got nearer they saw a white fringe round the steps by which it +was approached, and they soon found that this fringe was composed of +millions of white-bleached bones and skulls, shaped very much like those +of terrestrial men, save that they were very much larger, and that the +ribs were out of all proportion to the rest of the skeleton.</p> + +<p>They stopped awe-stricken before this strange spectacle. Redgrave +stooped down and took hold of one of the bones, a huge femur. It broke +in two as he tried to lift it, and the piece which remained in his hand +crumbled instantly to white powder.</p> + +<p>"Whoever they were," he said, "they were giants. When air and water +failed above, they came down here by some means and built this city. You +see what enormous chests they must have had. That would be Nature's last +struggle to enable them to breathe the diminishing atmosphere. These, of +course, were the last descendants of the fittest to breathe it; this was +their temple, I suppose, and here they came to die—I wonder how many +thousand years ago—perishing of heat, and cold, and hunger, and thirst; +the last tragedy of a race, which, after all, must have been something +like ourselves."</p> + +<p>"It's just too awful for words," said Zaidie. "Shall we go into the +temple? That seems one of the entrances up there, only I don't like +walking over all those bones."</p> + +<p>"I don't suppose they'll mind if we do," replied Redgrave, "only we +mustn't go far in. It may be full of cross passages and mazes, and we +might never get out. Our lamps won't be much use in there, you know, for +there's no air. They'll just be points of light, and we shan't see +anything but them. It's very aggravating, but I'm afraid there's no help +for it. Come along."</p> + +<p>They ascended the steps, crushing the bones and skulls to powder beneath +their feet, and entered the huge, square doorway, which looked like a +rectangle of blackness against the grey-white of the wall. Even through +their asbestos-woven clothing they felt a sudden shock of icy cold. In +those few steps they had passed from a temperature of tenfold summer +heat into one below that of the coldest spots on earth. They turned on +the electric lamps which were fitted to the breastplates of their +dresses, but they could see nothing save the thin thread of light +straight in front of them. It did not even spread. It was like a +polished needle on a background of black velvet.</p> + +<p>All about them was darkness impenetrable, and so they reluctantly turned +back to the doorway, leaving all the mysteries which that vast temple of +a long-vanished people might contain to remain mysteries to the end of +time.</p> + +<p>They passed down the steps again and crossed the square, and for the +next half-hour Zaidie was busy taking photographs of the pyramid with +its ghastly surroundings, and a few general views of this strange City +of the Dead.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</h2> + + +<p>When they got back they found Murgatroyd pacing up and down the floor of +the deck-chamber, looking about him with serious eyes, but betraying no +other visible sign of anxiety. The <i>Astronef</i> was at once his home and +his idol, and, as Redgrave had said, even his own direct orders would +hardly have induced him to leave her even in a world in which there was +not a living human being to dispute possession of her.</p> + +<p>When they had resumed their ordinary clothing the <i>Astronef</i> rose from +the surface of the plain, crossed the encircling wall at the height of a +few hundred feet, and made her way at a speed of about fifty miles an +hour towards the regions of the South Pole.</p> + +<p>Behind them to the north-west they could see from their elevation of +nearly thirty thousand feet the vast expanse of the Sea of Clouds. +Dotted here and there were the shining points and ridges of light +marking the peaks and crater-walls which the rays of the rising sun had +already touched. Before them and to the right and left rose a vast maze +of ragged, splintery peaks and huge ramparts of mountain-walls enclosing +plains so far below their summits that the light of neither sun nor +earth ever reached them.</p> + +<p>By directing the force exerted by what might now be called the +propelling part of the engines against the mountain masses which they +crossed to right and left and behind, Redgrave was able to take a zigzag +course that carried them over many of the walled plains which were +wholly or partially lit up by the sun, and in nearly all of the deepest +their telescopes revealed something like what they had found within the +crater of Tycho. At length, pointing to a gigantic circle of white light +fringing an abyss of utter darkness, he said:</p> + +<p>"There is Newton, the greatest mystery of the moon. Those inner walls +are twenty-four thousand feet high; that means that the bottom, which +has never been seen by human eyes, is about five thousand feet below the +surface of the moon. What do you say, dear—shall we go down and see if +the searchlight will show us anything? You know there may be something +like breathable air down there, and perhaps living creatures who can +breathe it."</p> + +<p>"Certainly!" replied Zaidie decisively; "haven't we come to see things +that nobody else has ever seen?"</p> + +<p>Redgrave went down to the engine-room, and presently the <i>Astronef</i> +changed her course, and in a few minutes was hanging with her polished +hull bathed in sunlight, like a star suspended over the unfathomable +gulf of darkness below.</p> + +<p>As they sank below the level of the sun-rays, Murgatroyd turned on both +the searchlights. They dropped down ever slowly and more slowly until +gradually the two long, thin streams of light began to spread themselves +out; the lower they went the more the beams spread out, and by the time +the <i>Astronef</i> came gently to a rest they were swinging round her in +broad fans of diffused light over a dark, marshy surface, with scattered +patches of grey moss and reeds, with dull gleams of stagnant water +showing between them.</p> + +<p>"Air and water at last! I thought so," said Redgrave, as he rejoined her +on the upper deck; "air and water and eternal darkness! Well, we shall +find life on the moon here if anywhere."</p> + +<p>"I suppose we had better put on our breathing-dresses, hadn't we?" asked +Zaidie.</p> + +<p>"Certainly," he replied, "because, although there is some sort of air, +we don't know yet whether we shall be able to breathe it. It may be half +carbon-dioxide for all we know; but a few matches will soon tell us +that."</p> + +<p>Within a quarter of an hour they were again standing on the surface. +Murgatroyd had orders to follow them as far as possible with the head +searchlight, which, in the comparatively rarefied atmosphere, appeared +to have a range of several miles. Redgrave struck a match, and held it +up level with his head; it burnt with a clear, steady, yellow flame.</p> + +<p>"Where a match will burn a man should be able to breathe," he said. "I'm +going to see what lunar air is like."</p> + +<p>"For Heaven's sake be careful, dear," came the reply in pleading tones +across the wire.</p> + +<p>"All right; but don't open your helmet till I tell you."</p> + +<p>He then raised the hermetically closed slide of glass, which formed the +front of the helmets, half an inch or so. Instantly he felt a sensation +like the drawing of a red-hot iron across his skin. He snapped the visor +down and clasped it in its place. For a moment or two he gasped for +breath, and then he said rather faintly:</p> + +<p>"It's no good, it's too cold. It would freeze the blood of a salamander. +I think we'd better go back and explore this place under cover. We can't +do anything in the dark, and we can see just as well from the upper deck +with the searchlights. Besides, as there's air and water here, there's +no telling but there may be inhabitants of sorts such as we shouldn't +care to meet."</p> + +<p>He took her hand, and to Murgatroyd's great relief they went back to the +vessel.</p> + +<p>Redgrave then raised the <i>Astronef</i> a couple of hundred feet and, by +directing the repulsive force against the mountain walls, developed just +sufficient energy to keep them moving at about twelve miles an hour.</p> + +<p>They began to cross the plain with their searchlights flashing out in +all directions. They had scarcely gone a mile before the head-light fell +upon a moving form half walking, half crawling among some stunted +brown-leaved bushes by the side of a broad, stagnant stream.</p> + +<p>"Look!" said Zaidie, clasping his arm, "is that a gorilla, or—no, it +<i>can't</i> be a man."</p> + +<p>The light was turned full upon the object. If it had been covered with +hair it might have passed for some strange type of the ape tribe, but +its skin was smooth and of a livid grey. Its lower limbs were evidently +more powerful than its upper; its chest was enormously developed, but +the stomach was small. The head was big and round and smooth. As they +came nearer they saw that in place of fingernails it had long white +feelers which it kept extended and constantly waving about as it groped +its way towards the water. As the intense light flashed full on it, it +turned its head towards them. It had a nose and a mouth—the nose, long +and thick, with huge mobile nostrils; the mouth forming an angle +something like a fish's lips. Teeth there seemed none. At either side of +the upper part of the nose there were two little sunken holes—in which +this thing's ancestors of countless thousands of years ago had once had +eyes.</p> + +<p>As she looked upon this awful parody of what had once perhaps been a +human face, Zaidie covered hers with her hands and uttered a little moan +of horror.</p> + +<p>"Horrible, isn't it?" said Redgrave. "I suppose that's what the last +remnants of the Lunarians have come to. Evidently once men and women, +something like ourselves. I daresay the ancestors of that thing have +lived here in coldness and darkness for hundreds of generations. It +shows how tremendously tenacious Nature is of life.</p> + +<p>"Ages ago, no doubt, that brute's ancestors lived up yonder when there +were seas and rivers, fields and forests, just as we have them on earth, +among men and women who could see and breathe and enjoy everything in +life and had built up civilisations like ours!</p> + +<p>"Look, it's going to fish or something. Now we shall see what it feeds +on. I wonder why the water isn't frozen. I suppose there must be some +internal heat left still. A few patches with lakes of lava under them. +Perhaps this valley is just over one, and that's why these creatures +have managed to survive.</p> + +<p>"Ah! there's another of them, smaller, not so strongly formed. That +thing's mate, I suppose—female of the species. Ugh! I wonder how many +hundred of thousands of years it will take for <i>our</i> descendants to come +to that."</p> + +<p>"I hope our dear old earth will hit something else and be smashed to +atoms before that happens!" exclaimed Zaidie, whose curiosity had now +partly overcome her horror. "Look, it's trying to catch something!"</p> + +<p>The larger of the two creatures had groped its way to the edge of the +sluggish, oily water and dropped, or rather rolled, quietly into it. It +was evidently cold-blooded, or nearly so, for no warm-blooded animal +would have taken to such water so naturally. Presently the other dropped +in too, and both disappeared for some moments. Then, in the midst of a +violent commotion in the water a few yards away, they rose to the +surface of the water, the larger with a wriggling, eel-like fish between +its jaws.</p> + +<p>They both groped their way towards the edge, and had just reached it and +were pulling themselves out when a hideous shape rose out of the water +behind them. It was like the head of an octopus joined to the body of a +boa-constrictor, but head and neck were both of the same ghastly, livid +grey as the other two creatures. It was evidently blind, too, for it +took no notice of the brilliant glare of the searchlight, but it moved +rapidly towards the two scrambling forms, its long white feelers +trembling out in all directions. Then one of them touched the smaller of +the two shapes. Instantly the rest shot out and closed round it, and +with scarcely a struggle it was dragged beneath the water and vanished.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i114" id="i114"></a> +<img src="images/i114.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3><i>A hideous shape rose out of the water behind them.</i></h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<p>Zaidie uttered a little low scream and covered her face again, and +Redgrave said:</p> + +<p>"The same old brutal law you see, life preying upon life even on a dying +world, a world that is more than half dead itself. Well, I think we've +seen enough of this place. I suppose those are about the only types of +life we should meet anywhere, and I don't want to know much more about +them. I vote we go and see what the invisible hemisphere is like."</p> + +<p>"I have had all I want of this side," said Zaidie, looking away from the +scene of the hideous tragedy, "so the sooner we go, the better I shall +like it."</p> + +<p>A few minutes later the <i>Astronef</i> was again rising towards the stars +with her searchlights still flashing down into the Valley of Expiring +Life, which had seemed to them even worse than the Valley of Death. As +he followed the rays with a pair of powerful field glasses, Redgrave +fancied that he saw huge, dim shapes moving about the stunted shrubbery +and through the slimy pools of the stagnant rivers, and once or twice he +got a glimpse of what might well have been the ruins of towns and +cities, but the gloom soon became too deep and dense for the +searchlights to pierce and he was glad when the <i>Astronef</i> soared up +into the brilliant sunlight once more. Even the ghastly wilderness of +the lunar landscape was welcome after the nameless horrors of that +hideous abyss.</p> + +<p>After a couple of hours' rapid travelling, Redgrave pointed down to a +comparatively small, deep crater, and said:</p> + +<p>"There, that is Malapert. It is almost exactly at the south pole of the +moon, and there," he went on, pointing ahead, "is the horizon of the +hemisphere which no earthborn eyes have ever seen."</p> + +<p>"Except ours," said Zaidie somewhat inconsequently, "and I wonder what +<i>we</i> shall see."</p> + +<p>"Probably something very like what we have seen on this side," replied +Redgrave, and as the event proved, he was right.</p> + +<p>Contrary to many ingenious speculations which have been indulged in by +both scientist and romancer, they found that the hemisphere, which for +countless ages had never been turned towards the earth, was almost an +exact replica of the visible one. Fully three-fourths of it was +brilliantly illuminated by the sun, and what they saw through their +glasses was practically the same as what they had beheld on the +earthward side; huge groups of enormous craters and ringed mountains, +long, irregular chains crowned with sharp, splintery peaks, and between +these vast, deeply depressed areas, ranging in colour from dazzling +white to grey-brown, marking the beds of the vanished lunar seas.</p> + +<p>As they crossed one of these, Redgrave allowed the <i>Astronef</i> to sink to +within a few thousand feet of the surface, and then he and Zaidie swept +it with their telescopes. Their chance search was rewarded by something +they had not seen in the sea-beds of the other hemisphere.</p> + +<p>These depressions were far deeper than the others, evidently many +thousands of feet below the average surface, but the sun's rays were +blazing full into this one, and, dotted round its slopes at varying +elevations, they made out little patches which seemed to differ from the +general surface.</p> + +<p>"I wonder if those are the remains of cities," said Zaidie. "Isn't it +possible that the old peoples of the moon might have built their cities +along the seas just as we do, and that their descendants may have +followed the waters as they retreated, I mean as they either dried up or +disappeared into the centre?"</p> + +<p>"Very probable indeed, dearest of philosophers," he said, picking her up +with one arm and kissing the smiling lips which had just uttered this +most reasonable deduction. "Now we'll go down and see."</p> + +<p>He diminished the vertically repulsive force a little, and the +<i>Astronef</i> dropped slantingly towards the bed of what might once have +been the Pacific of the Moon.</p> + +<p>When they were within about a couple of thousand feet of the surface it +became perfectly plain that Zaidie was correct in her hypothesis. The +vast sea floor was thickly strewn with the ruins of countless cities and +towns, which had been inhabited by an equally countless series of +generations of men and women, who had perhaps lived and loved in the +days when our own world was a glowing mass of molten rock, surrounded by +the envelope of vapours which has since condensed to form our oceans.</p> + +<p>They dropped still lower and ran diagonally across the ocean-bed, and as +they did so Zaidie's proposition was more and more completely confirmed, +for they saw that the towns and cities which stood highest were the most +dilapidated, and that the buildings had evidently been torn and crumbled +away by the action of wind and water, snow and ice.</p> + +<p>The nearer they approached to the central and deepest depression, the +better preserved and the simpler the buildings became, until down in the +lowest depths they found a collection of low-built square edifices, +scarcely better than huts, which had clustered round the little lake +into which, ages before, the ocean had dwindled. But where the lake had +been there was now only a shallow depression covered with grey sand and +brown rock.</p> + +<p>Into this they descended and touched the lunar surface for the last +time. A couple of hours' excursion among the houses proved that they had +been the last refuge of the last descendants of a dying race, a race +which had socially degenerated just as the succession of cities had done +architecturally, age by age, as the long-drawn struggle for mere +existence had become keener and keener until the two last essentials, +air and water, had failed—and then the end had come.</p> + +<p>The streets, like the square of the great Temple of Tycho, were strewn +with myriads and myriads of bones, and there were myriads more scattered +round what had once been the shores of the dwindling lake. Here, as +elsewhere, there was not a sign or a record of any kind—carving or +sculpture. If there were any such on the surface of the moon they had +not discovered them. The buildings which they had seen evidently +belonged to the decadent period during which the dwindling remnants of +the Selenites asked only to eat and drink and breathe.</p> + +<p>Inside the great Pyramid of the City of Tycho they might, perhaps, have +found something—some stone or tablet which bore the mark of the +artist's hand; elsewhere, perhaps, they might have found cities reared +by older races, which might have rivalled the creations of Egypt and +Babylon, but they had neither time nor inclination to look for these.</p> + +<p>All that they had seen of the Dead World had only sickened and saddened +them. The untravelled regions of Space peopled by living worlds more +akin to their own were before them. The red disc of Mars was glowing in +the zenith among the diamond-white clusters which gemmed the black sky +behind him.</p> + +<p>More than a hundred millions of miles had to be traversed before they +would be able to set foot on his surface, and so, after one last look +round the Valley of Death about them, Redgrave turned on the full energy +of the repulsive force in a vertical direction, and the <i>Astronef</i> leapt +upwards in a straight line for her new destination. The Unknown +Hemisphere spread out in a vast plain beneath them, the blazing sun rose +on their left, and the brilliant silver orb of the earth on their right, +and so, full of wonder and yet without regret, they bade farewell to the +World that Had Been.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</h2> + + +<p>The earth and the moon had been left more than a hundred million miles +behind in the depths of Space, and the <i>Astronef</i> had crossed this +immense gap in eleven days and a few hours; but this apparently +inconceivable speed was not altogether due to the powers of the +Space-Navigator, for her commander had taken advantage of the passage of +the planet along its orbit towards that of the earth. Hence, while the +<i>Astronef</i> was approaching Mars with ever-increasing speed, Mars was +travelling towards the <i>Astronef</i> at the rate of sixteen miles a second.</p> + +<p>The great silver disc of the earth had diminished until it looked only a +little larger than Venus appears to human eyes. In fact the planet Terra +is to the inhabitants of Mars what Venus is to us, the Star of the +Morning and the Evening.</p> + +<p>Breakfast on the morning of the twelfth day—or, since there is neither +day nor night in Space, it would be more correct to say the twelfth +period of twenty-four earth-hours as measured by the chronometers—was +just over, and Redgrave was standing with Zaidie in the forward end of +the deck-chamber, looking downwards at a vast crescent of rosy light +which stretched out over an arc of more than ninety degrees. Two tiny +black spots were travelling towards each other across it.</p> + +<p>"Ah," she said, going towards one of the telescopes, "there are the +moons. I was reading my Gulliver last night. I wonder what the old Dean +would have given to be here, and see how true his guess was. Are we +going to land on them?"</p> + +<p>"I don't see why we shouldn't," he said. "I think we might find them +convenient stopping places; besides, you know this isn't only a +pleasure-trip. We have to add as much as we can to the sum of human +knowledge, and so of course we shall have to find out whether the moons +of Mars have atmospheres and inhabitants."</p> + +<p>"What, people living on those wee things!" she laughed. "Why they're +only about thirty or forty miles round, aren't they?"</p> + +<p>"About," he said, "but then that's just one of the points I want to +solve; and as for life, it doesn't always mean people, you know. We are +only a few hundred miles away from Deimos, the outer one, and he is +twelve thousand five hundred miles from Mars. I vote we drop on him +first and let him carry us towards Phobos. And then when we've examined +him we'll pay a visit to his brother and take a trip round Mars on him. +Phobos does the journey in about seven hours and a half, and as he's +only three thousand seven hundred miles above the surface, we ought to +get a very good view of our next stopping-place."</p> + +<p>"That ought to be quite delightful," said Zaidie. "But how commonplace +you are getting, Lenox. That's so like you Englishmen. We are doing what +has only been dreamt of before, and here you are talking about moons and +planets as if they were railway stations."</p> + +<p>"Well, if your Ladyship prefers it, we will call them undiscovered +islands and continents in the Ocean of Space. That does sound a little +bit better, doesn't it? Now I think I had better go down and see to my +engines."</p> + +<p>When he had gone, Zaidie sat down to the telescope again and kept it +focussed on one of the little black spots travelling across the crescent +of Mars. Both it and the other spot rapidly grew larger, and the +features of the planet itself became more distinct. Soon even with her +unaided eyes she could make out the seas and continents and the +mysterious canals quite plainly through the clear, rosy atmosphere, and, +with the aid of the telescope, she could even see the glimmering +twilight which the inner moon threw upon the unlighted portion of the +planet's disc.</p> + +<p>Deimos grew bigger and bigger, and in about half an hour the <i>Astronef</i> +grounded gently on what looked to Zaidie like a dimly lighted circular +plain, but which, when her eyes became accustomed to the light, was more +like the summit of a conical mountain. Redgrave raised the keel a little +from the surface again and steered towards a thin circle of light on the +tiny horizon.</p> + +<p>As they crossed into the sunlit portion it became quite plain that +Deimos, at any rate, was as airless and lifeless as the moon. The +surface was composed of brown rock and red sand broken up into miniature +hills and valleys. There were a few traces of bygone volcanic action, +but it was evident that the internal fires of this tiny world must have +burnt themselves out very quickly.</p> + +<p>"Not much to be seen here," said Redgrave, as he came up the +companion-way, "and I don't think it would be safe to go out. The +attraction is so weak here that we might find ourselves falling off with +very little exertion. Still, you may as well take a couple of +photographs of the surface, and then we'll be off to Phobos."</p> + +<p>Zaidie got her apparatus to work, and when she had taken her slides down +to the dark-room, Redgrave turned the R. Force on very slightly and +Phobos began to sink away beneath them. The attraction of Mars now began +to make itself strongly felt, and the <i>Astronef</i> dropped rapidly through +the eight thousand miles which separate the inner and outer satellites.</p> + +<p>As they approached Phobos they saw that half the little disc was +brilliantly lighted by the same rays of the sun which were glowing on +the rapidly increasing crescent of Mars beneath them. By careful +manipulation of his engines Redgrave managed to meet the approaching +satellite with a hardly perceptible shock about the centre of its +lighted portion, that is to say the side turned towards the planet.</p> + +<p>Mars now appeared as a gigantic rosy moon filling the whole vault of the +heavens above them. Their telescopes brought the three thousand seven +hundred and fifty miles down to about ten. The rapid motion of the tiny +satellite afforded them a spectacle which might be compared to the +rising of a moon glowing with rosy light and hundreds of times larger +than the earth. The speed of the vehicle of which they had taken +possession, something like four thousand two hundred miles an hour, +caused the surface of the planet to apparently sweep away from below +them, just as the earth seems to glide from under the car of a balloon.</p> + +<p>Neither of them left the telescopes for more than a few minutes during +this aerial circumnavigation. Murgatroyd, outwardly impassive, but +inwardly filled with solemn fears for the fate of this impiously daring +voyage, brought them wine and sandwiches, and later on tea and toast and +more sandwiches; but they took no moment's heed of these, so absorbed +were they in the wonderful spectacle which was swiftly passing under +their eyes.</p> + +<p>The main armament of the <i>Astronef</i> consisted of four pneumatic guns, +which could be mounted on swivels, two ahead and two astern, which +carried a shell containing either one of two kinds of explosives +invented by her creator.</p> + +<p>One of these was a solid, and burst on impact with an explosive force +equal to about twenty pounds of lyddite. The other consisted of two +liquids separated by a partition in the shell, and these, when mixed by +the breaking of the partition, burst into a volume of flame which could +not be extinguished by any known human means. It would burn even in a +vacuum, since it supplied its own elements of combustion. The guns would +throw these shells to a distance of about seven terrestrial miles. On +the upper deck there were also stands for a couple of light machine guns +capable of discharging seven hundred explosive bullets a minute.</p> + +<p>Professor Rennick, although a man of peace, had little sympathy with the +laws of "civilised" warfare which permit men to be blown into rags of +flesh and splinters of bone by explosive shells of a pound weight and +upward, and only allow projectiles of less weight to be used against +"savages." There was no humbug about him. He believed that when war +<i>was</i> necessary it had to <i>be</i> war—and the sooner it was over the +better for everybody concerned.</p> + +<p>The small arms consisted of a couple of heavy ten-bore elephant guns +carrying three-ounce melinite shells; a dozen rifles and fowling-pieces +of different makes of which three, a single and a double-barrelled rifle +and a double-barrelled shot-gun, belonged to her Ladyship, as well as a +dainty brace of revolvers, one of half a dozen braces of various +calibres which completed the minor armament of the <i>Astronef</i>.</p> + +<p>The guns were got up and mounted while the attraction of the planet was +comparatively feeble, and the weapons themselves therefore of very +little weight. On the surface of the earth a score of men could not have +done the work, but on board the <i>Astronef</i>, suspended in Space, her crew +of three found the work easy. Zaidie herself picked up a Maxim and +carried it about as though it were a toy sewing-machine.</p> + +<p>"Now I think we can go down," said Redgrave, when everything had been +put in position as far as possible. "I wonder whether we shall find the +atmosphere of Mars suitable for terrestrial lungs. It will be rather +awkward if it isn't."</p> + +<p>A very slight exertion of repulsive force was sufficient to detach the +<i>Astronef</i> from the body of Phobos. She dropped rapidly towards the +surface of the planet, and within three hours they saw the sunlight, for +the first time since they had left the earth, shining through an +unmistakable atmosphere, an atmosphere of a pale, rosy hue, instead of +the azure of the earthly skies. An angular observation showed that they +were within fifty miles of the surface of the undiscovered world.</p> + +<p>"Well, we shall find air here of some sort, there's no doubt. We'll drop +a bit further and then Andrew shall start the propellers. They'll very +soon give us an idea of the density. Do you notice the change in the +temperature? That's the diffused rays instead of the direct ones. Twenty +miles! I think that will do. I'll stop her now and we'll prospect for a +landing place."</p> + +<p>He went down to apply the repulsive force directly to the surface of +Mars, so as to check the descent, and then he put on his +breathing-dress, went into the exit-chamber, closed one door behind him, +opened the other and allowed it to fill with Martian air; then he shut +it again, opened his visor and took a cautious breath.</p> + +<p>It may, perhaps, have been the idea that he, the first of all the sons +of Earth, was breathing the air of another world, or it might have been +some property peculiar to the Martian atmosphere, but he immediately +experienced a sensation such as usually follows the drinking of a glass +of champagne. He took another breath, and another, then he opened the +inner door and went back to the lower deck, saying to himself: "Well, +the air's all right if it is a bit champagney; rich in oxygen, I +suppose, with perhaps a trace of nitrous-oxide in it. Still, it's +certainly breathable, and that's the principal thing."</p> + +<p>"It's all right, dear," he said as he reached the upper deck where +Zaidie was walking about round the sides of the glass dome gazing with +all her eyes at the strange scene of mingled cloud and sea and land +which spread for an immense distance on all sides of them. "I have +breathed the air of Mars, and even at this height it is distinctly +wholesome, though of course it's rather thin, and I had it mixed with +some of our own atmosphere. Still I think it will agree all right with +us lower down."</p> + +<p>"Well, then," said Zaidie, "suppose we get below those clouds and see +what there really is to be seen."</p> + +<p>"As there's a fairly big problem to be solved shortly I'll see to the +descent myself," he replied, going towards the stairway.</p> + +<p>In a couple of minutes she saw the cloud-belt below them rising rapidly. +When Redgrave returned the <i>Astronef</i> was plunging into a sea of rosy +mist.</p> + +<p>"The clouds of Mars!" she exclaimed. "Fancy a world with pink clouds! I +wonder what there is on the other side."</p> + +<p>The next moment they saw. Just below them at a distance of about five +earth-miles lay an irregularly triangular island, a detached portion of +the Continent of Huygens almost equally divided by the Martian Equator, +and lying with another almost similarly shaped island between the +fortieth and the fiftieth meridians of west longitude. The two islands +were divided by a broad, straight stretch of water about the width of +the English Channel between Folkestone and Boulogne. Instead of the +bright blue-green of terrestrial seas, this connecting link between the +great Northern and Southern Martian oceans had an orange tinge.</p> + +<p>The land immediately beneath them was of a gently undulating character, +something like the Downs of South-Eastern England. No mountains were +visible in any direction. The lower portions, particularly along the +borders of the canals and the sea, were thickly dotted with towns and +cities, apparently of enormous extent. To the north of the Island +Continent there was a peninsula, which was covered with a vast +collection of buildings, which, with the broad streets and spacious +squares which divided them, must have covered an area of something like +two hundred square miles.</p> + +<p>"There's the London of Mars!" said Redgrave, pointing down towards it; +"where the London of Earth will be in a few thousand years, close to the +Equator. And, you see, all those other towns and cities are crowded +round the canals! I daresay when we go across the northern and southern +temperate zones we shall find them in about the state that Siberia or +Antarctica are in."</p> + +<p>"I daresay we shall," replied Zaidie; "Martian civilisation is crowding +towards the Equator, though I should call that place down there the +greater New York of Mars, and—see—there's Brooklyn just across the +canal. I wonder what they're thinking about us down there."</p> + +<p>Phobos revolves from west to east almost along the plane of its +primary's equator. To left and right they saw the huge ice-caps of the +South and North Poles gleaming through the red atmosphere with a pale +sunset glimmer. Then came the great stretches of sea, often obscured by +vast banks of clouds, which, as the sunlight fell upon them, looked +strangely like earth-clouds at sunset.</p> + +<p>Then, almost immediately underneath them, spread out the great land +areas of the equatorial region. The four continents of Halle, Galileo, +and Tycholand; then Huygens—which is to Mars what Europe, Asia, and +Africa are to the Earth, then Herschell and Copernicus. Nearly all of +these land masses were split up into semi-regular divisions by the +famous canals which have so long puzzled terrestrial observers.</p> + +<p>"Well, there is one problem solved at any rate," said Redgrave, when, +after a journey of nearly four hours, they had crossed the western +hemisphere. "Mars is getting very old, her seas are diminishing, and her +continents are increasing. Those canals are the remains of gulfs and +straits which have been widened and deepened and lengthened by human, or +I should say Martian, labour, partly, I've no doubt, for purposes of +navigation and partly to keep the inhabitants of the interior of the +continents within measurable distance of the sea. There's not the +slightest doubt about that. Then, you see, there are scarcely any +mountains to speak of so far, only ranges of low hills."</p> + +<p>"And that means, I suppose," said Zaidie, "that they've all been worn +down as the mountains of the earth are being. I was reading Flammarion's +'End of the World' last night, and he, you know, describes the earth at +the last as just one big plain of land, no hills or mountains, no seas, +and only sluggish rivers draining into marshes.</p> + +<p>"I suppose that is what they're coming to down yonder. Now, I wonder +what sort of civilisation we shall find. Perhaps we shan't find any at +all. Suppose all their civilisations have worn out and they are +degenerating into the same struggle for sheer existence those poor +creatures in the moon must have had."</p> + +<p>"Or suppose," said Redgrave rather seriously, "we find that they have +passed the zenith of civilisation, and are dropping back into savagery, +but still have the use of weapons and means of destruction which we, +perhaps, have no notion of, and are inclined to use them? We'd better be +careful, dear."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean, Lenox?" she said. "They wouldn't try to do us any +harm, would they? Why should they?"</p> + +<p>"I don't say they would," he replied; "but still you never know. You +see, their ideas of right and wrong and hospitality and all that sort of +thing may be quite different to what we have on the earth. In fact, they +may not be men at all, but just a sort of monster with perhaps a +superhuman intellect with all sorts of extra-human ideas in it.</p> + +<p>"Then there's another thing," he went on. "Suppose they fancied a trip +through Space, and thought that they had as good a right to the +<i>Astronef</i> as we have? I daresay they've seen us by this time if they've +got telescopes, as no doubt they have, perhaps a good deal more powerful +than ours, and they may be getting ready to receive us now. I think I'll +get the guns in place before we go down, in case their moral ideas, as +dear old Hans Breitmann called them, are not quite the same as ours."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</h2> + + +<p>The words were hardly out of his mouth before Zaidie, who still had her +glasses to her eyes, and was looking down towards the great city whose +glazed roofs were flashing with a thousand tints in the pale crimson +sunlight, said with a little tremor in her voice:</p> + +<p>"Look, Lenox, down there—don't you see something coming up? That little +black thing. Just look how fast it's coming up; it's quite distinct +already. It's a sort of flying-ship, only it has wings and, I think, +masts too. Yes, I can see three masts, and there's something glittering +on the tops of them. I wonder if they're coming to pay us a polite +morning call, or whether they're going to treat us like trespassers in +their atmosphere."</p> + +<p>"There's no telling, but those things on the top of the masts look like +revolving helices," replied Redgrave, after a long look through his +telescope. "He's screwing himself up into the air. That shows that they +must either have stronger and lighter machinery than we have, or, as the +astronomers have thought, this atmosphere is denser than ours, and +therefore easier to fly in. Then, of course, things are only half their +earthly weight here.</p> + +<p>"Well, whether it's peace or war, I suppose we may as well let them come +and reconnoitre. Then we shall see what kind of creatures they are. Ah, +there are a lot more of them, some coming from Brooklyn, too, as you +call it. Come up into the conning-tower, and I'll relieve Murgatroyd, so +that he can go and look after his engines. We shall have to give these +gentlemen a lesson in flying. Meanwhile, in case of accidents, we may as +well make ourselves as invulnerable as possible."</p> + +<p>A few minutes later they were in the conning-tower again, watching the +approach of the Martian fleet through the thick windows of toughened +glass which enabled them to look in every direction except straight +down. The steel coverings had been drawn down over the glass dome of the +deck-chamber, and Murgatroyd had gone down to the engine-room. Fifty +feet ahead of them stretched out the long, shining spur, of which ten +feet were solid steel, a ram which no floating structure built by human +hands could have resisted.</p> + +<p>Redgrave was standing with his hand on the steering-wheel, looking more +serious than he had done so far during the voyage. Zaidie stood beside +him with a powerful binocular telescope watching, with cheeks a little +paler than usual, the movements of the Martian air-ships. She counted +twenty-five vessels rising round them in a wide circle.</p> + +<p>"I don't like the idea of a whole fleet coming up," said Redgrave, as he +watched them rising, and the ring narrowing round the still motionless +<i>Astronef</i>. "If they only wanted to know who and what we are, or to +leave their cards on us, as it were, and bid us welcome to the world, +one ship could have done that just as well as a fleet. This lot coming +up looks as if they wanted to get round and capture us."</p> + +<p>"It does look like it," said Zaidie, with her glasses fixed on the +nearest of the vessels; "and now I can see they've guns too, something +like ours, and perhaps, as you said just now, they may have explosives +that we don't know anything about. Oh, Lenox, suppose they were able to +smash us up with a single shot."</p> + +<p>"You needn't be afraid of that, dear," he said, putting his arm round +her shoulders. "Of course it's perfectly natural that they should look +upon us with a certain amount of suspicion, dropping like this on them +from the stars. Can you see anything like men on board them yet?"</p> + +<p>"No, they're all closed in just as we are," she replied; "but they've +got conning-towers like this, and something like windows along the +sides. That's where the guns are, and the guns are moving. They're +pointing them at us. Lenox, I'm afraid they're going to shoot."</p> + +<p>"Then we may as well spoil their aim," he said, pressing one of the +buttons on the signal-board three times, and then once more after a +little interval.</p> + +<p>In obedience to the signal Murgatroyd turned on the repulsive force to +half power, and the <i>Astronef</i> leapt up vertically a couple of thousand +feet. Then Redgrave pressed the button once and she stopped. Another +signal set the propellers in motion, and as she sprang forward across +the circle formed by the Martian air-ships, they looked down and saw +that the place which they had just left was occupied by a thick +greenish-yellow cloud.</p> + +<p>"Look, Lenox, what on earth is that?" exclaimed Zaidie, pointing down to +it.</p> + +<p>"What on Mars would be nearer the point, dear," he said, with what she +thought a somewhat vicious laugh. "That, I'm afraid, means anything but +a friendly reception for us. That cloud is one of two things—it's the +smoke of the explosion of twenty or thirty shells, or else it's made of +gases intended to either poison us or make us insensible, so that they +can take possession of the ship. In either case I should say that the +Martians are not what we should call gentlemen."</p> + +<p>"I should think not," she said angrily. "They might at least have taken +us for friends till they had proved us enemies, which they wouldn't have +done. Nice sort of hospitality that, considering how far we've come, and +we can't shoot back, because we haven't got the ports open."</p> + +<p>"And a very good thing too!" laughed Redgrave; "if we had had them open, +and that volley had caught us unawares, the <i>Astronef</i> would probably +have been full of poisonous gases by this time, and your honeymoon, +dear, would have come to a somewhat untimely end. Ah, they're trying to +follow us! Well, now we'll see how high they can fly."</p> + +<p>He sent another signal to Murgatroyd, and the <i>Astronef</i>, still beating +the Martian air with the fans of her propellers, and travelling forward +at about fifty miles an hour, rose in a slanting direction through a +dense bank of rosy-tinted clouds, which hung over the bigger of the two +cities—New York, as Zaidie had named it.</p> + +<p>When they reached the golden-red sunlight above it the <i>Astronef</i> +stopped her ascent, and then, with half a turn of the steering-wheel, +her commander sent her sweeping round in a wide circle. A few minutes +later they saw the Martian fleet rise almost simultaneously through the +clouds. They seemed to hesitate a moment, and then the prow of every +vessel was directed towards the swiftly moving <i>Astronef</i>.</p> + +<p>"Well, gentlemen," said Redgrave, "you evidently don't know anything +about Professor Rennick and the R. Force; and yet you ought to know that +we couldn't have come through Space without being able to get beyond +this little atmosphere of yours. Now let us see how fast you can fly."</p> + +<p>Another signal went down to Murgatroyd, the whirling propellers became +two intersecting circles of light. The speed of the <i>Astronef</i> increased +to a hundred-and-fifty miles an hour, and the Martian fleet began to +drop behind and trail out into a triangle like a flock of huge birds.</p> + +<p>"That's lovely; we're leaving them!" exclaimed Zaidie, leaning forward +with the glasses to her eyes and tapping the floor of the conning-tower +with her foot as if she wanted to dance, "and their wings are working +faster than ever. They don't seem to have any screws."</p> + +<p>"Probably because they've solved the problem of bird's flight," said +Redgrave. "They're not gaining on us, are they?"</p> + +<p>"No, they're at about the same distance."</p> + +<p>"Then we'll see how they can soar."</p> + +<p>Another signal went down the tube. The <i>Astronef's</i> propellers slowed +down and stopped, and the vessel began to rise swiftly towards the +zenith, which the sun was now approaching. The Martian fleet continued +the impossible chase until the limits of the navigable atmosphere, about +eight earth-miles above the surface, was reached. Here the air was +evidently too rarefied for their wings to act upon. They came to a +standstill, looking like links of a broken chain, their occupants no +doubt looking up with envious eyes upon the shining body of the +<i>Astronef</i> glittering like a tiny star in the sunlight ten thousand feet +above them.</p> + +<p>"Well, gentlemen," said Redgrave, after a swift glance round, "I think +we have shown you that we can fly faster and soar higher than you can. +Perhaps you'll be a bit more civil now. If you're not we shall have to +teach you manners."</p> + +<p>"But you're not going to fight them all, dear, are you? Don't let us be +the first to bring war and bloodshed with us into another world."</p> + +<p>"Don't trouble about that, little woman, it's here already," he replied, +a trifle savagely. "People don't have air-ships and guns which fire +shells or poison-bombs, or whatever they were, without knowing what war +is. From what I've seen, I should say these Martians have civilised +themselves out of all emotions, and, I daresay, have fought pitilessly +for the possession of the last habitable lands of the planet.</p> + +<p>"They've preyed upon each other till only the fittest are left, and +those, I suppose, were the ones who invented the air-ships and finally +got possession of all that was worth having. Of course that would give +them the command of the planet, land and sea. In fact, if we are able to +make the personal acquaintance of the Martians, we shall probably find +them a set of over-civilised savages."</p> + +<p>"That's a rather striking paradox, isn't it, dear?" said Zaidie, +slipping her hand through his arm; "but still it's not at all bad. You +mean, of course, that they may have civilised themselves out of all the +emotions until they're just a set of cold, calculating, scientific +animals. After all they must be something of the sort, for I'm quite +sure we should not have done anything like that on earth if we'd had a +visitor from Mars. We shouldn't have got out cannons and shot at him +before we'd even made his acquaintance.</p> + +<p>"Now, if he, or they, had dropped in America as we were going down +there, we should have received them with deputations, given them +banquets, which they might not have been able to eat, and speeches, +which they would not understand, and photographed them, and filled the +newspapers with everything that we could imagine about them, and then +put them in a palace car and hustled them round the country for +everybody to look at."</p> + +<p>"And meanwhile," laughed Redgrave, "some of your smart engineers, I +suppose, would have gone over the vessel they had come in, found out how +she was worked, and taken out a dozen patents for her machinery."</p> + +<p>"Very likely," replied Zaidie, with a saucy little toss of her chin; +"and why not? We like to learn things down there—and anyhow that would +be much more really civilised than shooting at them."</p> + +<p>While this little conversation was going on, the <i>Astronef</i> was dropping +rapidly into the midst of the Martian fleet, which had again arranged +itself in a circle. Zaidie soon made out through her glasses that the +guns were pointed upwards.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's your little game, is it!" said Redgrave, when she had told +him of this. "Well, if you want a fight, you can have it."</p> + +<p>As he said this, his jaws came together, and Zaidie saw a look in his +eyes that she had never seen there before. He signalled rapidly two or +three times to Murgatroyd. The propellers began to whirl at their utmost +speed, and the <i>Astronef</i>, making a spiral downward course, swooped down +on to the Martian fleet with terrific velocity. Her last curve coincided +almost exactly with the circle occupied by the ships. Half-a-dozen +spouts of greenish flame came from the nearest vessel, and for a moment +the <i>Astronef</i> was enveloped in a yellow mist.</p> + +<p>"Evidently they don't know that we are air-tight, and they don't use +shot or shell. They've got past that. Their projectiles kill by poison +or suffocation. I daresay a volley like that would kill a regiment. Now +I'll give that fellow a lesson which he won't live to remember."</p> + +<p>They swept through the poison-mist. Redgrave swung the wheel round. The +<i>Astronef</i> dropped to the level of the ring of Martian vessels, which +had now got up speed again. Her steel ram was directed straight at the +vessel which had fired the last shot. Propelled at a speed of nearly two +hundred miles an hour, it took the strange-winged craft amidships. As +the shock came, Redgrave put his arm round Zaidie's waist and held her +close to him, otherwise she would have been flung against the forward +wall of the conning-tower.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i146" id="i146"></a> +<img src="images/i146.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3><i>It took the strange-winged craft amidships.</i></h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<p>The Martian vessel stopped and bent up. They saw human figures more than +half as large again as men inside her staring at them through the +windows in the sides. There were others at the breaches of the guns in +the act of turning the muzzles on the <i>Astronef</i>; but this was only a +momentary glimpse, for in a second the <i>Astronef's</i> spur had pierced +her, the Martian air-ship broke in twain, and her two halves plunged +downwards through the rosy clouds.</p> + +<p>"Keep her at full speed, Andrew," said Redgrave down the speaking-tube, +"and stand by to jump if we want to."</p> + +<p>"All ready, my Lord!" came back up the tube.</p> + +<p>The old Yorkshireman during the last few minutes had undergone a +transformation which he himself hardly understood. He recognised that +there was a fight going on, that it was a case of "burn, sink and +destroy," and the thousand-year-old Berserker awoke in him just, as a +matter of fact, it had done in his lordship.</p> + +<p>"They can pick up the pieces down there, what there is left of them," +said Redgrave, still holding Zaidie tight to his side with one hand and +working the wheel with the other, "and now we'll teach them another +lesson."</p> + +<p>"What are you going to do, dear?" she said, looking up at him with +somewhat frightened eyes.</p> + +<p>"You'll see in a moment," he said, between his shut teeth. "I don't care +whether these Martians are degenerate human beings or only animals; but +from my point of view the reception they have given us justifies any +kind of retaliation. If we'd had a single port-hole open during the +first volley you and I would have been dead by this time, and I'm not +going to stand anything like that without reprisals. They've declared +war on us, and killing in war isn't murder."</p> + +<p>"Well, no, I suppose not," she said; "but it's the first fight I've been +in, and I don't like it. Still, they did receive us pretty meanly, +didn't they?"</p> + +<p>"Meanly? If there was anything like a code of interplanetary morals or +manners one might call it absolutely caddish. I don't believe even Stead +himself could stand that—unless, of course, he wasn't here."</p> + +<p>He sent another message to Murgatroyd. The <i>Astronef</i> sprang a thousand +feet towards the zenith; another touch on the button, and she stopped +exactly over the biggest of the Martian air-ships; another, and she +dropped on to it like a stone and smashed it to fragments. Then she +stopped and mounted again above the broken circle of the fleet, while +the pieces of the air-ship and what was left of her crew plunged +downwards through the crimson clouds in a fall of nearly thirty thousand +feet.</p> + +<p>Within the next few moments the rest of the Martian fleet had followed +it, sinking rapidly down through the clouds and scattering in all +directions.</p> + +<p>"They seem to have had enough of it," laughed Redgrave, as the +<i>Astronef</i>, in obedience to another signal, began to drop towards the +surface of Mars. "Now we'll go down and see if they're in a more +reasonable frame of mind. At any rate we've won our first scrimmage, +dear."</p> + +<p>"But it was rather brutal, Lenox, wasn't it?"</p> + +<p>"When you are dealing with brutes, little woman, it is sometimes +necessary to be brutal."</p> + +<p>"And you look a wee bit brutal right now," she replied, looking up at +him with something like a look of fear in her eyes. "I suppose that is +because you have just killed somebody—or somethings—whichever they +are."</p> + +<p>"Do I, really?"</p> + +<p>The hard-set jaw relaxed and his lips melted into a smile under his +moustache, and he bent down and kissed her.</p> + +<p>"Well, what do you suppose I should have thought of them if <i>you</i> had +had a whiff of that poison?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, dear," she whispered in between the kisses, "I see now."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</h2> + + +<p>The <i>Astronef</i> dropped swiftly down through the crimson-tinged clouds, +and a few minutes later they saw that the rest of the fleet had +scattered in units in all directions, apparently with the intention of +getting as far as possible out of reach of that terrible ram. Only one +of them, the largest, which carried what looked like a flag of woven +gold at the top of its centre mast, remained in sight after a few +minutes. It was almost immediately below them when they had passed +through the clouds, and they could see it sinking straight down towards +the centre of what appeared to be the principal square of the bigger of +the two cities which Zaidie had named New York and Brooklyn.</p> + +<p>"That fellow has gone to report, evidently," said Redgrave. "We'll +follow him just to see what he's up to, but I don't think we'd better +open the ports even then. There's no telling when they might give us a +whiff of that poison-mist, or whatever it is."</p> + +<p>"But how are you going to talk to them, then, if they can talk?—I mean, +if they know any language that we do?"</p> + +<p>"They're something like men, and so I suppose they understand the +language of signs, at any rate. Still, if you don't fancy it, we'll go +somewhere else."</p> + +<p>"No, thanks," she said. "That's not my father's daughter. I haven't come +a hundred million miles from home to go away before the first act's +finished. We'll go down to see if we can make them understand."</p> + +<p>By this time the <i>Astronef</i> was hanging suspended over an enormous +square about half the size of Hyde Park. It was laid out just as a +terrestrial park would be, in grass land, flower-beds, and avenues, and +patches of trees, only the grass was a reddish yellow, the leaves of the +trees were like those of a beech in autumn, and the flowers were nearly +all a deep violet, or a bright emerald green.</p> + +<p>As they descended they saw that the square, or Central Park, as Zaidie +at once christened it, was flanked by enormous blocks of buildings, +palaces built of a dazzlingly white stone, and topped by domed roofs and +lofty cupolas of glass.</p> + +<p>"Isn't that just lovely!" she said, swinging her binoculars in every +direction. "Talk about your Park Lane and the houses round Central Park; +why, it's the Chicago Exposition, and the Paris one, and your Crystal +Palace, multiplied by about ten thousand, and all spread out just round +this one place. If we don't find these people nice, I guess we'd better +go back and build a fleet like this, and come and take it."</p> + +<p>"There spoke the new American imperialism," laughed Redgrave. "Well, +we'll go and see what they're like first, shall we?"</p> + +<p>The <i>Astronef</i> dropped a little more slowly than the air-ship had done, +and remained suspended a hundred feet or so above her after she had +reached the ground. Swarms of human figures but of more than human +stature, clad in tunics and trousers or knickerbockers, came out of the +glass-domed palaces from all sides into the park. They were nearly all +of the same stature, and there appeared to be no difference whatever +between the sexes. Their dress was absolutely plain; there was no +attempt at ornament or decoration of any kind.</p> + +<p>"If there are any of the Martian women among those people," said her +ladyship, "they've taken to rationals, and they've grown about as big as +the men."</p> + +<p>"That's exactly what's happening on earth, you know, dear. I don't mean +about the rationals, but the women growing up, especially in America. I +come of a pretty long family——but, look!"</p> + +<p>"Well, I only come to your ear," she said.</p> + +<p>"And our descendants of ten thousand years hence——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't bother about them!" she said. "Look; there's some one who +seems to want to communicate with us. Why, they're all bald! They +haven't got a hair among them—and what a size their heads are!"</p> + +<p>"That's brains—too much brains, in fact. These people have lived too +long. I daresay they've ceased to be animals—civilised themselves out +of everything in the way of passions and emotions, and are just purely +intellectual beings, with as much human nature about them as Russian +diplomacy or those things we saw at the bottom of the Newton Crater. I +don't like the look of them."</p> + +<p>The orderly swarms of figures, which were rapidly filling the park, +divided as he was speaking, making a broad lane from one of its +entrances to where the <i>Astronef</i> was hanging above the air-ship. A +light four-wheeled vehicle, whose framework and wheels glittered like +burnished gold, sped towards them, driven by some invisible agency.</p> + +<p>Its only occupant was a huge man, dressed in the universal costume, +saving only a scarlet sash in place of the cord-girdle which the others +wore round their waists. The vehicle stopped near the air-ship, over +which the <i>Astronef</i> was hanging, and, as the figure dismounted, a door +opened in the side of the vessel and three other figures, similar both +in stature and attire, came out and entered into conversation with him.</p> + +<p>"The Admiral of the Fleet is evidently making his report," said +Redgrave. "Meanwhile, the crowd seems to be taking a considerable amount +of interest in us."</p> + +<p>"And very naturally, too!" replied Zaidie. "Don't you think we might go +down now and see if we can make ourselves understood in any way? You can +have the guns ready in case of accidents, but I don't think they'll try +and hurt us now. Look, the gentleman with the red sash is making signs."</p> + +<p>"I think we can go down now all right," replied Redgrave, "because it's +quite certain they can't use the poison-guns on us without killing +themselves as well. Still, we may as well have our own ready. Andrew, +get that port Maxim ready. I hope we shan't want it, but we may. I don't +quite like the look of these people."</p> + +<p>"They're very ugly, aren't they?" said Zaidie; "and really you can't +tell which are men and which are women. I suppose they've civilised +themselves out of everything that's nice, and are just scientific and +utilitarian and everything that's horrid."</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't wonder. They look to me as if they've just got common +sense, as we call it, and hadn't any other sense; but, at any rate, if +they don't behave themselves, we shall be able to teach them manners of +a sort, though we may possibly have done that to some extent already."</p> + +<p>As he said this Redgrave went into the conning-tower, and the <i>Astronef</i> +moved from above the air-ship, and dropped gently into the crimson grass +about a hundred feet from her. Then the ports were opened, the guns, +which Murgatroyd had loaded, were swung into position, and they armed +themselves with a brace of revolvers each, in case of accident.</p> + +<p>"What delicious air this is!" said her ladyship, as the ports were +opened and she took her first breath of the Martian atmosphere. "It's +ever so much nicer than ours. Oh, Lenox, it's just like breathing +champagne."</p> + +<p>Redgrave looked at her with an admiration which was tempered by a sudden +apprehension. Even in his eyes she had never seemed so lovely before. +Her cheeks were glowing and her eyes were gleaming with a brightness +that was almost feverish, and he was himself sensible of a strange +feeling of exultation, both mental and physical, as his lungs filled +with the Martian air.</p> + +<p>"Oxygen," he said, shortly, "and too much of it! Or I shouldn't wonder +if it was something like nitrous-oxide—you know, laughing gas."</p> + +<p>"Don't!" she laughed; "it may be very nice to breathe, but it reminds +one of other things which aren't a bit nice. Still, if it is anything of +that sort it might account for these people having lived so fast. I know +I feel just now as if I was living at the rate of thirty-six hours a +day, and so, I suppose, the fewer hours we stop here the better."</p> + +<p>"Exactly!" said Redgrave, with another glance of apprehension at her. +"Now, there's his Royal Highness, or whatever he is, coming. How are we +going to talk to him? Are you all ready, Andrew?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, my Lord, all ready," replied the old Yorkshireman, dropping his +huge, hairy hand on the breech of the Maxim.</p> + +<p>"Very well, then, shoot the moment you see them doing anything +suspicious, and don't let any one except his Royal Highness come nearer +than a hundred yards."</p> + +<p>As he said this Redgrave went to the door, from which the gangway steps +had been lowered, and, in reply to a singularly expressive gesture from +the huge Martian, who seemed to stand nearly nine feet high, he beckoned +to him to come up on to the deck.</p> + +<p>As he mounted the steps the crowd closed round the <i>Astronef</i> and the +Martian air-ship; but, as though in obedience to orders which had +already been given, they kept at a respectful distance of a little over +a hundred yards away from the strange vessel which had wrought such +havoc with their fleet. When the Martian reached the deck, Redgrave held +out his hand and the giant recoiled, as a man on earth might have done +if, instead of the open palm, he had seen a clenched hand gripping a +knife.</p> + +<p>"Take care, Lenox," exclaimed Zaidie, taking a couple of steps towards +him, with her right hand on the butt of one of her revolvers. The +movement brought her close to the open door, and in full view of the +crowd outside.</p> + +<p>If a seraph had come on earth and presented itself thus before a throng +of human beings, there might have happened some such miracle as was +wrought when the swarm of Martians beheld the strange beauty of this +radiant daughter of the earth.</p> + +<p>As it seemed to the space-voyagers, when they discussed it afterwards, +ages of purely utilitarian civilisation had brought all conditions of +Martian life up—or down—to the same level. There was no apparent +difference between the males and females in stature; their faces were +all the same, with features of mathematical regularity, pale skin, +bloodless cheeks, and an expression, if such it could be called, utterly +devoid of emotion.</p> + +<p>But still these creatures were human, or at least their forefathers had +been. Hearts beat in their breasts, blood of a sort still flowed through +their veins, and so the magic of this marvellous vision instantly awoke +the long-slumbering elementary instincts of a bygone age. A low murmur +ran through the vast throng, a murmur half-human, half-brutish, which +swiftly rose to a hoarse screaming roar.</p> + +<p>"Look out, my Lord! Quick! Shut the door, they're coming! It's her +ladyship they want; she must look like an angel from Heaven to them. +Shall I fire?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Redgrave, gripping the lever, and bringing the door down. +"Zaidie, if this fellow moves put a bullet through him. I'm going to +talk to that air-ship before he gets his poison-guns to work."</p> + +<p>As the last word left his lips Murgatroyd put his thumb on the spring on +the Maxim. A roar such as Martian ears had never heard before resounded +through the vast square, and was flung back with a thousand echoes from +the walls of the huge palaces on every side. A stream of smoke and flame +poured out of the little port-hole, and then the onward-swarming throng +seemed to stop, and the front ranks of it began to sink down silently in +long rows.</p> + +<p>Then through the roaring rattle of the Maxim sounded the deep, sharp +bang of Redgrave's gun, as he sent ten pounds weight of Rennickite, as +he had christened it, into the Martian air-ship. There was the roar of +an explosion which shook the air for miles around. A blaze of greenish +flame and a huge cloud of steamy smoke showed that the projectile had +done its work, and, when the smoke drifted away, the spot on which the +air-ship had lain was only a deep, red, jagged gash in the ground. There +was not even a fragment of the ship to be seen.</p> + +<p>This done, Redgrave went and turned the starboard Maxim on to another +swarm which was approaching the <i>Astronef</i> from that side. When he had +got the range he swung the gun slowly from side to side. The moving +throng stopped, as the other one had done, and sank down to the red +grass, now dyed with a deeper red.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, Zaidie had been holding the Martian at something more than +arm's length with her revolver. He seemed to understand perfectly that, +if she pulled the trigger, the revolver would do something like what the +Maxims had done. He appeared to take no notice whatever either of the +destruction of the air-ship or of the slaughter that was going on around +the <i>Astronef</i>. His big, pale blue eyes were fixed upon her face. They +seemed to be devouring a loveliness such as they had never seen before. +A dim, pinky flush stole for the first time into his waxy cheeks, and +something like a light of human passion came into his eyes.</p> + +<p>Then, to the utter astonishment of both Redgrave and Zaidie, he said +slowly and deliberately, and with only just enough tinge of emotion in +his voice to make Redgrave want to shoot him:</p> + +<p>"Beautiful. Perfect. More perfect than ours. I want it. Give Palace and +Garden of Eternal Summer for it. Two thousand work-slaves and fifty——"</p> + +<p>"And I'll see you damned first, sir, whoever you are!" said Redgrave, +clapping his hand on to the butt of his revolver, and forgetting for the +moment that he was speaking in another world than his own. "What the +devil do you mean, sir, by insulting my wife——?"</p> + +<p>"Insulting. Wife. What is that? We have no words like those."</p> + +<p>"But you speak English," exclaimed Zaidie, going a little nearer to him, +but still keeping the muzzle of her revolver pointing up to his hairless +head. "No, Lenox, don't be afraid about me, and don't get angry. Can't +you see that this person hasn't got any temper? I suppose it was +civilised out of his ancestors ages ago. He doesn't know what a wife or +an insult is. He just looks upon me as a desirable piece of property to +be bought, and I daresay he offered you a very handsome price. Now, +don't look so savage, because you know bargains like that have been made +even on our dear old virtuous Mother Earth. For instance, if you hadn't +met us in the middle of the Atlantic——"</p> + +<p>"That'll do, Zaidie," Redgrave interrupted almost roughly. "That's not +exactly the question, but I see what you mean, and it was a bit silly of +me to get angry."</p> + +<p>"Silly? Angry? What do those words mean?" said the Martian in his slow, +passionless, mechanical voice. "Who are you? Whence come you?"</p> + +<p>"I'll answer the last part first," said Redgrave. "We come from the +earth, the planet which you see after sunset and before sunrise."</p> + +<p>"Yes, the Silver Star," said the Martian without any note of wonder or +surprise in his voice. "Are all the dwellers there like the gods and +angels our children read about in the old legends?"</p> + +<p>"Gods and angels!" laughed Zaidie. "There, Lenox, there's a compliment +for you. I really think we ought to be as civil to his Royal Highness +after that as possible." Then she went on, addressing the Martian, "No, +we are not all gods and angels on earth. There are no gods and very few +angels. In fact there are none except those which exist in the fancy of +certain prejudiced persons. But that doesn't matter, at least not just +now," she continued with American directness. "What we want to know just +now is, why you speak English, and what sort of a world this Mars is?"</p> + +<p>The Martian evidently only understood the most direct essentials of her +speech. He saw that she asked two questions, and he answered them.</p> + +<p>"Speak English?" he replied, with a little shake of his huge head. "We +know not English, but there is no other speech. There is only ours. +Cycles ago there were other speeches here, but those who spoke them were +killed. It was inconvenient. One speech for a world is best."</p> + +<p>"I see what he means," said Redgrave, looking towards Zaidie. "The +Martian people have developed along practically the same lines as we are +doing, but they have done it faster and got a long way ahead of us. We +are finding out that the speech we call English is the shortest and most +convenient. The Martians found it out long ago and killed everybody who +spoke anything else. After all, what we call speech is only the +translation of thoughts into sounds. These people have been thinking for +ages with the same sort of brains as ours, and they've translated their +thoughts into the same sounds. What we call English they, I daresay, +call Martian, and that's all there is in it that I can see."</p> + +<p>"Of course," laughed Zaidie. "Wonderful until you know how, eh? Like +most things. Still I must say that our friend here speaks English +something like a phonograph, and if he'll excuse me saying so, which of +course he will, he doesn't seem to have much more human nature about +him."</p> + +<p>"I'm not quite so sure on that point," said Redgrave, "but——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, never mind about that now!" she interrupted, and then, turning +towards the Martian, who had been listening intently as though he was +trying to make sense out of what they had been saying, she went on +speaking slowly and very plainly——</p> + +<p>"Tell me, sir, if you please, do you know what 'angry' means? Are you +not angry with us for destroying your air-ships up there in the clouds, +and the one that came down, and for shooting all those people of yours?"</p> + +<p>The Martian looked at her with a little light in his big blue eyes, and +two faint little spots of red just under them, and said:</p> + +<p>"Anger! Yes, I remember, that is what we called brain-heat. Our teachers +found it to be madness and it was abolished. It was not convenient. The +air-ships were not convenient to you, so you abolished them. The folk, +too, that you abolished with those things," pointing to the guns, "they +were not convenient. If you hadn't done that they would have abolished +you. There is no more to say."</p> + +<p>"What brutes," said Zaidie, turning away from him, her head thrown back +and her lips curling in unutterable disgust. "Well, if these people have +civilised themselves along the same lines that we are doing, thinking +the same things and speaking something like the same speech, thank God +we shall be dead before our civilisation reaches a stage like this. +That's not a man. It's only a machine of flesh and bone and nerves, and +I suppose it has blood of some sort."</p> + +<p>A beautiful woman always looks most beautiful when she is just a little +angry. Redgrave had never seen Zaidie look quite so lovely as she did +just then. The Martian, whose ancestors had for generations forgotten +what human emotion was like, only saw in her anger a miracle which made +her a thousand times more beautiful than before, and as he looked upon +her glowing cheeks and gleaming eyes some instinct insensibly +transmitted through many generations awoke to sudden life in some unused +corner of his brain.</p> + +<p>His pale clear eyes lit up with something like a glow of human passion. +The pink spots under his eyes spread downwards over his cheeks. Some +half-articulate sounds came from between his thin lips. Then they were +drawn back and showed his smooth, toothless gums. He took a couple of +long, swift strides towards her, and then bent forward, towering over +her with long, outstretched arms, huge, hideous, and half-human.</p> + +<p>Zaidie sprang backwards as he came towards her, her right hand went up, +and, just as Redgrave levelled his revolver, and Murgatroyd, true to the +old Berserk instinct, took a rifle by the barrel and swung the stock +above his head, Zaidie pulled her trigger. The bullet cut a clean hole +through the smooth, hairless skull of the Martian. A dark, red spot came +just between his eyes, his huge frame shrank together and collapsed in a +heap on the deck.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I've killed him! God forgive me, killed a man!" she whispered, as +her hand fell to her side, and the revolver dropped from her fingers. +"But, Lenox, do you really think it was a man?"</p> + +<p>"That thing a man!" he replied between his clenched teeth. "He wanted +you, and spoke English of a sort, so there was something human about +him, but anyhow he's better dead. Here, Andrew, open that door again and +help me to heave this thing overboard. Then I think we'd better be off +before we have the rest of the fleet with their poison guns round us. +Zaidie, I think you'd better go to your room for the present. Take a nip +of cognac and then lie down, and mind you keep the door tight shut. +There's no telling what these animals might do if they had a chance, and +just now it's my business and Andrew's to see that they don't."</p> + +<p>Though she would much rather have remained on deck to see anything more +that might happen, she saw that he was really in earnest, and so like a +wise wife who commands by obeying, she obeyed, and went below.</p> + +<p>Then the dead body of the Martian was tumbled out of the side door. The +windows through which the guns had been fired were hermetically closed, +and a few minutes later the <i>Astronef</i> vanished from the surface of +Mars, to remain a memory and a marvel to the dwindling generations of +the worn-out world which is as this may be in the far-off days that are +to come.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h2> + + +<p>"How very different Venus looks now to what it does from the earth," +said Zaidie, a couple of mornings later, by earth-time, as she took her +eye away from the telescope through which she had been examining an +enormous golden crescent which spanned the dark vault of Space ahead of +and slightly below the <i>Astronef</i>.</p> + +<p>"Yes," replied Redgrave, "she looks——"</p> + +<p>"How do you know that she is a she?" said Zaidie, getting up and laying +a hand on his shoulder as he sat at his own telescope. "Of course I know +what you mean, that according to our own ideas on earth, it is the +planet or the world which has been supposed for ages to, as it were, +shine upon the lovers of earth with the light reflected from +the—the—well, I suppose you know what I mean."</p> + +<p>"Seeing that you are the most perfect terrestrial incarnation of the +said goddess that I have seen yet," he replied, slipping his arm round +her waist and pulling her down on to his knees, "I don't think that that +is quite the view you ought to take. Surely if Venus ever had a +daughter——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nonsense! After we've travelled all these millions of miles +together do you really expect me to believe stuff like that?"</p> + +<p>"My dear girl-graduate," he said, tightening his grip round her waist a +little, "you know perfectly well that if we had travelled beyond the +limits of the Solar System, if we had outsailed old Halley's Comet +itself, and dived into the uttermost depths of Space outside the Milky +Way, you and I would still be a man and a woman, and, being, as may be +presumed, more or less in love with each other——"</p> + +<p>"Less indeed!" said Zaidie; "you're speaking for yourself, I hope."</p> + +<p>And then when she had partially disengaged herself and sat up straight, +she said between her laughs——</p> + +<p>"Really, Lenox, you're quite absurd for a person who has been married as +long as you have, I don't mean in time, but in Space. Was it a thousand +years or a couple of hundred million miles ago that we were married? +Really I am getting my ideas of time and space quite mixed up.</p> + +<p>"But never mind that! What I was going to say is that, according to all +the authorities which your girl-graduate has been reading since we left +Mars, Venus—oh, doesn't she look just gorgeous, and our old friend the +Sun behind there blazing out of darkness like one of the furnaces at +Pittsburg—I beg your pardon, Lenox, I'm afraid I'm getting quite +provincial. I suppose we're considerably more than a hundred million +miles away?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, dear; we're about a hundred and fifty millions, and at that +distance, if you'll excuse me saying so, even the United States would +seem almost like a province, wouldn't they?"</p> + +<p>"Well, yes; that's just where distance doesn't lend enchantment to the +view, I suppose."</p> + +<p>"But what was it you were going to say before that——"</p> + +<p>"The interlude, eh? Well, before the interlude you were accusing me of +being a graduate as well as a girl. Of course I can't help that, but +what I was going to say was——"</p> + +<p>"If you are going to talk science, dear, perhaps we'd better sit on +different chairs. I may have been married for a hundred and fifty +million miles, but the honeymoon isn't half way through yet, you know."</p> + +<p>Then there was another interlude of a few seconds' duration. When Zaidie +was seated beside her own telescope again, she said, after another +glance at the splendid crescent which, as the <i>Astronef</i> approached at a +speed of over forty miles a second, increased in size and distinctness +every moment:</p> + +<p>"What I mean is this. All the authorities are agreed that on Venus, her +axis of revolution being so very much inclined to the plane of her +orbit, the seasons are so severe that half the year its temperate zone +and its tropics have a summer about twice as hot as ours and the other +half they have a winter twice as cold as our coldest. I'm afraid, after +all, we shall find the Love-Star a world of salamanders and seals; +things that can live in a furnace and bask on an iceberg; and when we +get back home it will be our painful duty, as the first explorers of the +fields of Space, to dispel another dearly-cherished popular delusion."</p> + +<p>"I'm not so very sure about that," said Lenox, glancing from the rapidly +growing crescent, to the sweet, smiling face beside him. "Don't you see +something very different there to what we saw either on the Moon or +Mars? Now just go back to your telescope and let us take an +observation."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Zaidie, rising, "as our trip is, partly at least, in the +interests of science, I will;" and then when she had got her own +telescope into focus again—for the distance between the <i>Astronef</i> and +the new world they were about to visit was rapidly lessening—she took a +long look through it, and said:</p> + +<p>"Yes, I think I see what you mean. The outer edge of the crescent is +bright, but it gets greyer and dimmer towards the inside of the curve. +Of course Venus has an atmosphere. So had Mars; but this must be very +dense. There's a sort of halo all round it. Just fancy that splendid +thing being the little black spot we saw going across the face of the +Sun a few days ago! It makes one feel rather small, doesn't it?"</p> + +<p>"That is one of the things which a woman says when she doesn't want to +be answered; but, apart from that, you were saying——"</p> + +<p>"What a very unpleasant person you can be when you like! I was going to +say that on the Moon we saw nothing but black and white, light and +darkness. There was no atmosphere, except in those awful places I don't +want to think about. Then, as we got near Mars, we saw a pinky +atmosphere, but not very dense; but this, you see, is a sort of +pearl-grey white shading from silver to black. You notice how much paler +it grows as we get nearer. But look—what are those tiny bright spots? +There are hundreds of them."</p> + +<p>"Do you remember as we were leaving the Earth, how bright the mountain +ranges looked; how plainly we could see the Rockies and the Andes?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I see; they're mountains; thirty-seven miles high, some of +them, they say; and the rest of the silver-grey will be clouds, I +suppose. Fancy living under clouds like those."</p> + +<p>"Only another case of the adaptation of life to natural conditions, I +expect. When we get there I daresay we shall find that these clouds are +just what make it possible for the inhabitants of Venus to stand the +extremes of heat and cold. Given elevations three or four times as high +as the Himalayas, it would be quite possible for them to choose their +temperature by shifting their altitude.</p> + +<p>"But I think it's about time to drop theory and see to the practice," he +continued, getting up from his chair and going to the signal board in +the conning-tower. "Whatever the planet Venus may be like, we don't want +to charge it at the rate of sixty miles a second. That's about the speed +now, considering how fast she's travelling towards us."</p> + +<p>"And considering that, whether it is a nice world or not it's nearly as +big as the Earth, I guess we should get rather the worst of the charge," +laughed Zaidie as she went back to her telescope.</p> + +<p>Redgrave sent a signal down to Murgatroyd to reverse engines, as it +were, or, in other words, to direct the "R. Force" against the planet, +from which they were now only a couple of hundred thousand miles +distant. The next moment the sun and stars seemed to halt in their +courses. The great golden-grey crescent, which had been increasing in +size every moment, appeared to remain stationary, and then, when he was +satisfied that the engines were developing the Force properly, he sent +another signal down, and the <i>Astronef</i> began to descend.</p> + +<p>The half-disc of Venus seemed to fall below them, and in a few minutes +they could see it from the upper deck spreading out like a huge +semi-circular plain of light ahead and on both sides of them. The +<i>Astronef</i> was falling at the rate of about a thousand miles a minute +towards the centre of the half-crescent, and every moment the brilliant +spots above the cloud-surface grew in size and brightness.</p> + +<p>"I believe the theory about the enormous height of the mountains of +Venus must be correct after all," said Redgrave, tearing himself with an +evident wrench away from his telescope. "Those white patches can't be +anything else but the summits of snow-capped mountains. You know how +brilliantly white a snow-peak looks on earth against the whitest of +clouds."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," said Zaidie, "I've often seen that in the Rockies. But it's +lunch-time, and I must go down and see how my things in the kitchen are +getting on. I suppose you'll try and land somewhere where it's morning, +so that we can have a good day before us. Really, it's very convenient +to be able to make your own morning or night as you like, isn't it? I +hope it won't make us too conceited when we get back, being able to +choose our mornings and our evenings; in fact, our sunrises and sunsets +on any world we like to visit in a casual way like this."</p> + +<p>"Well," laughed Redgrave, as she moved away towards the companion +stairs, "after all, if you find the United States, or even the Planet +Terra, too small for you, we've always got the fields of Space open to +us. We might take a trip across the Zodiac or down the Milky Way."</p> + +<p>"And meanwhile," she replied, stopping at the top of the stairs and +looking round, "I'll go down and get lunch. You and I may be king and +queen of the realms of Space, and all that sort of thing, but we've got +to eat and drink, after all."</p> + +<p>"And that reminds me," said Redgrave, getting up and following her, "we +must celebrate our arrival on a new world as usual. I'll go down and get +out the wine. I shouldn't be surprised if we found the people of the +Love-World living on nectar and ambrosia, and as fizz is our nearest +approach to nectar——"</p> + +<p>"I suppose," said Zaidie, as she gathered up her skirts and stepped +daintily down the companion stairs, "if you find anything human, or at +least human enough to eat and drink, you'll have a party and give them +champagne. I wonder what those wretches on Mars would have thought of it +if we'd only made friends with them?"</p> + +<p>Lunch on board the <i>Astronef</i> was about the pleasantest meal of the day. +Of course, there was neither day nor night, in the ordinary sense of the +word, except as the hours were measured off by the chronometers. +Whichever side or end of the vessel received the direct rays of the sun, +was bathed in blazing heat and dazzling light. Elsewhere there was black +darkness and the more than icy cold of Space; but lunch was a convenient +division of the waking hours, which began with a stroll on the upper +deck and a view of the ever-varying splendours about them, and ended +after dinner in the same place with coffee and cigarettes and +speculations as to the next day's happenings.</p> + +<p>This lunch-hour passed even more pleasantly and rapidly than others had +done, for the discussion as to the possibilities of Venus was continued +in a quite delightful mixture of scientific disquisition and that +converse which is common to most human beings on their honeymoon.</p> + +<p>As there was nothing more to be done or seen for an hour or two, the +afternoon was spent in a pleasant siesta in the luxurious deck-saloon; +because evening to them would be morning on that portion of Venus to +which they were directing their course, and, as Zaidie said, when she +subsided into her hammock:</p> + +<p>It would be breakfast-time before they could get dinner.</p> + +<p>As the <i>Astronef</i> fell with ever-increasing velocity towards the +cloud-covered surface of Venus, the remainder of her disc, lit up by the +radiance of her sister-worlds, Mercury, Mars, and the Earth, and also by +the pale radiance of an enormous comet, which had suddenly shot into +view from behind its southern limb, became more or less visible.</p> + +<p>Towards six o'clock it became necessary to exert nearly the whole +strength of her engines to check the velocity of her fall. By eight she +had entered the atmosphere of Venus, and was dropping slowly towards a +vast sea of sunlit cloud, out of which, on all sides, towered thousands +of snow-clad peaks, rounded summits, and widespread stretches of upland +about which the clouds swept and surged like the silent billows of some +vast ocean in Ghostland.</p> + +<p>"I thought so!" said Redgrave, when the propellers had begun to revolve +and Murgatroyd had taken his place in the conning-tower. "A very dense +atmosphere loaded with clouds. There's the Sun just rising, so your +ladyship's wishes are duly obeyed."</p> + +<p>"And doesn't it seem nice and homelike to see him rising through an +atmosphere above the clouds again? It doesn't look a bit like the same +sort of dear old Sun just blazing like a red-hot Moon among a lot of +white-hot stars and planets. Look, aren't those peaks lovely, and that +cloud-sea?—why, for all the world we might be in a balloon above the +Rockies or the Alps. And see," she continued, pointing to one of the +thermometers fixed outside the glass dome which covered the upper deck, +"it's only sixty-five even here. I wonder if we can breathe this air, +and—oh—I do wonder what we shall see on the other side of those +clouds."</p> + +<p>"You shall have both questions answered in a few minutes," replied +Redgrave, going towards the conning-tower. "To begin with, I think we'll +land on that big snow-dome yonder, and do a little exploring. Where +there are snow and clouds there is moisture, and where there is moisture +a man ought to be able to breathe."</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i176" id="i176"></a> +<img src="images/i176.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + + +<h3><i>Snow peaks and cloud seas.</i></h3> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<p>The <i>Astronef</i>, still falling, but now easily under the command of the +helmsman, shot forwards and downwards towards a vast dome of snow which, +rising some two thousand feet above the cloud-sea, shone with dazzling +brilliance in the light of the rising Sun. She landed just above the +edge of the clouds. Meanwhile they had put on their breathing-suits, and +Redgrave had seen that the air chamber through which they had to pass +from their own little world into the new ones that they visited was in +working order. When the outer door was opened and the ladder lowered he +stood aside, as he had done on the Moon, and Zaidie's was the first +human foot which made an imprint on the virgin snows of Venus.</p> + +<p>The first thing Redgrave did was to raise the visor of his helmet and +taste the air of the new world. It was cool, and fresh, and sweet, and +the first draught of it sent the blood tingling and dancing through his +veins. Perfect as the arrangements of the <i>Astronef</i> were in this +respect, the air of Venus tasted like clear running spring water would +have done to a man who had been drinking filtered water for several +days. He threw the visor right up and motioned to Zaidie to do the same. +She obeyed, and, after drawing a long breath, she said:</p> + +<p>"That's glorious! It's like wine after water, and rather stagnant water +too. But what a world, snow-peaks and cloud-seas, islands of ice and +snow in an ocean of mist! Just look at them! Did you ever see anything +so lovely and unearthly in your life? I wonder how high this mountain +is, and what there is on the other side of the clouds. Isn't the air +delicious! Not a bit too cold after all—but, still, I think we may as +well go back and put on something more becoming. I shouldn't quite like +the ladies of Venus to see me dressed like a diver."</p> + +<p>"Come along, then," laughed Lenox, as he turned back towards the vessel. +"That's just like a woman. You're about a hundred and fifty million +miles away from Broadway or Regent Street. You are standing on the top +of a snow mountain above the clouds of Venus, and the moment that you +find the air is fit to breathe you begin thinking about dress. How do +you know that the inhabitants of Venus, if there are any, dress at all?"</p> + +<p>"What nonsense! Of course they do—at least, if they are anything like +us."</p> + +<p>As soon as they got back on board the <i>Astronef</i> and had taken their +breathing-dresses off, Redgrave and the old engineer, who appeared to +take no visible interest in their new surroundings, threw open all the +sliding doors on the upper and lower decks so that the vessel might be +thoroughly ventilated by the fresh sweet air. Then a gentle repulsion +was applied to the huge snow mass on which the <i>Astronef</i> rested. She +rose a couple of hundred feet, her propellers began to whirl round, and +Redgrave steered her out towards the centre of the vast cloud-sea which +was almost surrounded by a thousand glittering peaks of ice and domes of +snow.</p> + +<p>"I think we may as well put off dinner, or breakfast as it will be now, +until we see what the world below is like," he said to Zaidie, who was +standing beside him on the conning-tower.</p> + +<p>"Oh, never mind about eating just now, this is altogether too wonderful +to be missed for the sake of ordinary meat and drink. Let's go down and +see what there is on the other side."</p> + +<p>He sent a message down the speaking tube to Murgatroyd, who was below +among his beloved engines, and the next moment sun and clouds and +ice-peaks had disappeared and nothing was visible save the +all-enveloping silver-grey mist.</p> + +<p>For several minutes they remained silent, watching and wondering what +they would find beneath the veil which hid the surface of Venus from +their view. Then the mist thinned out and broke up into patches which +drifted past them as they descended on their downward slanting course.</p> + +<p>Below them they saw vast, ghostly shapes of mountains and valleys, lakes +and rivers, continents, islands, and seas. Every moment these became +more and more distinct, and soon they were in full view of the most +marvellous landscape that human eyes had ever beheld. The distances were +tremendous. Mountains, compared with which the Alps or even the Andes +would have seemed mere hillocks, towered up out of the vast depths +beneath them.</p> + +<p>Up to the lower edge of the all-covering cloud-sea they were clad with a +golden-yellow vegetation, fields and forests, open, smiling valleys, and +deep, dark ravines through which a thousand torrents thundered down from +the eternal snows beyond, to spread themselves out in rivers and lakes +in the valleys and plains which lay many thousands of feet below.</p> + +<p>"What a lovely world!" said Zaidie, as she at last found her voice after +what was almost a stupor of speechless wonder and admiration. "And the +light! Did you ever see anything like it? It's neither moonlight nor +sunlight. See, there are no shadows down there, it's just all lovely +silvery twilight. Lenox, if Venus is as nice as she looks from here I +don't think I shall want to go back. It reminds me of Tennyson's Lotus +Eaters, 'the Land where it is always afternoon.'</p> + +<p>"I think you are right after all. We are thirty million miles nearer to +the Sun than we were on the Earth, and the light and heat have to filter +through those clouds. They are not at all like Earth clouds from this +side. It's the other way about. The silver lining is on this side. Look, +there isn't a black or a brown one, or even a grey one, within sight. +They are just like a thin mist, lighted by a million of electric lamps. +It's a delicious world, and if it isn't inhabited by angels it ought to +be."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</h2> + + +<p>While Zaidie was talking the <i>Astronef</i> was sweeping swiftly down +towards the surface of Venus, through scenery of whose almost +inconceivable magnificence no human words could convey any adequate +idea. Underneath the cloud-veil the air was absolutely clear and +transparent, clearer, indeed, than terrestrial air at the highest +elevations reached by mountain-climbers, and, moreover, it seemed to be +endowed with a strange, luminous quality, which made objects, no matter +how distant, stand out with almost startling distinctness.</p> + +<p>The rivers and lakes and seas which spread out beneath them, seemed +never to have been ruffled by blast of storm or breath of wind, and +their surfaces shone with a soft, silvery light, which seemed to come +from below rather than from above.</p> + +<p>"If this isn't heaven it must be the half-way house," said Redgrave, +with what was, perhaps, under the circumstances, a pardonable +irreverence. "Still, after all, we don't know what the inhabitants may +be like, so I think we'd better close the doors, and drop on the top of +that mountain-spur running out between the two rivers into the bay. Do +you notice how curious the water looks after the Earth seas; bright +silver, instead of blue and green?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's just lovely," said Zaidie. "Let's go down and have a walk. +There's nothing to be afraid of. You'll never make me believe that a +world like this can be inhabited by anything dangerous."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps, but we mustn't forget what happened on Mars, <i>Madonna mia</i>. +Still, there's one thing, we haven't been tackled by any aerial fleets +yet."</p> + +<p>"I don't think the people here want air-ships. They can fly themselves. +Look! there are a lot of them coming to meet us. That was a rather +wicked remark of yours, Lenox, about the half-way house to heaven; but +those certainly do look something like angels."</p> + +<p>As Zaidie said this, after a somewhat lengthy pause, during which the +<i>Astronef</i> had descended to within a few hundred feet of the +mountain-spur, she handed her field-glasses to her husband, and pointed +downwards towards an island which lay a couple or miles or so off the +end of the spur.</p> + +<p>He put the glasses to his eyes, and took a long look through them. +Moving them slowly up and down, and from side to side, he saw hundreds +of winged figures rising from the island and floating towards them.</p> + +<p>"You were right, dear," he said, without taking the glass from his eyes, +"and so was I. If those aren't angels, they're certainly something like +men, and, I suppose, women too who can fly. We may as well stop here and +wait for them. I wonder what sort of an animal they take the <i>Astronef</i> +for."</p> + +<p>He sent a message down the tube to Murgatroyd and gave a turn and a half +to the steering-wheel. The propellers slowed down and the <i>Astronef</i> +dropped with a hardly-perceptible shock in the midst of a little plateau +covered with a thick, soft moss of a pale yellowish green, and fringed +by a belt of trees which seemed to be over three hundred feet high, and +whose foliage was a deep golden bronze.</p> + +<p>They had scarcely landed before the flying figures reappeared over the +tree tops and swept downwards in long spiral curves towards the +<i>Astronef</i>.</p> + +<p>"If they're not angels, they're very like them," said Zaidie, putting +down her glasses.</p> + +<p>"There's one thing, they fly a lot better than the old masters' angels +or Doré's could have done, because they have tails—or at least +something that seems to serve the same purpose, and yet they haven't got +feathers."</p> + +<p>"Yes, they have, at least round the edges of their wings or whatever +they are, and they've got clothes, too, silk tunics or something of that +sort—and there are men and women."</p> + +<p>"You're quite right, those fringes down their legs are feathers, and +that's how they can fly. They seem to have four arms."</p> + +<p>The flying figures which came hovering near to the <i>Astronef</i>, without +evincing any apparent sign of fear, were the strangest that human eyes +had looked upon. In some respects they had a sufficient resemblance for +them to be taken for winged men and women, while in another they bore a +decided resemblance to birds. Their bodies and limbs were human in +shape, but of slenderer and lighter build; and from the shoulder-blades +and muscles of the back there sprang a second pair of arms arching up +above their heads. Between these and the lower arms, and continued from +them down the side to the ankles, there appeared to be a flexible +membrane covered with a light feathery down, pure white on the inside, +but on the back a brilliant golden yellow, deepening to bronze towards +the edges, round which ran a deep feathery fringe.</p> + +<p>The body was covered in front and down the back between the wings with a +sort of divided tunic of a light, silken-looking material, which must +have been clothing, since there were many different colours all more or +less of different hue among them. Below this and attached to the inner +sides of the leg from the knee downward, was another membrane which +reached down to the heels, and it was this which Redgrave somewhat +flippantly alluded to as a tail. Its obvious purpose was to maintain the +longitudinal balance when flying.</p> + +<p>In stature the inhabitants of the Love-Star varied from about five feet +six to five feet, but both the taller and the shorter of them were all +of nearly the same size, from which it was easy to conclude that this +difference in stature was on Venus as well as on the Earth, one of the +broad distinctions between the sexes.</p> + +<p>They flew round the <i>Astronef</i> with an exquisite ease and grace which +made Zaidie exclaim:</p> + +<p>"Now, why weren't we made like that on Earth?"</p> + +<p>To which Redgrave, after a look at the barometer, replied:</p> + +<p>"Partly, I suppose, because we weren't built that way, and partly +because we don't live in an atmosphere about two and a half times as +dense as ours."</p> + +<p>Then several of the winged figures alighted on the mossy covering of the +plain and walked towards the vessel.</p> + +<p>"Why, they walk just like us, only much more prettily!" said Zaidie. +"And look what funny little faces they've got! Half bird, half human, +and soft, downy feathers instead of hair. I wonder whether they talk or +sing. I wish you'd open the doors again, Lenox. I'm sure they can't +possibly mean us any harm; they are far too pretty for that. What lovely +soft eyes they have, and what a thousand pities it is we shan't be able +to understand them."</p> + +<p>They had left the conning-tower, and both his lordship and Murgatroyd +were throwing open the sliding-doors and, to Zaidie's considerable +displeasure, getting the deck Maxims ready for action in case they +should be required. As soon as the doors were open Zaidie's judgment of +the inhabitants of Venus was entirely justified.</p> + +<p>Without the slightest sign of fear, but with very evident astonishment +in their round golden-yellow eyes, they came walking close up to the +sides of the <i>Astronef</i>. Some of them stroked her smooth, shining sides +with their little hands, which Zaidie now found had only three fingers +and a thumb. Many ages before they might have been birds' claws, but now +they were soft and pink and plump, utterly strange to manual work as it +is understood upon Earth.</p> + +<p>"Just fancy getting Maxim guns ready to shoot those delightful things," +said Zaidie, almost indignantly, as she went towards the doorway from +which the gangway ladder ran down to the soft, mossy turf. "Why, not one +of them has got a weapon of any sort; and just listen," she went on, +stopping in the opening of the doorway, "have you ever heard music like +that on Earth? I haven't. I suppose it's the way they talk. I'd give a +good deal to be able to understand them. But still, it's very lovely, +isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Ay, like the voices of syrens," said Murgatroyd, speaking for the first +time since the <i>Astronef</i> had landed; for this big, grizzled, taciturn +Yorkshireman, who looked upon the whole cruise through Space as a mad +and almost impious adventure, which nothing but his hereditary loyalty +to his master's name and family could have persuaded him to share in, +had grown more and more silent as the millions of miles between the +<i>Astronef</i> and his native Yorkshire village had multiplied day by day.</p> + +<p>"Syrens—and why not, Andrew?" laughed Redgrave. "At any rate, I don't +think they look likely to lure us and the <i>Astronef</i> to destruction." +Then he went on: "Yes, Zaidie, I never heard anything like that before. +Unearthly, of course it is, but then we're not on Earth. Now, Zaidie, +they seem to talk in song-language. You did pretty well on Mars with +your American, suppose we go out and show them that you can speak the +song-language, too."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?" she said; "sing them something?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," he replied; "they'll try to talk to you in song, and you won't be +able to understand them; at least, not as far as words and sentences go. +But music is the universal language on Earth, and there's no reason why +it shouldn't be the same through the Solar System. Come along, tune up, +little woman!"</p> + +<p>They went together down the gangway stairs, he dressed in an ordinary +suit of grey, English tweed, with a golf cap on the back of his head, +and she in the last and daintiest of the costumes which the art of Paris +and London and New York had produced before the <i>Astronef</i> soared up +from far-off Washington.</p> + +<p>The moment that she set foot on the golden-yellow sward she was +surrounded by a swarm of the winged, and yet strangely human creatures. +Those nearest to her came and touched her hands and face, and stroked +the folds of her dress. Others looked into her violet-blue eyes, and +others put out their queer little hands and stroked her hair.</p> + +<p>This and her clothing seemed to be the most wonderful experience for +them, saving always the fact that she had only two arms and no wings. +Redgrave kept close beside her until he was satisfied that these +exquisite inhabitants of the new-found fairyland were innocent of any +intention of harm, and when he saw two of the winged daughters of the +Love-Star put up their hands and touch the thick coils of her hair, he +said:</p> + +<p>"Take those pins and things out and let it down. They seem to think that +your hair's part of your head. It's the first chance you've had to work +a miracle, so you may as well do it. Show them the most beautiful thing +they've ever seen."</p> + +<p>"What babies you men can be when you get sentimental!" laughed Zaidie, +as she put her hands up to her head. "How do you know that this may not +be ugly in their eyes?"</p> + +<p>"Quite impossible!" he replied. "They're a great deal too pretty +themselves to think <i>you</i> ugly. Let it down!"</p> + +<p>While he was speaking Zaidie had taken off a Spanish mantilla which she +had thrown over her head as she came out, and which the ladies of Venus +seemed to think was part of her hair. Then she took out the comb and one +or two hairpins which kept the coils in position, deftly caught the +ends, and then, after a few rapid movements of her fingers, she shook +her head, and the wondering crowd about her saw, what seemed to them a +shimmering veil, half gold, half silver, in the soft reflected light +from the cloud-veil, fall down from her head over her shoulders.</p> + +<p>They crowded still more closely round her, but so quietly and so gently +that she felt nothing more than the touch of wondering hands on her +arms, and dress, and hair. As Redgrave said afterwards, he was +"absolutely out of it." They seemed to imagine him to be a kind of +uncouth monster, possibly the slave of this radiant being which had come +so strangely from somewhere beyond the cloud-veil. They looked at him +with their golden-yellow eyes wide open, and some of them came up rather +timidly and touched his clothes, which they seemed to think were his +skin.</p> + +<p>Then one or two, more daring, put their little hands up to his face and +touched his moustache, and all of them, while both examinations were +going on, kept up a running conversation of cooing and singing which +evidently conveyed their ideas from one to the other on the subject of +this most marvellous visit of these two strange beings with neither +wings nor feathers, but who, most undoubtedly, had other means of +flying, since it was quite certain that they had come from another +world.</p> + +<p>Their ordinary speech was a low crooning note, like the language in +which doves converse, mingled with a twittering current of undertone. +But every moment it rose into higher notes, evidently expressing wonder +or admiration, or both.</p> + +<p>"You were right about the universal language," said Redgrave, when he +had submitted to the stroking process for a few moments. "These people +talk in music, and, as far as I can see or hear, their opinion of us, +or, at least, of you, is distinctly flattering. I don't know what they +take <i>me</i> for, and I don't care, but as we'd better make friends with +them suppose you sing them 'Home, Sweet Home,' or the 'Swanee River.' I +shouldn't wonder if they consider our talking voices most horrible +discords, so you might as well give them something different."</p> + +<p>While he was speaking the sounds about them suddenly hushed, and, as +Redgrave said afterwards, it was something like the silence that follows +a cannon shot. Then, in the midst of the hush, Zaidie put her hands +behind her, looked up towards the luminous silver surface which formed +the only visible sky of Venus, and began to sing "The Swanee River."</p> + +<p>The clear, sweet notes rang up through the midst of a sudden silence. +The sons and daughters of the Love-Star instantly ceased their own soft +musical conversation, and Zaidie sang the old plantation song through +for the first time that a human voice had sung it to ears other than +human.</p> + +<p>As the last note thrilled sweetly from her lips she looked round at the +crowd of queer half-human shapes about her, and something in their +unlikeness to her own kind brought back to her mind the familiar scenes +which lay so far away, so many millions of miles across the dark and +silent Ocean of Space.</p> + +<p>Other winged figures, attracted by the sound of her singing, had crossed +the trees, and these, during the silence which came after the singing of +the song, were swiftly followed by others, until there were nearly a +thousand of them gathered about the side of the <i>Astronef</i>.</p> + +<p>There was no crowding or jostling among them. Each one treated every +other with the most perfect gentleness and courtesy. No such thing as +enmity or ill-feeling seemed to exist among them, and, in perfect +silence, they waited for Zaidie to continue what they thought was her +long speech of greeting. The temper of the throng somehow coincided +exactly with the mood which her own memories had brought to her, and the +next moment she sent the first line of "Home, Sweet Home" soaring up to +the cloud-veiled sky.</p> + +<p>As the notes rang up into the still, soft air a deeper hush fell on the +listening throng. Heads were bowed with a gesture almost of adoration, +and many of those standing nearest to her bent their bodies forward, and +expanded their wings, bringing them together over their breasts with a +motion which, as they afterwards learnt, was intended to convey the idea +of wonder and admiration, mingled with something like a sentiment of +worship.</p> + +<p>Zaidie sang the sweet old song through from end to end, forgetting for +the time being everything but the home she had left behind her on the +banks of the Hudson. As the last notes left her lips, she turned round +to Redgrave and looked at him with eyes dim with the first tears that +had filled them since her father's death, and said, as he caught hold of +her outstretched hand:</p> + +<p>"I believe they've understood every word of it."</p> + +<p>"Or, at any rate, every note. You may be quite certain of that," he +replied. "If you had done that on Mars it might have been even more +effective than the Maxims."</p> + +<p>"For goodness sake don't talk about things like that in a heaven like +this! Oh, listen! They've got the tune already!"</p> + +<p>It was true! The dwellers of the Love-Star, whose speech was song, had +instantly recognised the sweetness of the sweetest of all earthly songs. +They had, of course, no idea of the meaning of the words; but the music +spoke to them and told them that this fair visitant from another world +could speak the same speech as theirs. Every note and cadence was +repeated with absolute fidelity, and so the speech, common to the two +far-distant worlds, became a link connecting this wandering son and +daughter of the Earth with the sons and daughters of the Love-Star.</p> + +<p>The throng fell back a little and two figures, apparently male and +female, came to Zaidie and held out their right hands and began +addressing her in perfectly harmonised song, which, though utterly +unintelligible to her in the sense of speech, expressed sentiments which +could not possibly be mistaken, as there was a faint suggestion of the +old English song running through the little song-speech that they made, +and both Zaidie and her husband rightly concluded that it was intended +to convey a welcome to the strangers from beyond the cloud-veil.</p> + +<p>And then the strangest of all possible conversations began. Redgrave, +who had no more notion of music than a walrus, perforce kept silence. In +fact, he noticed with a certain displeasure which vanished speedily with +a musical, and half-malicious little laugh from Zaidie, that when he +spoke the Bird-Folk drew back a little and looked in something like +astonishment at him; but Zaidie was already in touch with them, and half +by song and half by signs she very soon gave them an idea of what they +were and where they had come from. Her husband afterwards told her that +it was the best piece of operatic acting he had ever seen, and, +considering all the circumstances, this was very possibly true.</p> + +<p>In the end the two who had come to give her what seemed to be the formal +greeting, were invited into the <i>Astronef</i>. They went on board without +the slightest sign of mistrust and with only an expression of mild +wonder on their beautiful and strangely childlike faces.</p> + +<p>Then, while the other doors were being closed, Zaidie stood at the open +one above the gangway and made signs showing that they were going up +beyond the clouds and then down into the valley, and as she made the +signs she sang through the scale, her voice rising and falling in +harmony with her gestures. The Bird-Folk understood her instantly, and +as the door closed and the <i>Astronef</i> rose from the ground, a thousand +wings were outspread and presently hundreds of beautiful soaring forms +were circling about the Navigator of the Stars.</p> + +<p>"Don't they look lovely!" said Zaidie. "I wonder what they would think +if they could see us flying above New York or London or Paris with an +escort like this. I suppose they're going to show us the way. Perhaps +they have a city down there. Suppose you were to go and get a bottle of +champagne and see if Master Cupid and Miss Venus would like a drink. +We'll see then if our nectar is anything like theirs."</p> + +<p>Redgrave went below. Meanwhile, for lack of other possible conversation, +Zaidie began to sing the last verse of "Never Again." The melody almost +exactly described the upward motion of the <i>Astronef</i>, and she could see +that it was instantly understood, for when she had finished their two +voices joined in an almost exact imitation of it.</p> + +<p>When Redgrave brought up the wine and the glasses they looked at them +without any sign of surprise. The pop of the cork did not even make them +look round.</p> + +<p>"Evidently a semi-angelic people, living on nectar and ambrosia, with +nectar very like our own," he said, as he filled the glasses. "Perhaps +you'd better give it to them. They seem to understand you better than +they do me—you being, of course, a good bit nearer to the angels than I +am."</p> + +<p>"Thanks!" she said, as she took a couple of glasses up, wondering a +little what their visitors would do with them. Somewhat to her surprise, +they took them with a little bow and a smile and sipped at the wine, +first with a swift glint of wonder in their eyes, and then with smiles +which are unmistakable evidence of perfect appreciation.</p> + +<p>"I thought so," said Redgrave, as he raised his own glass, and bowed +gravely towards them. "This is our nearest approach to nectar, and they +seem to recognise it."</p> + +<p>"And don't they just look like the sort of people who live on it, and, +of course, other things?" added Zaidie, as she too lifted her glass, and +looked with laughing eyes across the brim at her two guests.</p> + +<p>But meanwhile Murgatroyd had been applying the repulsive force a little +too strongly. The <i>Astronef</i> shot up with a rapidity which soon left her +winged escort far below. She entered the cloud-veil and passed beyond +it. The instant that the unclouded sun-rays struck the glass-roofing of +the deck-chamber their two guests, who had been moving about examining +everything with a childlike curiosity, closed their eyes and clasped +their hands over them, uttering little cries, tuneful and musical, but +still with a note of strange discord in them.</p> + +<p>"Lenox, we must go down again," exclaimed Zaidie. "Don't you see they +can't stand the light; it hurts them. Perhaps, poor dears, it's the +first time they've ever been hurt in their lives. I don't believe they +have any of our ideas of pain or sorrow or anything of that sort. Take +us back under the clouds—quick, or we may blind them."</p> + +<p>Before she had ceased speaking, Redgrave had sent a signal down to +Murgatroyd, and the <i>Astronef</i> began to drop back again towards the +surface of the cloud-sea. Zaidie had, meanwhile, gone to her lady guest +and dropped the black lace mantilla over her head, and, as she did so, +she caught herself saying:</p> + +<p>"There, dear, we shall soon be back in your own light. I hope it hasn't +hurt you. It was very stupid of us to do a thing like that."</p> + +<p>The answer came in a little cooing murmur, which said, "Thank you!" +quite as effectively as any earthly words could have done, and then the +<i>Astronef</i> passed through the cloud-sea. The soaring forms of her lost +escort came into view again and clustered about her; and, surrounded by +them, she dropped, in obedience to their signs, down between the +tremendous mountains and towards the island, thick with golden foliage, +which lay two or three Earth-miles out in a bay, where four converging +rivers spread out through a vast estuary into the sea.</p> + +<p>As Lady Redgrave said afterwards to Mrs. Van Stuyler, she could have +filled a whole volume with a description of the exquisitely arcadian +delights with which the hours of the next ten days and nights were +filled. Possibly if she had been able to do justice to them, even her +account might have been received with qualified credence; but still some +idea of them may be gathered from this extract of a conversation which +took place in the saloon of the <i>Astronef</i> on the eleventh evening.</p> + +<p>"But look here, Zaidie," said Redgrave, "as we've found a world which is +certainly much more delightful than our own, why shouldn't we stop here +a bit? The air suits us and the people are simply enchanting. I think +they like us, and I'm sure you're in love with every one of them, male +and female. Of course, it's rather a pity that we can't fly unless we do +it in the <i>Astronef</i>. But that's only a detail. You're enjoying yourself +thoroughly, and I never saw you looking better or, if possible, more +beautiful; and why on Earth—or Venus—do you want to go?"</p> + +<p>She looked at him steadily for a few moments, and with an expression +which he had never seen on her face or in her eyes before, and then she +said slowly and very sweetly, although there was something like a note +of solemnity running through her tone:</p> + +<p>"I altogether agree with you, dear; but there is something which you +don't seem to have noticed. As you say, we have had a perfectly +delightful time. It's a delicious world, and just everything that one +would think it to be; but if we were to stop here we should be +committing one of the greatest of crimes, perhaps the greatest, that +ever was committed within the limits of the Solar System."</p> + +<p>"My dear Zaidie, what, in the name of what we used to call morals on the +Earth, <i>do</i> you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Just this," she replied, leaning a little towards him in her +deck-chair. "These people, half angels, and half men and women, welcomed +us after we dropped through their cloud-veil, as friends; we were a +little strange to them, certainly, but still they welcomed us as +friends. They had no suspicions of us; they didn't try to poison us or +blow us up as those wretches on Mars did. They're just like a lot of +grown-up children with wings on. In fact they're about as nearly angels +as anything we can think of. They've taken us into their palaces, +they've given us, as one might say, the whole planet. Everything was +ours that we liked to take. You know we have two or three hundredweight +of precious stones on board now, which they would make me take just +because they saw my rings.</p> + +<p>"We've been living with them ten days now, and neither you nor I, nor +even Murgatroyd, who, like the old Puritan that he is, seems to see sin +or wrong in everything that looks nice, has seen a single sign among +them that they know anything about what we call sin or wrong on Earth. +There's no jealousy, no selfishness. In short, no envy, hatred, malice, +and all uncharitableness; no vice, or meanness, or cheating, or any of +the abominations of the planet Terra, and <i>we come from that planet</i>. Do +you see what I mean now?"</p> + +<p>"I think I understand what you're driving at," said Redgrave; "you mean, +I suppose, that this world is something like Eden before the fall, and +that you and I—oh—but that's all rubbish you know. I've got my own +share of original sin, of course, but here it doesn't seem to come in; +and as for you, the very idea of <i>you</i> imagining yourself a feminine +edition of the Serpent in Eden. Nonsense!"</p> + +<p>She got up out of her chair and, leaning over his, put her arm round his +shoulder. Then she said very softly:</p> + +<p>"I see you understand what I mean, Lenox. That's just it—original sin. +It doesn't matter how good you think me or I think you, but we have it. +You're an Earth-born man and I'm an Earth-born woman, and, as I'm your +wife, I can say it plainly. We may think a good bit of each other, but +that's no reason why we might not be a couple of plague-spots in a +sinless world like this. Surely you see what I mean, I needn't put it +plainer, need I?"</p> + +<p>Their eyes met, and he read her meaning in hers. He put his arm up over +her shoulder and drew her down towards him. Their lips met, and then he +got up and went down to the engine-room.</p> + +<p>A couple of minutes later the <i>Astronef</i> sprang upwards from the midst +of the delightful valley in which she was resting. No lights were shown. +In five minutes she had passed through the cloud-veil, and the next +morning when their new friends came to visit them and found that they +had vanished back into Space, there was sorrow for the first time among +the sons and daughters of the Love-Star.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</h2> + + +<p>"Five hundred million miles from the Earth, and forty-seven million +miles from Jupiter," said Redgrave as he came into breakfast on the +morning of the twenty-eighth day after leaving Venus.</p> + +<p>During this brief period the <i>Astronef</i> had recrossed the orbits of the +Earth and Mars and had passed through that marvellous region of the +Solar System, the Belt of the Asteroides. Nearly a hundred million miles +of their journey had lain through this zone in which hundreds and +possibly thousands of tiny planets revolve in vast orbits round the Sun.</p> + +<p>Then had come a world less void of over three hundred million miles, +through which they voyaged alone, surrounded by the ever-constant +splendours of the heavens, and visited only now and then by one of those +Spectres of Space, which we call comets.</p> + +<p>Astern the disc of the Sun steadily diminished and ahead the grey-blue +shape of Jupiter, the Giant of the Solar System, had grown larger and +larger until now they could see it as it had never been seen before—a +gigantic three-quarter moon filling up the whole heavens in front of +them almost from zenith to nadir. Three of its satellites, Europa, +Ganymede, and Calisto, were distinctly visible even to the naked eye, +and Europa and Ganymede, happened to be in such a position in regard to +the <i>Astronef</i> that her crew could see not only the bright sides turned +towards the Sun, but also the black shadow-spots which they cast on the +cloud-veiled face of the huge planet. Calisto was above the horizon +hanging like a tiny flicker of yellowish-red light above the rounded +edge of Jupiter, and Io was invisible behind the planet.</p> + +<p>"Five hundred million miles!" said Zaidie, with a little shiver; "that +seems an awful long way from home—I mean America—doesn't it? I often +wonder what they are thinking about us on the dear old Earth. I don't +suppose any one ever expects to see us again. However, it's no good +getting homesick in the middle of a journey when you're outward bound. +And now what is the programme as regards His Majesty King Jove? We shall +visit the satellites of course?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," replied Redgrave; "in fact, I shouldn't be surprised if our +visit was confined to them."</p> + +<p>"What! do you mean to say we shan't land on Jupiter after coming nearly +six hundred million miles to see him? That would be disappointing. But +why not? don't you think he's ready to be visited yet?"</p> + +<p>"I can't say that, but you must remember that no one has the remotest +notion of what there is behind the clouds or whatever they are which +form those bands. All we really know about Jupiter is that he is of +enormous size, for instance, he's over twelve hundred times bigger than +the Earth and that his density isn't much greater than that of +water—and my humble opinion is that if we're able to go through the +clouds without getting the <i>Astronef</i> red-hot we shall find that Jupiter +is in the same state as the Earth was a good many million years ago."</p> + +<p>"I see," said Zaidie, "you mean just a mass of blazing, boiling rock and +metal which will make islands and continents some day; and that what we +call the cloud-bands are the vapours which will one day make its seas. +Well, if we can get through these clouds we ought to see something worth +seeing. Just fancy a whole world as big as that all ablaze like molten +iron! Do you think we shall be able to see it, Lenox?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not so sure about that, little woman. We shall have to go to work +rather cautiously. You see Jupiter is far bigger than any world we've +visited yet, and if we got too close to him the <i>Astronef's</i> engines +might not be powerful enough to drive us away again. Then we should +either stop there till the R. Force was exhausted or be drawn towards +him and perhaps drop into an ocean of molten rock and metal."</p> + +<p>"Thanks!" said Zaidie, with a shrug of her shapely shoulders. "That +<i>would</i> be an ignominious end to a journey like this, to say nothing of +the boiling oil part of it; so I suppose you'll make stopping-places of +the satellites and use their attraction to help you to resist His +Majesty's."</p> + +<p>"Your Ladyship's reasoning is perfect. I propose to visit them in turn, +beginning with Calisto. I shouldn't be at all surprised if we found +something interesting on them. You know they're quite little worlds of +themselves. They're all bigger than our moon, except Europa. Ganymede, +in fact, is two-thirds bigger than Mercury, and if old Jupiter is still +in a state of fiery incandescence there's no reason why we shouldn't +find on Ganymede or one of the others the same state of things that +existed on our moon when the Earth was blazing hot."</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't wonder," said Zaidie; "I've often heard my father say that +that was probably what happened. It's all very marvellous, isn't it? +death in one place, life in another, all beginnings and endings, and yet +no actual beginning or end of anything anywhere. That's eternity, I +suppose."</p> + +<p>"It's just about as near as the finite intellect can get to it, I should +say," replied Redgrave. "But I don't think metaphysics are much in our +line. If you've finished we may as well go and have a look at the +realities."</p> + +<p>"Which the metaphysicians," laughed Zaidie as she rose, "would tell you +are not realities at all, or only realities so far as you can think +about them. 'Thinks,' in short, instead of real things. But meanwhile +I've got the breakfast <i>things</i> to put away, so you can go up on deck +and put the telescopes in order."</p> + +<p>When she joined him a few minutes later in the deck-chamber the +three-quarter disc of Jupiter was rapidly approaching the full.</p> + +<p>Its phases are invisible from the Earth owing to the enormous distance; +but from the deck of the <i>Astronef</i> they had been plainly visible for +some days, and, since the huge planet turns on its axis in less than ten +hours, or with more than twice the speed of the Earth's rotation, the +phases followed each other very rapidly.</p> + +<p>Thus at twelve o'clock noon by <i>Astronef</i> time they might have seen a +gigantic rim of silver-blue overarching the whole vault of heaven in +front of them. By five o'clock it would be a hemisphere, and by five +minutes to ten the vast sphere would be once more shining full-orbed +upon them. By eight o'clock next morning they would find Jupiter "new" +again.</p> + +<p>They were now falling very rapidly towards the huge planet, and, since +there is no up or down in Space, the nearer they got to it the more it +appeared to sink below them and become, as it were, the floor of the +Celestial Sphere. As the crescent approached the full they were able to +examine the mysterious bands as human observers had never examined them +before. For hours they sat almost silent at their telescopes, trying to +probe the mystery which has baffled human science since the days of +Galileo, and gradually it became plain that Redgrave was correct in the +hypothesis which he had derived from Flammarion and one or two others of +the more advanced astronomers.</p> + +<p>"I believe I was right, or, in other words, those that I got the idea +from are," he said, as they approached the orbit of Calisto, which +revolves at a distance of about eleven hundred thousand miles from the +surface of Jupiter.</p> + +<p>"Those belts are made of clouds or vapour in some stage or other. The +highest—the ones along the Equator and what we should call the +Temperate Zones—are the highest, and therefore coolest and whitest. The +dark ones are the lowest and hottest. I daresay they are more like what +we should call volcanic clouds. Do you see how they keep changing? +That's what's bothered our astronomers. Look at that big one yonder a +bit to the north, going from brown to red. I suppose that's something +like the famous red spot which they have been puzzling about. What do +you make of it?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said Zaidie, looking up from her telescope, "it's quite certain +that the glare must come from underneath. It can't be sunlight, because +the poor old Sun doesn't seem to have strength enough to make a decent +sunset or sunrise here, and look how it's running along to the westward! +What does that mean, do you think?"</p> + +<p>"I should say it means that some half-formed Jovian Continent has been +flung sky high by a big burst-up underneath, and that's the blaze of the +incandescent stuff running along. Just fancy a continent, say ten times +the size of Asia, being split up and sent flying in a few moments like +that. Look! there's another one to the north! On the whole, dear, I +don't think we should find the climate on the other side of those clouds +very salubrious. Still, as they say the atmosphere of Jupiter is about +ten thousand miles thick, we may be able to get near enough to see +something of what's going on.</p> + +<p>"Meanwhile, here comes Calisto. Look at his shadow flying across the +clouds. And there's Ganymede coming up after him, and Europa behind him. +Talk about eclipses! they must be about as common here as thunderstorms +are with us."</p> + +<p>"We don't have a thunderstorm every day—at least not at home," +corrected Zaidie, "but on Jupiter they must have two or three eclipses +every day. Meanwhile, there goes Jupiter himself. What a difference +distance makes! This little thing is only a trifle larger than our Moon, +and it's hiding everything else."</p> + +<p>As she was speaking the full-orbed disc of Calisto, measuring nearly +three thousand miles across, swept between them and the planet. It shone +with a clear, somewhat reddish light like that of Mars. The <i>Astronef</i> +was feeling his attraction strongly, and Redgrave went to the levers and +turned on about a fifth of the R. Force to avoid too sudden contact with +it.</p> + +<p>"Another dead world!" said Redgrave, as the surface of Calisto revolved +swiftly beneath them, "or at any rate a dying one. There must be an +atmosphere of some sort, or else that snow and ice wouldn't be there, +and everything would be either black or white as it was on the Moon. We +may as well land, however, and get a specimen of the rocks and soil to +add to the museum, though I don't expect there will be very much to see +in the way of life."</p> + +<p>In another hour or so the <i>Astronef</i> had dropped gently on to the +surface of Calisto at the foot of a range of mountains crowded with +jagged and splintery peaks, and a mile or two from the edge of a sea of +snow and ice which stretched away in a vast expanse of rugged frozen +billows beyond the horizon. Redgrave, as usual, went into the +air-chamber and tried the atmosphere. A second's experience of it was +enough for him. It was unbreathably thin and unbearably cold, although, +when mixed with the air of the <i>Astronef</i>, it distinctly freshened it +up. This proved that its composition was, or had been, fit for human +respiration.</p> + +<p>"There's only one fault about it," he said, when he rejoined Zaidie in +the sitting-room. "You know what the schoolboy said when he started +kissing his first sweetheart, 'It takes too long to get enough of it.'"</p> + +<p>"You seem to be very fond of referring to that particular subject, +Lenox."</p> + +<p>"Well, yes; to tell you the truth I am," and then he referred to it +again in another form.</p> + +<p>After this they went and put on their breathing-dresses and went for a +welcome stroll along the arid shores of the frozen sea after their +lengthy confinement to the decks of the <i>Astronef</i>. The Sun was still +powerful enough to keep them comfortably warm in their dresses, and +there was enough atmosphere to make this warmth diffused instead of +direct. So they were able to step out briskly, and every now and then +open their visors a little and take in a breath or two of the thin, +sharp air, which they found quite exhilarating when mixed with the air +supplied by their own oxygen apparatus.</p> + +<p>The attraction of the satellite being only a little more than that of +the Moon—or, say, about a fifth of that of the Earth—they were able to +get along with a series of hops, skips, and jumps which might have +looked rather ridiculous to terrestrial eyes, but which they found a +very pleasant mode of locomotion. They were also able to climb the +steepest mountainsides with no more trouble than they would have had in +walking along a terrestrial plain.</p> + +<p>On the heights they found no sign either of animal or vegetable +life—only rocks and gravel and sand of a brownish red, apparently +uniform in composition. They took a few lumps of rock and a canvas bag +full of sand back with them from the mountain-side. In the valley +sloping towards the ice-sea they found what had once been watercourses +opening out into rivers towards the sea; and in the lowest parts there +was a kind of lichen-growth clinging to the rocks under the snow. On the +surface of the snow they saw traces of what might have been the tracks +of animals, but, as there was no breath of wind in the attenuated +atmosphere, it was quite possible that these might have been frozen into +permanent shape hundreds or thousands of years before. It was also +possible that if they had explored long enough they might have found +some low forms of animal life, but as they had landed almost on the +equator of the satellite, under the full rays of the Sun, and seen +nothing, this was hardly likely.</p> + +<p>"I don't think it is worth while stopping here any longer," said Zaidie, +who was getting a little bit <i>blasé</i> with her interplanetary +experiences. "We've got lots to see further on, so if you don't mind I +think I'll just take two or three photographs, then we can get back to +the ship and have dinner and go on and see what Ganymede is like. He's +bigger than Mercury, and nearly as big as Mars, so we ought to find +something interesting there. This is only a sort of combination of the +Moon and the polar regions and I don't think very much of it. Suppose we +go back."</p> + +<p>"Just as your Ladyship pleases," laughed Redgrave over the wire which +connected their helmets, as, with joined hands, they turned back and +danced along the snow-covered ocean shore towards the <i>Astronef</i>.</p> + +<p>Zaidie took a couple of photographs of the mountain range and the +ice-sea and another one of the general landscape of Calisto as they rose +from the surface. Then, while she went to get lunch ready, Redgrave took +the pieces of rock and the bag of dust into the laboratory which opened +out of the main engine-room and analysed them. When he came out about an +hour later he saw Murgatroyd going through his beloved engines with an +oil-can and a piece of common cotton-waste which had come from a faraway +Yorkshire mill.</p> + +<p>"Andrew," he said, "should you be surprised if I told you that that moon +we've just left seems to be mostly made of a spongy sort of alloy of +gold and silver?"</p> + +<p>"My lord," said the old engineer, straightening himself up and looking +at him with eyes in which this announcement had not seemed to kindle a +spark of interest, "after what I have seen so far there's nothing +that'll surprise me unless it be that the grace of God allows us to get +back safely."</p> + +<p>"Amen, Andrew, that's well said," replied Redgrave, and then he went +back to the saloon and Murgatroyd went on with his oiling.</p> + +<p>When he told her ladyship of his discovery she just looked up from the +table she was laying and said:</p> + +<p>"Oh, indeed! Well, I'm very glad that it's five or six hundred million +miles from the Earth. A dead world bigger than the Moon, and made of +gold and silver sponge, wouldn't be a nice thing to have too near the +Earth. There's trouble enough about that sort of thing at home as it is. +Still, it'll be a nice addition to the museum, and if you'll put it away +and go and wash your hands lunch will be ready."</p> + +<p>When they got back to the deck-chamber Calisto was already a half moon +in the upper sky nearly five hundred thousand miles away, and the full +orb of Ganymede, shining with a pale golden light, lay outspread beneath +them. A thin, bluish-grey arc of the giant planet overarched its western +edge.</p> + +<p>"I think we shall find something like a world here," said her ladyship, +when she had taken her first look through her telescope; "there's an +atmosphere and what look like thin clouds. Continents and oceans too, or +something like them, and what is that light shining up between the +breaks? Isn't it something like our Aurora?"</p> + +<p>"It might be," replied Redgrave, turning his own telescope towards the +northern pole of Ganymede, "though I never heard of a satellite having +an aurora. Perhaps it's the Sun shining on the ice."</p> + +<p>As the <i>Astronef</i> fell towards the surface of Ganymede she crossed his +northern pole, and the nearer they got the plainer it became that a +light very like the terrestrial Aurora was playing about it, +illuminating the thin, yellow clouds with a bluish-violet light, which +made magnificent contrasts of colouring amongst them.</p> + +<p>"Let us go down there and see what it's like," said Zaidie. "There must +be something nice under all those lovely colours."</p> + +<p>Redgrave checked the R. Force and the <i>Astronef</i> fell obliquely across +the pole towards the equator. As they approached the luminous clouds +Redgrave turned it on again, and they sank slowly through a glowing mist +of innumerable colours, until the surface of Ganymede came into plain +view about ten miles below them.</p> + +<p>What they saw then was the strangest sight they had beheld since they +had left the Earth. As far as their eyes could reach the surface of the +Ganymede was covered with vast orderly patches, mostly rectangular, of +what they at first took for ice, but which they soon found to be a +something that was self-illuminating.</p> + +<p>"Glorified hot-houses, as I'm alive," exclaimed Redgrave. "Whole cities +under glass, fields, too, and lit by electricity or something very like +it. Zaidie, we shall find human beings down there."</p> + +<p>"Well, if we do I hope they won't be like the half-human things we found +on Mars! But isn't it all just lovely! Only there doesn't seem to be +anything outside the cities, at least nothing but bare, flat ground with +a few rugged mountains here and there. See, there's a nice level plain +there near the big glass city, or whatever it is. Suppose we go down +there."</p> + +<p>Redgrave checked the after engine which was driving them obliquely over +the surface of the satellite, and the <i>Astronef</i> fell vertically towards +a bare, flat plain of what looked like deep yellow sand, which spread +for miles alongside one of the glittering cities of glass.</p> + +<p>"Oh, look, they've seen us!" exclaimed Zaidie. "I do hope they're going +to be as friendly as those dear people on Venus were."</p> + +<p>"I hope so," replied Redgrave, "but if they're not we've got the guns +ready."</p> + +<p>As he said this about twenty streams of an intense bluish light suddenly +shot up all round them, concentrating themselves upon the hull of the +<i>Astronef</i>, which was now about a mile and a half from the surface. The +light was so intense that the rays of the Sun were lost in it. They +looked at each other, and found that their faces looked almost perfectly +white in it. The plain and the city below had vanished.</p> + +<p>To look downwards was like staring straight into the focus of a ten +thousand candle-power electric arc lamp. It was so intolerable that +Redgrave closed the lower shutters, and meanwhile he found that the +<i>Astronef</i> had ceased to descend. He shut off more of the R. Force, but +it produced no effect. The <i>Astronef</i> remained stationary. Then he +ordered Murgatroyd to set the propellers in motion. The engineer pulled +the starting-levers, and then came up out of the engine-room and said to +him:</p> + +<p>"It's no good, my Lord; I don't know what devil's world we've got into +now, but they won't work. If I thought that engines could be +bewitched——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nonsense, Andrew!" said his lordship rather testily. "It's +perfectly simple: those people down there, whoever they are, have got +some way of demagnetising us, or else they've got the R. Force too, and +they're applying it against us to stop us going down. Apparently they +don't want us. No, that's just to show us that they can stop us if they +want to. The light's going down. Begin dropping a bit. Don't start the +propellers, but just go and see that the guns are all right in case of +accidents."</p> + +<p>The old engineer nodded and went back to his engines, looking +considerably scared. As he spoke the brilliancy of the light faded +rapidly, and the <i>Astronef</i> began to sink slowly towards the surface.</p> + +<p>As a precaution against their being allowed to drop with force enough to +cause a disaster, Redgrave turned the R. Force on again and they fell +slowly towards the plain, through what seemed like a halo of perfectly +white light. When she was within a couple of hundred yards of the ground +a winged car of exquisitely graceful shape rose from the roof of one of +the huge glass buildings nearest to them, flew swiftly towards them, and +after circling once round the dome of the upper deck, ran close +alongside.</p> + +<p>The car was occupied by two figures of distinctly human form but rather +more than human stature. Both were dressed in long, close-fitting +garments of what seemed like a golden brown fleece. Their heads were +covered with a close hood and their hands with gloves.</p> + +<p>"What an exceedingly handsome man!" said Zaidie, as one of them stood +up. "I never saw such a noble-looking face in my life; it's half +philosopher, half saint. Of course, you won't be jealous?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nonsense!" he laughed. "It would be quite impossible to imagine +<i>you</i> in love with either. But he is handsome, and evidently +friendly—there's no mistaking that. Answer him, Zaidie; you can do it +better than I can."</p> + +<p>The car had now come close alongside. The standing figure stretched its +hands out, palms upward, smiled a smile which Zaidie thought was very +sweetly solemn, next the head was bowed, and the gloved hands brought +back and crossed over his breast. Zaidie imitated the movements exactly. +Then, as the figure raised its head she raised hers, and she found +herself looking into a pair of large, luminous eyes such as she could +have imagined under the brows of an angel. As they met hers a look of +unmistakable wonder and admiration came into them. Redgrave was standing +just behind her; she took him by the hand and drew him beside her, +saying, with a little laugh:</p> + +<p>"Now, please look as pleasant as you can; I am sure they are very +friendly. A man with a face like that couldn't mean any harm."</p> + +<p>The figure repeated the motions to Redgrave, who returned them, perhaps +a trifle awkwardly.</p> + +<p>Then the car began to descend, and the figure beckoned to them to +follow.</p> + +<p>"You'd better go and wrap up, dear. From the gentleman's dress it seems +pretty cold outside; though the air is evidently quite breathable," said +Redgrave, as the <i>Astronef</i> began to drop in company with the car. "At +any rate, I'll try it first, and if it isn't we can put on our +breathing-dresses."</p> + +<p>When Zaidie had made her winter toilet, and Redgrave had found the air +to be quite respirable, but of Arctic cold, they went down the gangway +ladder about twenty minutes later. The figure had got out of the car, +which was laying a few yards from them on the sandy plain, and came +forward to meet them with both hands outstretched.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i218" id="i218"></a> +<img src="images/i218.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + + +<h3><i>Came forward to meet them with both hands outstretched.</i></h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<p>Zaidie unhesitatingly held out hers, and a strange thrill ran through +her as she felt them for the first time clasped gently by other than +earthly hands, for the Venus folk had only been able to pat and stroke +with their gentle little paws, somewhat as a kitten might do. The figure +bowed its head again and said something in a low, melodious voice, which +was, of course, quite unintelligible save for the evident friendliness +of its tone. Then, releasing her hands, he took Redgrave's in the same +fashion, and then led the way towards a vast, domed building of +semi-opaque glass, or rather a substance that seemed to be something +like a mixture of glass and mica, which appeared to be one of the +entrance gates of the city.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV</h2> + + +<p>The wondering visitors from far-off Terra had hardly halted before the +magnificent portal when a huge sheet of frosted glass rose silently from +the ground. They passed through and it fell behind them. They found +themselves in a great oval ante-chamber along each side of which stood +triple rows of strangely shaped trees whose leaves gave off a subtle and +most agreeable scent. The temperature here was several degrees higher, +in fact about that of an English spring day, and Zaidie immediately +threw open her big fur cloak, saying:</p> + +<p>"These good people seem to live in Winter Gardens, don't they? I don't +think I shall want these things much while we're inside. I wonder what +dear old Andrew would have thought of this if we could have persuaded +him to leave the ship."</p> + +<p>They followed their host through the ante-chamber towards a magnificent +pointed arch raised on clusters of small pillars each of a differently +coloured, highly polished stone, which shone brilliantly in a light +which seemed to come from nowhere. Another door, this time of pale +transparent blue glass, rose as they approached; they passed under it, +and as it fell behind them half a dozen figures, considerably shorter +and slighter than their host, came forward to meet them. He took off his +gloves and cape and thick outer covering, and they were glad to follow +his example for the atmosphere was now that of a warm June day.</p> + +<p>The attendants, as they evidently were, took their wraps from them, +looking at the furs and stroking them with evident wonder; but with +nothing like the wonder which came into their big soft grey eyes when +they looked at Zaidie, who, as usual when she arrived on a new world, +was arrayed in one of her daintiest costumes.</p> + +<p>Their host was now dressed in a tunic of a light blue material, which +glistened with a lustre greater than that of the finest silk. It reached +a little below his knees, and was confined at the waist by a sash of the +same colour but of somewhat deeper hue. His feet and legs were covered +with stockings of the same material and colour, and his feet, which were +small for his stature and exquisitely shaped, were shod with thin +sandals of a material which looked like soft felt, and which made no +noise as he walked over the delicately coloured mosaic pavement of the +street—for such it actually was—which ran past the gate.</p> + +<p>When he removed his cape they expected to find that he was bald like the +Martians, but they were mistaken. His well-shaped head was covered with +long, thick hair of a colour something between bronze and grey. A broad +band of metal looking like light gold passed round the upper part of his +forehead, and from under this the hair fell in gentle waves to below his +shoulders.</p> + +<p>For a few moments Zaidie and Redgrave stared about them in frank and +silent wonder. They were standing in a broad street running in a +straight line to what seemed to be several miles along the edge of a +city of crystal. It was lined with double rows of trees with beds of +brilliantly coloured flowers between them. From this street others went +off at right angles and at regular intervals. The roof of the city +appeared to be composed of an infinity of domes of enormous extent, +supported by tall clusters of slender pillars standing at the street +corners. The general level of the roof seemed about three hundred feet +above the ground, and the summits of the domes some fifty feet higher.</p> + +<p>The houses, which were all square, were, as a rule, about forty feet +high. The roofs were covered with gardens and shrubberies, from which +creepers, bearing brillantly coloured leaves and flowers, hung down +about the windows in carefully arranged festoons. The walls were +composed of the opaque mica-like glass, relieved by pillars and arched +doorways and windows. The windows, of French form, were of clear glass, +and mostly stood open. A sweet, cool zephyr of hardly perceptible +strength appeared to be blowing along the street and over the house-tops +and in the vast airy space above the roofs.</p> + +<p>Brightly plumaged birds were flitting about among the branches of giant +trees, and keeping up a perpetual chorus of song.</p> + +<p>Presently their host touched Redgrave on the shoulder and pointed to a +four-wheeled car of light framework and exquisite design, containing +seats for four besides the driver, or guide, who sat behind. He held out +his hand to Zaidie, and handed her to one of the front seats just as an +Earth-born gentleman might have done. Then he motioned to Redgrave to +sit beside her, and mounted behind them.</p> + +<p>The car immediately began to move silently, but with considerable speed, +along the left-hand side of the outer street, which, like all the +others, was divided by narrow strips of russet-coloured grass and +flowering shrubs.</p> + +<p>In a few minutes it swung round to the right, crossed the road, and +entered a magnificent avenue, which, after a run of some four miles, +ended in a vast, park-like square, measuring at least a mile each way.</p> + +<p>The two sides of the avenue were busy with cars like their own, some +carrying six people, and others only the driver. Those on each side of +the road all went in the same direction. Those nearest to the broad +side-walks between the houses and the first row of trees went at a +moderate speed of five or six miles an hour, but along the inner sides, +near the central line of trees, they seemed to be running as high as +thirty miles an hour. Their occupants were nearly all dressed in clothes +made of the same glistening, silky fabric as their host wore, but the +colourings were of infinite variety.</p> + +<p>It was quite easy to distinguish between the sexes, although in stature +they were almost equal. The men were nearly all clothed as their host +was. The colours of their garments were quieter, and there was little +attempt at personal adornment, though many wore bands of an intensely +bright, sky-blue metal round their arms above the elbow, and others wore +belts and necklaces of links composed of this and two other metals +resembling gold and aluminum, but of an exceedingly high lustre.</p> + +<p>The women were dressed in flowing garments something after the Greek +style, but they were of brighter hues and much more lavishly embroidered +than the men's tunics were. They also wore much more jewellery. Indeed, +some of the younger ones glittered from head to foot with polished metal +and gleaming stones. There was one more difference which they quickly +noticed. The men's hair, like their host's, was nearly always wavy, but +that of the women, especially the younger, was a mass of either natural +or artificial curls, short and crisp about the head, and flowing down in +glistening ringlets to their waists.</p> + +<p>"Could any one ever have dreamt of such a lovely place?" said Zaidie, +after their wondering eyes had become accustomed to the marvels about +them, "and yet—oh dear, now I know what it reminds me of! Flammarion's +book, 'The End of the World,' where he describes the remnants of the +human race dying of cold and hunger on the Equator in places something +like this. I suppose the life of poor Ganymede is giving out, and that's +why they've got to live in magnified exposition buildings, poor things!"</p> + +<p>"Poor things!" laughed Redgrave. "I'm afraid I can't agree with you +there, dear. I never saw a jollier-looking lot of people in my life. I +daresay you're quite right, but they certainly seem to view their +approaching end with considerable equanimity."</p> + +<p>"Don't be horrid, Lenox! Fancy talking in that cold-blooded way about +such delightful-looking people as these, why, they are even nicer than +our dear bird-folk on Venus, and of course they are a great deal more +like ourselves."</p> + +<p>"Wherefore it stands to reason that they must be a great deal nicer!" he +replied, with a glance which brought a brighter flush to her cheeks. +Then he went on, "Ah, now I see the difference."</p> + +<p>"What difference? Between what?"</p> + +<p>"Between the daughter of Earth and the daughters of Ganymede," he +replied. "You can blush, and I don't think they can. Haven't you noticed +that, although they have the most exquisite skins and beautiful eyes and +hair and all that sort of thing, not a man or woman of them has any +colouring? I suppose that's the result of living for generations in a +hothouse."</p> + +<p>"Very likely," she said; "but has it struck you also that all the girls +and women are either beautiful or handsome, and all the men, except the +ones that seem to be servants or slaves, are something like Greek gods, +or, at least, the sort of men you see on the Greek sculptures?"</p> + +<p>"Survival of the fittest, I presume. These are probably the descendants +of the highest races of Ganymede; the people who conceived the idea of +prolonging the life of their race and were able to carry it out. The +inferior races would either perish of starvation or become their +servants. That's what will happen on Earth, and there is no reason why +it shouldn't have happened here."</p> + +<p>As he said this the car swung out round a broad curve into the centre of +the great square, and a little cry of amazement broke from Zaidie's lips +as her glance roamed over the multiplying splendours about her.</p> + +<p>In the centre of the square, in the midst of smooth lawns and +flower-beds of every conceivable shape and colour, and groves of +flowering trees, stood a great domed building, which they approached +through an avenue of overarching trees interlaced with flowering +creepers.</p> + +<p>The car stopped at the foot of a triple flight of stairs of dazzling +whiteness which led up to a broad arched doorway. Several groups of +people were sprinkled about the avenue and steps and the wide terrace +which ran along the front of the building. They looked with keen, but +perfectly well-mannered surprise at their strange visitors, and seemed +to be discussing their appearance; but not a step was taken towards +them, nor was there the slightest sign of anything like vulgar +curiosity.</p> + +<p>"What perfect manners these dear people have!" said Zaidie, as they +dismounted at the foot of the staircase. "I wonder what would happen if +a couple of them were to be landed from a motor-car in front of the +Capitol at Washington. I suppose this is their Capitol, and we've been +brought here to be put through our facings. What a pity we can't talk to +them! I wonder if they'd believe our story if we could tell it."</p> + +<p>"I've no doubt they know something of it already," replied Redgrave; +"they're evidently people of immense intelligence. Intellectually, I +daresay, we're mere children compared with them, and it's quite possible +that they have developed senses which we have no idea of."</p> + +<p>"And perhaps," added Zaidie, "all the time that we are talking to each +other our friend here is quietly reading everything that is going on in +our minds."</p> + +<p>Whether this was so or not their host gave no sign of comprehension. He +led them up the steps and through the great doorway, where he was met by +three splendidly dressed men even taller than himself.</p> + +<p>"I feel beastly shabby among all these gorgeously attired personages," +said Redgrave, looking down at his plain tweed suit, as they were +conducted with every manifestation of politeness along the magnificent +vestibule into which the door opened.</p> + +<p>"And I'm sure I am quite a dowdy in comparison with these lovely +creatures," added Zaidie, "although this dress was made in Paris. Lenox, +if things are for sale here you'll have to buy me one of those costumes, +and we'll take it back and get one made like it. I wonder what they'd +think of me dressed in one of those costumes at a ball at the +Waldorf-Astoria."</p> + +<p>Before he could make a suitable reply, a door at the end of the +vestibule opened and they were ushered into a large hall which was +evidently a council-chamber. At the further end of it were three +semi-circular rows of seats made of a polished silvery metal, and in the +centre and raised slightly above them another under a canopy of sky-blue +silk. This seat and six others were occupied by men of most venerable +aspect, in spite of the fact their hair was just as long and thick and +glossy as their host's or even as Zaidie's own.</p> + +<p>The ceremony of introduction was exceedingly simple. Though they could +not, of course, understand a word he said, it was evident from his +eloquent gestures that their host described the way in which they had +come from Space and landed on the surface of the World of the Crystal +Cities, as Zaidie subsequently re-christened Ganymede.</p> + +<p>The President of the Senate or Council spoke a few sentences in a deep +musical tone. Then their host, taking their hands, led them up to his +seat, and the President rose and took them by both hands in turn. Then, +with a grave smile of greeting, he bent his head and resumed his seat. +They joined hands in turn with each of the six senators present, bowed +their farewells in silence, and then went back with their host to the +car.</p> + +<p>They ran down the avenue, made a curving sweep round to the left—for +all the paths in the great square were laid in curves, apparently to +form a contrast to the straight streets—and presently stopped before +the porch of one of the hundred palaces which surrounded it. This was +their host's house, and their home during the rest of their sojourn on +Ganymede.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI</h2> + + +<p>The period of Ganymede's revolution round its gigantic primary is seven +days, three hours, and forty-three minutes, practically a terrestrial +week, and on their return to their native world both the daring +navigators of Space described this as the most interesting and +delightful week in their lives, excepting always the period which they +spent in the Eden of the Morning Star. Yet in one sense, it was even +more interesting.</p> + +<p>There the inhabitants had never learnt to sin; here they had learnt the +lesson that sin is mere foolishness, and that no really sensible or +properly educated man or woman thinks crime worth committing.</p> + +<p>The life of the Crystal Cities, of which they visited four in different +parts of the satellite, using the <i>Astronef</i> as their vehicle, was one +of peaceful industry and calm, innocent enjoyment. It was quite plain +that their first impressions of this aged world were correct. Outside +the cities spread a universal desert on which life was impossible. There +was hardly any moisture in the thin atmosphere. The rivers had dwindled +into rivulets and the seas into vast, shallow marshes. The heat received +from the Sun was only about a twenty-fifth of that which falls on the +surface of the Earth, and this was drawn to the cities and collected and +preserved under their glass domes by a number of devices which displayed +superhuman intelligence.</p> + +<p>The dwindling supplies of water were hoarded in vast subterranean +reservoirs, and, by means of a perfect system of redistillation, the +priceless fluid was used over and over again both for human purposes and +for irrigating the land within the cities. Still the total quantity was +steadily diminishing, for it was not only evaporating from the surface, +but, as the orb cooled more and more rapidly towards its centre, it +descended deeper and deeper below the surface, and could now only be +reached by means of marvellously constructed borings and pumping +machinery which extended several miles below the surface.</p> + +<p>The fast-failing store of heat in the centre of the little world, which +had now cooled through more than half its bulk, was utilised for warming +the air of the cities, and to drive the machinery which propelled it +through the streets and squares. All work was done by electric energy +developed directly from this source, which also actuated the repulsive +engines which had prevented the <i>Astronef</i> from descending.</p> + +<p>In short, the inhabitants of Ganymede were engaged in a steady, +ceaseless struggle to utilise the expiring natural forces of their world +to prolong their own lives and the exquisitely refined civilisation to +which they had attained to the latest possible date. They were, indeed, +in exactly the same position in which the distant descendants of the +human race may one day be expected to find themselves.</p> + +<p>Their domestic life, as Zaidie and Redgrave saw it while they were the +guests of their host, was the perfection of simplicity and comfort, and +their public life was characterised by a quiet but intense +intellectuality which, as Zaidie had said, made them feel very much like +children who had only just learnt to speak.</p> + +<p>As they possessed magnificent telescopes, far surpassing any on Earth, +their guests were able to survey, not only the Solar System, but the +other systems far beyond its limits as no others of their kind had ever +been able to do before. They did not look through or into the +telescopes. The lens was turned upon the object, and this was thrown, +enormously magnified, upon screens of what looked something like ground +glass some fifty feet square. It was thus that they saw, not only the +whole visible surface of Jupiter as he revolved above them and they +about him, but also their native Earth, sometimes a pale silver disc or +crescent close to the edge of the Sun, visible only in the morning and +the evening of Jupiter, and at other times like a little black spot +crossing the glowing surface.</p> + +<p>But there was another development of the science of the Crystal Cities +which interested them far more than this—for after all they could not +only see the Worlds of Space for themselves, but circumnavigate them if +they chose.</p> + +<p>During their stay they were shown on these same screens the pictorial +history of the world whose guests they were. These pictures, which they +recognised as an immeasurable development of what is called the +cinematograph process on Earth, extended through the whole gamut of the +satellite's life. They formed, in fact, the means by which the children +of Ganymede were taught the history of their world.</p> + +<p>It was, of course, inevitable that the <i>Astronef</i> should prove an object +of intense interest to their hosts. They had solved the problem of the +Resolution of Forces, as Professor Rennick had done, and, as they were +shown pictorially, a vessel had been made which embodied the principles +of attraction and repulsion. It had risen from the surface of Ganymede, +and then, possibly because its engines could not develop sufficient +repulsive force, the tremendous pull of the giant planet had dragged it +away. It had vanished through the cloud-belts towards the flaming +surface beneath—and the experiment had never been repeated.</p> + +<p>Here, however, was a vessel which had actually, as Redgrave had +convinced his hosts by means of celestial maps and drawings of his own, +left a planet close to the Sun, and safely crossed the tremendous gulf +of six hundred and fifty million miles which separated Jupiter from the +centre of the system. Moreover, he had twice proved her powers by taking +his host and two of his newly-made friends, the chief astronomers of +Ganymede, on a short trip across Space to Calisto and Europa, the second +satellite of Jupiter, which, to their very grave interest, they found +had already passed the stage in which Ganymede was, and had lapsed into +the icy silence of death.</p> + +<p>It was these two journeys which led to the last adventure of the +<i>Astronef</i> in the Jovian System. Both Redgrave and Zaidie had +determined, at whatever risk, to pass through the cloud-belts of +Jupiter, and catch a glimpse, if only a glimpse, of a world in the +making. Their host and the two astronomers, after a certain amount of +quiet discussion, accepted their invitation to accompany them, and on +the morning of the eighth day after their landing on Ganymede, the +<i>Astronef</i> rose from the plain outside the Crystal City, and directed +her course towards the centre of the vast disc of Jupiter.</p> + +<p>She was followed by the telescopes of all the observatories until she +vanished through the brilliant cloud-band, eighty-five thousand miles +long and some five thousand miles broad, which stretched from east to +west of the planet. At the same moment the voyagers lost sight of +Ganymede and his sister satellites.</p> + +<p>The temperature of the interior of the <i>Astronef</i> began to rise as soon +as the upper cloud-belt was passed. Under this, spread out a vast field +of brown-red cloud, rent here and there into holes and gaps like those +storm-cavities in the atmosphere of the Sun, which are commonly known as +sun-spots. This lower stratum of cloud appeared to be the scene of +terrific storms, compared with which the fiercest earthly tempests were +mere zephyrs.</p> + +<p>After falling some five hundred miles further they found themselves +surrounded by what seemed an ocean of fire, but still the internal +temperature had only risen from seventy to ninety-five. The engines were +well under control. Only about a fourth of the total R. Force was being +developed, and the <i>Astronef</i> was dropping swiftly, but steadily.</p> + +<p>Redgrave, who was in the conning-tower controlling the engines, beckoned +to Zaidie and said:</p> + +<p>"Shall we go on?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," she said. "Now we've got as far as this I want to see what +Jupiter is like, and where you are not afraid to go, I'll go."</p> + +<p>"If I'm afraid at all it's only because you are with me, Zaidie," he +replied, "but I've only got a fourth of the power turned on yet, so +there's plenty of margin."</p> + +<p>The <i>Astronef</i>, therefore, continued to sink through what seemed to be a +fathomless ocean of whirling, blazing clouds, and the internal +temperature went on rising slowly but steadily. Their guests, without +showing the slightest sign of any emotion, walked about the upper deck +now, singly and now together, apparently absorbed by the strange scene +about them.</p> + +<p>At length, after they had been dropping for some five hours by +<i>Astronef</i> time, one of them, uttering a sharp exclamation, pointed to +an enormous rift about fifty miles away. A dull, red glare was streaming +up out of it. The next moment the brown cloud-floor beneath them seemed +to split up into enormous wreaths of vapour, which whirled up on all +sides of them, and a few minutes later they caught their first glimpse +of the true surface of Jupiter.</p> + +<p>It lay, as nearly as they could judge, some two thousand miles beneath +them, a distance which the telescopes reduced to less than twenty; and +they saw for a few moments the world that was in the making. Through +floating seas of misty steam they beheld what seemed to them to be vast +continents shape themselves and melt away into oceans of flames. Whole +mountain ranges of glowing lava were hurled up miles high to take shape +for an instant and then fall away again, leaving fathomless gulfs of +fiery mist in their place.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i238" id="i238"></a> +<img src="images/i238.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3><i>Whole mountain ranges of glowing lava were hurled up +miles high.</i></h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + + +<p>Then waves of molten matter rose up again out of the gulfs, tens of +miles high and hundreds of miles long, surged forward, and met with a +concussion like that of millions of earthly thunder-clouds. Minute after +minute they remained writhing and struggling with each other, flinging +up spurts of flaming matter far above their crests. Other waves followed +them, climbing up their bases as a sea-surge runs up the side of a +smooth, slanting rock. Then from the midst of them a jet of living fire +leapt up hundreds of miles into the lurid atmosphere above, and then, +with a crash and a roar which shook the vast Jovian firmament, the +battling lava-waves would split apart and sink down into the +all-surrounding fire-ocean, like two grappling giants who had strangled +each other in their final struggle.</p> + +<p>"It's just Hell let loose!" said Murgatroyd to himself as he looked down +upon the terrific scene through one of the port-holes of the +engine-room; "and, with all respect to my lord and her ladyship, those +that come this near almost deserve to stop in it."</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, Redgrave and Zaidie and their three guests were so absorbed +in the tremendous spectacle, that for a few moments no one noticed that +they were dropping faster and faster towards the world which Murgatroyd, +according to his lights, had not inaptly described. As for Zaidie, all +her fears were for the time being lost in wonder, until she saw her +husband take a swift glance round upwards and downwards, and then go up +into the conning-tower. She followed him quickly, and said:</p> + +<p>"What is the matter, Lenox, are we falling too quickly?"</p> + +<p>"Much faster than we should," he replied, sending a signal to Murgatroyd +to increase the force by three-tenths.</p> + +<p>The answering signal came back, but still the <i>Astronef</i> continued to +fall with terrific rapidity, and the awful landscape beneath them—a +landscape of fire and chaos—broadened out and became more and more +distinct.</p> + +<p>He sent two more signals down in quick succession. Three-fourths of the +whole repulsive power of the engines was now being exerted—a force +which would have been sufficient to hurl the <i>Astronef</i> up from the +surface of the Earth like a feather in a whirlwind. Her downward course +became a little slower, but still she did not stop. Zaidie, white to the +lips, looked down upon the hideous scene beneath and slipped her hand +through Redgrave's arm. He looked at her for an instant and then turned +his head away with a jerk, and sent down the last signal.</p> + +<p>The whole energy of the engines was now directing the maximum of the R. +Force against the surface of Jupiter, but still, as every moment passed +in a speechless agony of apprehension, it grew nearer and nearer. The +fire-waves mounted higher and higher, the roar of the fiery surges grew +louder and louder. Then in a momentary lull, he put his arm round her, +drew her close up to him and kissed her and said:</p> + +<p>"That's all we can do, dear. We've come too close and he's too strong +for us."</p> + +<p>She returned his kiss and said quite steadily:</p> + +<p>"Well, at any rate, I'm with you, and it won't last long, will it?"</p> + +<p>"Not very long now, I'm afraid," he said between his clenched teeth. And +then he pulled her close to him again, and together they looked down +into the storm-tossed hell towards which they were falling at the rate +of nearly a hundred miles a minute.</p> + +<p>Almost the next moment they felt a little jerk beneath their feet—a +jerk upwards; and Redgrave shook himself out of the half stupor into +which he was falling and said:</p> + +<p>"Hullo, what's that? I believe we're stopping—yes, we are—and we're +beginning to rise, too. Look, dear, the clouds are coming down upon +us—fast too! I wonder what sort of miracle that is. Ay, what's the +matter, little woman?"</p> + +<p>Zaidie's head had dropped heavily on his shoulder. A glance showed him +that she had fainted. He could do nothing more in the conning-tower, so +he picked her up and carried her towards the companion-way, past his +three guests, who were standing in the middle of the upper deck round a +table on which lay a large sheet of paper.</p> + +<p>He took her below and laid her on her bed, and in a few minutes he had +brought her to and told her that it was all right. Then he gave her a +drink of brandy-and-water and went back to the upper deck. As he reached +the top of the stairway one of the astronomers came towards him with a +sheet of paper in his hand, smiling gravely, and pointing to a sketch +upon it.</p> + +<p>He took the paper under one of the electric lights and looked at it. The +sketch was a plan of the Jovian System. There were some signs written +along one side, which he did not understand, but he divined that they +were calculations. Still, there was no mistaking the diagram. There was +a circle representing the huge bulk of Jupiter; there were four smaller +circles at varying distances in a nearly straight line from it, and +between the nearest of these and the planet was the figure of the +<i>Astronef</i>, with an arrow pointing upwards.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I see!" he said, forgetting for a moment that the other did not +understand him, "that was the miracle! The four satellites came into +line with us just as the pull of Jupiter was getting too much for our +engines, and their combined pull just turned the scale. Well, thank God +for that, sir, for in a few minutes more we should have been cinders!"</p> + +<p>The astronomer smiled again as he took the paper back. Meanwhile the +<i>Astronef</i> was rushing upward like a meteor through the clouds. In ten +minutes the limits of the Jovian atmosphere were passed. Stars and suns +and planets blazed out of the black vault of Space, and the great disc +of the World that Is to Be once more covered the floor of Space beneath +them—an ocean of cloud, covering continents of lava and seas of flame, +the scene of the natal throes of a world which some day will be.</p> + +<p>They passed Io and Europa, which changed from new to full moons as they +sped by towards the Sun, and then the golden yellow crescent of Ganymede +also began to fill out to the half and full disc, and by the tenth hour +of Earth-time, after they had risen from its surface, the <i>Astronef</i> was +once more lying beside the gate of the Crystal City.</p> + +<p>At midnight on the second night after their return, the ringed shape of +Saturn, attended by his eight satellites, hung in the zenith +magnificently inviting. The <i>Astronef's</i> engines had been replenished +after the exhaustion of their struggle with the might of Jupiter. They +said farewell to their friends of the dying world. The doors of the +air-chamber closed. The signal tinkled in the engine-room, and a few +moments later a blurr of white lights on the brown background of the +surrounding desert was all they could see of the Crystal City under +whose domes they had seen and learnt so much.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</h2> + + +<p>The relative position of the two giants of the Solar System at the +moment when the <i>Astronef</i> left the surface of Ganymede, was such that +she had to make a journey of rather more than 340,000,000 miles before +she passed within the confines of the Saturnine System.</p> + +<p>At first her speed, as shown by the observations which Redgrave took +with the instruments which Professor Rennick had designed for the +purpose, was comparatively slow. This was due to the tremendous pull of +Jupiter and its four moons on the fabric of the vessel. The backward +drag rapidly decreased as the pull of Saturn and his system began to +overmaster that of Jupiter.</p> + +<p>It so happened, too, that Uranus, the next outer planet of the Solar +System, 1,700,000,000 miles away from the Sun, was approaching its +conjunction with Saturn, and so assisted in producing a constant +acceleration of speed.</p> + +<p>Jupiter and his satellites dropped behind, sinking, as it seemed to the +wanderers, down into the bottomless gulf of Space, but still forming by +far the most brilliant and splendid object in the skies. The far-distant +Sun, which, seen from the Saturnian System, has only about a nineteenth +of the superficial extent which it presents to the Earth, dwindled away +rapidly until it began to look like a huge planet, with the Earth, +Venus, Mars, and Mercury as satellites. Beyond the orbit of Saturn, +Uranus, with his eight moons, was shining with the lustre of a star of +the first magnitude, and far above and beyond him again hung the pale +disc of Neptune, the Outer Guard of the Solar System, separated from the +Sun by a gulf of more than 2,750,000,000 miles.</p> + +<p>When two-thirds of the distance between Jupiter and Saturn had been +traversed, Ringed Orb lay beneath them like a vast globe surrounded by +an enormous circular ocean of many-coloured fire, divided, as it were, +by circular shores of shade and darkness. On the side opposite to them a +gigantic conical shadow extended beyond the confines of the ocean of +light. It was the shadow of half the globe of Saturn cast by the Sun +across his rings. Three little dark spots were also travelling across +the surface of the rings. They were the shadows of Mimas, Enceladus, and +Tethys, the three inner satellites. Japetus, the most distant, which +revolves at a distance ten times greater than that of the Moon from the +Earth, was rising to their left above the edge of the rings, a pale, +yellow, little disc shining feebly against the black background of +Space. The rest of the eight satellites were hidden behind the enormous +bulk of the planet and the infinitely vaster area of the rings.</p> + +<p>Day after day Zaidie and her husband had been exhausting the +possibilities of the English language in attempting to describe to each +other the multiplying marvels of the wondrous scene which they were +approaching at a speed of more than a hundred miles a second, and at +length Zaidie, after nearly an hour's absolute silence, during which +they sat with eyes fastened to their telescopes, looked up and said:</p> + +<p>"It's no use, Lenox, all the fine words that we've been trying to think +of have just been wasted. The angels may have a language that you could +describe that in, but we haven't. If it wouldn't be something like +blasphemy I should drop down to the commonplace, and call Saturn a +celestial spinning-top, with bands of light and shadow instead of +colours all round it."</p> + +<p>"Not at all a bad simile either," laughed Redgrave, as he got up from +his chair with a yawn and a stretch of his long limbs, "still, it's as +well that you said celestial, for, after all, that's about the best word +we've found yet. Certainly the Ringed World is the most nearly heavenly +thing we've seen so far.</p> + +<p>"But," he went on, "I think it's about time we were stopping this +headlong fall of ours. Do you see how the landscape is spreading out +round us? That means that we are dropping pretty fast. Whereabouts would +you like to land? At present we're heading straight for Saturn's north +pole."</p> + +<p>"I think I'd rather see what the rings are like first," said Zaidie; +"couldn't we go across them?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly we can," he replied, "only we'll have to be a bit careful."</p> + +<p>"Careful, what of—collisions? Are you thinking of Proctor's hypothesis +that the rings are formed of multitudes of tiny satellites?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but I should go a little farther than that, I should say that his +rings and his eight satellites are to Saturn what the planets generally +and the ring of the Asteroides are to the Sun, and if that is the +case—I mean if we find the rings made up of myriads of tiny bodies +flying round with Saturn—it might get a bit risky.</p> + +<p>"You see the outside ring is a bit over 160,000 miles across, and it +revolves in less than eleven hours. In other words we might find the +ring a sort of celestial maelstrom, and if we once got into the whirl, +and Saturn exerted his full pull on us, we might become a satellite, +too, and go on swinging round with the rest for a good bit of eternity."</p> + +<p>"Very well then," she said, "of course we don't want to do anything of +that sort, but there's something else I think we could do," she went on, +taking up a copy of Proctor's "Saturn and its System," which she had +been reading just after breakfast. "You see those rings are, all +together, about 10,000 miles broad; there's a gap of about 1,700 miles +between the big dark one and the middle bright one, and it's nearly +10,000 miles from the edge of the bright ring to the surface of Saturn. +Now why shouldn't we get in between the inner ring and the planet? If +Proctor was right and the rings are made of tiny satellites and there +are myriads of them, of course they'll pull up while Saturn pulls down. +In fact Flammarion says somewhere that along Saturn's equator there is +no weight at all."</p> + +<p>"Quite possible," replied Redgrave, "and, if you like, we'll go and +prove it. Of course, if the <i>Astronef</i> weighs absolutely nothing between +Saturn and the rings, we can easily get away. The only thing that I +object to is getting into this 170,000-mile vortex, being whizzed round +with Saturn every ten and a half hours, and sauntering round the Sun at +21,000 miles an hour."</p> + +<p>"Don't!" she said. "Really it isn't good to think about these things, +situated as we are. Fancy, in a single year of Saturn there are nearly +25,000 Earth-days. Why, we should each of us be about thirty years older +when we got round, even if we lived, which, of course, we shouldn't. By +the way, how long could we live for, if the worst came to the worst?"</p> + +<p>"Given water, about one Earth-year at the outside;" "but, of course, we +shall be home long before that."</p> + +<p>"If we don't become one of the satellites of Saturn," she replied, "or +get dragged away by something into the outer depths of Space."</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the downward speed of the <i>Astronef</i> had been considerably +checked. The vast circle of the rings seemed to suddenly expand, and +soon it covered the whole floor of the Vault of Space.</p> + +<p>As she dropped towards what might be called the limit of the northern +tropic of Saturn, the spectacle presented by the rings became every +minute more and more marvellous—purple and silver, black and gold, +dotted with myriads of brilliant points of many-coloured light, they +stretched upwards like vast rainbows into the Saturnian sky as the +<i>Astronef's</i> position changed with regard to the horizon of the planet. +The nearer they approached the surface, the nearer the gigantic arch of +the many-coloured rings approached the zenith. Sun and stars sank down +behind it, for now they were dropping through the fifteen-year-long +twilight that reigns over that portion of the globe of Saturn which, +during half of his year of thirty terrestrial years, is turned away from +the Sun.</p> + +<p>The further they fell towards the rings the more certain it became that +the theory of the great English astronomer was the correct one. Seen +through the telescopes at a distance of only thirty or forty thousand +miles, it became perfectly plain that the outer or darker ring as seen +from the Earth was composed of myriads of tiny bodies so far separated +from each other that the rayless blackness of Space could be seen +through them.</p> + +<p>"It's quite evident," said Redgrave, after a long look through his +telescope, "that those are rings of what we should call meteorites on +Earth, atoms of matter which Saturn threw off into Space after the +satellites were formed."</p> + +<p>"And I shouldn't wonder, if you will excuse my interrupting you," said +Zaidie, "if the moons themselves have been made up of a lot of these +things going together when they were only gas, or nebula, or something +of that sort. In fact, when Saturn was a good deal younger than he is +now, he may have had a lot more rings and no moons, and now these +aerolites, or whatever they are, can't come together and make moons, +because they've got too solid."</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the <i>Astronef</i> was rapidly approaching that portion of +Saturn's surface which was illuminated by the rays of the Sun, streaming +under the lower arch of the inner ring.</p> + +<p>As they passed under it the whole scene suddenly changed. The rings +vanished. Overhead was an arch of brilliant light a hundred miles thick, +spanning the whole of the visible heavens. Below lay the sunlit surface +of Saturn divided into light and dark bands of enormous breadth.</p> + +<p>The band immediately below them was of a brilliant silver-grey, very +much like the central zone of Jupiter. North of this on the one side +stretched the long shadow of the rings, and southward other bands of +alternating white and gold and deep purple succeeded each other till +they were lost in the curvature of the vast planet. The poles were of +course invisible since the <i>Astronef</i> was now too near the surface; but +on their approach they had seen unmistakable evidence of snow and ice.</p> + +<p>As soon as they were exactly under the Ring-arch, Redgrave shut off the +R. Force, and, somewhat to their astonishment, the <i>Astronef</i> began to +revolve slowly on its axis, giving them the idea that the Saturnian +System was revolving round them. The arch seemed to sink beneath their +feet while the belts of the planet rose above them.</p> + +<p>"What on earth is the matter?" said Zaidie. "Everything has gone upside +down."</p> + +<p>"Which shows," replied Redgrave, "that as soon as the <i>Astronef</i> became +neutral the rings pulled harder than the planet, I suppose because we're +so near to them, and, instead of falling on to Saturn, we shall have to +push up at him."</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I see that," said Zaidie, "but after all it does look a little +bit bewildering, doesn't it, to be on your feet one minute and on your +head the next?"</p> + +<p>"It is, rather; but you ought to be getting accustomed to that sort of +thing now. In a few minutes neither you, nor I, nor anything else will +have any weight. We shall be just between the attraction of the rings +and Saturn, so you'd better go and sit down, for if you were to give a +bit of an extra spring in walking you might be knocking that pretty head +of yours against the roof," said Redgrave, as he went to turn the R. +Force on to the edge of the rings.</p> + +<p>A vast sea of silver cloud seemed now to descend upon them. Then they +entered it, and for nearly half an hour the <i>Astronef</i> was totally +enveloped in a sea of pearl-grey luminous mist.</p> + +<p>"Atmosphere!" said Redgrave, as he went to the conning-tower and +signalled to Murgatroyd to start the propellers. They continued to rise +and the mist began to drift past them in patches, showing that the +propellers were driving them ahead.</p> + +<p>They now rose swiftly towards the surface of the planet. The cloud-wrack +got thinner and thinner, and presently they found themselves floating in +a clear atmosphere between two seas of cloud, the one above them being +much less dense than the one below.</p> + +<p>"I believe we shall see Saturn on the other side of that," said Zaidie, +looking up at it. "Oh dear, there we are going round again."</p> + +<p>"Reaching the point of neutral attraction," said Redgrave; "once more +you'd better sit down in case of accidents."</p> + +<p>Instead of dropping into her deck-chair as she would have done on Earth, +she took hold of the arms and pulled herself into it, saying:</p> + +<p>"Really, it seems rather absurd to have to do this sort of thing. Fancy +having to hold yourself into a chair. I suppose I hardly weigh anything +at all now."</p> + +<p>"Not much," said Redgrave, stooping down and taking hold of the end of +the chair with both hands. Without any apparent effort he raised her +about five feet from the floor, and held her there while the <i>Astronef</i> +made another revolution. For a moment he let go, and she and the chair +floated between the roof and the floor of the deck-chamber. Then he +pulled the chair away from under her, and as the floor of the vessel +once more turned towards Saturn, he took hold of her hands and brought +her to her feet on deck again.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i256" id="i256"></a> +<img src="images/i256.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + + +<h3><i>Without any apparent effort he raised her about five +feet from the floor.</i></h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>"I ought to have had a photograph of you like that!" he laughed. "I +wonder what they'd think of it at home?"</p> + +<p>"If you had taken one I should certainly have broken the negative. The +very idea—a photograph of me standing on nothing! Besides, they'd never +believe it on Earth."</p> + +<p>"We might have got old Andrew to make an affidavit as to the true +circumstances," he began.</p> + +<p>"Don't talk nonsense, Lenox! Look! there's something much more +interesting. There's Saturn at last. Now I wonder if we shall find any +sort of life there—and shall we be able to breathe the air?"</p> + +<p>"I hardly think so," he said, as the <i>Astronef</i> dropped slowly through +the thin cloud-veil. "You know spectrum analysis has proved that there +is a gas in Saturn's atmosphere which we know nothing about, and, +however good it may be for the Saturnians, it's not very likely that it +would agree with us, so I think we'd better be content with our own. +Besides, the atmosphere is so enormously dense that even if we could +breathe it it might squash us up. You see we're only accustomed to +fifteen pounds on the square inch, and it may be hundreds of pounds +here."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Zaidie, "I haven't got any particular desire to be +flattened out, or squeezed dry like an orange. It's not at all a nice +idea, is it? But look, Lenox," she went on, pointing downwards, "surely +this isn't air at all, or at least it's something between air and water. +Aren't those things swimming about in it—something like fish in the +sea? They can't be clouds, and they aren't either fish or birds. They +don't fly or float. Well, this is certainly more wonderful than anything +else we've seen, though it doesn't look very pleasant. They're not +nice-looking, are they? I wonder if they are at all dangerous!"</p> + +<p>While she was saying this Zaidie had gone to her telescope, and was +sweeping the surface of Saturn, which was now about a hundred miles +distant. Her husband was doing the same. In fact, for the time being +they were all eyes, for they were looking on a stranger sight than man +or woman had ever seen before.</p> + +<p>Underneath the inner cloud-veil the atmosphere of Saturn appeared to +them somewhat as the lower depths of the ocean would appear to a diver, +granted that he was able to see for hundreds of miles about him. Its +colour was a pale greenish yellow. The outside thermometers showed that +the temperature was a hundred and seventy-five Fahrenheit. In fact, the +interior of the <i>Astronef</i> was getting uncomfortably like a Turkish +bath, and Redgrave took the opportunity of at once freshening and +cooling the air by releasing a little oxygen from the cylinders.</p> + +<p>From what they could see of the surface of Saturn it seemed to be a dead +level, greyish brown in colour, and not divided into oceans and +continents. In fact there were no signs whatever of water within range +of their telescopes. There was nothing that looked like cities, or any +human habitations, but the ground, as they got nearer to it, seemed to +be covered with a very dense vegetable growth, not unlike gigantic forms +of seaweed, and of somewhat the same colour. In fact, as Zaidie +remarked, the surface of Saturn was not at all unlike what the floors of +the ocean of the Earth might be if they were laid bare.</p> + +<p>It was evident that the life of this portion of Saturn was not what, for +want of a more exact word, might be called terrestrial. Its inhabitants, +however they were constituted, floated about in the depths of this +semi-gaseous ocean as the denizens of earthly seas did in the +terrestrial oceans. Already their telescopes enabled them to make out +enormous moving shapes, black and grey-brown and pale red, swimming +about, evidently by their own volition, rising and falling and often +sinking down on to the gigantic vegetation which covered the surface, +possibly for the purpose of feeding. But it was also evident that they +resembled the inhabitants of earthly oceans in another respect, since it +was easy to see that they preyed upon each other.</p> + +<p>"I don't like the look of those creatures at all," said Zaidie, when the +<i>Astronef</i> had come to a stop and was floating about ten miles above the +surface. "They're altogether too uncanny. They look to me something like +jelly-fish about the size of whales, only they have eyes and mouths. Did +you ever see such awful-looking eyes, bigger than soup-plates and as +bright as a cat's. I suppose that's because of the dim light. And the +nasty wormy sort of way they swim, or fly, or whatever it is. Lenox, I +don't know what the rest of Saturn may be like, but I certainly don't +like this part. It's quite too creepy and unearthly for my taste. Look +at the horrors fighting and eating each other. That's the only bit of +earthly character they've got about them; the big ones eating the little +ones. I hope they won't take the <i>Astronef</i> for something nice to eat."</p> + +<p>"They'd find her a pretty tough morsel if they did," laughed Redgrave, +"but still we may as well get some steering way on her in case of +accident."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII</h2> + + +<p>A few moments later he sent a signal to Murgatroyd in the engine-room. +The propellers began to revolve slowly, beating the dense air and +driving the <i>Astronef</i> at a speed of about twenty miles an hour through +the depths of this strangely peopled ocean.</p> + +<p>They approached nearer and nearer to the surface, and as they did so the +uncanny creatures about them grew more and more numerous. They were +certainly the most extraordinary living things that human eyes had ever +looked upon. Zaidie's comparison to the whale and the jelly-fish was by +no means incorrect; only when they got near enough to them they found, +to their astonishment, that they were double-headed—that is to say, +they had a head with a mouth, nostrils, ear-holes, and eyes at each end +of their bodies.</p> + +<p>The larger of the creatures appeared to have a certain amount of respect +for each other. Now and then they witnessed a battle-royal between two +of the monsters who were pursuing the same prey. Their method of attack +was as follows: The assailant would rise above his opponent or prey, and +then, dropping on to its back, envelop it and begin tearing at its sides +and under parts with huge beak-like jaws, somewhat resembling those of +the largest kind of the earthly octopus, only infinitely more +formidable. The substance composing their bodies appeared to be not +unlike that of a terrestrial jelly-fish, but much denser. It seemed from +their motions to have the tenacity of soft indiarubber save at the +headed ends, where it was much harder. The necks were protected for +about fifty feet by huge scales of a dull, greenish hue.</p> + +<p>When one of them had overpowered an enemy or a victim the two sank down +into the vegetation, and the victor began to eat the vanquished. Their +means of locomotion consisted of huge fins, or rather half-fins, +half-wings, of which they had three laterally arranged behind each head, +and four much longer and narrower, above and below, which seemed to be +used mainly for steering purposes.</p> + +<p>They moved with equal ease in either direction, and they appeared to +rise or fall by inflating or deflating the middle portions of their +bodies, somewhat as fish do with their swimming bladders.</p> + +<p>The light in the lower regions of this strange ocean was dimmer than +earthly twilight, although the <i>Astronef</i> was steadily making her way +beneath the arch of the rings towards the sunlit hemisphere.</p> + +<p>"I wonder what the effect of the searchlight would be on these fellows!" +said Redgrave. "Those huge eyes of theirs are evidently only suited to +dim light. Let's try and dazzle some of them."</p> + +<p>"I hope it won't be a case of the moths and the candle!" said Zaidie. +"They don't seem to have taken much interest in us so far. Perhaps they +haven't been able to see properly, but suppose they were attracted by +the light and began crowding round us and fastening on to us, as the +horrible things do with each other. What should we do then? They might +drag us down and perhaps keep us there; but there's one thing, they'd +never eat us, because we could keep closed up and die respectably +together."</p> + +<p>"Not much fear of that, little woman," he said, "we're too strong for +them. Hardened steel and toughened glass ought to be more than a match +for a lot of exaggerated jelly-fish like these," said Redgrave, as he +switched on the head searchlight. "We've come here to see strange things +and we may as well see them. Ah, would you, my friend. No, this is not +one of your sort, and it isn't meant to eat."</p> + +<p>An enormous double-headed monster, apparently some four hundred feet +long, came floating towards them as the searchlight flashed out, and +others began instantly to crowd about them, just as Zaidie had feared.</p> + +<p>"Lenox, for Heaven's sake be careful!" cried Zaidie, shrinking up beside +him as the huge, hideous head, with its saucer eyes and enormous +beak-like jaws wide open, came towards them. "And look! there are more +coming. Can't we go up and get away from them?"</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute, little woman," replied Redgrave, who was beginning to +feel the passion of adventure thrilling along his nerves. "If we fought +the Martian air fleet and licked it I think we can manage these things. +Let's see how he likes the light."</p> + +<p>As he spoke he flashed the full glare of the five thousand candle-power +lamp full on to the creature's great cat-like eyes. Instantly it bent +itself up into an arc. The two heads, each the exact image of the other, +came together. The four eyes glared half-dazzled into the conning-tower, +and the four fearful jaws snapped viciously together.</p> + +<p>"Lenox, Lenox, for goodness' sake let us go up!" cried Zaidie, shrinking +still closer to him. "That thing's too horrible to look at."</p> + +<p>"It is a beast, isn't it?" he said; "but I think we can cut him in two +without much trouble."</p> + +<p>He signalled for full speed. The <i>Astronef</i> ought to have sprung forward +and driven her ram through the huge, brick-red body of the hideous +creature which was now only a couple of hundred yards from them; but +instead of that a slow, jarring, grinding thrill seemed to run through +her, and she stopped. The next moment Murgatroyd put his head up through +the companion-way which led from the upper deck to the conning-tower, +and said, in a tone whose calm indicated, as usual, resignation to the +worst that could happen:</p> + +<p>"My Lord, two of those beasts, fishes or live balloons, or whatever they +are, have come across the propellers. They're cut up a good bit, but +I've had to stop the engines, and they're clinging all round the after +part. We're going down, too. Shall I disconnect the propellers and turn +on the repulsion?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, certainly, Andrew!" cried Zaidie, "and all of it, too. Look, +Lenox, that horrible thing is coming. Suppose it broke the glass, and we +couldn't breathe this atmosphere!"</p> + +<p>As she spoke the enormous, double-headed body advanced until it +completely enveloped the forward part of the <i>Astronef</i>. The two hideous +heads came close to the sides of the conning-tower; the huge, palely +luminous eyes looked in upon them. Zaidie, in her terror, even thought +that she saw something like human curiosity in them.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="i266" id="i266"></a> +<img src="images/i266.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3><i>The huge palely luminous eyes looked in upon them.</i></h3> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<p>Then, as Murgatroyd disappeared to obey the orders which Redgrave had +sanctioned with a quick nod, the heads approached still closer, and she +heard the ends of the pointed jaws, which she now saw were armed with +shark-like teeth, striking against the thick glass walls of the +conning-tower.</p> + +<p>"Don't be frightened, dear!" he said, putting his arm round her, just as +he had done when they thought they were falling into the fiery seas of +Jupiter. "You'll see something happen to this gentleman soon. Big and +all as he is there won't be much left of him in a few minutes. They are +like those monsters they found in the lowest depths of our own seas. +They can only live under tremendous pressure. That's why we didn't find +any of them up above. This chap'll burst like a bubble presently. +Meanwhile, there's no use in stopping here. Suppose you go below and +brew some coffee and bring it up on deck while I go and see how things +are looking aft. It doesn't do you any good, you know, to be looking at +monsters of this sort. You can see what's left of them later on. You +might bring the cognac decanter up too."</p> + +<p>Zaidie was not at all sorry to obey him, for the horrible sight had +almost sickened her.</p> + +<p>They were still under the arch of the rings, and so, when the full +strength of the R. Force was directed against the body of Saturn, the +vessel sprang upwards like a projectile fired from a cannon.</p> + +<p>Redgrave went back into the conning-tower to see what happened to their +assailant. It was already trying to detach itself and sink back into a +more congenial element. As the pressure of the atmosphere decreased its +huge body swelled up into still huger proportions. The scaly skin on the +two heads and necks puffed up as though air was being pumped in under +it. The great eyes protruded out of their sockets; the jaws opened +widely as though the creature were gasping for breath.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile Murgatroyd was seeing something very similar at the after end, +and wondering what was going to happen to his propellers, the blades of +which were deeply imbedded in the jelly-like flesh of the monsters.</p> + +<p>The <i>Astronef</i> leaped higher and higher, and the hideous bodies which +were clinging to her swelled out huger and huger. Redgrave even fancied +that he heard something like the cries of pain from both heads on either +side of the conning-tower. They passed through the inner cloud-veil, and +then the <i>Astronef</i> began to turn on her axis, and, just as the outer +envelope came into view the enormously distended bulk of the monsters +collapsed, and their fragments, seeming now like the tatters of a burst +balloon than portions of a once living creature, dropped from the body +of the <i>Astronef</i>, and floated away down into what had been their native +element.</p> + +<p>"Difference of environment means a lot, after all," said Redgrave to +himself. "I should have called that either a lie or a miracle if I +hadn't seen it, and I'm jolly glad I sent Zaidie down below."</p> + +<p>"Here's your coffee, Lenox," said her voice from the upper deck the next +moment, "only it doesn't seem to want to stop in the cups, and the cups +keep getting off the saucers. I suppose we're turning upside down +again."</p> + +<p>Redgrave stepped somewhat gingerly on to the deck, for his body had so +little weight under the double attraction of Saturn and the Rings that a +very slight effort would have sent him flying up to the roof of the +deck-chamber.</p> + +<p>"That's exactly as you please," he said, "just hold that table steady a +minute. We shall have our centre of gravity back soon. And now, as to +the main question, suppose we take a trip across the sunlit hemisphere +of Saturn to, what I suppose we should call on Earth, the South Pole. We +can get resistance from the Rings, and as we are here we may as well see +what the rest of Saturn is like. You see, if our theory is correct as to +the Rings gathering up most of the atmosphere of Saturn about its +equator, we shall get to higher latitudes where the air is thinner and +more like our own, and therefore it's quite possible that we shall find +different forms of life in it too—or if you've had enough of Saturn and +would prefer a trip to Uranus——"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks," said Zaidie quickly. "To tell you the truth, Lenox, I've +had almost enough star-wandering for one honeymoon, and though we've +seen nice things as well as horrible things—especially those ghastly, +slimy creatures down there—I'm beginning to feel a bit homesick for +good old Mother Earth. You see, we're nearly a thousand million miles +from home, and, even with you, it makes one feel a bit lonely. I vote we +explore the rest of this hemisphere up to the pole, and then, as they +say at sea—I mean our sea—'bout ship, and try if we can find our own +old world again. After all, it <i>is</i> more homelike than any of these, +isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Just take our telescope and look at it," said Redgrave, pointing +towards the Sun, with its little cluster of attendant planets. "It looks +something like one of Jupiter's little moons down there, doesn't it, +only not quite as big?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, it does, but that doesn't matter. The fact is that it's there, and +we know what it's like, and it's <i>home</i>, if it <i>is</i> a thousand million +miles away, and that's everything."</p> + +<p>By this time they had passed through the outer band of clouds. The vast, +sunlit arch of the Rings towered up to the zenith, apparently spanning +the whole visible heavens. Below and in front of them lay the enormous +semicircle of the hemisphere which was turned towards the Sun, shrouded +by its many-coloured bands of clouds. The R. Force was directed strongly +against the lower ring, and the <i>Astronef</i> descended rapidly in a +slanting direction through the cloud-bands towards the southern +temperate zone of the planet.</p> + +<p>They passed through the second, or dark, cloud-band at the rate of about +three thousand miles an hour, aided by the repulsion against the Rings +and the attraction of the planets, and soon after lunch, the materials +of which now consented to remain on the table, they passed through the +clouds and found themselves in a new world of wonders.</p> + +<p>On a far vaster scale, it was the Earth during that period of its +development which is called the Reptilian Age. The atmosphere was still +dense and loaded with aqueous vapour, but the waters had already been +divided from the land.</p> + +<p>They passed over vast, marshy continents and islands, and warm seas, +above which thin clouds of steam still hung, and as they swept southward +with the propellers working at their utmost speed they caught glimpses +of giant forms rising out of the steamy waters near the land, of others +crawling slowly over it, dragging their huge bulk through a tremendous +vegetation, which they crushed down as they passed, as a sheep on Earth +might push its way through a field of standing corn.</p> + +<p>Other and even stranger shapes, broad-winged and ungainly, fluttered +with a slow, bat-like motion through the lower strata of the atmosphere.</p> + +<p>Every now and then during the voyage across the temperate zone the +propellers were slowed down to enable them to witness some Titanic +conflict between the gigantic denizens of land and sea and air. But +Zaidie had had enough of horrors on the Saturnian equator, and so she +was content to watch this phase of evolution working itself out (as it +had done on the Earth thousands of ages ago) from a convenient distance. +Wherefore the <i>Astronef</i> sped on without approaching the surface nearer +than was necessary to get a clear general view.</p> + +<p>"It'll be all very nice to see and remember and dream about afterwards," +she said, "but I don't think I can stand any more monsters just now, at +least not at close quarters, and I'm quite sure that if those things can +live there we couldn't, any more than we could have lived on Earth a +million years or so ago. No, really I don't want to land, Lenox; let's +go on."</p> + +<p>They went on at a speed of about a hundred miles an hour, and, as they +progressed southward, both the atmosphere and the landscape rapidly +changed. The air grew clearer and the clouds lighter. Land and sea were +more sharply divided, and both teeming with life. The seas still swarmed +with serpentine monsters of the saurian type, and the firmer lands were +peopled by huge animals, mastodons, bears, giant tapirs, mylodons, +deinotheriums, and a score of other species too strange for them to +recognise by any Earthly likeness, which roamed in great herds through +the vast twilit forests and over boundless plains covered with grey-blue +vegetation.</p> + +<p>Here, too, they found mountains for the first time on Saturn; mountains +steep-sided, and many Earth-miles high.</p> + +<p>As the <i>Astronef</i> was skirting the side of one of these ranges Redgrave +allowed it to approach more closely than he had so far done to the +surface of Saturn.</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't wonder if we found some of the higher forms of life up +here," he said. "If there is any kind of being that is going to develop +some day into the human race of Saturn it would naturally get up here."</p> + +<p>"I should hope so," said Zaidie, "and just as far as possible out of the +reach of those unutterable horrors on the equator. That would be one of +the first signs they would show of superior intelligence. Look! I +believe there are some of them. Do you see those holes in the +mountain-side there? And there they are, something like gorillas, only +twice as big, and up the trees, too—and what trees! They must be seven +or eight hundred feet high."</p> + +<p>"Tree-men and cave-dwellers, and ancestors of the future royal race of +Saturn, I suppose!" said Redgrave. "They don't look very nice, do they? +Still, there's no doubt about their being far superior in intelligence +to those other brutes we saw. Evidently this atmosphere is too thin for +the two-headed jelly-fishes and the saurians to breathe. These creatures +have found that out in a few hundreds of generations, and so they have +come to live up here out of the way. Vegetarians, I suppose, or perhaps +they live on smaller monkeys and other animals, just as our ancestors +did."</p> + +<p>"Really, Lenox," said Zaidie, turning round and facing him, "I must say +that you have a most unpleasant way of alluding to one's ancestors. They +couldn't help what they were."</p> + +<p>"Well, dear," he said, going towards her, "marvellous as the miracle +seems, I'm heretic enough to believe it possible that your ancestors +even, millions of years ago, perhaps, may have been something like +those; but then, of course, you know I'm a hopeless Darwinian."</p> + +<p>"And, therefore, entirely horrid, as I've often said before, when you +get on subjects like these. Not, of course, that I'm ashamed of my poor +relations; and then, after all, your Darwin was quite wrong when he +talked about the descent of man—and woman. We—especially the +women—have <i>as</i>cended from that sort of thing, if there's any truth in +the story at all; though, personally, I must say I prefer dear old +Mother Eve."</p> + +<p>"Who never had a sweeter daughter than——!" he replied, drawing her +towards him.</p> + +<p>"Very prettily put, my Lord," she laughed, releasing herself with a +gentle twirl; "and now I'll go and get dinner ready. After all, it +doesn't matter what world one's in, one gets hungry all the same."</p> + +<p>The dinner, which was eaten somewhere in the middle of the +fifteen-year-long day of Saturn, was a more than usually pleasant one, +because they were now nearing the turning-point of their trip into the +depths of Space, and thoughts of home and friends were already beginning +to fly back across the thousand-million-mile gulf which lay between them +and the Earth which they had left only a little more than two months +ago.</p> + +<p>While they were at dinner the <i>Astronef</i> rose above the mountains and +resumed her southward course. Zaidie brought the coffee up on deck as +usual after dinner, and, while Redgrave smoked his cigar and Zaidie her +cigarette, they luxuriated in the magnificent spectacle of the sunlit +side of the Rings towering up, rainbow built on rainbow, to the zenith +of their visible heavens.</p> + +<p>"What a pity there aren't any words to describe it!" said Zaidie. "I +wonder if the descendants of the ancestors of the future human race on +Saturn will invent anything like a suitable language. I wonder how +they'll talk about those Rings millions of years hence."</p> + +<p>"By that time there may not be any Rings," Lenox replied, blowing one of +blue smoke from his own lips. "Look at that—made in a moment and gone +in a moment—and yet on exactly the same principle, it gives one a dim +idea of the difference between time and eternity. After all it's only +another example of Kelvin's theory of vortices. Nebulæ, and asteroids, +and planet-rings, and smoke-rings are really all made on the same +principle."</p> + +<p>"My dear Lenox, if you're going to get as philosophical and as +commonplace as that, I'm going to bed. Now that I come to think of it, +I've been up about fifteen Earth-hours, so it's about time I went and +had a sleep. It's your turn to make the coffee in the morning—our +morning, I mean—and you'll wake me in time to see the South Pole of +Saturn, won't you? You're not coming yet, I suppose?"</p> + +<p>"Not just yet, dear. I want to see a bit more of this, and then I must +go through the engines and see that they're all right and ready for that +thousand million mile homeward voyage you're talking about. You can have +a good ten hours' sleep without missing much, I think, for there doesn't +seem to be anything more interesting than our own Arctic life down +there. So good-night, little woman, and don't have too many nightmares."</p> + +<p>"Good-night!" she said; "if you hear me shout you'll know that you're to +come and protect me from monsters. Weren't those two-headed brutes just +too horrid for words? Good-night, dear!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX</h2> + + +<p>A little before six (Earth time) on the fourth morning after they had +cleared the confines of the Saturnian System, Redgrave went as usual +into the conning-tower to examine the instruments, and to see that +everything was in order. To his intense surprise he found, on looking at +the gravitational compass, which was to the <i>Astronef</i> what the ordinary +compass is to a ship at sea, that the vessel was a long way out of her +course.</p> + +<p>Such a thing had never yet occurred. Up to now the <i>Astronef</i> had obeyed +the laws of gravitation and repulsion with absolute exactness. He made +another examination of the instruments; but no, all were in perfect +order.</p> + +<p>"I wonder what the deuce is the matter," he said, after he had looked +for a few moments with frowning eyes at the multitude of orbs ahead. "By +Jove, we're swinging more. This is getting serious."</p> + +<p>He went back to the compass. The long, slender needle was slowly +swinging farther and farther out of the middle line of the vessel.</p> + +<p>"There can only be two explanations of that," he went on, thrusting his +hands deep into his trousers pockets; "either the engines are not +working properly, or some enormous and invisible body is pulling us +towards it out of our course. Let's have a look at the engines first."</p> + +<p>When he reached the engine-room he said to Murgatroyd, who was indulging +in his usual pastime of cleaning and polishing his beloved charges:</p> + +<p>"Have you noticed anything wrong during the last hour or so, +Murgatroyd?"</p> + +<p>"No, my Lord; at least not so far as concerns the engines. They're all +right. Hark, now, they're not making more noise than a lady's sewing +machine," replied the old Yorkshireman, with a note of resentment in his +voice. The suspicion that anything could be wrong with his shining +darlings was almost a personal offence to him. "But is anything the +matter, my Lord, if I might ask?"</p> + +<p>"We're a long way off our course, and for the life of me I can't +understand it," replied Redgrave. "There's nothing about here to pull us +out of our line. Of course the stars—good Lord, I never thought of +that! Look here, Murgatroyd, not a word about this to her ladyship, and +stand by to raise the power by degrees, as I signal to you."</p> + +<p>"Ay, my lord. I hope it's nothing bad!"</p> + +<p>Redgrave went back to the conning-tower without replying. The only +possible solution of the mystery of the deviation had suddenly dawned +upon him, and a very serious solution it was. He remembered there were +such things as dead suns—the derelicts of the Ocean of Space—vast, +invisible orbs, lightless and lifeless, too distant from any living sun +to be illumined by its rays, and yet exercising the only force left to +them—the force of attraction. Might not one of these have wandered near +enough to the confines of the Solar System to exert this force, a force +of absolutely unknown magnitude, upon the <i>Astronef</i>?</p> + +<p>He went to the desk beside the instrument-table and plunged into a maze +of mathematics, of masses and weights, angles and distances. Half an +hour later he stood looking at the last symbol on the last sheet of +paper with something like fear. It was the fatal <i>x</i> which remained to +satisfy the last equation, the unknown quantity which represented the +unseen force that was dragging them into the outer wilderness of +insterstellar space, into far-off regions from which, with the remaining +force at his disposal, no return would be possible.</p> + +<p>He signalled to Murgatroyd to increase the development of the R. Force +from a tenth to a fifth. Then he went to the lower saloon, where Zaidie +was busy with her usual morning tidy-up. Now that the mystery was +explained there was no reason to keep her in the dark. Indeed, he had +given her his word that he would conceal from her no danger, however +great, that might threaten them when he had once assured himself of its +existence.</p> + +<p>She listened to him in silence and without a sign of fear beyond a +little lifting of the eyelids and a little fading of the colour in her +cheeks.</p> + +<p>"And if we can't resist this force," she said, when he had finished, "it +will drag us millions—perhaps millions of millions—of miles away from +our own system into outer space, and we shall either fall on the surface +of this dead sun and be reduced to a puff of lighted gas in an instant, +or some other body will pull us away from it, and then another away from +that, and so on, and we shall wander among the stars for ever and ever +until the end of time!"</p> + +<p>"If the first happens, darling, we shall die—together—without knowing +it. It's the second that I'm most afraid of. The <i>Astronef</i> may go on +wandering among the stars for ever—but we have only water enough for +three weeks more. Now come into the conning-tower and we'll see how +things are going."</p> + +<p>As they bent their heads over the instrument-table Redgrave saw that the +remorseless needle had moved two degrees more to the right. The keel of +the <i>Astronef</i>, under the impulse of the R. Force, was continually +turning. The pull of the invisible orb was dragging her slowly but +irresistibly out of her line.</p> + +<p>"There's nothing for it but this," said Redgrave, putting out his hand +to the signal-board, and signalling to Murgatroyd to put the engines to +their highest capacity. "You see, dear, our greatest danger is this: we +had to exert such a tremendous lot of power getting away from Jupiter +and Saturn, that we haven't any too much to spare, and if we have to +spend it in counteracting the pull of this dead sun, or whatever it is, +we may not have enough of what I call the R. fluid left to get home +with."</p> + +<p>"I see," she said, staring with wide-open eyes at the needle. "You mean +that we may not have enough to keep us from falling into one of the +planets or perhaps into the Sun itself. Well, supposing the dangers are +equal, this one is the nearest, and so I guess we've got to fight it +first."</p> + +<p>"Spoken like a good American!" he said, putting his arm across her +shoulders and looking at once with infinite pride and infinite regret at +the calm, proud face which the glory of resignation had adorned with a +new beauty.</p> + +<p>She bowed her head and then looked away again so that he should not see +that there were tears in her eyes. He took his hand from her shoulder +and stared in silence down at the needle. It was stationary again.</p> + +<p>"We've stopped!" he said, after a pause of several moments. "Now, if the +body that's taken us out of our course is moving away from us we win, if +it's coming towards us we lose. At any rate, we've done all we can. Come +along, Zaidie, let's go and have a walk on deck."</p> + +<p>They had scarcely reached the upper deck when something happened which +dwarfed all the other experiences of their marvellous voyage into utter +insignificance.</p> + +<p>Above and around them the constellations blazed with a splendour +inconceivable to an observer on Earth, but ahead of them gaped the vast, +black void which sailors call "the Coal Hole," and in which the most +powerful telescopes have only discovered a few faintly luminous bodies. +Suddenly, out of the midst of this infinity of darkness, there blazed a +glare of almost intolerably brilliant radiance. Instantly the forward +end of the <i>Astronef</i> was bathed in light and heat—the light and heat +of a re-created sun, whose elements had been dark and cold for uncounted +ages.</p> + +<p>Hundreds of tiny points of light, unknown worlds which had been dark for +myriads of years, twinkled out of the blackness. Then the fierce glare +grew dimmer. A vast mantle of luminous mist spread out with +inconceivable rapidity, and in the midst of this blazed the central +nucleus—the sun which in far-off ages to come would be the giver of +light and heat, of life and beauty to worlds unborn, to planets which +were now only little eddies of atoms whirling in that ocean of nebulous +flame.</p> + +<p>For more than an hour the two wanderers from the far-off Earth stood +motionless and silent, gazing on the indescribable splendours of the +fearfully magnificent spectacle before them. Every mundane thought +seemed burnt out of their souls by the glory and the wonder of it. It +was almost as though they were standing in the very presence of God. +Indeed, were they not witnessing the supreme act of Omnipotence, a new +creation? Their peril, a peril such as had never threatened mortals +before, was utterly forgotten. They had even forgotten each other's +presence. For the time being they existed only to look and to wonder.</p> + +<p>They were called at length out of their trance by the matter-of-fact +voice of Murgatroyd saying—</p> + +<p>"My Lord, she's back to her course. Will I keep the power on full?"</p> + +<p>"Eh! What's that?" exclaimed Redgrave, as they both turned quickly +round. "Oh, it's you, Murgatroyd. The power? Yes, keep it on full till I +have taken the bearings."</p> + +<p>"Ay, my Lord, very good," replied the engineer.</p> + +<p>As he left the deck Redgrave put his arm round Zaidie and drew her +gently towards him and said, "Zaidie, truly you are favoured among +women! You have seen the beginning of a new creation. You will certainly +be saved somehow after that."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and you too, dear," she murmured, as though still half-dreaming. +"It is very glorious and wonderful; but what is it all—I mean, what is +the explanation of it?"</p> + +<p>"The merely scientific explanation, dear, is very simple. I see it all +now. The force that was dragging us out of our course was the united +pull of two dead stars approaching each other in the same orbit. They +may have been doing that for millions of years. The shock of their +meeting has transformed their motion into light and heat. They have +united to form a single sun and a nebula, which will some day condense +into a system of planets like ours. To-night the astronomers on Earth +will discover a new star—a variable star as they'll call it—for it +will grow dimmer as it moves away from our system. It has often happened +before."</p> + +<p>Then they turned back to the conning-tower.</p> + +<p>The needle had swung to its old position. The new star, henceforth to be +known in the annals of astronomy as Lilla-Zaidie, had already set for +them to the right of the <i>Astronef</i> and risen on the left, and, at a +distance of more than nine hundred million miles from the Earth, the +corner was turned, and the homeward voyage began.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX</h2> + + +<p>A week later they crossed the path of Jupiter, but the giant was +invisible, far away on the other side of the Sun. Redgrave laid his +course so as to avail himself to the utmost of the "pull" of the planets +without going near enough to them to be compelled to exert too much of +the priceless R. Force, which the indicators showed to be running +perilously low.</p> + +<p>Between the orbits of Jupiter and Mars they made a most valuable economy +by landing on Ceres, one of the largest of the asteroids, and travelling +about fifty million miles on her towards the orbit of the Earth without +any expenditure of force whatever. They found that the tiny world +possessed a breathable atmosphere and a fluid resembling water, but +nearly as dense as mercury. A couple of flasks of it form the greatest +treasures of the British Museum and the National Museum at Washington. +The vegetable world was represented by coarse grass, lichens, and dwarf +shrubs, and the animal by different species of worms, lizards, flies, +and small burrowing animals of the rodent type.</p> + +<p>As the orbit of Ceres, like that of the other asteroids, is considerably +inclined to that of the Earth, the <i>Astronef</i> rose from its surface when +the plane of the Earth's revolution was reached, and the glittering +swarm of miniature planets plunged away into space beneath them.</p> + +<p>"Where to now?" said Zaidie, as her husband came down on deck from the +conning-tower.</p> + +<p>"I am going to try to steer a middle course between the orbits of +Mercury and Venus," he replied. "They just happen to be so placed now +that we ought to be able to get the advantage of the pull of both of +them as we pass, and that will save us a lot of power. The only thing +I'm afraid of is the pull of the Sun, equal to goodness knows how many +times the attraction of all the planets put together. You see, little +woman, it's like this," he went on, taking out a pencil and going down +on one knee on the deck: "Here's the <i>Astronef</i>; there's Venus; there's +Mercury; there's the Sun; and there, away on the other side of him, is +Mother Earth. If we can turn that corner safely and without expending +too much power we ought to be all right."</p> + +<p>"And if we can't, what will happen?"</p> + +<p>"It will be a choice between morphine and cremation in the atmosphere of +the Sun, dear, or rather gradually roasting as we fall towards it."</p> + +<p>"Then, of course, it will be morphine," she said quite quietly, as she +turned away from his diagram and looked at the now fast-increasing disc +of the Sun. A well-balanced mind speedily becomes accustomed even to the +most terrible perils, and Zaidie had now looked this one so long and so +steadily in the face that for her it had already become merely the +choice between two forms of death with just a chance of escape hidden in +the closed hand of Fate.</p> + +<p>Thirty-six Earth-hours later the glorious golden disc of Venus lay broad +and bright beneath them. Above was the blazing orb of the Sun, nearly +half as big again as it appears from the Earth, with Mercury, a round +black spot, travelling slowly across it.</p> + +<p>"My dear Bird-Folk!" said Zaidie, looking down at the lovely world below +them. "If home wasn't home——"</p> + +<p>"We can be back among them in a few hours with absolute safety," +interrupted her husband, catching at the suggestion. "I've told you the +truth about the bare possibility of getting back to the Earth. It's only +a chance at best, and even if we pass the Sun we may not have force +enough left to prevent the <i>Astronef</i> from being smashed to dust or +burnt up in the atmosphere. After all we might do worse——"</p> + +<p>"What would you do if you were alone, Lenox?" she said, interrupting him +in turn.</p> + +<p>"I should take my chance and go on. After all home's home and worth a +struggle. But you, dear——"</p> + +<p>"I'm you, and so I take the same chances as you do. Besides, we're not +perfect enough for a world where there isn't any sin. We should probably +get quite miserable there. No, home's home, as you say."</p> + +<p>"Then home it is, dear!" he replied.</p> + +<p>The resplendent hemisphere of the Love-Star sank swiftly down into the +vault of Space, growing smaller and dimmer as the <i>Astronef</i> sped +towards the little black spot on the face of the Sun, which to them was +like a buoy marking a place of utter and hopeless shipwreck in the Ocean +of Immensity.</p> + +<p>The chronometer, still set to Earth-time, had now begun to mark the last +hours of the <i>Astronef's</i> voyage. She was not only travelling at a speed +of which figures could give no comprehensible idea, but the Sun, +Mercury, and the Earth were rushing towards her with a compound +velocity, composed of the movement of the Solar System through Space and +of the movement of the two planets round the Sun.</p> + +<p>Murgatroyd was at his post in the engine-room. Redgrave and Zaidie had +gone into the conning-tower, perhaps for the last time. For good fortune +or evil, for life or death, they would see the end of the voyage +together.</p> + +<p>"How far yet, dear?" she said, as Venus began to slip away behind them, +rising like a splendid moon in their wake.</p> + +<p>"Only sixty million miles or so, a matter of a few hours, more or +less—it all depends," he replied, without taking his eyes off the +compass.</p> + +<p>"Sixty millions! Why I feel almost at home again."</p> + +<p>"But we have to turn the corner of the street yet, dear, and after that +there's a fall of more than twenty-five million miles on to the more or +less kindly breast of Mother Earth."</p> + +<p>"A fall! It does sound rather awful when you put it that way; but I am +not going to let you frighten me. I believe Mother Earth will receive +her wandering children quite as kindly as they deserve."</p> + +<p>The moon-like disc of Venus grew swiftly smaller, and the black spot on +the face of the Sun larger and larger as the <i>Astronef</i> rushed silently +and imperceptibly, and yet with almost inconceivable velocity towards +doom or fortune. Neither Zaidie nor Redgrave spoke again for nearly +three hours—hours which to them seemed to pass like so many minutes. +Their eyes were fixed on the black disc of Mercury, which, as they +approached it, expanded with magical rapidity till it completely +eclipsed the blazing orb behind it. Their thoughts were far away on the +still invisible Earth and all the splendid possibilities that it held +for two young lives like theirs.</p> + +<p>As the sunlight vanished they looked at each other in the golden +moonlight of Venus, and Zaidie let her head rest for a moment on her +husband's shoulder. Then a swiftly broadening gleam of light shot out +from behind the black circle of Mercury. The first crisis had come. +Redgrave put out his hand to the signal-board and rang for full power. +The planet seemed to swing round as the <i>Astronef</i> rushed into the +blaze. In a few minutes it passed through the phases from "new" to +"full." Venus became eclipsed in turn as they swung between Mercury and +the Sun, and then Redgrave, after a rapid glance to either side, said:</p> + +<p>"If we can only keep the two pulls balanced we shall do it. That will +keep us in a straight line, and our own momentum ought to carry us into +the Earth's attraction."</p> + +<p>Zaidie did not reply. She was shading her eyes with her hand from the +almost intolerable brilliance of the Sun's rays, and looking straight +ahead to catch the first glimpse of the silver-grey orb. Her husband +read her thoughts and respected them. But a few minutes later he +startled her out of her dream of home by exclaiming:</p> + +<p>"Good God, we're turning!"</p> + +<p>"What do you say, dear? Turning what?"</p> + +<p>"On our own centre. Look! I'm afraid only a miracle can save us now, +darling."</p> + +<p>She glanced to the left-hand side where he was pointing. The Sun, no +longer now a sun, but a vast ocean of flame filling nearly a third of +the vault of Space, was sinking beneath them. On the right Mercury was +rising. Zaidie knew only too well what this meant. It meant that the +keel of the <i>Astronef</i> was being dragged out of the straight line which +would cut the Earth's orbit some forty million miles away. It meant +that, in spite of the exertion of the full power that the engines could +develop, they had begun to fall into the Sun.</p> + +<p>Redgrave laid his hand on hers, and their eyes met. There was no need +for words. Perhaps speech just then would have been impossible. In that +mute glance each looked into the other's soul and was content. Then he +left the conning-tower, and Zaidie dropped on to her knees before the +instrument-table and laid her forehead upon her clasped hands.</p> + +<p>Her husband went to the saloon, unlocked a little cupboard in the wall +and took out a blue bottle of corrugated glass labelled "Morphine, +Poison." He took another empty bottle of white glass and measured fifty +drops into it. Then he went to the engine-room and said abruptly:</p> + +<p>"Murgatroyd, I'm afraid it's all up with us. We're falling into the +Sun, and you know what that means. In a few hours the <i>Astronef</i> will be +red-hot. So it's roasting alive—or this. I recommend this."</p> + +<p>"And what might that be, my Lord?" said the old engineer, looking at the +bottle which his master held out towards him.</p> + +<p>"That's morphine—poison. Fill that up with water, drink it, and in half +an hour you'll be dead without knowing it. Of course, you won't take it +until there's absolutely no hope; but, granted that, you'll find this a +better death than roasting or baking alive." Then his voice changed +suddenly as he went on, "Of course, I need not say now, Murgatroyd, how +deeply I regret now that I asked you to come in the <i>Astronef</i>."</p> + +<p>"My Lord, my people have served yours for seven hundred years, and, +whether on Earth or among the stars, where you go it is my duty to go +also. But don't ask me to take the poison. It is not for me to say that +a journey like this is tempting Providence, but, by my lights, if I am +to die I shall die the death that Providence in its wisdom sends."</p> + +<p>"I daresay you're right in one way, Murgatroyd, but it's no time to +argue about beliefs now. There's the bottle. Do as you think right. And +now, in case the miracle doesn't happen, goodbye."</p> + +<p>"Goodbye, my Lord, if it is to be," replied the old Yorkshireman, taking +the hand which Redgrave held out to him. "I'll keep the power on to the +last, I suppose?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, you may as well. If it doesn't keep us away from the Sun it won't +be much use to us in two or three hours."</p> + +<p>He left the engine-room and went back to the conning-tower. Zaidie was +still on her knees. Beneath and around them the awful gulf of flame was +broadening and deepening. Mercury was rising higher and growing smaller. +He put the bottle down on the table and waited. Then Zaidie looked up. +Her eyes were clear, and her face was perfectly calm. She rose and put +her arm through his, and said:</p> + +<p>"Well, is there any hope, dear? There can't be now, can there? Is that +the morphine?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," he replied, slipping his arm beneath hers and round her waist. +"I'm afraid there's not much chance now, little woman. We're using up +the last of the power, and you see——"</p> + +<p>As he said this he looked at the thermometer. The mercury had risen from +65 degrees Fahrenheit, the normal temperature of the interior of the +<i>Astronef</i>, to 93 degrees, and during the half-minute that he watched it +rose another degree. There was no mistaking such a warning as that. He +had brought two little liqueur glasses in his pocket from the saloon. He +divided the morphine between them, and filled them up with water.</p> + +<p>"Not until the last moment, dear," said Zaidie, as he set one of them +before her. "We have no right to do it until then."</p> + +<p>"Very well. When the mercury reaches a hundred and fifty. After that it +will go up ten and fifteen degrees at a jump, and we——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, at a hundred and fifty," she replied, cutting short a speech she +dared not hear the end of. "I understand. It will be impossible to hope +any more."</p> + +<p>Now, side by side, they stood and watched the thermometer.</p> + +<p>Ninety-five—ninety-eight—a hundred and three—a hundred and +ten—eighteen—twenty-four—thirty-two—forty-one.</p> + +<p>The silent minutes passed, and with each the silver thread—for them the +thread of life—grew, with strange contradiction, longer and longer, and +with every minute it grew more quickly.</p> + +<p>A hundred and forty-six.</p> + +<p>With his right arm Redgrave drew Zaidie still closer to him. He put out +his left hand and took up the little glass. She did the same.</p> + +<p>"Goodbye, dear, till we have slept and wake again!"</p> + +<p>"Goodbye, darling, God grant that we may!" But the agony of that last +farewell was more than Zaidie could bear. She looked away at the little +glass in her hand, a hand which even now did not tremble. Then she +raised her eyes again to take one last look at the glory of the stars, +and at the Fate Incarnate in Flame which lay beneath them. Then, even as +the end of the last minute came, a cry broke through her white, +half-parted lips:</p> + +<p>"The Earth, the Earth—thank God, the Earth!"</p> + +<p>With the hand that held the draught of Lethe—which in another moment +she would have swallowed—she caught at her husband's hand, pulled the +glass out of it, and then with a little sigh she dropped senseless on +the floor of the conning-tower. Redgrave looked for a moment in the +direction that her eyes had taken. A pale, silver-grey crescent, with a +little white spot near it, was rising out of the blackness beyond the +edge of the solar ocean of flame. Home was in sight at last, but would +they reach it—and how?</p> + +<p>He picked her up and carried her to their room and laid her on the bed. +Then he went to the medicine chest again, this time for a very different +purpose.</p> + +<p>An hour later, they were on the upper deck with their telescopes turned +on to the rapidly growing crescent of the Home-World, which, in its +eternal march through Space, had come into the line of direct attraction +just in time to turn the scale in which the lives of the Space-voyagers +were trembling. The higher it rose, the bigger and broader and brighter +it grew, and, at last, Zaidie—forgetting in her transport of joy all +the perils that were yet to come—sprang to her feet and clapped her +hands, and cried:</p> + +<p>"There's America!"</p> + +<p>Then she dropped back into her long deck-chair and began a good, hearty, +healthy cry.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EPILOGUE" id="EPILOGUE"></a>EPILOGUE</h2> + + +<p>There is little now to be told that all the world does not already know +as well as it knows the circumstances of Lord and Lady Redgrave's +departure from the Earth, at the beginning of that marvellous voyage, +that desperate plunge into the unknown immensities of Space which began +so happily, and yet with so many grave misgivings in the hearts of their +friends, and which, after passing many perils, the adventurous voyagers +finished even more happily than they had begun.</p> + +<p>As I said at the beginning of this narrative the sole purpose of writing +it has been to place before the reading public an account of the +adventures experienced by Lord Redgrave and his beautiful Countess from +the time of their departure from the Earth to the hour of their return +to it. Therefore there is no need to re-tell a tale already told, and +one that has been read and re-read a thousand times. Every one who has +read his or her newspaper from Chamskatska to Cape Horn, and from Alaska +to South Australia, knows how the Commander of the <i>Astronef</i> so nursed +the remains which were left to him of the R. Force after overcoming the +attraction of the Sun, that he was able to steer an oblique course +between the Moon and the Earth, and to counteract what Zaidie called the +all too-loving attraction of the Mother Planet, and, after sixty hours +of agonising suspense, at last re-entered their native atmosphere.</p> + +<p>The expenditure of the last few units of the R. Force enabled them to +just clear the summits of the Bolivian Andes, to cross the foothills and +western slopes of Peru, and finally to let the <i>Astronef</i> drop quietly +on to the bosom of the broad Pacific about twenty miles westward of the +Port of Mollendo.</p> + +<p>All this time thousands of anxious eyes had been peering through +telescopes every night in quest of the wanderers who must now be +returning if ever they were to return, and a reward of ten thousand +dollars, offered conjointly by the British and United States Governments +for the first authentic tidings of the <i>Astronef</i>, was won by a smart +young Californian, who was Assistant Astronomer at the Harvard +University Observatory at Arequipa.</p> + +<p>One night when he was on duty watching a lunar occultation, he saw +something sweep across the disc of the full moon just as the captain and +officers of the <i>St. Louis</i> had seen that same something sweep across +the disc of the rising sun. What else could it be if not the <i>Astronef</i>? +He rang for another assistant to go on with the occultation, and wired +down to the coast requesting the British Consul at Mollendo to look out +for an arrival from the skies.</p> + +<p>Three hours later the gleam of an electric searchlight flickered down +over the huge black cone of the Misti, and by dawn the next morning one +of Her Majesty's cruisers—most appropriately named <i>Astræa</i>—attached +to the Pacific Squadron then <i>en route</i> from Lima to Valparaiso, steamed +out westward from Mollendo and found the long, shining hull of the +<i>Astronef</i> waiting quietly on the unrippled rollers of the Pacific, and +Lord and Lady Redgrave having breakfast in the deck-chamber.</p> + +<p>Compliments and congratulations having been duly exchanged, she was +taken in tow by the cruiser, and so reached Valparaiso. Here she lay for +a few days while the wires of the world were being kept hot with +telegraphic accounts of her return to Earth, and while her Commander, +with the assistance of the officers of the National Laboratory, was +replenishing his stock of the R. Fluid from the chemicals which they had +placed at his disposal.</p> + +<p>It would, of course, have been quite possible for him and Zaidie to have +taken steamer northward to Panama, crossed the Isthmus, and returned to +New York and Washington <i>viâ</i> Jamaica. The British Admiral even offered +to place his fastest cruiser at their disposal for a run to San +Francisco, whence the Overland Limited would have landed them in New +York in four days and a half, but Zaidie vetoed this as quickly as she +had done the other proposition. If she had her way the <i>Astronef</i> should +go back to Washington as she had left it, by means of her own motive +force, and so, of course, it came to pass.</p> + +<p>Even Murgatroyd's grim and homely features seemed irradiated by a glow +of what he afterwards thought unholy pride when he once more stood by +his levers and heard the familiar signal coming from the conning-tower.</p> + +<p>"A tenth."</p> + +<p>And then—"Stand by steering-gear."</p> + +<p>The next moment there was another tinkle in the engine-room.</p> + +<p>Redgrave, standing with Zaidie in the conning-tower, moved the +power-wheel through ten degrees, and then to the amazement of tens of +thousands of spectators, the hull of the <i>Astronef</i> rose perpendicularly +from the waters of the Bay. The British Squadron and a detachment of the +Chilian fleet thundered out a salute which was answered a few moments +later by the shore batteries, Redgrave went down into the deck-chamber +and fired twenty-one shots from one of the Maxim-Nordenfelts—the same +with which he had mown down the crowds of Martians in the square of +their great city a hundred and thirty million miles away, and while he +was doing this Zaidie in the conning-tower ran the White Ensign up to +the top of the flagstaff.</p> + +<p>Then the glass doors were closed again, the propellers began to revolve +at their utmost speed, and the Space-Navigator with one tremendous leap +cleared the double chain of the Andes and vanished to the +north-eastward.</p> + +<p>To describe the reception of Lord and Lady Redgrave when the <i>Astronef</i> +dropped a few hours later, on to the very spot in front of the steps of +the Capitol at Washington from which she had risen just four months +before, would only be to repeat what has already been told in the Press +of the world, and especially of the United States, with a far more +luxuriant wealth of detail than could possibly be emulated here. Suffice +it to say that the first human form that Zaidie embraced after her long +wanderings was that of Mrs. Van Stuyler, whom the President of the +United States had escorted to the gangway.</p> + +<p>The most marvellous of human adventures become commonplace by +repetition, and Mrs. Van Stuyler had already spent nearly a fortnight +devouring every item, whether of fact or fancy, with which the American +Press had embroidered the adventures of the <i>Astronef</i> and her crew. And +so when the first embracings and emotions were over, all she could find +to say was:</p> + +<p>"Well, Zaidie dear, and how did you enjoy it, after all?"</p> + +<p>"It was just gorgeous, Mrs. Van, and if there was a more gorgeous word +than that in the American language I'd use it," replied Zaidie, with +another hug, "Why didn't you come? You'd have been—well no, perhaps I'd +better not say what you would have been. But just think of it, or try +to—A honeymoon trip of over two thousand million miles, and +back—safe—thank God!"</p> + +<p>As she said this, Zaidie threw her arm over Mrs. Van Stuyler's shoulder, +and drew her away towards the forward end of the deck-chamber. At the +same moment the President's hand met Lord Redgrave's in a long, strong +grip. They didn't say anything just then. Men seldom do under such +circumstances.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A HONEYMOON IN SPACE***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 19476-h.txt or 19476-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/4/7/19476">http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/4/7/19476</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: A Honeymoon in Space + + +Author: George Griffith + + + +Release Date: October 5, 2006 [eBook #19476] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A HONEYMOON IN SPACE*** + + +E-text prepared by the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading +Team (https://www.pgdp.net/) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 19476-h.htm or 19476-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/4/7/19476/19476-h/19476-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/4/7/19476/19476-h.zip) + + + + + +A HONEYMOON IN SPACE + +by + +GEORGE GRIFFITH + +Author of "Valdar the Oft-Born," "The Virgin of the Sun," "The Rose of +Judah," &c., &c. + +Illustrated by Stanley Wood and Harold Piffard + + + + + + + +London +C. Arthur Pearson Ltd. +Henrietta Street +1901 + +Arno Press +A New York Times Company +New York--1975 +Reprint Edition 1974 by Arno Press Inc. + +Reprinted from a copy in The Library +of the University of California, Riverside + + + + +A Honeymoon in Space + + + + +[Illustration: "_The Earth, the Earth--thank God, the Earth!_"] + + + + +Contents + + +PROLOGUE--The First Cruise of the _Astronef_ + +Chapter I. + +Chapter II. + +Chapter III. + +Chapter IV. + +Chapter V. + +Chapter VI. + +Chapter VII. + +Chapter VIII. + +Chapter IX. + +Chapter X. + +Chapter XI. + +Chapter XII. + +Chapter XIII. + +Chapter XIV. + +Chapter XV. + +Chapter XVI. + +Chapter XVII. + +Chapter XVIII. + +Chapter XIX. + +Chapter XX. + +Epilogue + + + + +List of Illustrations + + +"THE EARTH, THE EARTH--THANK GOD, THE EARTH!" + +A HIDEOUS SHAPE ROSE OUT OF THE WATER BEHIND THEM + +IT TOOK THE STRANGE-WINGED CRAFT AMIDSHIPS + +SNOW PEAKS AND CLOUD SEAS + +CAME FORWARD TO MEET THEM WITH BOTH HANDS OUTSTRETCHED + +WHOLE MOUNTAIN RANGES OF GLOWING LAVA WERE HURLED UP MILES HIGH + +WITHOUT ANY APPARENT EFFORT HE RAISED HER ABOUT FIVE FEET FROM THE FLOOR + +THE HUGE PALELY LUMINOUS EYES LOOKED IN UPON THEM + + + + +PROLOGUE + +THE FIRST CRUISE OF THE _ASTRONEF_ + + +About eight o'clock on the morning of the 5th of November, 1900, those +of the passengers and crew of the American liner _St. Louis_ who +happened, whether from causes of duty or of their own pleasure, to be on +deck, had a very strange--in fact a quite unprecedented experience. + +The big ship was ploughing her way through the long, smooth rollers at +her average twenty-one knots towards the rising sun, when the officer in +charge of the navigating bridge happened to turn his glasses straight +ahead. He took them down from his eyes, rubbed the two object-glasses +with the cuff of his coat, and looked again. The sun was shining through +a haze which so far dimmed the solar disc that it was possible to look +straight at it without inconvenience to the eyes. + +The officer took another long squint, put his glasses down, rubbed his +eyes and took another, and murmured, "Well I'm damned!" + +Just then the Fourth Officer came up on to the bridge to relieve his +senior while he went down for a cup of coffee and a biscuit. The Second +took him away to the other end of the bridge, out of hearing of the +helmsman and the quartermaster standing by, and said almost in a +whisper: + +"Say, Norton, there's something ahead there that I can't make out. Just +as the sun got clear above the horizon I saw a black spot go straight +across it, right through the upper and lower limbs. I looked again, and +it was plumb in the middle of the disc. Look," he went on, speaking +louder in his growing excitement, "there it is again! I can see it +without the glasses now. See?" + +The Fourth did not reply at once. He had the glasses close to his eyes, +and was moving them slowly about as though he were following some +shifting object in the sky. Then he handed them back, and said: + +"If I didn't believe the thing was impossible I should say that's an +air-ship; but, for the present, I guess I'd rather wait till it gets a +bit nearer, if it's coming. Still, there _is_ something. Seems to be +getting bigger pretty fast, too. Perhaps it would be as well to notify +the old man. What do you think?" + +"Guess we'd better," said the Second. "S'pose you go down. Don't say +anything except to him. We don't want any more excitement among the +people than we can help." + +The Fourth nodded and went down the steps, and the Second began walking +up and down the bridge, every now and then taking another squint ahead. +Again and again the mysterious shape crossed the disc of the sun, always +vertically as though, whatever it might be, it was steering a direct +course from the sun to the ship, its apparent rising and falling being +due really to the dipping of her bows into the swells. + +"Well, Mr. Charteris, what's the trouble?" said the Skipper as he +reached the bridge. "Nothing wrong, I hope? Have you sighted a derelict, +or what? Ay, what in hell's that!" + +His hands went up to his eyes and he stared for a few moments at the +pale yellow oblate shape of the sun. + +At this moment the _St. Louis'_ head dipped again, and the Captain saw +something like a black line swiftly drawn across the sun from bottom to +top. + +"That's what I wanted to call your attention to, sir," said the Second +in a low tone. "I first noticed it crossing the sun as it rose through +the mist. I thought it was a spot of dirt on my glasses, but it has +crossed the sun several times since then, and for some minutes seemed to +remain dead in the middle of it. Later on it got quite a lot larger, and +whatever it is it's approaching us pretty rapidly. You see it's quite +plain to the naked eye now." + +By this time several of the crew and of the early loungers on deck had +also caught sight of the strange thing which seemed to be hanging and +swinging between the sky and the sea. People dived below for their +glasses, knocked at their friends' state-room doors and told them to get +up because something was flying towards the ship through the air; and in +a very few minutes there were hundreds of passengers on deck in all +varieties of early morning costume, and scores of glasses, held to +anxious eyes, were being directed ahead. + +The glasses, however, soon became unnecessary, for the passengers had +scarcely got up on deck before the mysterious object to the eastward at +length took definite shape, and as it did so mouths were opened as well +as eyes, for the owners of the eyes and mouths beheld just then the +strangest sight that travellers by sea or land had ever seen. + +Within the distance of about a mile it swung round at right angles to +the steamer's course with a rapidity which plainly showed that it was +entirely obedient to the control of a guiding intelligence, and hundreds +of eager eyes on board the liner saw, sweeping down from the grey-blue +of the early morning sky, a vessel whose hull seemed to be constructed +of some metal which shone with a pale, steely lustre. + +It was pointed at both ends, the forward end being shaped something like +a spur or ram. At the after end were two flickering, interlacing circles +of a glittering greenish-yellow colour, apparently formed by two +intersecting propellers driven at an enormous velocity. Behind these was +a vertical fan of triangular shape. The craft appeared to be +flat-bottomed, and for about a third of her length amidships the upper +half of her hull was covered with a curving, domelike roof of glass. + +"She's an air-ship of some sort, there's no doubt about that," said the +Captain, "so I guess the great problem has got solved at last. And yet +it ain't a balloon, because it's coming against the wind, and it's +nothing of the aeroplane sort neither, because it hasn't planes or kites +or any fixings of that kind. Still it's made of something like metal and +glass, and it must take a lot of keeping up. It's travelling at a pretty +healthy speed too. Getting on for a hundred miles an hour, I should +guess. Ah! he's going to speak us! Hope he's honest." + +Everybody on board the _St. Louis_ was up on deck by this time, and the +excitement rose to fever-heat as the strange vessel swept down towards +them from the middle sky, passed them like a flash of light, swung round +the stern, and ranged up alongside to starboard some twenty feet from +the bridge rail. + +She was about a hundred and twenty feet long, with some twenty feet of +depth and thirty of beam, and the Captain and many of his officers and +passengers were very much relieved to find that, as far as could be +seen, she carried no weapons of offence. + +As she ranged up alongside, a sliding door opened in the glass-domed +roof amidships, just opposite to the end of the _St. Louis'_ bridge. A +tall, fair-haired, clean-featured man, of about thirty, in grey +flannels, tipped up his golf cap with his thumb, and said: + +"Good morning, Captain! You remember me, I suppose? Had a fine passage, +so far? I thought I should meet you somewhere about here." + +The Captain of the _St. Louis_, in common with every one else on board, +had already had his credulity stretched about as far as it would go, and +he was beginning to wonder whether he was really awake; but when he +heard the hail and recognised the speaker he stared at him in blank and, +for the moment, speechless bewilderment. Then he got hold of his voice +again and said, keeping as steady as he could: + +"Good morning, my Lord! Guess I never expected to meet even you like +this in the middle of the Atlantic! So the newspaper men were right for +once in a way, and you _have_ got an air-ship that will fly?" + +"And a good deal more than that, Captain, if she wants to. I am just +taking a trial trip across the Atlantic before I start on a run round +the Solar System. Sounds like a lie, doesn't it? But it's coming off. +Oh, good morning, Miss Rennick! Captain, may I come on board?" + +"By all means, my Lord, only I'm afraid I daren't stop Uncle Sam's +mails, even for you." + +"There's no need for that, Captain, on a smooth sea like this," was the +reply. "Just keep on as you are going and I'll come alongside." + +He put his head inside the door and called something up a speaking-tube +which led to a glass-walled chamber in the forward part of the roof, +where a motionless figure stood before a little steering wheel. + +The craft immediately began to edge nearer and nearer to the liner's +rail, keeping speed so exactly with her that the threshold of the door +touched the end of the bridge without a perceptible jar. Then the +flannel-clad figure jumped on to the bridge and held out his hand to the +Captain. + +As they shook hands he said in a low tone, "I want a word or two in +private with you, as soon as possible." + +The commander saw a very serious meaning in his eyes. Besides, even if +he had not made his appearance under such extraordinary circumstances, +it was quite impossible that one of his social position and his wealth +and influence could have made such a request without good reason for it, +so he replied: + +"Certainly, my Lord. Will you come down to my room?" + +Hundreds of anxious, curious eyes looked upon the tall athletic figure +and the regular-featured, bronzed, honest English face as Rollo Lenox +Smeaton Aubrey, Earl of Redgrave, Baron Smeaton in the Peerage of +England, and Viscount Aubrey in the Peerage of Ireland, followed the +Captain to his room through the parting crowd of passengers. He nodded +to one or two familiar faces in the crowd, for he was an old Atlantic +ferryman, and had crossed five times with Captain Hawkins in the _St. +Louis_. + +Then he caught sight of a well and fondly remembered face which he had +not seen for over two years. It was a face which possessed at once the +fair Anglo-Saxon skin, the firm and yet delicate Anglo-Saxon features, +and the wavy wealth of the old Saxon gold-brown hair; but a pair of big, +soft, pansy eyes, fringed with long, curling, black lashes, looked out +from under dark and perhaps just a trifle heavy eyebrows. Moreover, +there was that indescribable expression in the curve of her lips and the +pose of her head; to say nothing of a lissome, vivacious grace in her +whole carriage which proclaimed her a daughter of the younger branch of +the Race that Rules. + +Their eyes met for an instant, and Lord Redgrave was startled and even a +trifle angered to see that she flushed up quickly, and that the +momentary smile with which she greeted him died away as she turned her +head aside. Still, he was a man accustomed to do what he wanted: and +what he wanted to do just then was to shake hands with Lilla Zaidie +Rennick, and so he went straight towards her, raised his cap, and held +out his hand saying, first with a glance into her eyes, and then with +one upward at the _Astronef_: + +"Good morning again, Miss Rennick! You see it is done." + +"Good morning, Lord Redgrave!" she replied, he thought, a little +awkwardly. "Yes, I see you have kept your promise. What a pity it is too +late! But I hope you will be able to stop long enough to tell us all +about it. This is Mrs. Van Stuyler, who has taken me under her +protection on my journey to Europe." + +His lordship returned the bow of a tall, somewhat hard-featured matron +who looked dignified even in the somewhat nondescript costume which most +of the ladies were wearing. But her eyes were kindly, and he said: + +"Very pleased to meet, Mrs. Van Stuyler. I heard you were coming, and I +was in hopes of catching you on the other side before you left. And now, +if you will excuse me, I must go and have a chat with the Skipper." He +raised his cap again and presently vanished from the curious eyes of the +excited crowd, through the door of the Captain's apartment. + +Captain Hawkins closed the door of his sitting-room as he entered, and +said: + +"Now, my Lord, I'm not going to ask you any questions to begin with, +because if I once began I should never stop; and besides, perhaps you'd +like to have your own say right away." + +"Perhaps that will be the shortest way," said his lordship. "The fact +is, we've not only the remains of this Boer business on our hands, but +we've had what is practically a declaration of war from France and +Russia. Briefly it's this way. A few weeks ago, while the Allies thought +they were fighting the Boxers, it came to the knowledge of my brother, +the Foreign Secretary, that the Tsung-li-Yamen had concluded a secret +treaty with Russia which practically annulled all our rights over the +Yang-tse Valley, and gave Russia the right to bring her Northern Railway +right down through China. + +"As you know, we've stood a lot too much in that part of the world +already, but we couldn't stand this; so about ten days ago an ultimatum +was sent declaring that the British Government would consider any +encroachment on the Yang-tse Valley as an unfriendly act. + +"Meanwhile France chipped in with a notification that she was going to +occupy Morocco as a compensation for Fashoda, and added a few nasty +things about Egypt and other places. Of course we couldn't stand that +either, so there was another ultimatum, and the upshot of it all was +that I got a wire late last night from my brother telling me that war +would almost certainly be declared to-day, and asking me for the use of +this craft of mine as a sort of dispatch-boat if she was ready. She is +intended for something very much better than fighting purposes, so he +couldn't ask me to use her as a war-ship; besides, I am under a solemn +obligation to her inventor--her creator, in fact, for I've only built +her--to blow her to pieces rather than allow her to be used as a +fighting machine except, of course, in sheer personal self-defence. + +"There is the telegram from my brother, so you can see there's no +mistake, and just after it came a messenger asking me, if the machine +was a success, to bring this with me across the Atlantic as fast as I +could come. It is the duplicate of an offensive and defensive alliance +between Great Britain and the United States, of which the details had +been arranged just as this complication arose. Another is coming across +by a fast cruiser, and, of course, the news will have got to Washington +by cable by this time. + +"By the time you get to the entrance of the Channel you will probably +find it swarming with French cruisers and torpedo-destroyers, so if +you'll be advised by me, you'll leave Queenstown out and get as far +north as possible." + +"Lord Redgrave," said the Captain, putting out his hand, "I'm +responsible for a good bit right here, and I don't know how to thank you +enough. I guess that treaty's been given away back to France by some of +our Irish statesmen by now, and it'd be mighty unhealthy for the _St. +Louis_ to fall in with a French or Russian cruiser----" + +"That's all right, Captain," said Lord Redgrave, taking his hand. "I +should have warned any other British or American ship. At the same time, +I must confess that my motives in warning you were not entirely +unselfish. The fact is, there's some one on board the _St. Louis_ whom I +should decidedly object to see taken off to France as a prisoner of +war." + +"And may I ask who that is?" said Captain Hawkins. + +"Why not?" replied his lordship. "It's the young lady I spoke to on deck +just now, Miss Rennick. Her father was the inventor of that craft of +mine. No one would believe his theories. He was refused patents both in +England and America on the ground of lack of practical utility. I met +him about two years ago, that is to say rather more than a year before +his death, when I was stopping at Banff up in the Canadian Rockies. We +made a travellers' acquaintance, and he told me about this idea of his. +I was very much interested, but I'm afraid I must confess that I might +not have taken it up practically if the Professor hadn't happened to +possess an exceedingly beautiful daughter. However, of course I'm pretty +glad now that I did do it; though the experiments cost nearly five +thousand pounds and the craft herself close on a quarter of a million. +Still, she is worth every penny of it, and I was bringing her over to +offer to Miss Rennick as a wedding present, that is to say if she'd have +it--and me." + +Captain Hawkins looked up and said rather seriously: + +"Then, my Lord, I presume you don't know----" + +"Don't know what?" + +"That Miss Rennick is crossing in the care of Mrs. Van Stuyler, to be +married in London next month." + +"The devil she is! And to whom, may I ask?" exclaimed his lordship, +pulling himself up very straight. + +"To the Marquis of Byfleet, son of the Duke of Duncaster. I wonder you +didn't hear of it. The match was arranged last fall. From what people +say she's not very desperately in love with him, but--well, I fancy it's +like rather too many of these Anglo-American matches. A couple of +million dollars on one side, a title on the other, and mighty little +real love between them." + +"But," said Redgrave between his teeth, "I didn't understand that Miss +Rennick ever had a fortune; in fact I'm quite certain that if her father +had been a rich man he'd have worked out his invention himself." + +"Oh, the dollars aren't his. In fact they won't be hers till she +marries," replied the Captain. "They belong to her uncle, old Russell +Rennick. He got in on the ground floor of the New York and Chicago ice +trusts, and made millions. He's going to spend some of them on making +his niece a Marchioness. That's about all there is to it." + +"Oh, indeed!" said Redgrave, still between his teeth. "Well, considering +that Byfleet is about as big a wastrel as ever disgraced the English +aristocracy, I don't think either Miss Rennick or her uncle will make a +very good bargain. However, of course that's no affair of mine now. I +remember that this Russell Rennick refused to finance his brother when +he really wanted the money. He made a particularly bad bargain, too, +then, though he didn't know it; for a dozen crafts like that, properly +armed, would simply smash up the navies of the world, and make sea-power +a private trust. After all, I'm not particularly sorry, because then it +wouldn't have belonged to me. Well now, Captain, I'm going to ask you to +give me a bit of breakfast when it's ready, and then I must be off. I +want to be in Washington to-night." + +"To-night! What, twenty-one hundred miles!" + +"Why not?" said Redgrave; "I can do about a hundred and fifty an hour +through the atmosphere, and then, you see, if that isn't fast enough I +can rise outside the earth's attraction, let it spin round, and then +come down where I want to." + +"Great Scott!" remarked Captain Hawkins inadequately, but with emphasis. +"Well, my Lord, I guess we'll go down to breakfast." + +But breakfast was not quite ready, and so Lord Redgrave rejoined Miss +Rennick and her chaperon on deck. All eyes and a good many glasses were +still turned on the _Astronef_, which had now moved a few feet away from +the liner's side, and was running along, exactly keeping pace with her. + +"It's so wonderful, that even seeing doesn't seem believing," said the +girl, when they had renewed their acquaintance of two years before. + +"Well," he replied, "it would be very easy to convince you. She shall +come alongside again, and if you and Mrs. Van Stuyler will honour her by +your presence for half an hour while breakfast is getting ready, I think +I shall be able to convince you that she is not the airy fabric of a +vision, but simply the realisation in metal and glass and other things +of visions which your father saw some years ago." + +There was no resisting an invitation put in such a way. Besides, the +prospect of becoming the wonder and envy of every other woman on board +was altogether too dazzling for words. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler looked a little aghast at the idea at first, but she +too had something of the same feeling as Zaidie, and besides, there +could hardly be any impropriety in accepting the invitation of one of +the wealthiest and most distinguished noblemen in the British Peerage. +So, after a little demur and a slight manifestation of nervousness, she +consented. + +Redgrave signalled to the man at the steering wheel. The _Astronef_ +slackened pace a little, dropped a yard or so, and slid up quite close +to the bridge-rail again. Lord Redgrave got in first and ran a light +gangway down on to the bridge. Zaidie and Mrs. Van Stuyler were +carefully handed up. The next moment the gangway was drawn up again, the +sliding glass doors clashed to, the _Astronef_ leapt a couple of +thousand feet into the air, swept round to the westward in a magnificent +curve, and vanished into the gloom of the upper mists. + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +The situation was one which was absolutely without parallel in all the +history of courtship from the days of Mother Eve to those of Miss Lilla +Zaidie Rennick. The nearest approach to it would have been the +old-fashioned Tartar custom which made it lawful for a man to steal his +best girl, if he could get her first, fling her across his horse's +crupper and ride away with her to his tent. + +But to the shocked senses of Mrs. Van Stuyler the present adventure +appeared a great deal more terrible than that. Both Zaidie and herself +had sprung to their feet as soon as the upward rush of the _Astronef_ +had slackened and they were released from their seats. They looked down +through the glass walls of what may be called the hurricane deck-chamber +of the _Astronef_, and saw below them a snowy sea of clouds just +crimsoned by the rising sun. + +In this cloud-sea, which spread like a wide-meshed veil between them and +the earth, there were great irregular rifts which looked as big as +continents on a map. These had a blue-grey background, or it might be +more correct to say under-ground, and in the midst of one of these they +saw a little black speck which after a moment or two took the shape of a +little toy ship, and presently they recognised it as the +eleven-thousand-ton liner which a few moments ago had been their ocean +home. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler was shaking in every muscle, afflicted by a sort of St. +Vitus' dance induced by physical fear and outraged propriety. Quite +apart from these, however, she experienced a third sensation which made +for a nameless inquietude. She was a woman of the world, well versed in +most of its ways, and she fully recognised that that single bound from +the bridge-rail of the _St. Louis_ to the other side of the clouds had +already carried her and her charge beyond the pale of human law. + +The same thought, mingled with other feelings, half of wonder and half +of re-awakened tenderness, was just then uppermost in Miss Zaidie's +mind. It was quite obvious that the man who could create and control +such a marvellous vehicle as this could, morally as well as physically, +lift himself beyond the reach of the conventions which civilised society +had instituted for its own protection and government. + +He could do with them exactly as he pleased. They were utterly at his +mercy. He might carry them away to some unexplored spot on one of the +continents, or to some unknown island in the midst of the wide Pacific. +He might even transport them into the midst of the awful solitudes which +surround the Poles. He could give them the choice between doing as he +wished, submitting unconditionally to his will, or committing suicide by +starvation. + +They had not even the option of jumping out, for they did not know how +to open the sliding doors; and even if they had done, what feminine +nerves could have faced a leap into that awful gulf which lay below +them, a two-thousand-foot dive through the clouds into the waters of the +wintry Atlantic? + +They looked at each other in speechless, dazed amazement. Far away below +them on the other side of the clouds the _St. Louis_ was steaming +eastward, and with her were going the last hopes of the coronet which +was to be the matrimonial equivalent of Miss Zaidie's beauty and Russell +Rennick's millions. + +They were no longer of the world. Its laws could no longer protect them. +Anything might happen, and that anything depended absolutely on the will +of the lord and master of the extraordinary vessel which, for the +present, was their only world. + +"My dearest Zaidie," Mrs. Van Stuyler gasped, when she at length +recovered the power of articulate speech, "what an entirely too awful +thing this is! Why, it's abduction and nothing less. Indeed it's worse, +for he's taken us clean off the earth, and there's no more chance of +rescue than if he took us to one of those planets he said he could go +to. If I didn't feel a great responsibility for you, dear, I believe I +should faint." + +By this time Miss Zaidie had recovered a good deal of her usual +composure. The excitement of the upward rush, and what was left of the +momentary physical fear, had flushed her cheeks and lighted her eyes. +Even Mrs. Van Stuyler thought her looking, if possible, more beautiful +than she had done under the most favourable of terrestrial +circumstances. There was a something else too, which she didn't +altogether like to see, a sort of resignation to her fate which, in a +young lady situated as she was then, Mrs. Van Stuyler considered to be +distinctly improper. + +"It is rather startling, isn't it?" she said, with hardly a trace of +emotion in her voice; "but I have no doubt that everything will be all +right in the end." + +"Everything all right, my dear Zaidie! What on earth, or I might say +under heaven, do you mean?" + +"I mean," replied Zaidie even more composedly than before, and also with +a little tightening of her lips, "that Lord Redgrave is the owner of +this vessel, and that therefore it is quite impossible that anything out +of the way could happen to us--I mean anything more out of the way than +this wonderful jump from the sea to the sky has been, unless, of course, +Lord Redgrave is going to take us for a voyage among the stars." + +"Zaidie Rennick!" said Mrs. Van Stuyler, bridling up into her most +frigid dignity, "I am more than surprised to hear you talk in such a +strain. Perfectly safe, indeed! Has it not struck you that we are +absolutely at this man's--this Lord Redgrave's, mercy, that he can take +us where he likes, and treat us just as he pleases?" + +"My dear Mrs. Van," replied Zaidie, dropping back into her familiar form +of address, but speaking even more frigidly than her chaperon had done, +"you seem to forget that, however extraordinary our situation may be +just now, we are in the care of an English gentleman. Lord Redgrave was +a friend of my father's, the only man who believed in his ideals, the +only man who realised them, the only man----" + +"That you were ever in love with, eh?" said Mrs. Van Stuyler with a snap +in her voice. "Is that so? Ah, I begin to see something now." + +"And I think, if you possess your soul in patience, you will see +something more before long," snapped Miss Zaidie in reply. Then she +stopped abruptly and the flush on her cheek deepened, for at that moment +Lord Redgrave came up the companion way from the lower deck carrying a +big silver tray with a coffee pot, three cups and saucers, a rack of +toast, and a couple of plates of bread and butter and cake. + +Just then a sort of social miracle happened. The fact was that Mrs. Van +Stuyler had never before had her early coffee brought to her by a peer +of the British Realm. She thought it a little humiliating afterwards, +but for the moment all sorts of conventional barriers seemed to melt +away. After all she was a woman, and some years ago she had been a young +one. Lord Redgrave was an almost perfect specimen of English manhood in +its early prime. He was one of the richest peers in England, and he was +bringing her her coffee. As she said afterwards, she wilted, and she +couldn't help it. + +"I'm afraid I have kept you waiting a long time for your coffee, +ladies," said Redgrave, as he balanced the tray on one hand and drew a +wicker table towards them with the other. "You see there are only two of +us on board this craft, and as my engineer is navigating the ship, I +have to attend to the domestic arrangements." + +Mrs. Van Stuyler looked at him in the silence of mental paralysis. Miss +Zaidie frowned, smiled, and then began to laugh. + +"Well, of all the cold-blooded English ways of putting things----" she +began. + +"I beg your pardon?" said Lord Redgrave as he put the tray down on the +table. + +"What Miss Rennick means, Lord Redgrave," interrupted Mrs. Van Stuyler, +struggling out of her paralytic condition, "and what I, too, should like +to say, is that under the circumstances----" + +"You think that I am not as penitent as I ought to be. Is that so?" said +Redgrave, with a glance and a smile mostly directed towards Miss Zaidie. +"Well, to tell you the truth," he went on, "I am not a bit penitent. On +the contrary, I am very glad to have been able to assist the Fates as +far as I have done." + +"Assist the Fates!" gasped Mrs. Van Stuyler, helping herself shakingly +to sugar, while Miss Zaidie folded a gossamer slice of bread and butter +and began to eat it; "I think, Lord Redgrave, that if you knew _all_ the +circumstances, you would say that you were working against them." + +"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler," he replied, as he filled his own coffee cup, +"I quite agree with you as to certain fates, but the Fates which I mean +are the ones which, with good or bad reason, I think are working on my +side. Besides, I _do_ know all the circumstances, or at least the most +important of them. That knowledge is, in fact, my principal excuse for +bringing you so unceremoniously above the clouds." + +As he said this he took a sideway glance at Miss Zaidie. She dropped her +eyelids and went on eating her bread and butter; but there was a little +deepening of the flush on her cheeks which was to him as the first flush +of sunrise to a benighted wanderer. + +There was a rather awkward silence after this. Miss Zaidie stirred the +coffee in her cup with a dainty Queen Anne spoon, and seemed to +concentrate the whole of her attention upon the operation. Then Mrs. Van +Stuyler took a sip out of her cup and said: + +"But really, Lord Redgrave, I feel that I must ask you whether you think +that what you have done during the last few minutes (which already, I +assure you, seem hours to me) is--well, quite in accordance with +the--what shall I say--ah, the rules that we have been accustomed to +live under?" + +Lord Redgrave looked at Miss Zaidie again. She didn't even raise her +eyelids, only a very slight tremor of her hand as she raised her cup to +her lips told that she was even listening. He took courage from this +sign, and replied: + +"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler, the only answer that I can make to that just +now is to remind you that, by the sanction of ages, everything is +supposed to be fair under two sets of circumstances, and, whatever is +happening on the earth down yonder, we, I think, are not at war." + +The next moment Miss Zaidie's eyelids lifted a little. There was a +tremor about her lips almost too faint to be perceptible, and the +slightest possible tinge of colour crept upwards towards her eyes. She +put her cup down and got up, walked towards the glass walls of the +deck-chamber, and looked out over the cloud-scape. + +The shortness of her steamer skirt made it possible for Lord Redgrave +and Mrs. Van Stuyler to see that the sole of her right boot was swinging +up and down on the heel ever so slightly. They came simultaneously to +the conclusion that if she had been alone she would have stamped, and +stamped pretty hard. Possibly also she would have said things to herself +and the surrounding silence. This seemed probable from the almost +equally imperceptible motion of her shapely shoulders. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler recognised in a moment that her charge was getting +angry. She knew by experience that Miss Zaidie possessed a very proper +spirit of her own, and that it was just as well not to push matters too +far. She further recognised that the circumstances were extraordinary, +not to say equivocal, and that she herself occupied a distinctly +peculiar position. + +She had accepted the charge of Miss Zaidie from her Uncle Russell for a +consideration counted partly by social advantages and partly by dollars. +In the most perfect innocence she had permitted not only her charge but +herself to be abducted--for, after all, that was what it came to--from +the deck of an American liner, and carried, not only beyond the clouds, +but also beyond the reach of human law, both criminal and conventional. + +Inwardly she was simply fuming with rage. As she said afterwards, she +felt just like a bottled volcano which would like to go off and daren't. + +About two minutes of somewhat surcharged silence passed. Mrs. Van +Stuyler sipped her coffee in ostentatiously small sips. Lord Redgrave +took his in slower and longer ones, and helped himself to bread and +butter. Miss Zaidie appeared perfectly contented with her contemplation +of the clouds. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +At length Mrs. Van Stuyler, being a woman of large experience and some +social deftness, recognised that a change of subject was the easiest way +of retreat out of a rather difficult situation. So she put her cup down, +leant back in her chair, and, looking straight into Lord Redgrave's +eyes, she said with purely feminine irrelevance: + +"I suppose you know, Lord Redgrave, that, when we left, the machine +which we call in America Manhood Suffrage--which, of course, simply +means the selection of a government by counting noses which may or may +not have brains above them--was what some of our orators would call in +full blast. If you are going to New York after Washington, as you said +on the boat, we might find it a rather inconvenient time to arrive. The +whole place will be chaos, you know; because when the citizen of the +United States begins electioneering, New York is not a very nice place +to stop in except for people who want excitement, and so if you will +excuse me putting the question so directly, I should like to know what +you just do mean to do----" + +Lord Redgrave saw that she was going to add "with us," but before he had +time to say anything, Miss Zaidie turned round, walked deliberately +towards her chair, sat down, poured herself out a fresh cup of coffee, +added the milk and sugar with deliberation, and then after a preliminary +sip said, with her cup poised half-way between her dainty lips and the +table: + +"Mrs. Van, I've got an idea. I suppose it's inherited, for dear old Pop +had plenty. Anyhow we may as well get back to common-sense subjects. Now +look here," she went on, switching an absolutely convincing glance +straight into her host's eyes, "my father may have been a dreamer, but +still he was a Sound Money man. He believed in honest dealings. He +didn't believe in borrowing a hundred dollars gold and paying back in +fifty dollars silver. What's your opinion, Lord Redgrave; you don't do +that sort of thing in England, do you? Uncle Russell is a Sound Money +man too. He's got too much gold locked up to want silver for it." + +"My dear Zaidie," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, "what _have_ democratic and +republican politics and bimetalism got to do with----" + +"With a trip in this wonderful vessel which Pop told me years ago could +go up to the stars if it ever was made? Why just this, Lord Redgrave is +an Englishman and too rich to believe in anything but sound money, so is +Uncle Russell, and there you have it, or should have." + +"I think I see what you mean, Miss Rennick," said their host, leaning +back in his chair and folding his hands behind his head, as steamboat +travellers are wont to do when seas are smooth and skies are blue. "The +_Astronef_ might come down like a vision from the clouds and preach the +Gospel of Gold in electric rays of silver through the commonplace medium +of the Morse Code. How's that for poetry and practice?" + +"I quite agree with his lordship as regards the practice," said Mrs. Van +Stuyler, talking somewhat rudely across him to Zaidie. "It would be an +excellent use to put this wonderful invention to. And then, I am sure +his lordship would land us in Central Park, so that we could go to your +Uncle's house right away." + +"No, no, I'm afraid I must ask you to excuse me there, Mrs. Van +Stuyler," said Redgrave, with a change of tone which Miss Zaidie +appreciated with a swiftly veiled glance. "You see, I have placed myself +beyond the law. I have, as you have been good enough to intimate, +abducted--to put it brutally--two ladies from the deck of an Atlantic +liner. Further, in doing so I have selfishly spoiled the prospects of +one of the ladies. But, seriously, I really must go to Washington +first----" + +"I think, Lord Redgrave," interrupted Mrs. Van Stuyler, ignoring the +last unfinished sentence and assuming her best Knickerbocker dignity, +"if you will forgive me saying so, that that is scarcely a subject for +discussion here." + +"And if that's so," interrupted Miss Zaidie, "the less we say about it +the better. What I wanted to say was this. We all want the Republicans +in, at least all of us that have much to lose. Now, if Lord Redgrave was +to use this wonderful air-ship of his on the right side--why there +wouldn't be any standing against it." + +"I must say that until just now I had hardly contemplated turning the +_Astronef_ into an electioneering machine. Still, I admit that she might +be made use of in a good cause, only I hope----" + +"That we shan't want you to paste her over with election bills, eh?--or +start handbill-snowstorms from the deck--or kidnap Croker and Bryan just +as you did us, for instance?" + +"If I could, I'm quite sure that I shouldn't have as pleasant guests as +I have now on board the _Astronef_. What do you think, Mrs. Van +Stuyler?" + +"My dear Lord Redgrave," she replied, "that would be quite impossible. +The idea of being shut up in a ship like this which can soar not only +from earth, but beyond the clouds, with people who would find out your +best secrets and then perhaps shoot you so as to be the only possessors +of them--well, that would be foolishness indeed." + +"Why, certainly it would," said Zaidie; "the only use you could have for +people like that would be to take them up above the clouds and drop them +out. But suppose we--I mean Lord Redgrave--took the _Astronef_ down over +New York and signalled messages from the sky at night with a +searchlight----" + +"Good," said their host, getting up from his deck-chair and stretching +himself up straight, looking the while at Miss Zaidie's averted profile. +"That's gorgeously good! We might even turn the election. I'm for sound +money all the time, if I may be permitted to speak American." + +"English is quite good enough for us, Lord Redgrave," said Miss Zaidie a +little stiffly. "We may have improved on the old language a bit, still +we understand it, and--well, we can forgive its shortcomings. But that +isn't quite to the point." + +"It seems to me," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, "that we are getting nearly as +far from the original subject as we are from the _St. Louis_. May I ask, +Zaidie, what you really propose to do?" + +"_Do_ is not for us to say," said Miss Zaidie, looking straight up to +the glass roof of the deck-chamber. "You see, Mrs. Van, we're not free +agents. We are not even first-class passengers who have paid their fares +on a contract ticket which is supposed to get them there." + +"If you'll pardon me saying so," said Lord Redgrave, stopping his walk +up and down the deck, "that is not quite the case. To put it in the most +brutally material form, it is quite true that I have kidnapped you two +ladies and taken you beyond the reach of earthly law. But there is +another law, one which would bind a gentleman even if he were beyond the +limits of the Solar System, and so if you wish to be landed either in +Washington or New York it shall be done. You shall be put down within a +carriage drive of your own residence, or of Mr. Russell Rennick's. I +will myself see you to his door, and there we may say goodbye, and I +will take my trip through the Solar System alone." + +There was another pause after this, a pause pregnant with the fate of +two lives. They looked at each other--Mrs. Van Stuyler at Zaidie, Zaidie +at Lord Redgrave, and he at Mrs. Van Stuyler again. It was a kind of +three-cornered duel of eyes, and the eyes said a good deal more than +common human speech could have done. + +Then Lord Redgrave, in answer to the last glance from Zaidie's eyes, +said slowly and deliberately: + +"I don't want to take any undue advantage, but I think I am justified in +making one condition. Of course I can take you beyond the limits of the +world that we know, and to other worlds that we know little or nothing +of. At least I could do so if I were not bound by law as strong as +gravitation itself; but now, as I said before, I just ask whether or not +my guests or, if you think it suits the circumstances better, my +prisoners, shall be released unconditionally wherever they choose to be +landed." + +He paused for a moment and then, looking straight into Zaidie's eyes, he +added: + +"The one condition I make is that the vote shall be unanimous." + +"Under the circumstances, Lord Redgrave," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, rising +from her seat and walking towards him with all the dignity that would +have been hers in her own drawing-room, "there can only be one answer to +that. Your guests or your prisoners, as you choose to call them, must be +released unconditionally." + +Lord Redgrave heard these words as a man might hear words in a dream. +Zaidie had risen too. They were looking into each other's eyes, and many +unspoken words were passing between them. There was a little silence, +and then, to Mrs. Van Stuyler's unutterable horror, Zaidie said, with +just the suspicion of a gasp in her voice: + +"There's one dissentient. We are prisoners, and I guess I'd better +surrender at discretion." + +The next moment her captor's arm was round her waist, and Mrs. Van +Stuyler, with her twitching fingers linked behind her back, and her nose +at an angle of sixty degrees, was staring away through the blue +immensity, dumbly wondering what on earth or under heaven was going to +happen next. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +After a couple of minutes of silence which could be felt, Mrs. Van +Stuyler turned round and said angrily: + +"Zaidie, you will excuse me, perhaps, if I say that your conduct is +not--I mean has not been what I should have expected--what I did, +indeed, expect from your uncle's niece when I undertook to take you to +Europe. I must say----" + +"If I were you, Mrs. Van, I don't think I'd say much more about that, +because, you see, it's fixed and done. Of course, Lord Redgrave's only +an earl, and the other is a marquis, but, you see, he's a man, and I +don't quite think the other one is--and that's about all there is to +it." + +Their host had just left the deck-saloon, taking the early coffee +apparatus with him, and Miss Zaidie, in the first flush of her pride and +re-found happiness, was taking a promenade of about twelve strides each +way, while Mrs. Van Stuyler, after partially relieving her feelings as +above, had seated herself stiffly in her wicker-chair, and was following +her with eyes which were critical and, if they had been twenty years +younger, might also have been envious. + +"Well, at least I suppose I must congratulate you on your ability to +accommodate yourself to most extraordinary circumstances. I must say +that as far as that goes I quite envy you. I feel as though I ought to +choke or take poison, or something of that sort." + +"Sakes, Mrs. Van, please don't talk like that!" said Zaidie, stopping in +her walk just in front of her chaperon's chair. "Can't you see that +there's nothing extraordinary about the circumstances except this +wonderful ship? I have told you how Pop and I met Lord Redgrave in our +tour through the Canadian Rockies two or three years ago. No, it's two +years and nine months next June; and how he took an interest in Pop's +theories and ideas about this same ship that we are on now----" + +"Oh yes," said Mrs. Van Stuyler rather acidly, "and not only in the +abstract ideas, but apparently in a certain concrete reality." + +"Mrs. Van," laughed Zaidie, with a cunning twist on her heel, "I know +you don't mean to be rude, but--well, now did any one ever call _you_ a +concrete reality? Of course it's correct just as a scientific +definition, perhaps--still, anyhow, I guess it's not much good going on +about that. The facts are just this way. I consented to marry that +Byfleet marquis just out of sheer spite and blank ignorance. Lord +Redgrave never actually asked me to marry him when we were in the +Rockies, but he did say when he went back to England that as soon as he +had realised my father's ideal he would come over and try and realise +one of his own. He was looking at me when he said it, and he looked a +good deal more than he said. Then he went away, and poor Pop died. Of +course I couldn't write and tell him, and I suppose he was too proud to +write before he'd done what he undertook to do, and I, like most +girl-fools in the same place would have done, thought that he'd given +the whole thing up and just looked upon the trip as a sort of interlude +in globe-trotting, and thought no more about Pop's ideas and inventions +than he did about his daughter." + +"Very natural, of course," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, somewhat mollified by +the subdued passion which Zaidie had managed to put into her commonplace +words; "and so as you thought he had forgotten you and was finding a +wife in his own country, and a possible husband came over from that same +country with a coronet----" + +"That'll do, Mrs. Van, thank you," interrupted Miss Zaidie, bringing her +daintily-shod foot down on the deck this time with an unmistakable +stamp. "We'll consider that incident closed if you please. It was a +miserable, mean, sordid business altogether; I am utterly, hopelessly +ashamed of it and myself too. Just to think that I could ever----" + +Mrs. Van Stuyler cut short her indignant flow of words by a sudden +uplifting of her eyelids and a swift turn of her head towards the +companion way. Zaidie stamped again, this time more softly, and walked +away to have another look at the clouds. + +"Why, what on earth is the matter?" she exclaimed, shrinking back from +the glass wall. "There's nothing--we're not anywhere!" + +"Pardon me, Miss Rennick, you are on board the _Astronef_," said Lord +Redgrave, as he reached the top of the companion way, "and the +_Astronef_ is at present travelling at about a hundred and fifty miles +an hour above the clouds towards Washington. That is why you don't see +the clouds and sea as you did after we left the _St. Louis_. At a speed +like this they simply make a sort of grey-green blur. We shall be in +Washington this evening, I hope." + +"To-night, sir--I beg your pardon, my Lord!" gasped Mrs. Van Stuyler. "A +hundred and fifty miles an hour! Surely that's impossible." + +"My dear Mrs. Van Stuyler," said Redgrave, with a side-look at Zaidie, +"nowadays 'impossible' is hardly an English or even an American word. In +fact, since I have had the honour of realising some of Professor +Rennick's ideas it has been relegated to the domain of mathematics. Not +even he could make two and two more or less than four, but--well, would +you like to come into the conning-tower and see for yourselves? I can +show you a few experiments that will, at any rate, help to pass the time +between here and Washington." + +"Lord Redgrave," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, dropping gracefully back into +her wicker armchair, "if I may say so, I have seen quite enough +impossibilities, and--er, well--other things since we left the deck of +the _St. Louis_ to keep me quite satisfied until, with your lordship's +permission, I set foot on solid ground again, and I should also like to +remind you that we have left everything behind us on the _St. Louis_, +everything except what we stand up in, and--and----" + +"And therefore it will be a point of honour with me to see that you want +for nothing while you are on board the _Astronef_, and that you shall be +released from your durance----" + +"Now don't say vile, Lenox--I mean----" + +"It is perfectly plain what you mean, Zaidie," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, in +a tone which seemed to send a chill through the deck-chamber. "Really, +the American girl----" + +"Just wants to tell the truth," laughed Zaidie, going towards Redgrave. +"Lord Redgrave, if you like it better, says he wants to marry me, and, +peer or peasant, I want to marry him, and that's all there is to it. You +don't suppose I'd have----" + +"My dear girl, there's no need to go into details," interrupted Mrs. Van +Stuyler, inspired by fond memories of her own youth; "we will take that +for granted, and as we are beyond the social region in which chaperons +are supposed to be necessary, I think I will have a nap." + +"And we'll go to the conning-tower, eh?" + +"Breakfast will be ready in about half an hour," said Redgrave, as he +took Zaidie by the arm and led her towards the forward end of the +deck-chamber. "Meanwhile, _au revoir_! If you want anything, touch the +button at your right hand, just as you would on board the _St. Louis_." + +"I thank your lordship," said Mrs. Van Stuyler, half melting and half +icy still. "I shall be quite content to wait until you come back. Really +I feel quite sleepy." + +"That's the effect of the elevation on the dear old lady's nerves," +Redgrave whispered to Zaidie as he helped her up the narrow stairway +which led to the glass-domed conning-tower, in which in days to come she +was destined to pass some of the most delightful and the most terrible +moments of her life. + +"Then why doesn't it affect me that way?" said Zaidie, as she took her +place in the little chamber, steel-walled and glass-roofed, and half +filled with instruments of which she, Vassar girl and all as she was, +could only guess the use. + +"Well, to begin with, you are younger, which is an absolutely +unnecessary observation; and in the second place, perhaps you were +thinking about something else." + +"By which I suppose you mean your lordship's noble self." + +This was said in such a tone and with such an indescribable smile that +there immediately ensued a gap in the conversation, and a silence which +was a great deal more eloquent than any words could have made it. + +When Miss Zaidie had got free again she put her hands up to her hair, +and while she was patting it into something like shape again she said: + +"But I thought you brought me here to show me some experiments, and not +to----" + +"Not to take advantage of the first real opportunity of tasting some of +the dearest delights that mortal man ever stole from earth or sea? Do +you remember that day when we were coming down from the big +glacier--when your foot slipped and I just caught you and saved a +sprained ankle?" + +"Yes, you wretch, and went away next day and left something like a +broken heart behind you! Why didn't you--Oh what idiots you men can be +when you put your minds to it!" + +"It wasn't quite that, Zaidie. You see, I'd promised your father the day +before--of course I was only a younger son then--that I wouldn't say +anything about realising _my_ ideal until I had realised his, and +so----" + +"And so I might have gone to Europe with Uncle Russell's millions to buy +that man Byfleet's coronet, and pay the price----" + +"Don't, Zaidie, don't! That is quite too horrible to think of, and as +for the coronet, well, I think I can give you one about as good as his, +and one that doesn't want re-gilding. Good Lord, fancy you married to a +thing like that! What could have made you think of it?" + +"I didn't think," she said angrily; "I didn't think and I didn't feel. +Of course I thought that I'd dropped right out of your life, and after +that I didn't care. I was mad right through, and I'd made up my mind to +do what others did--take a title and a big position, and have the +outside as bright as I could get it, whatever the inside might be like. +I'd made up my mind to be a society queen abroad, and a miserable woman +at home--and, Lenox, thank God and you, that I wasn't!" + +Then there was another interlude, and at the end of it Redgrave said: + +"Wait till we've finished our honeymoon in space, and come back to +earth. You won't want any coronets then, although you'll have one, for +all the lands of earth won't hold another woman like yourself--your own +sweet self! Of course it doesn't now, but--there, you know what I mean. +You'll have been to other worlds, you'll have made the round trip of the +Solar System, so to say, and----" + +"And I think, dear, that is about promise of wonders enough, and of +other things too--no, you are really quite too exacting. I thought you +brought me here to show me some of the wonders that this marvellous ship +of yours can work." + +"Then just one more and I'll show you. Now you stand up there on that +step so that you can see all round, and watch with all your eyes, +because you are going to see something that no woman ever saw before." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +Above a tiny little writing-desk fixed to the wall of the conning-tower +there was a square mahogany board with six white buttons in pairs. On +one side of the board hung a telephone and on the other a speaking-tube. +To the right hand opposite where Zaidie stood were two nickel-plated +wheels and behind each of them a white disc, one marked off into 360 +degrees, and the other into 100 with subdivisions of tens. Overhead hung +an ordinary tell-tale compass, and compactly placed on other parts of +the wall were barometers, thermometers, barographs, and, in fact, +practically every instrument that the most exacting of aeronauts or +Space-explorers could have asked for. + +"You see, Zaidie, this is what one might call the cerebral chamber of +the _Astronef_, and, granted that my engines worked all right, I could +make her do anything I wanted without moving out of here, but as a rule, +of course, Murgatroyd is in the engine-room. If he wasn't the most +whole-souled Wesleyan that Yorkshire ever produced, I believe he'd +become an idolater and worship the _Astronef's_ engines." + +"And who is Murgatroyd, please?" + +"In the first place he is what I might call an hereditary retainer of +the House of Redgrave. His ancestors have served mine for the last seven +hundred years. When my ancestors were burglar-barons, his were +men-at-arms. When we went on the Crusades they went too; when we raised +a regiment for the King against the Parliament they were naturally the +first to enlist in it; and as we gradually settled down into peaceful +respectability they did the same. Lastly, when we went into trade as +ironmasters and engineers they went in too. This Murgatroyd, for +instance, was master-foreman of my works at Smeaton, and he was the only +man I dared trust with the secrets of the _Astronef_, and the only one I +would trust myself on board her with, and that's why we're a crew of +two. You see the command of a vessel like this is a fairly big business, +and if it got into the wrong sort of hands----" + +"Yes, I see," said Zaidie with a little nod. "It would be just too awful +to think about. Why you might keep the world in terror with it; but I +know you wouldn't do that, because, for one thing, I wouldn't let you." + +"Gently, gently, Ma'm'selle; permit me most humbly to remind you that +you are still my prisoner, and that I am still Commander of the +_Astronef_." + +"Oh, very well then," said Zaidie, interrupting him with a pretty little +gesture of impatience, "and now suppose you let me see what the +_Astronef's_ commander can do with her." + +"Certainly," replied Redgrave, "and with the greatest pleasure--but, by +the way, that reminds me you haven't paid your footing yet." + +When due payment had been given and taken, or perhaps it would be more +correct to say taken and given, Redgrave put his finger on one of the +buttons. + +Immediately Zaidie heard the swish of the air past the smooth wall of +the conning-tower grow fainter and fainter. Then there came a little +check which nearly upset her balance, and presently the clouds beneath +them began to take shape and great white continents of them with grey +oceans in between went sweeping silently and swiftly away behind them. + +Redgrave turned the wheel in front of the 100-degree disc a little to +the left. The next instant the clouds rose up. For a moment Zaidie could +see nothing but white mist on all sides. Then the atmosphere cleared +again, and she saw far below her what looked like a vast expanse of +ocean that had been suddenly frozen solid. + +There were the long Atlantic rollers tipped with snowy foam. Here and +there at wide intervals were little black dots, some of them with brown +trails behind them, others with little patches of white which showed up +distinctly against the dark grey-blue of the sea. Every moment they grew +bigger. Then the white-crested waves began to move, and the big ocean +steamers and full-rigged sailing ships looked less and less like toys. +Just under them there was a very big one with four funnels pouring out +dense volumes of black smoke. Redgrave took up a pair of glasses, looked +at her for a moment and said: + +"That's the _Deutschland_, the new Hamburg-American record-breaker. +Suppose we go down and have a lark with her. I wonder if she's taking +news of the war. We're in with Germany, and they may know something +about it." + +"That would be just too lovely!" said Zaidie. "Let's go and show them +how _we_ can break records. I suppose they've seen us by this time and +are just wondering with all their wits what we are. I guess they'll feel +pretty tired about poor Count Zeppelin's balloon when they see _us_." + +Redgrave noted the "we" and the "us" with much secret satisfaction. + +"All right," he said, "we'll go and give them a bit of a startler." + +In front of the conning-tower there was a steel flagstaff about ten feet +high, with halliards rove through a sheer in the top. He took a little +roll of bunting out of a locker under the desk, opened a glass slide, +brought in the halliards and bent the flag on. + +Meanwhile the long shape of the great liner was getting bigger and +bigger. Her decks were black, with people staring up at this strange +apparition which was dropping upon them from the clouds. Another minute +and the _Astronef_ had dropped to within five hundred feet of the water, +and about half a mile astern of the _Deutschland_. Redgrave turned the +wheel back two or three inches and touched a second button. + +The _Astronef_ stopped her descent instantly, and then she shot forward. +The new greyhound was making her twenty-two and a half knots, hurling a +broad white torrent of foam away from under her counters. But in half a +minute the _Astronef_ was alongside her. + +Redgrave ran the roll of bunting up to the top of the flagstaff, pulled +one of the halliards, and the White Ensign of England floated out. +Almost at the same moment the German flag went up to the staff at the +stern of the _Deutschland_, and they heard a roar of cheers, mingled +with cries of wonder, come up from her swarming decks. + +Each flag was dipped thrice in due course. Redgrave took off his cap and +bowed to the Captain on the bridge. Zaidie nodded and fluttered her +handkerchief in reply to hundreds of others that were waving on the +decks. Mrs. Van Stuyler woke up in wonder and waved hers instinctively, +half longing to change crafts. In fact, if it hadn't been for her +absolute devotion to the proprieties she would have obeyed her first +impulse and asked Lord Redgrave to put her on board the steamer. + +While the officers and crew and passengers of the _Deutschland_ were +staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the graceful glittering shape of +the _Astronef_, Redgrave touched the first button in the second row +once, moved the 100-degree wheel on a few degrees, and then gave the +other a quarter turn. Then he closed the window slide, and the next +moment Zaidie saw the great liner sink down beneath them in a curious +twisting sort of way. She seemed to stop still and then spin round on +her centre, getting smaller and smaller every moment. + +"What's the matter, Lenox?" she said, with a little gasp. "What's the +_Deutschland_ doing? She seems to be spinning round on her own axis like +a top." + +"That's only the point of view, dear. She's just plugging along straight +on her way to New York, and we've been making rings round her and going +up all the time. But of course you don't notice the motion here any more +than you would if you were in a balloon." + +"But I thought you were going to speak them. Surely you don't mean to +say that you intended that just as a little bit of showing off?" + +"That's about what it comes to, I suppose, but you must not think it was +altogether vanity. You see the German Government has bought Count +Zeppelin's air-ship or steerable balloon, as it ought to be called, +always supposing that they can steer it in a wind, and of course their +idea is to make a fighting machine of it. Now Germany is engaged to +stand by us in this trouble that's coming, and by way of cementing the +alliance I thought it was just as well to let the wily Teuton know that +there's something flying the British flag which could make very small +mincemeat of their gas-bags." + +"And what about Old Glory?" said Miss Zaidie. "The _Astronef_ was built +with English money and English skill, but----" + +"She is the creature of American genius. Of course she is. In fact she +is the first concrete symbol of the Anglo-American Alliance, and when +the daughter of her creator has gone into partnership with the man who +made her we'll have two flagstaff's, and the Jack and Old Glory will +float side by side." + +"And meanwhile where are we going?" asked Zaidie, after a moment's +interval. "Ah, there we are through the clouds again. What makes us +rise? Is that the force that Pop told me he discovered?" + +"I'll answer the last question first," said Redgrave. "That was the +greatest of your father's discoveries. He got at the secret of +gravitation, and was able to analyse it into two separate forces just as +Volta did with electricity--positive and negative, or, to put it better, +attractive and repulsive. + +"Three out of the five sets of engines in the _Astronef_ develop the R. +Force, as I call it for short. This wheel with the hundred degrees +marked behind it regulates the development. The further I turn it this +way to the right, the more the R. Force overcomes the attractive force +of the earth or any other planet that we may visit. Turn it back, and +gravitation asserts itself. If I put this arrow-head on the wheel +opposite zero the weight of the _Astronef_ is about a hundred and fifty +tons, and of course she would go down like a stone, and a very big one +at that. At ten she weighs nothing; that is to say the R. Force exactly +counteracts gravitation. At eleven she begins to rise. At a hundred she +would be hurled away from the earth like a shell from a twelve-inch gun, +or even faster. Now, watch." + +He took up the speaking-tube. "Is she all tight everywhere, Andrew?" + +"Yes, my Lord," came gurgling through the tube. + +Then Redgrave slowly turned the wheel till the indicator pointed to +twenty-five. Zaidie, all eyes and wonder, saw a vast sea of glittering +white spread out beneath them, an ocean of snow with grey-blue patches +here and there. It sank away from under them till the patches became +spots and the sunlit clouds a vast, luminous blur. The air about them +grew marvellously clear and limpid. The sun blazed down on them with a +tenfold intensity of light, but Zaidie was astonished to find that very +little heat penetrated the glass walls and roof of the conning-tower. + +"What an awful height!" she exclaimed, looking round at him with +something like fear in her eyes. "How high are we, Lenox?" + +"You'll find afterwards that the _Astronef_ doesn't take any account of +high or low or up or down," he replied, looking at the dial of an +aneroid barometer by the side of him. "Roughly speaking, we're rather +over 60,000 feet--say ten miles--from the surface of the Atlantic. +That's why I asked Andrew whether everything was tight. You see we +couldn't breathe the air there is outside there--too thin and cold--and +so the _Astronef_ makes her own atmosphere as we go along. But I won't +spoil what you're going to see by any more of this. So if you please, +we'll go down now and get along to Washington. Anyhow, I hope I've +convinced you so far that I've kept my promise." + +"Yes, dear, you have, and splendidly! I've only one regret. If _he_ was +only here now, what a happy man he'd be! Still, I daresay he knows all +about it and is just as happy. In fact he must be. I feel certain he +must. The very soul of his intellect was in the dream of this ship, and +now that it's a reality he must be here still. Isn't it part of himself? +Isn't it his mind that's working in these wonderful engines of yours, +and isn't it his strength that lifts us up from the earth and takes us +down again just as you please to turn that wheel?" + +"There's little doubt about that, Zaidie," said Redgrave quietly, but +earnestly. "You know we North-country folk all have our traditions and +our ghosts; and what more likely than that the spirit of a dead man or a +man gone to other worlds should watch over the realisation of his +greatest work on earth? Why shouldn't we believe that, we who are going +away from this world to other ones?" + +"Why not?" interrupted Zaidie, "why, of course we will. And now suppose +we come down in more ways than one and go and give poor Mrs. Van Stuyler +something to eat and drink. The dear old girl must be frightened half +out of her wits by this time." + +"Very well," replied Redgrave; "but we'll come down literally first, so +that we can get the propellers to work." + +He turned the wheel back till the indicator pointed to five. The +cloud-sea came up with a rush. They passed through it, and stopped about +a thousand feet above the sea. Redgrave touched the first button twice, +and then the next one twice. The air began to hiss past the walls of the +conning-tower. The crest-crowned waves of the Atlantic seemed to sweep +in a hurrying torrent behind them, and then Redgrave, having made sure +that Murgatroyd was at the after-wheel, gave him the course for +Washington, and then went down to induct his bride-elect into the art +and mystery of cooking by electricity as it was done in the kitchen of +the _Astronef_. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +As this narrative is the story of the personal adventures of Lord +Redgrave and his bride, and not an account of events at which all the +world has already wondered, there is no necessity to describe in any +detail the extraordinary sequence of circumstances which began when the +_Astronef_ dropped without warning from the clouds in front of the White +House at Washington, and his lordship, after paying his respects to the +President, proceeded to the British Embassy and placed the copy of the +Anglo-American agreement in Lord Pauncefote's hands. + +Mrs. Van Stuyler's spirits had risen as the _Astronef_ descended towards +the lights of Washington, and when the President and Lord Pauncefote +paid a visit to the wonderful craft, the joint product of American +genius and English capital and constructive skill, she immediately +assumed, at Redgrave's request, the position of lady of the house _pro +tem._, and described the "change of plans," as she called it, which led +to their transfer from the _St. Louis_ to the _Astronef_ with an +imaginative fluency which would have done credit to the most +enterprising of American interviewers. + +"You see, my dear," she said to Zaidie afterwards, "as everything turned +out so very happily, and as Lord Redgrave behaved in such a splendid +way, I thought it was my duty to make everything appear as pleasant to +the President and Lord Pauncefote as I could." + +"It was real good of you, Mrs. Van," said Zaidie. "If I hadn't been +paralysed with admiration I believe I should have laughed. Now if you'll +just come with us on our trip, and write a book about it afterwards just +as you told--I mean as you described what happened between the _St. +Louis_ and Washington, to the President and Lord Pauncefote, you'd make +a million dollars out of it. Say now, won't you come?" + +"My dear Zaidie," Mrs. Van Stuyler replied, "you know that I am very +fond of you. If I'd only had a daughter I should have wanted her to be +just like you, and I should have wanted her to marry a man just like +Lord Redgrave. But there's a limit to everything. You say that you are +going to the moon and the stars, and to see what the other planets are +like. Well, that's your affair. I hope God will forgive you for your +presumption, and let you come back safe, but I----No. Ten--twenty +millions wouldn't pay me to tempt Providence like that." + +The _Astronef_ had landed in front of the White House, as everybody +knows, on the eve of the Presidential election. After dinner in the +deck-saloon, as the Space Navigator lay in the midst of a square of +troops, outside which a huge crowd surged and struggled to get a look at +the latest miracle of constructive science, the President and the +British Ambassador said goodbye, and as soon as the gangway ladder was +drawn in the _Astronef_, moved by no visible agency, rose from the +ground amidst a roar of cheers coming from a hundred thousand throats. +She stopped at a height of about a thousand feet, and then her forward +searchlight flashed out, swept the horizon, and vanished. Then it +flashed out again intermittently in the longs and shorts of the Morse +Code, and these, when translated, read: + +"Vote for sound men and sound money!" + +In five minutes the wires of the United States were alive with the +terse, pregnant message, and under the ocean in the dark depths of the +Atlantic ooze, vivid narratives of the coming of the miracle went +flashing to a hundred newspaper offices in England and on the Continent. +The New York correspondent of the London _Daily Express_ added the +following paragraph to his account of the strange occurrence: + +"The secret of this amazing vessel, which has proved itself capable of +traversing the Atlantic in a day, and of soaring beyond the limits of +the atmosphere at will, is possessed by one man only, and that man is an +English nobleman. The air is full of rumours of universal war. One +vessel such as this could scatter terror over a continent in a few days, +demoralise armies and fleets, reduce Society to chaos, and establish a +one-man despotism on the ruins of all the Governments of the world. The +man who could build one ship like this could build fifty, and, if his +country asked him to do it, no doubt he would. Those who, as we are +almost forced to believe, are even now contemplating a serious attempt +to dethrone England from her supreme place among the nations of Europe, +will do well to take this latest potential factor in the warfare of the +immediate future into their most serious consideration." + +This paragraph was not perhaps as absolutely correct as a proposition in +Euclid, but it stopped the war. The _Deutschland_ came in the next day, +and again the press was flooded, this time with personal narratives, and +brilliantly imaginative descriptions of the Vision which had descended +from the clouds, made rings round the great liner going at her best +speed, and then vanished in an instant beyond the range of field-glasses +and telescopes. + +Thus did the creature of Professor Rennick's inventive genius play its +first part as the peacemaker of the world. + +When the _Astronef's_ message had been duly given and recorded, her +propellers began to revolve, and her head swung round to the north-east. +So began, as all the world now knows, the most extraordinary +electioneering trip that ever was known. First Baltimore, then +Philadelphia, and then New York saw the flashes in the sky. There were +illuminations, torchlight processions, and all the machinery of American +electioneering going at full blast. But when people saw, far away up in +the starlit night, those swiftly-changing beams glittering down, as it +were, out of infinite Space, and when the telegraph operators caught on +to the fact that they were signals, a sort of awe seemed to come over +both Republicans and Democrats alike. Even Tammany's thoughts began to +lift above the sordid level of boodle. It was almost like a message from +another world. There was something supernatural about it, and when it +was translated and rushed out in extra editions of the evening papers: +"Vote for sound men and sound money" became the watchword of millions. + +From New York to Boston, Boston to Albany, and then across country to +Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Omaha--then westward to St. Paul and +Minneapolis, and northward to Portland and Seattle, southward to San +Francisco and Monterey, then eastward again to Salt Lake City, and then, +after a leap across the Rockies which frightened Mrs. Van Stuyler almost +to fainting point and made Zaidie gasp for breath, away southward to +Santa Fe and New Orleans. + +Then northward again up the Mississippi Valley to St. Louis, and thence +eastward across the Alleghanies back to Washington--such was the famous +night-voyage of the _Astronef_, and so by means of that long silver +tongue of light did she spread the message of common-sense and +commercial honesty throughout the length and breadth of the Great +Republic. The world knows how America received and interpreted it the +next day. + +Meanwhile Mr. Russell Rennick had taken train to Washington, and the day +after the election he willingly took back all that he had intended with +regard to the Marquis of Byfleet, accepted Lord Redgrave in his stead, +and bestowed his avuncular blessing at the wedding breakfast held in the +deck-chamber of the _Astronef_ poised in mid-air, five hundred feet +above the dome of the Capitol, a week later. To this he added a cheque +for a million dollars--payable to the Countess of Redgrave on her return +from her wedding trip. + +Breakfast over, the wedding party made an inspection of the wonderful +vessel under the guidance of her Commander. After this, while they were +drinking their coffee and liqueurs, and the men were smoking their +cigars in the deck-chamber, a score of the most distinguished men and +women in the United States experienced the novel sensation of sitting +quietly in deck-chairs while they were being hurled at the rate of a +hundred and fifty miles an hour through the atmosphere. + +They ran up to Niagara, dropped to within a few feet of the surface of +the Falls, passed over them, fell to the Rapids, and drifted down them +within a couple of yards of the raging waters. Then in an instant they +leapt up into the clouds, dropped again, and took a slanting course for +Washington at a speed incredible, but to them quite imperceptible, save +for the blurred rush of the half-visible earth behind them. + +That night the _Astronef_ rested again in front of the steps of the +White House, and Lord and Lady Redgrave were the guests at a +semi-official banquet given by the newly re-elected President. The +speech of the evening was made by the President himself in proposing the +health of the bride and bridegroom, and this is the way he ended: + +"There is something more in the ceremony which we have been privileged +to witness than the union of a man and a woman in the bonds of holy +matrimony. Lord Redgrave, as you know, is the descendant of one of the +noblest and most ancient families in the Motherland of New Nations. Lady +Redgrave is the daughter of the oldest and, I hope I may be allowed to +say without offence, the greatest of those nations. It is, perhaps, +early days to talk about a formal federation of the Anglo-Saxon people, +but I think I am only voicing the sentiments of every good American when +I say that, if the rumours which have drifted over and under the +Atlantic, rumours of a determined attempt on the part of certain +European powers to assault and, if possible, destroy that magnificent +fortress of individual liberty and collective equity which we call the +British Empire should unhappily prove to be true, then it may be that +the rest of the world will find that America does not speak English for +nothing. + +"But I must also remind you that a few yards from the doors of the White +House there lies the greatest marvel, I had almost said the greatest +miracle, that has ever been accomplished by human genius and human +industry. That wonderful vessel in which some of us have been privileged +to take the most marvellous journey in the history of mechanical +locomotion was thought out by an American man of science, the man whose +daughter sits on my right hand to-night. In her concrete material form +this vessel, destined to navigate the shoreless Ocean of Space, is +English. But she is also the result of the belief and the faith of an +Englishman in an American ideal.... So when she leaves this earth, as +she will do in an hour or so, to enter the confines of other worlds than +this--and, it may be, to make the acquaintance of peoples other than +those who inhabit the earth--she will have done infinitely more than she +has already done, incredible as that seems. She will not only have +convinced this world that the greatest triumph of human genius is of +Anglo-Saxon origin, but she will carry to other worlds than this the +truth which this world will have learnt before the nineteenth century +ends. + +"England in the person of Lord Redgrave, and America in the person of +his Countess, leave this world to-night to tell the other worlds of our +system, if haply they may find some intelligible means of communication, +what this world, good and bad, is like. And it is within the bounds of +possibility that in doing so they may inaugurate a wider fellowship of +created beings than the limits of this world permit; a fellowship, a +friendship, and, as the _Astronef_ entitles us to believe, even a +physical communication of world with world which, in the dawn of the +twentieth century, may transcend in sober fact the wildest dreams of all +the philanthropists and the philosophers who have sought to educate +humanity from Socrates to Herbert Spencer." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +After the _Astronef's_ forward searchlight had flashed its farewells to +the thronging, cheering crowds of Washington, her propellers began to +whirl, and she swung round northward on her way to say goodbye to the +Empire City. + +A little before midnight her two lights flashed down over New York and +Brooklyn, and were almost instantly answered by hundreds of electric +beams streaming up from different parts of the Twin Cities, and from +several men-of-war lying in the bay and the river. + +"Goodbye for the present! Have you any messages for Mars?" flickered out +from above the _Astronef's_ conning-tower. + +What Uncle Sam's message was, if he had one, was never deciphered, for +fifty beams began dotting and dashing at once, and the result was that +nothing but a blur of many mingled rays reached the conning-tower from +which Lord Redgrave and his bride were taking their last look at human +habitations. + +"You might have known that they would all answer at once," said Zaidie. +"I suppose the newspapers, of course, want interviews with the leading +Martians, and the others want to know what there is to be done in the +way of trade. Anyhow, it would be a feather in Uncle Sam's cap if he +made the first Reciprocity Treaty with another world." + +"And then proceeded to corner the commerce of the Solar System," laughed +Redgrave. "Well, we'll see what can be done. Although I think, as an +Englishman, I ought to look after the Open Door." + +"So that the Germans could get in before you, eh? That's just like you +dear, good-natured English. But look," she went on, pointing downwards, +"they're signalling again, all at once this time." + +Half a dozen beams shone out together from the principal newspaper +offices of New York. Then simultaneously they began the dotting and +dashing again. Redgrave took them down in pencil, and when the +signalling had stopped he read off: + +"No war. Dual Alliance climbs down. Don't like idea of _Astronef_. +Cables just received. Goodbye, and good luck! Come back soon, and safe!" + +"What? We have stopped the war!" exclaimed Zaidie, clasping his arm. +"Well, thank God for that. How could we begin our voyage better? You +remember what we were saying the other day, Lenox. If that's only true, +my father somewhere knows now what a blessing he has given his brother +men! We've stopped a war which might have deluged the world in blood. +We've saved perhaps hundreds of thousands of lives, and kept sorrow from +thousands of homes. Lenox, when we get back, you and the States and the +British Government will have to build a fleet of these ships, and then +the Anglo-Saxon race must say to the rest of the world----" + +"The millennium has come and its presiding goddess is Zaidie Redgrave. +If you don't stop fighting, disband your armies and turn your fleets +into liners and cargo boats, she'll proceed to sink your ships and +decimate your armies until you learn sense. Is that what you mean, +dear?" laughed Redgrave, as he slipped his left hand round her waist and +laid his right on the searchlight-switch to reply to the message. + +"Don't be ridiculous, Lenox. Still, I suppose that is something like it. +They wouldn't deserve anything else if they were fools enough to go on +fighting after they knew we could wipe them out." + +"Exactly. I perfectly agree with your Ladyship, but still sufficient +unto the day is the Armageddon thereof. Now I suppose we'd better say +goodbye and be off." + +"And what a goodbye," whispered Zaidie, with an upward glance into the +starlit ocean of Space which lay above and around them. "Goodbye to the +world itself! Well, say it, Lenox, and let us go; I want to see what the +others are like." + +"Very well then; goodbye it is," he said, beginning to jerk the switch +backwards and forwards with irregular motions, sending short flashes and +longer beams down towards the earth. + +The Empire City read the farewell message. + +"Thank God for the peace. Goodbye for the present. We shall convey the +joint compliments of John Bull and Uncle Sam to the peoples of the +planets when we find them. _Au revoir!_" + +The message was answered by the blaze of the concentrated searchlights +from land and sea all directed on the _Astronef_. For a moment her +shining shape glittered like a speck of diamond in the midst of the +luminous haze far up in the sky, and then it vanished for many an +anxious day from mortal sight. + +A few moments later Zaidie pointed over the stern and said: + +"Look, there's the moon! Just fancy--our first stopping place! Well, it +doesn't look so very far off at present." + +Redgrave turned and saw the pale yellow crescent of the new moon +swimming high above the eastern edge of the Atlantic Ocean. + +"It almost looks as if we could steer straight to it right over the +water--only, of course, it wouldn't wait there for us," she went on. + +"Oh, it'll be there when we want it, never fear," he laughed, "and, +after all, it's only a mere matter of about two hundred and forty +thousand miles away, and what's that in a trip that will cover hundreds +of millions? It will just be a sort of jumping-off place into Space for +us." + +"Still, I shouldn't like to miss seeing it," she said. "I want to see +what there is on that other side which nobody has ever seen yet, and +settle that question about air and water. Won't it just be heavenly to +be able to come back and tell them all about it at home? But just fancy +me talking stuff like this when we are going, perhaps, to solve some of +the hidden mysteries of Creation, and, may be, look upon things that +human eyes were never meant to see," she went on, with a sudden change +in her voice. + +He felt a little shiver in the arm that was resting upon his, and his +hand went down and caught hers. + +"Well, we shall see a good many marvels, and, perhaps, miracles, before +we come back, but why should there be anything in Creation that the eyes +of created beings should not look upon? Anyhow, there's one thing we +shall do I hope, we shall solve once and for all the great problem of +the worlds. + +"Look, for instance," he went on, turning round and pointing to the +west, "there is Venus following the sun. In a few days I hope you and I +will be standing on her surface, perhaps trying to talk by signs with +her inhabitants, and taking photographs of her scenery. There's Mars +too, that little red one up yonder. Before we come back we shall have +settled a good many problems about him, too. We shall have navigated the +rings of Saturn, and perhaps graphed them from his surface. We shall +have crossed the bands of Jupiter, and found out whether they are clouds +or not; perhaps we shall have landed on one of his moons and taken a +voyage round him. + +"Still, that's not the question just now, and if you are in a hurry to +circumnavigate the moon we'd better begin to get a wriggle on us as they +say down yonder; so come below and we'll shut up. A bit later I'll show +you something that no human eyes have ever seen." + +"What's that?" she asked as they turned away towards the companion +ladder. + +"I won't spoil it by telling you," he said, stopping at the top of the +stairs and taking her by the shoulders. "By the way," he went on, "I may +remind your Ladyship that you are just now drawing the last breaths of +earthly air which you will taste for some time, in fact until we get +back. And you may as well take your last look at earth as earth, for the +next time you see it it will be a planet." + +She turned to the open window and looked over into the enormous void +beneath, for all this time the _Astronef_ had been mounting swiftly +towards the zenith. + +She could see, by the growing moonlight, vast, vague shapes of land and +sea. The myriad lights of New York and Brooklyn were mingled in a tiny +patch of dimly luminous haze. The air about her had suddenly grown +bitterly cold, and she saw that the stars and planets were shining with +a brilliancy she had never seen before. Redgrave came back to her, and +laying his arm across her shoulder, said: + +"Well, have you said goodbye to your native world? It is a bit solemn, +isn't it, saying goodbye to a world that you have been born on; which +contains everything that has made up your life, everything that is dear +to you?" + +"Not quite everything," she said, looking up at him--"at least I don't +think so." + +He lost no time in making the only reply which was appropriate under the +circumstances; and then he said, drawing her close to him: + +"Nor I, as _you_ know, darling. This is our world, a world travelling +among worlds, and since I have been able to bring the most delightful of +the daughters of Terra with me, I, at any rate, am perfectly happy. Now, +I think it's getting on to supper time, so if your Ladyship will go to +your household duties, I'll have a look at my engines and make +everything snug for the voyage." + +The first thing he did when he left the conning-tower was to +hermetically close every external opening in the ship. Then he went and +carefully inspected the apparatus for purifying the air and supplying it +with fresh oxygen from the tanks in which it was stored in liquid form. +Lastly he descended into the lower hold and turned on the energy of +repulsion to its fullest extent, at the same time stopping the engines +which had been working the propellers. + +It was now no longer necessary or even possible to steer the _Astronef_. +She was directed solely by the repulsive force which would carry her +with ever-increasing swiftness, as the attraction of the earth +diminished, towards that neutral point at which the attraction of the +earth is exactly balanced by the moon. Her momentum would carry her past +this point, and then the "R. Force" would be gradually brought into play +in order to avert the unpleasant consequences of a fall of some forty +odd thousand miles. + +Andrew Murgatroyd, relieved from his duties in the wheel-house, made a +careful inspection of the auxiliary machinery, which was under his +special charge, and then retired to his quarters in the after end of the +vessel to prepare his own evening meal. + +Meanwhile, her Ladyship, with the help of the ingenious contrivances +with which the kitchen of the _Astronef_ was stocked, had prepared a +dainty little _souper a deux_. Her husband opened a bottle of the finest +champagne that the cellars of Smeaton could supply, to drink to the +prosperity of the voyage, and the health of his beautiful +fellow-voyager. When he had filled the two tall glasses the wine began +to run over the side which was toward the stern of the vessel. They took +no notice of this at first, but when Zaidie put her glass down she +stared at it for a moment, and said, in a half-frightened voice: + +"Why, what's the matter, Lenox? look at the wine! It won't keep +straight, and yet the table's perfectly level--and see! the water in the +jug looks as though it were going to run up the side." + +Redgrave took up the glass and held it balanced in his hand. When he had +got the surface of the wine level the glass was no longer perpendicular +to the table. + +"Ah, I see what it is," he said, taking another sip and putting the +glass down. "You notice that, although the wine isn't lying straight in +the glass, it isn't moving about. It's just as still as it would be on +earth. That means that our centre of gravity is not exactly in line with +the centre of the earth. We haven't quite swung into our proper +position, and that reminds me, dear. You will have to be prepared for +some rather curious experiences in that way. For instance, just see if +that jug of water is as heavy as it ought to be." + +She took hold of the handle, and exerting, as she thought, just enough +force to lift the jug a few inches, was astonished to find herself +holding it out at arm's length with scarcely any effort. She put it down +again very carefully as though she were afraid it would go floating off +the table, and said, looking rather scared: + +"That's very strange, but I suppose it's all perfectly natural?" + +"Perfectly; it merely means that we have left Mother Earth a good long +way behind us." + +"How far?" she asked. + +"I can't tell you exactly," he replied, "until I go to the +instrument-room and take the angles, but I should say roughly about +seventy thousand miles. When we've finished we'll go and have coffee on +the upper deck, and then we shall see something of the glories of Space +as no human eyes have ever seen them before." + +"Seventy thousand miles away from home already, and we only started a +couple of hours ago!" Zaidie found the idea a trifle terrifying, and +finished her meal almost in silence. When she got up she was not a +little disconcerted when the effort she made not only took her off her +chair but off her feet as well. She rose into the air nearly to the +surface of the table. + +"Sakes!" she said, "this is getting quite a little embarrassing; I shall +be hitting my head against the roof next." + +"Oh, you'll soon get used to it," he laughed, pulling her down on to her +feet by the skirt of her dress; "always remember to exert very little +strength in everything you do, and don't forget to do everything very +slowly." + +When the coffee was made he carried the apparatus up into the +deck-chamber. Then he came back and said: + +"You'd better wrap yourself up warmly. It's a good deal colder up there +than it is here." + +When she reached the deck and took a first glance about her, Zaidie +seemed suddenly to lapse into a state of somnambulism. + +The whole heavens above and around were strewn with thick clusters of +stars which she had never seen before. The stars she remembered seeing +from the earth were only pin-points in the darkness compared with the +myriads of blazing orbs which were now shooting their rays across the +black void of Space. + +So many millions of new ones had come into view, that she looked in vain +for the familiar constellations. She saw only vast clusters of living +gems of every colour crowding the heavens on every side of her. + +She walked slowly round the deck, gazing to right and left and above, +incapable for the moment either of thought or speech, but only of dumb +wonder, mingled with a dim sense of overwhelming awe. Presently she +craned her neck backwards and looked straight up to the zenith. A huge +silver crescent, supporting, as it were, a dim greenish-coloured body in +its arms, stretched overhead across nearly a sixth of the heavens. + +Then Redgrave came to her side, took her in his arms, lifted her as if +she had been a little child, and laid her in a long, low deck-chair, so +that she could look at it without inconvenience. + +The splendid crescent seemed to be growing visibly bigger, and as she +lay there in a trance of wonder and admiration she saw point after point +of dazzling white light flash out in the dark portions, and then begin +to send out rays as though they were gigantic volcanoes in full +eruption, and were pouring torrents of living fire from their blazing +craters. + +"Sunrise on the Moon!" said Redgrave, who had stretched himself on +another chair beside her. "A glorious sight, isn't it? But nothing to +what we shall see to-morrow morning--only there doesn't happen to be any +morning just about here." + +"Yes," she said dreamily, "glorious, isn't it? That and all the +stars--but I can't think anything yet, Lenox, it's all too mighty and +too marvellous. It doesn't seem as though human eyes were meant to look +upon things like this. But where's the earth? We must be able to see +that still." + +"Not from here," he said, "because it's underneath us. Come below now, +and you shall see what I promised you." + +They went down into the lower part of the vessel and to the after end +behind the engine-room. Redgrave switched on a couple of electric +lights, and then pulled a lever attached to one of the side-walls. A +part of the flooring about six feet square slid noiselessly away; then +he pulled another lever on the opposite side and a similar piece +disappeared, leaving a large space covered only by a thick plate of +absolutely transparent glass. He switched off the lights again and led +her to the edge of it, and said: + +"There is your native world, dear. That is your Mother Earth." + +Wonderful as the moon had seemed, the gorgeous spectacle which lay +seemingly at her feet was infinitely more magnificent. A vast disc of +silver grey, streaked and dotted with lines and points of dazzling +lights, and more than half covered with vast, glimmering, greyish-green +expanses, seemed to form the floor of the tremendous gulf beneath them. +They were not yet too far away to make out the general features of the +continents and oceans, and fortunately the hemisphere presented to them +happened to be singularly free from clouds. + +To the right spread out the majestic outlines of the continents of North +and South America, and to the left Asia, the Malay Archipelago, and +Australia. At the top was a vast, roughly circular area of dazzling +whiteness, and Redgrave, pointing to this, said: + +"There, look up a little further north than the middle of that white +patch, and you'll see what no eyes but yours and mine have ever +seen--the North Pole! When we come back we shall see the South Pole, +because we shall approach the earth from the other end, as it were. + +"I suppose you recognise a good deal of the picture. All that bright +part up to the north, with the black spots on it, is Canada. The black +spots are forests. That long white line to the left is the Rockies. You +see they're all bright at the north, and as you go south you only see a +few bright dots. Those are the snow-peaks. + +"Those long thin white lines in South America are the tops of the Andes, +and the big, dark patches to the right of them are the forests and +plains of Brazil and the Argentine. Not a bad way of studying geography, +is it? If we stopped here long enough we should see the whole earth spin +right round under us, but we haven't time for that. We shall be in the +moon before it's morning in New York, but we shall probably get a +glimpse of Europe to-morrow." + +Zaidie stood gazing for nearly an hour at this marvellous vision of the +home-world which she had left so far behind her before she could tear +herself away and allow her husband to shut the slides again. The greatly +diminished weight of her body destroyed the fatigue of standing almost +entirely. In fact, on board the _Astronef_ just then it was almost as +easy to stand as it was to lie down. + +There was of course very little sleep for the travellers on this first +night of their wonderful voyage, but towards the sixth hour after +leaving the earth, Zaidie, overcome as much by the emotions which had +been awakened within her as by physical fatigue, went to bed, after +making her husband promise that he would wake her in good time to see +the descent upon the moon. Two hours later she was awake and drinking +the coffee which he had prepared for her. Then she went on to the upper +deck. + +To her astonishment she found, on one hand, day more brilliant than she +had ever seen it before, and on the other hand darkness blacker than the +blackest earthly night. On the right was an intensely brilliant orb, +about half as large again as the full moon seen from the earth, shining +with inconceivable brightness out of a sky black as midnight and +thronged with stars. It was the Sun; the Sun shining in the midst of +airless Space. + +The tiny atmosphere enclosed in the glass-domed deck-space was lighted +brilliantly, but it was not perceptibly warmer, though Redgrave warned +her not to touch anything upon which the sun's rays fell directly, as +she might find it uncomfortably hot. On the other side was the same +black immensity which she had seen the night before, an ocean of +darkness clustered with islands of light. High above in the zenith +floated the great silver-grey disc of earth, a good deal smaller now. +But there was another object beneath them which was at present of far +more interest to her. + +Looking down to the left, she saw a vast semi-luminous area in which not +a star was to be seen. It was the earth-lit portion of the long familiar +and yet mysterious orb which was to be their resting place for the next +few hours. + +"The sun hasn't risen over there yet," said Redgrave, as she was peering +down into the void. "It's earth-light still. Now look at the other +side." + +She crossed the deck, and saw the strangest scene she had yet beheld. +Apparently only a few miles below her was a huge crescent-shaped plain +arching away for hundreds of miles on either side. The outer edge had a +ragged look, and little excrescences, which soon took the shape of +flat-topped mountains, projected from it and stood out bright and sharp +against the black void beneath, out of which the stars shone up, as it +seemed, a few feet beyond the edge of the disc. + +The plain itself was a scene of awful and utter desolation. Huge +mountain-walls, towering to immense heights and enclosing great circular +and oval plains, one side of them blazing with intolerable light, and +the other side black with impenetrable obscurity; enormous valleys +reaching down from brilliant day into rayless night--perhaps down into +the very bowels of the dead world itself; vast grey-white plains lying +round the mountains, crossed by little ridges and by long black lines, +which could only be immense fissures with perpendicular sides--but all +hard, grey-white and black, all intolerable brightness or inky gloom; +not a sign of life anywhere; no shady forests, no green fields, no +broad, glittering oceans; only a ghastly wilderness of dead mountains +and dead plains. + +"What an awful place," Zaidie whispered. "Surely we can't land there. +How far are we from it?" + +"About fifteen hundred miles," replied Redgrave, who was sweeping the +scene below him with one of the two powerful telescopes which stood on +the deck. "No, it doesn't look very cheerful, does it? But it's a +marvellous sight for all that, and one that a good many people on earth +would give one of their eyes to see from here. I'm letting her drop +pretty fast, and we shall probably land in a couple of hours or so. +Meanwhile you may as well get out your moon atlas, and study your +lunography. I'm going to turn the power a bit astern so that we shall go +down obliquely, and see more of the lighted disc. We started at new moon +so that you should have a look at the full earth, and also so that we +could get round to the invisible side while it is lighted up." + +They both went below, he to deflect the repulsive force so that one set +of engines should give them a somewhat oblique direction, while the +other, acting directly on the surface of the moon, simply retarded their +fall; and she to get out her maps. + +When they got back the _Astronef_ had changed her apparent position, +and, instead of falling directly on to the moon, was descending towards +it in a slanting direction. The result of this was that the sunlit +crescent rapidly grew in breadth. Peak after peak and range after range +rose up swiftly out of the black gulf beyond. The sun climbed quickly up +through the star-strewn, mid-day heavens, and the full earth sank more +swiftly still behind them. + +Another hour of silent, entranced wonder and admiration followed, and +then Redgrave said: + +"Don't you think it's about time we were beginning to think of +breakfast, dear--or do you think you can wait till we land?" + +"Breakfast on the moon!" she exclaimed. "That would be just too lovely +for words--of course we'll wait!" + +"Very well," he said; "you see that big black ring nearly below +us?--that, as I suppose you know, is the celebrated Mount Tycho. I'll +try and find a convenient spot on the top of the ring to drop on, and +then you will be able to survey the scenery from seventeen or eighteen +thousand feet above the plains." + +About two hours later a slight, jarring tremor ran through the frame of +the vessel, and the first stage of the voyage was ended. After a passage +of less than twelve hours the _Astronef_ had crossed a gulf of nearly +two hundred and fifty thousand miles, and rested on the untrodden +surface of the lunar world. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +"Well, Madame, we've arrived. This is the moon and there is the earth. +To put it into plain figures, you are now two hundred and forty thousand +odd miles away from home. I think you said you would like breakfast on +the surface of the World that Has Been, and so, as it's about eleven +o'clock earth-time, we'll call it a _dejeuner_, and then we'll go and +see what this poor old skeleton of a world is like." + +"Oh, then we shan't actually have breakfast on the moon?" + +"My dear child, of course you will. Isn't the _Astronef_ resting +now--right now as they say in some parts of the States--on the top of +the crater wall of Tycho? Aren't we really and actually on the surface +of the moon? Just look at this frightful black and white, god-forsaken +landscape! Isn't it like everything that you've ever learnt about the +moon? Nothing but light and shade, black and white, peaks of mountains +blazing in sunlight, and valleys underneath them as black as the hinges +of----" + +"Tophet," said Zaidie, interrupting him quickly. "Yes, I see what you +mean. So we'll have our _dejeuner_ here, breathing our own nice +atmosphere, and eating and drinking what was grown on the soil of dear +old Mother Earth. It's a wee bit paralysing to think of, isn't it, dear? +Two hundred and forty thousand miles across the gulf of Space--and we +sitting here at our breakfast table just as comfortable as though we +were in the Cecil in London, or the Waldorf-Astoria in New York!" + +"There's nothing much in that, I mean as regards distance. You see, +before we've finished we shall probably, at least I hope we shall, be +eating a breakfast or a dinner together a thousand million miles or more +from New York or London. Your Ladyship must remember that this is only +the first stage on the journey, the jumping-off place as you called it. +You see the distance from Washington to New York is--well, it isn't even +a hop, skip and a jump in comparison with----" + +"Oh yes, I see what you mean of course, and so I suppose I had better +cut off or short-circuit such sympathies with Mother Earth as are not +connected with your noble self, and get breakfast ready. How's that?" + +"Well," said Lord Redgrave, looking at her as she rose from the table, +"I think our honeymoon in Space is young enough yet to make it possible +for me to say that your Ladyship's opinion is exactly right." + +"That's a hopeless commonplace! Really, Lenox, I thought you were +capable of something better than that." + +"My dear Zaidie, it has been my fate to have many friends who have had +honeymoons on earth, and some of their experience seems to be that the +man who contradicts his wife during the first six weeks of matrimony +simply makes an ass of himself. He offends her and makes himself +unhappy, and it sometimes takes six months or more to get back to +bearings." + +"What a lot of silly men and women you must have known, Lenox. Is that +the way Englishmen start marriage in England? If it is, I don't wonder +at Englishmen coming across the Atlantic in liners and air-ships and so +on to get American wives. I guess you can't understand your own +womenfolk." + +"Or perhaps they don't understand us; but anyhow, I don't think I've +made any great mistake." + +"No, I don't think you have. Of course if I thought so I wouldn't be +here now. But this is very well for a breakfast talk; all the same, I +should like to know how we are going to take the promenade you promised +me on the surface of the moon?" + +"Your Ladyship has only to finish her breakfast, and then everything +shall be made plain to her, even the deepest craters of the mountains of +the moon." + +"Very well, then, I will eat swiftly and in obedience; and meanwhile, as +your Lordship seems to have finished, perhaps----" + +"Yes, I will go and see to the mechanical necessities," said Redgrave, +swallowing his last cup of coffee, and getting up. "If you'll come down +to the lower deck when you've finished, I'll have your breathing-suit +ready for you, and then we'll go into the air-chamber." + +"Thanks, dear, yes," she said, putting out her hand to him as he left +the table, "the ante-chamber to other worlds. Isn't it just lovely? +Fancy me being able to leave one world and land on another, and have you +to say just those few words which make it all possible. I wonder what +all the girls of all the civilised countries of earth would give just to +be me right now." + +"They could none of them give what you gave me, Zaidie, because you see +from my point of view there's only one Zaidie in the world--or as +perhaps I ought to say just now, in the Solar System." + +"Very prettily said, sir!" she laughed, when she had given him his due +reward for his courtly speech. "I am too dazed with all these wonders +about me to----" + +"To reply to it? You've given me the most convincing reply possible. Now +finish your breakfast, and I'll tell you when the breathing-dresses and +the air-chamber are ready. By the way, don't forget your cameras. It's +quite possible we may find something worth taking pictures of, and you +needn't trouble much about the weight. You know, you and I and all that +we carry will only weigh about a sixth of what we did on the earth." + +"Very well, then, I'll take the whole-plate apparatus as well as the +kodak and the panorama camera. When I'm ready, Murgatroyd will tell you +to come down." + +"But isn't he coming with us too?" + +"My dear girl, if I were to ask Murgatroyd to leave the _Astronef_ +there'd be a mutiny on board--a mutiny of one against one. No, he's left +his native world; but he says he's done it in a ship that's made with +British steel out of English iron mines, smelted, forged and fashioned +in English works, and so to him it's a bit of England, however far away +from Mother Earth it may be; and if you ever see Andrew Murgatroyd's big +head and good, ungainly body outside the _Astronef_ in any of the +worlds, dead or alive, that we're going to visit--well, when we get back +to Mother Earth you may ask me----" + +"I don't think I'll have to ask you for anything, Lenox. I believe if I +wanted anything you'd know before I did, so go away and get those +breathing-dresses ready. I didn't come to the moon to talk commonplaces +with a husband I've been married to for nearly three days." + +"Is it really as long as that?" + +"Oh, don't be ridiculous, even if you are beyond the limits of earthly +conventionalities. Anyhow, I've been married long enough to want my own +way, and just now I want a promenade on the moon." + +"The will of her Ladyship is a law unto her servant, and that which she +hath said shall be done! If you come down on to the lower deck in ten +minutes everything shall be ready." + +With this he disappeared down the companion-way. + +About five minutes afterwards Andrew Murgatroyd showed his grizzled, +long-bearded face with its high forehead, heavy brows, and broad-set +eyes, long nose and shaven upper lip, just above the stairway and said, +for all the world as though he might have been giving out the number of +the hymn in his beloved Ebenezer at Smeaton: + +"If it pleases yer Ladyship, his Lordship is ready, and if you'll please +come down I'll show you the way." + +"Oh, thank you, Mr. Murgatroyd!" said Zaidie, getting up and going +towards the companion-way; "but I'm afraid you don't think that--I mean +you don't seem to take very much interest----" + +"If your Ladyship will pardon me," said the old man, standing aside to +let her go down, "it is not my business to think on board his Lordship's +vessel. I am his servant, and my fathers have been his fathers' servants +for more years than I'd like to count. If it wasn't that way I wouldn't +be here. Will your Ladyship please to come down?" + +Zaidie bowed her beautiful head in recognition of this ages-old +devotion, and said as she passed him, more sweetly than he had ever +heard human lips speak: + +"Thank you, Mr. Murgatroyd. You've taught me something in those few +words that we have no knowledge of in the States. Good service is as +honourable as good mastership. Thank you." + +Murgatroyd put up his lower lip and half smiled with his upper, for he +was not yet quite sure of this radiant beauty, who, according to his +ideas, should have been English and wasn't. Then, with a rather clumsy +and yet eloquent gesture, he showed her the way down to the air-chamber. + +She nodded to him with a smile as she passed in through the air-tight +door, and when she heard the levers swing to and the bolts shoot into +their places she felt as though, for the time being, she had said +goodbye to a friend. + +Her husband was waiting for her almost fully clad in his +breathing-dress. He had hers all ready to put on, and when the necessary +changes and investments had been made, Zaidie found herself clad in a +costume which was not by any means unlike the diving-dresses of common +use, save that they were very much lighter in construction. + +The helmets were smaller, and not having to withstand outside pressure +they were made of welded aluminum, lined thickly with asbestos, not to +keep the cold out, but the heat in. On the back of the dress there was a +square case, looking like a knapsack, containing the expanding +apparatus, which would furnish breathable air for an almost unlimited +time as long as the liquefied air from a cylinder hung below it passed +through the cells in which the breathed air had been deprived of its +carbonic acid gas and other noxious ingredients. + +The pressure of air inside the helmet automatically regulated the +supply, which was not permitted to circulate through the other portions +of the dress. The reasons for this precaution were very simple. Granted +the absence of atmosphere on the moon, any air in the dress, which was +woven of a cunning compound of silk and asbestos, would instantly expand +with irresistible force, burst the covering, and expose the limbs of the +explorers to a cold which would be infinitely more destructive than the +hottest of earthly fires. It would wither them to nothing in a moment. + +A human hand or foot--we won't say anything about faces--exposed to the +summer or winter temperature of the moon--that is to say, to its +sunlight and its darkness--would be shrivelled into dry bone in a +moment, and therefore Lord Redgrave, foreseeing this, had provided the +breathing-dresses. Lastly, the two helmets were connected, for purposes +of conversation, by a light wire, the two ends of which were connected +with a little telephonic receiver and transmitter inside each of the +head-dresses. + +"Well, now I think we're ready," said Redgrave, putting his hand on the +lever which opened the outer door. + +His voice sounded a little queer and squeaky over the wire, and for the +matter of that so did Zaidie's as she replied: + +"Yes, I'm ready, I think. I hope these things will work all right." + +"You may be quite sure that I shouldn't have put _you_ into one of them +if I hadn't tested them pretty thoroughly," he replied, swinging the +door open and throwing out a light folding iron ladder which was hinged +to the floor. + +They were in the shade cast by the hull of the _Astronef_. For about ten +yards in front of her Zaidie saw a dense black shadow, and beyond it a +stretch of grey-white sand lit up by a glare of sunlight which would +have been intolerable if it had not been for the smoke-coloured slips of +glass which had been fitted behind the glass visors of the helmets. + +Over it were thickly scattered boulders and pieces of rock bleached and +desiccated, and each throwing a black shadow, fantastically shaped and +yet clearly defined on the grey-white sand behind it. There was no soil, +and all the softer kind of rock and stone had crumbled away ages ago. +Every particle of moisture had long since evaporated; even chemical +combinations had been dissolved by the alternations of heat and cold +known only on earth to the chemist in his laboratory. + +Only the hardest rocks, such as granites and basalts, remained. +Everything else had been reduced to the universal grey-white impalpable +powder into which Zaidie's shoes sank when she, holding her husband's +hand, went down the ladder and stood at the foot of it--first of the +earth-dwellers to set foot on another world. + +Redgrave followed her with a little spring from the centre of the ladder +which landed him with strange gentleness beside her. He took both her +gloved hands and pressed them hard in his. He would have kissed his +welcome to the World that Had Been if he could, but that of course was +out of the question, and so he had to be content with telling her that +he wanted to. + +Then, hand in hand, they crossed the little plateau towards the edge of +the tremendous gulf, fifty-four miles across and nearly twenty thousand +feet deep, which forms the crater of Tycho. In the middle of it rose a +conical mountain about five thousand feet high, the summit of which was +just beginning to catch the solar rays. Half of the vast plain was +already brilliantly illuminated, but round the central cone was a +semicircle of shadow of impenetrable blackness. + +"Day and night in this same valley, actually side by side!" said Zaidie. +Then she stopped and pointed down into the brightly lit distance, and +went on hurriedly, "Look, Lenox; look at the foot of the mountain there! +Doesn't that seem like the ruins of a city?" + +"It does," he said, "and there's no reason why it shouldn't be. I've +always thought that, as the air and water disappeared from the upper +parts of the moon, the inhabitants, whoever they were, must have been +driven down into the deeper parts. Shall we go down and see?" + +"But how?" she said. + +He pointed towards the _Astronef_. She nodded her helmeted head, and +they went back towards the vessel. + +A few minutes later the Space-Navigator had risen from her resting-place +with an impetus which rapidly carried her over half of the vast crater, +and then she began to drop slowly into the depths. She grounded gently, +and presently they were standing on the ground about a mile from the +central cone. This time, however, Redgrave had taken the precaution to +bring a magazine rifle and a couple of revolvers with him in case any +strange monsters, relics of the vanished fauna of the moon, might still +be taking refuge in these mysterious depths. Zaidie, although like a +good many American girls she could shoot excellently well, carried no +weapon more offensive than the photographic apparatus aforesaid. + +The first thing that Redgrave did when they stepped out on to the sandy +surface of the plain was to stoop down and strike a wax match. There was +a tiny glimmer of light, which was immediately extinguished. + +"No air here," he said, "so we shall find no living beings--at any rate, +none like ourselves." + +They found the walking exceedingly easy, although their boots were +purposely weighted in order to counteract, to some extent, the great +difference in gravity. A few minutes brought them to the outskirts of +the city. It had no walls and exhibited no signs of any devices for +defence. Its streets were broad and well-paved, and the houses, built of +great blocks of grey stone joined together with white cement, looked as +fresh and unworn as though they had only been built a few months, +whereas they had probably stood for hundreds of thousands of years. They +were flat-roofed, all of one storey and practically of one type. + +There were very few public buildings, and absolutely no attempt at +ornamentation was visible. Round some of the houses were spaces which +might once have been gardens. In the midst of the city, which appeared +to cover an area of about four square miles, was an enormous square +paved with flag-stones, which were covered to the depth of a couple of +inches with a light grey dust, which, as they walked across it, remained +perfectly still save for the disturbance caused by their footsteps. +There was no air to support it, otherwise it might have risen in clouds +about them. + +From the centre of this square rose a huge pyramid nearly a thousand +feet in height, the sole building of the great silent city which +appeared to have been raised most probably as a temple by the hands of +its long-dead inhabitants. + +When they got nearer they saw a white fringe round the steps by which it +was approached, and they soon found that this fringe was composed of +millions of white-bleached bones and skulls, shaped very much like those +of terrestrial men, save that they were very much larger, and that the +ribs were out of all proportion to the rest of the skeleton. + +They stopped awe-stricken before this strange spectacle. Redgrave +stooped down and took hold of one of the bones, a huge femur. It broke +in two as he tried to lift it, and the piece which remained in his hand +crumbled instantly to white powder. + +"Whoever they were," he said, "they were giants. When air and water +failed above, they came down here by some means and built this city. You +see what enormous chests they must have had. That would be Nature's last +struggle to enable them to breathe the diminishing atmosphere. These, of +course, were the last descendants of the fittest to breathe it; this was +their temple, I suppose, and here they came to die--I wonder how many +thousand years ago--perishing of heat, and cold, and hunger, and thirst; +the last tragedy of a race, which, after all, must have been something +like ourselves." + +"It's just too awful for words," said Zaidie. "Shall we go into the +temple? That seems one of the entrances up there, only I don't like +walking over all those bones." + +"I don't suppose they'll mind if we do," replied Redgrave, "only we +mustn't go far in. It may be full of cross passages and mazes, and we +might never get out. Our lamps won't be much use in there, you know, for +there's no air. They'll just be points of light, and we shan't see +anything but them. It's very aggravating, but I'm afraid there's no help +for it. Come along." + +They ascended the steps, crushing the bones and skulls to powder beneath +their feet, and entered the huge, square doorway, which looked like a +rectangle of blackness against the grey-white of the wall. Even through +their asbestos-woven clothing they felt a sudden shock of icy cold. In +those few steps they had passed from a temperature of tenfold summer +heat into one below that of the coldest spots on earth. They turned on +the electric lamps which were fitted to the breastplates of their +dresses, but they could see nothing save the thin thread of light +straight in front of them. It did not even spread. It was like a +polished needle on a background of black velvet. + +All about them was darkness impenetrable, and so they reluctantly turned +back to the doorway, leaving all the mysteries which that vast temple of +a long-vanished people might contain to remain mysteries to the end of +time. + +They passed down the steps again and crossed the square, and for the +next half-hour Zaidie was busy taking photographs of the pyramid with +its ghastly surroundings, and a few general views of this strange City +of the Dead. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +When they got back they found Murgatroyd pacing up and down the floor of +the deck-chamber, looking about him with serious eyes, but betraying no +other visible sign of anxiety. The _Astronef_ was at once his home and +his idol, and, as Redgrave had said, even his own direct orders would +hardly have induced him to leave her even in a world in which there was +not a living human being to dispute possession of her. + +When they had resumed their ordinary clothing the _Astronef_ rose from +the surface of the plain, crossed the encircling wall at the height of a +few hundred feet, and made her way at a speed of about fifty miles an +hour towards the regions of the South Pole. + +Behind them to the north-west they could see from their elevation of +nearly thirty thousand feet the vast expanse of the Sea of Clouds. +Dotted here and there were the shining points and ridges of light +marking the peaks and crater-walls which the rays of the rising sun had +already touched. Before them and to the right and left rose a vast maze +of ragged, splintery peaks and huge ramparts of mountain-walls enclosing +plains so far below their summits that the light of neither sun nor +earth ever reached them. + +By directing the force exerted by what might now be called the +propelling part of the engines against the mountain masses which they +crossed to right and left and behind, Redgrave was able to take a zigzag +course that carried them over many of the walled plains which were +wholly or partially lit up by the sun, and in nearly all of the deepest +their telescopes revealed something like what they had found within the +crater of Tycho. At length, pointing to a gigantic circle of white light +fringing an abyss of utter darkness, he said: + +"There is Newton, the greatest mystery of the moon. Those inner walls +are twenty-four thousand feet high; that means that the bottom, which +has never been seen by human eyes, is about five thousand feet below the +surface of the moon. What do you say, dear--shall we go down and see if +the searchlight will show us anything? You know there may be something +like breathable air down there, and perhaps living creatures who can +breathe it." + +"Certainly!" replied Zaidie decisively; "haven't we come to see things +that nobody else has ever seen?" + +Redgrave went down to the engine-room, and presently the _Astronef_ +changed her course, and in a few minutes was hanging with her polished +hull bathed in sunlight, like a star suspended over the unfathomable +gulf of darkness below. + +As they sank below the level of the sun-rays, Murgatroyd turned on both +the searchlights. They dropped down ever slowly and more slowly until +gradually the two long, thin streams of light began to spread themselves +out; the lower they went the more the beams spread out, and by the time +the _Astronef_ came gently to a rest they were swinging round her in +broad fans of diffused light over a dark, marshy surface, with scattered +patches of grey moss and reeds, with dull gleams of stagnant water +showing between them. + +"Air and water at last! I thought so," said Redgrave, as he rejoined her +on the upper deck; "air and water and eternal darkness! Well, we shall +find life on the moon here if anywhere." + +"I suppose we had better put on our breathing-dresses, hadn't we?" asked +Zaidie. + +"Certainly," he replied, "because, although there is some sort of air, +we don't know yet whether we shall be able to breathe it. It may be half +carbon-dioxide for all we know; but a few matches will soon tell us +that." + +Within a quarter of an hour they were again standing on the surface. +Murgatroyd had orders to follow them as far as possible with the head +searchlight, which, in the comparatively rarefied atmosphere, appeared +to have a range of several miles. Redgrave struck a match, and held it +up level with his head; it burnt with a clear, steady, yellow flame. + +"Where a match will burn a man should be able to breathe," he said. "I'm +going to see what lunar air is like." + +"For Heaven's sake be careful, dear," came the reply in pleading tones +across the wire. + +"All right; but don't open your helmet till I tell you." + +He then raised the hermetically closed slide of glass, which formed the +front of the helmets, half an inch or so. Instantly he felt a sensation +like the drawing of a red-hot iron across his skin. He snapped the visor +down and clasped it in its place. For a moment or two he gasped for +breath, and then he said rather faintly: + +"It's no good, it's too cold. It would freeze the blood of a salamander. +I think we'd better go back and explore this place under cover. We can't +do anything in the dark, and we can see just as well from the upper deck +with the searchlights. Besides, as there's air and water here, there's +no telling but there may be inhabitants of sorts such as we shouldn't +care to meet." + +He took her hand, and to Murgatroyd's great relief they went back to the +vessel. + +Redgrave then raised the _Astronef_ a couple of hundred feet and, by +directing the repulsive force against the mountain walls, developed just +sufficient energy to keep them moving at about twelve miles an hour. + +They began to cross the plain with their searchlights flashing out in +all directions. They had scarcely gone a mile before the head-light fell +upon a moving form half walking, half crawling among some stunted +brown-leaved bushes by the side of a broad, stagnant stream. + +"Look!" said Zaidie, clasping his arm, "is that a gorilla, or--no, it +_can't_ be a man." + +The light was turned full upon the object. If it had been covered with +hair it might have passed for some strange type of the ape tribe, but +its skin was smooth and of a livid grey. Its lower limbs were evidently +more powerful than its upper; its chest was enormously developed, but +the stomach was small. The head was big and round and smooth. As they +came nearer they saw that in place of fingernails it had long white +feelers which it kept extended and constantly waving about as it groped +its way towards the water. As the intense light flashed full on it, it +turned its head towards them. It had a nose and a mouth--the nose, long +and thick, with huge mobile nostrils; the mouth forming an angle +something like a fish's lips. Teeth there seemed none. At either side of +the upper part of the nose there were two little sunken holes--in which +this thing's ancestors of countless thousands of years ago had once had +eyes. + +As she looked upon this awful parody of what had once perhaps been a +human face, Zaidie covered hers with her hands and uttered a little moan +of horror. + +"Horrible, isn't it?" said Redgrave. "I suppose that's what the last +remnants of the Lunarians have come to. Evidently once men and women, +something like ourselves. I daresay the ancestors of that thing have +lived here in coldness and darkness for hundreds of generations. It +shows how tremendously tenacious Nature is of life. + +"Ages ago, no doubt, that brute's ancestors lived up yonder when there +were seas and rivers, fields and forests, just as we have them on earth, +among men and women who could see and breathe and enjoy everything in +life and had built up civilisations like ours! + +"Look, it's going to fish or something. Now we shall see what it feeds +on. I wonder why the water isn't frozen. I suppose there must be some +internal heat left still. A few patches with lakes of lava under them. +Perhaps this valley is just over one, and that's why these creatures +have managed to survive. + +"Ah! there's another of them, smaller, not so strongly formed. That +thing's mate, I suppose--female of the species. Ugh! I wonder how many +hundred of thousands of years it will take for _our_ descendants to come +to that." + +"I hope our dear old earth will hit something else and be smashed to +atoms before that happens!" exclaimed Zaidie, whose curiosity had now +partly overcome her horror. "Look, it's trying to catch something!" + +The larger of the two creatures had groped its way to the edge of the +sluggish, oily water and dropped, or rather rolled, quietly into it. It +was evidently cold-blooded, or nearly so, for no warm-blooded animal +would have taken to such water so naturally. Presently the other dropped +in too, and both disappeared for some moments. Then, in the midst of a +violent commotion in the water a few yards away, they rose to the +surface of the water, the larger with a wriggling, eel-like fish between +its jaws. + +They both groped their way towards the edge, and had just reached it and +were pulling themselves out when a hideous shape rose out of the water +behind them. It was like the head of an octopus joined to the body of a +boa-constrictor, but head and neck were both of the same ghastly, livid +grey as the other two creatures. It was evidently blind, too, for it +took no notice of the brilliant glare of the searchlight, but it moved +rapidly towards the two scrambling forms, its long white feelers +trembling out in all directions. Then one of them touched the smaller of +the two shapes. Instantly the rest shot out and closed round it, and +with scarcely a struggle it was dragged beneath the water and vanished. + +[Illustration: _A hideous shape rose out of the water behind them._] + +Zaidie uttered a little low scream and covered her face again, and +Redgrave said: + +"The same old brutal law you see, life preying upon life even on a dying +world, a world that is more than half dead itself. Well, I think we've +seen enough of this place. I suppose those are about the only types of +life we should meet anywhere, and I don't want to know much more about +them. I vote we go and see what the invisible hemisphere is like." + +"I have had all I want of this side," said Zaidie, looking away from the +scene of the hideous tragedy, "so the sooner we go, the better I shall +like it." + +A few minutes later the _Astronef_ was again rising towards the stars +with her searchlights still flashing down into the Valley of Expiring +Life, which had seemed to them even worse than the Valley of Death. As +he followed the rays with a pair of powerful field glasses, Redgrave +fancied that he saw huge, dim shapes moving about the stunted shrubbery +and through the slimy pools of the stagnant rivers, and once or twice he +got a glimpse of what might well have been the ruins of towns and +cities, but the gloom soon became too deep and dense for the +searchlights to pierce and he was glad when the _Astronef_ soared up +into the brilliant sunlight once more. Even the ghastly wilderness of +the lunar landscape was welcome after the nameless horrors of that +hideous abyss. + +After a couple of hours' rapid travelling, Redgrave pointed down to a +comparatively small, deep crater, and said: + +"There, that is Malapert. It is almost exactly at the south pole of the +moon, and there," he went on, pointing ahead, "is the horizon of the +hemisphere which no earthborn eyes have ever seen." + +"Except ours," said Zaidie somewhat inconsequently, "and I wonder what +_we_ shall see." + +"Probably something very like what we have seen on this side," replied +Redgrave, and as the event proved, he was right. + +Contrary to many ingenious speculations which have been indulged in by +both scientist and romancer, they found that the hemisphere, which for +countless ages had never been turned towards the earth, was almost an +exact replica of the visible one. Fully three-fourths of it was +brilliantly illuminated by the sun, and what they saw through their +glasses was practically the same as what they had beheld on the +earthward side; huge groups of enormous craters and ringed mountains, +long, irregular chains crowned with sharp, splintery peaks, and between +these vast, deeply depressed areas, ranging in colour from dazzling +white to grey-brown, marking the beds of the vanished lunar seas. + +As they crossed one of these, Redgrave allowed the _Astronef_ to sink to +within a few thousand feet of the surface, and then he and Zaidie swept +it with their telescopes. Their chance search was rewarded by something +they had not seen in the sea-beds of the other hemisphere. + +These depressions were far deeper than the others, evidently many +thousands of feet below the average surface, but the sun's rays were +blazing full into this one, and, dotted round its slopes at varying +elevations, they made out little patches which seemed to differ from the +general surface. + +"I wonder if those are the remains of cities," said Zaidie. "Isn't it +possible that the old peoples of the moon might have built their cities +along the seas just as we do, and that their descendants may have +followed the waters as they retreated, I mean as they either dried up or +disappeared into the centre?" + +"Very probable indeed, dearest of philosophers," he said, picking her up +with one arm and kissing the smiling lips which had just uttered this +most reasonable deduction. "Now we'll go down and see." + +He diminished the vertically repulsive force a little, and the +_Astronef_ dropped slantingly towards the bed of what might once have +been the Pacific of the Moon. + +When they were within about a couple of thousand feet of the surface it +became perfectly plain that Zaidie was correct in her hypothesis. The +vast sea floor was thickly strewn with the ruins of countless cities and +towns, which had been inhabited by an equally countless series of +generations of men and women, who had perhaps lived and loved in the +days when our own world was a glowing mass of molten rock, surrounded by +the envelope of vapours which has since condensed to form our oceans. + +They dropped still lower and ran diagonally across the ocean-bed, and as +they did so Zaidie's proposition was more and more completely confirmed, +for they saw that the towns and cities which stood highest were the most +dilapidated, and that the buildings had evidently been torn and crumbled +away by the action of wind and water, snow and ice. + +The nearer they approached to the central and deepest depression, the +better preserved and the simpler the buildings became, until down in the +lowest depths they found a collection of low-built square edifices, +scarcely better than huts, which had clustered round the little lake +into which, ages before, the ocean had dwindled. But where the lake had +been there was now only a shallow depression covered with grey sand and +brown rock. + +Into this they descended and touched the lunar surface for the last +time. A couple of hours' excursion among the houses proved that they had +been the last refuge of the last descendants of a dying race, a race +which had socially degenerated just as the succession of cities had done +architecturally, age by age, as the long-drawn struggle for mere +existence had become keener and keener until the two last essentials, +air and water, had failed--and then the end had come. + +The streets, like the square of the great Temple of Tycho, were strewn +with myriads and myriads of bones, and there were myriads more scattered +round what had once been the shores of the dwindling lake. Here, as +elsewhere, there was not a sign or a record of any kind--carving or +sculpture. If there were any such on the surface of the moon they had +not discovered them. The buildings which they had seen evidently +belonged to the decadent period during which the dwindling remnants of +the Selenites asked only to eat and drink and breathe. + +Inside the great Pyramid of the City of Tycho they might, perhaps, have +found something--some stone or tablet which bore the mark of the +artist's hand; elsewhere, perhaps, they might have found cities reared +by older races, which might have rivalled the creations of Egypt and +Babylon, but they had neither time nor inclination to look for these. + +All that they had seen of the Dead World had only sickened and saddened +them. The untravelled regions of Space peopled by living worlds more +akin to their own were before them. The red disc of Mars was glowing in +the zenith among the diamond-white clusters which gemmed the black sky +behind him. + +More than a hundred millions of miles had to be traversed before they +would be able to set foot on his surface, and so, after one last look +round the Valley of Death about them, Redgrave turned on the full energy +of the repulsive force in a vertical direction, and the _Astronef_ leapt +upwards in a straight line for her new destination. The Unknown +Hemisphere spread out in a vast plain beneath them, the blazing sun rose +on their left, and the brilliant silver orb of the earth on their right, +and so, full of wonder and yet without regret, they bade farewell to the +World that Had Been. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +The earth and the moon had been left more than a hundred million miles +behind in the depths of Space, and the _Astronef_ had crossed this +immense gap in eleven days and a few hours; but this apparently +inconceivable speed was not altogether due to the powers of the +Space-Navigator, for her commander had taken advantage of the passage of +the planet along its orbit towards that of the earth. Hence, while the +_Astronef_ was approaching Mars with ever-increasing speed, Mars was +travelling towards the _Astronef_ at the rate of sixteen miles a second. + +The great silver disc of the earth had diminished until it looked only a +little larger than Venus appears to human eyes. In fact the planet Terra +is to the inhabitants of Mars what Venus is to us, the Star of the +Morning and the Evening. + +Breakfast on the morning of the twelfth day--or, since there is neither +day nor night in Space, it would be more correct to say the twelfth +period of twenty-four earth-hours as measured by the chronometers--was +just over, and Redgrave was standing with Zaidie in the forward end of +the deck-chamber, looking downwards at a vast crescent of rosy light +which stretched out over an arc of more than ninety degrees. Two tiny +black spots were travelling towards each other across it. + +"Ah," she said, going towards one of the telescopes, "there are the +moons. I was reading my Gulliver last night. I wonder what the old Dean +would have given to be here, and see how true his guess was. Are we +going to land on them?" + +"I don't see why we shouldn't," he said. "I think we might find them +convenient stopping places; besides, you know this isn't only a +pleasure-trip. We have to add as much as we can to the sum of human +knowledge, and so of course we shall have to find out whether the moons +of Mars have atmospheres and inhabitants." + +"What, people living on those wee things!" she laughed. "Why they're +only about thirty or forty miles round, aren't they?" + +"About," he said, "but then that's just one of the points I want to +solve; and as for life, it doesn't always mean people, you know. We are +only a few hundred miles away from Deimos, the outer one, and he is +twelve thousand five hundred miles from Mars. I vote we drop on him +first and let him carry us towards Phobos. And then when we've examined +him we'll pay a visit to his brother and take a trip round Mars on him. +Phobos does the journey in about seven hours and a half, and as he's +only three thousand seven hundred miles above the surface, we ought to +get a very good view of our next stopping-place." + +"That ought to be quite delightful," said Zaidie. "But how commonplace +you are getting, Lenox. That's so like you Englishmen. We are doing what +has only been dreamt of before, and here you are talking about moons and +planets as if they were railway stations." + +"Well, if your Ladyship prefers it, we will call them undiscovered +islands and continents in the Ocean of Space. That does sound a little +bit better, doesn't it? Now I think I had better go down and see to my +engines." + +When he had gone, Zaidie sat down to the telescope again and kept it +focussed on one of the little black spots travelling across the crescent +of Mars. Both it and the other spot rapidly grew larger, and the +features of the planet itself became more distinct. Soon even with her +unaided eyes she could make out the seas and continents and the +mysterious canals quite plainly through the clear, rosy atmosphere, and, +with the aid of the telescope, she could even see the glimmering +twilight which the inner moon threw upon the unlighted portion of the +planet's disc. + +Deimos grew bigger and bigger, and in about half an hour the _Astronef_ +grounded gently on what looked to Zaidie like a dimly lighted circular +plain, but which, when her eyes became accustomed to the light, was more +like the summit of a conical mountain. Redgrave raised the keel a little +from the surface again and steered towards a thin circle of light on the +tiny horizon. + +As they crossed into the sunlit portion it became quite plain that +Deimos, at any rate, was as airless and lifeless as the moon. The +surface was composed of brown rock and red sand broken up into miniature +hills and valleys. There were a few traces of bygone volcanic action, +but it was evident that the internal fires of this tiny world must have +burnt themselves out very quickly. + +"Not much to be seen here," said Redgrave, as he came up the +companion-way, "and I don't think it would be safe to go out. The +attraction is so weak here that we might find ourselves falling off with +very little exertion. Still, you may as well take a couple of +photographs of the surface, and then we'll be off to Phobos." + +Zaidie got her apparatus to work, and when she had taken her slides down +to the dark-room, Redgrave turned the R. Force on very slightly and +Phobos began to sink away beneath them. The attraction of Mars now began +to make itself strongly felt, and the _Astronef_ dropped rapidly through +the eight thousand miles which separate the inner and outer satellites. + +As they approached Phobos they saw that half the little disc was +brilliantly lighted by the same rays of the sun which were glowing on +the rapidly increasing crescent of Mars beneath them. By careful +manipulation of his engines Redgrave managed to meet the approaching +satellite with a hardly perceptible shock about the centre of its +lighted portion, that is to say the side turned towards the planet. + +Mars now appeared as a gigantic rosy moon filling the whole vault of the +heavens above them. Their telescopes brought the three thousand seven +hundred and fifty miles down to about ten. The rapid motion of the tiny +satellite afforded them a spectacle which might be compared to the +rising of a moon glowing with rosy light and hundreds of times larger +than the earth. The speed of the vehicle of which they had taken +possession, something like four thousand two hundred miles an hour, +caused the surface of the planet to apparently sweep away from below +them, just as the earth seems to glide from under the car of a balloon. + +Neither of them left the telescopes for more than a few minutes during +this aerial circumnavigation. Murgatroyd, outwardly impassive, but +inwardly filled with solemn fears for the fate of this impiously daring +voyage, brought them wine and sandwiches, and later on tea and toast and +more sandwiches; but they took no moment's heed of these, so absorbed +were they in the wonderful spectacle which was swiftly passing under +their eyes. + +The main armament of the _Astronef_ consisted of four pneumatic guns, +which could be mounted on swivels, two ahead and two astern, which +carried a shell containing either one of two kinds of explosives +invented by her creator. + +One of these was a solid, and burst on impact with an explosive force +equal to about twenty pounds of lyddite. The other consisted of two +liquids separated by a partition in the shell, and these, when mixed by +the breaking of the partition, burst into a volume of flame which could +not be extinguished by any known human means. It would burn even in a +vacuum, since it supplied its own elements of combustion. The guns would +throw these shells to a distance of about seven terrestrial miles. On +the upper deck there were also stands for a couple of light machine guns +capable of discharging seven hundred explosive bullets a minute. + +Professor Rennick, although a man of peace, had little sympathy with the +laws of "civilised" warfare which permit men to be blown into rags of +flesh and splinters of bone by explosive shells of a pound weight and +upward, and only allow projectiles of less weight to be used against +"savages." There was no humbug about him. He believed that when war +_was_ necessary it had to _be_ war--and the sooner it was over the +better for everybody concerned. + +The small arms consisted of a couple of heavy ten-bore elephant guns +carrying three-ounce melinite shells; a dozen rifles and fowling-pieces +of different makes of which three, a single and a double-barrelled rifle +and a double-barrelled shot-gun, belonged to her Ladyship, as well as a +dainty brace of revolvers, one of half a dozen braces of various +calibres which completed the minor armament of the _Astronef_. + +The guns were got up and mounted while the attraction of the planet was +comparatively feeble, and the weapons themselves therefore of very +little weight. On the surface of the earth a score of men could not have +done the work, but on board the _Astronef_, suspended in Space, her crew +of three found the work easy. Zaidie herself picked up a Maxim and +carried it about as though it were a toy sewing-machine. + +"Now I think we can go down," said Redgrave, when everything had been +put in position as far as possible. "I wonder whether we shall find the +atmosphere of Mars suitable for terrestrial lungs. It will be rather +awkward if it isn't." + +A very slight exertion of repulsive force was sufficient to detach the +_Astronef_ from the body of Phobos. She dropped rapidly towards the +surface of the planet, and within three hours they saw the sunlight, for +the first time since they had left the earth, shining through an +unmistakable atmosphere, an atmosphere of a pale, rosy hue, instead of +the azure of the earthly skies. An angular observation showed that they +were within fifty miles of the surface of the undiscovered world. + +"Well, we shall find air here of some sort, there's no doubt. We'll drop +a bit further and then Andrew shall start the propellers. They'll very +soon give us an idea of the density. Do you notice the change in the +temperature? That's the diffused rays instead of the direct ones. Twenty +miles! I think that will do. I'll stop her now and we'll prospect for a +landing place." + +He went down to apply the repulsive force directly to the surface of +Mars, so as to check the descent, and then he put on his +breathing-dress, went into the exit-chamber, closed one door behind him, +opened the other and allowed it to fill with Martian air; then he shut +it again, opened his visor and took a cautious breath. + +It may, perhaps, have been the idea that he, the first of all the sons +of Earth, was breathing the air of another world, or it might have been +some property peculiar to the Martian atmosphere, but he immediately +experienced a sensation such as usually follows the drinking of a glass +of champagne. He took another breath, and another, then he opened the +inner door and went back to the lower deck, saying to himself: "Well, +the air's all right if it is a bit champagney; rich in oxygen, I +suppose, with perhaps a trace of nitrous-oxide in it. Still, it's +certainly breathable, and that's the principal thing." + +"It's all right, dear," he said as he reached the upper deck where +Zaidie was walking about round the sides of the glass dome gazing with +all her eyes at the strange scene of mingled cloud and sea and land +which spread for an immense distance on all sides of them. "I have +breathed the air of Mars, and even at this height it is distinctly +wholesome, though of course it's rather thin, and I had it mixed with +some of our own atmosphere. Still I think it will agree all right with +us lower down." + +"Well, then," said Zaidie, "suppose we get below those clouds and see +what there really is to be seen." + +"As there's a fairly big problem to be solved shortly I'll see to the +descent myself," he replied, going towards the stairway. + +In a couple of minutes she saw the cloud-belt below them rising rapidly. +When Redgrave returned the _Astronef_ was plunging into a sea of rosy +mist. + +"The clouds of Mars!" she exclaimed. "Fancy a world with pink clouds! I +wonder what there is on the other side." + +The next moment they saw. Just below them at a distance of about five +earth-miles lay an irregularly triangular island, a detached portion of +the Continent of Huygens almost equally divided by the Martian Equator, +and lying with another almost similarly shaped island between the +fortieth and the fiftieth meridians of west longitude. The two islands +were divided by a broad, straight stretch of water about the width of +the English Channel between Folkestone and Boulogne. Instead of the +bright blue-green of terrestrial seas, this connecting link between the +great Northern and Southern Martian oceans had an orange tinge. + +The land immediately beneath them was of a gently undulating character, +something like the Downs of South-Eastern England. No mountains were +visible in any direction. The lower portions, particularly along the +borders of the canals and the sea, were thickly dotted with towns and +cities, apparently of enormous extent. To the north of the Island +Continent there was a peninsula, which was covered with a vast +collection of buildings, which, with the broad streets and spacious +squares which divided them, must have covered an area of something like +two hundred square miles. + +"There's the London of Mars!" said Redgrave, pointing down towards it; +"where the London of Earth will be in a few thousand years, close to the +Equator. And, you see, all those other towns and cities are crowded +round the canals! I daresay when we go across the northern and southern +temperate zones we shall find them in about the state that Siberia or +Antarctica are in." + +"I daresay we shall," replied Zaidie; "Martian civilisation is crowding +towards the Equator, though I should call that place down there the +greater New York of Mars, and--see--there's Brooklyn just across the +canal. I wonder what they're thinking about us down there." + +Phobos revolves from west to east almost along the plane of its +primary's equator. To left and right they saw the huge ice-caps of the +South and North Poles gleaming through the red atmosphere with a pale +sunset glimmer. Then came the great stretches of sea, often obscured by +vast banks of clouds, which, as the sunlight fell upon them, looked +strangely like earth-clouds at sunset. + +Then, almost immediately underneath them, spread out the great land +areas of the equatorial region. The four continents of Halle, Galileo, +and Tycholand; then Huygens--which is to Mars what Europe, Asia, and +Africa are to the Earth, then Herschell and Copernicus. Nearly all of +these land masses were split up into semi-regular divisions by the +famous canals which have so long puzzled terrestrial observers. + +"Well, there is one problem solved at any rate," said Redgrave, when, +after a journey of nearly four hours, they had crossed the western +hemisphere. "Mars is getting very old, her seas are diminishing, and her +continents are increasing. Those canals are the remains of gulfs and +straits which have been widened and deepened and lengthened by human, or +I should say Martian, labour, partly, I've no doubt, for purposes of +navigation and partly to keep the inhabitants of the interior of the +continents within measurable distance of the sea. There's not the +slightest doubt about that. Then, you see, there are scarcely any +mountains to speak of so far, only ranges of low hills." + +"And that means, I suppose," said Zaidie, "that they've all been worn +down as the mountains of the earth are being. I was reading Flammarion's +'End of the World' last night, and he, you know, describes the earth at +the last as just one big plain of land, no hills or mountains, no seas, +and only sluggish rivers draining into marshes. + +"I suppose that is what they're coming to down yonder. Now, I wonder +what sort of civilisation we shall find. Perhaps we shan't find any at +all. Suppose all their civilisations have worn out and they are +degenerating into the same struggle for sheer existence those poor +creatures in the moon must have had." + +"Or suppose," said Redgrave rather seriously, "we find that they have +passed the zenith of civilisation, and are dropping back into savagery, +but still have the use of weapons and means of destruction which we, +perhaps, have no notion of, and are inclined to use them? We'd better be +careful, dear." + +"What do you mean, Lenox?" she said. "They wouldn't try to do us any +harm, would they? Why should they?" + +"I don't say they would," he replied; "but still you never know. You +see, their ideas of right and wrong and hospitality and all that sort of +thing may be quite different to what we have on the earth. In fact, they +may not be men at all, but just a sort of monster with perhaps a +superhuman intellect with all sorts of extra-human ideas in it. + +"Then there's another thing," he went on. "Suppose they fancied a trip +through Space, and thought that they had as good a right to the +_Astronef_ as we have? I daresay they've seen us by this time if they've +got telescopes, as no doubt they have, perhaps a good deal more powerful +than ours, and they may be getting ready to receive us now. I think I'll +get the guns in place before we go down, in case their moral ideas, as +dear old Hans Breitmann called them, are not quite the same as ours." + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The words were hardly out of his mouth before Zaidie, who still had her +glasses to her eyes, and was looking down towards the great city whose +glazed roofs were flashing with a thousand tints in the pale crimson +sunlight, said with a little tremor in her voice: + +"Look, Lenox, down there--don't you see something coming up? That little +black thing. Just look how fast it's coming up; it's quite distinct +already. It's a sort of flying-ship, only it has wings and, I think, +masts too. Yes, I can see three masts, and there's something glittering +on the tops of them. I wonder if they're coming to pay us a polite +morning call, or whether they're going to treat us like trespassers in +their atmosphere." + +"There's no telling, but those things on the top of the masts look like +revolving helices," replied Redgrave, after a long look through his +telescope. "He's screwing himself up into the air. That shows that they +must either have stronger and lighter machinery than we have, or, as the +astronomers have thought, this atmosphere is denser than ours, and +therefore easier to fly in. Then, of course, things are only half their +earthly weight here. + +"Well, whether it's peace or war, I suppose we may as well let them come +and reconnoitre. Then we shall see what kind of creatures they are. Ah, +there are a lot more of them, some coming from Brooklyn, too, as you +call it. Come up into the conning-tower, and I'll relieve Murgatroyd, so +that he can go and look after his engines. We shall have to give these +gentlemen a lesson in flying. Meanwhile, in case of accidents, we may as +well make ourselves as invulnerable as possible." + +A few minutes later they were in the conning-tower again, watching the +approach of the Martian fleet through the thick windows of toughened +glass which enabled them to look in every direction except straight +down. The steel coverings had been drawn down over the glass dome of the +deck-chamber, and Murgatroyd had gone down to the engine-room. Fifty +feet ahead of them stretched out the long, shining spur, of which ten +feet were solid steel, a ram which no floating structure built by human +hands could have resisted. + +Redgrave was standing with his hand on the steering-wheel, looking more +serious than he had done so far during the voyage. Zaidie stood beside +him with a powerful binocular telescope watching, with cheeks a little +paler than usual, the movements of the Martian air-ships. She counted +twenty-five vessels rising round them in a wide circle. + +"I don't like the idea of a whole fleet coming up," said Redgrave, as he +watched them rising, and the ring narrowing round the still motionless +_Astronef_. "If they only wanted to know who and what we are, or to +leave their cards on us, as it were, and bid us welcome to the world, +one ship could have done that just as well as a fleet. This lot coming +up looks as if they wanted to get round and capture us." + +"It does look like it," said Zaidie, with her glasses fixed on the +nearest of the vessels; "and now I can see they've guns too, something +like ours, and perhaps, as you said just now, they may have explosives +that we don't know anything about. Oh, Lenox, suppose they were able to +smash us up with a single shot." + +"You needn't be afraid of that, dear," he said, putting his arm round +her shoulders. "Of course it's perfectly natural that they should look +upon us with a certain amount of suspicion, dropping like this on them +from the stars. Can you see anything like men on board them yet?" + +"No, they're all closed in just as we are," she replied; "but they've +got conning-towers like this, and something like windows along the +sides. That's where the guns are, and the guns are moving. They're +pointing them at us. Lenox, I'm afraid they're going to shoot." + +"Then we may as well spoil their aim," he said, pressing one of the +buttons on the signal-board three times, and then once more after a +little interval. + +In obedience to the signal Murgatroyd turned on the repulsive force to +half power, and the _Astronef_ leapt up vertically a couple of thousand +feet. Then Redgrave pressed the button once and she stopped. Another +signal set the propellers in motion, and as she sprang forward across +the circle formed by the Martian air-ships, they looked down and saw +that the place which they had just left was occupied by a thick +greenish-yellow cloud. + +"Look, Lenox, what on earth is that?" exclaimed Zaidie, pointing down to +it. + +"What on Mars would be nearer the point, dear," he said, with what she +thought a somewhat vicious laugh. "That, I'm afraid, means anything but +a friendly reception for us. That cloud is one of two things--it's the +smoke of the explosion of twenty or thirty shells, or else it's made of +gases intended to either poison us or make us insensible, so that they +can take possession of the ship. In either case I should say that the +Martians are not what we should call gentlemen." + +"I should think not," she said angrily. "They might at least have taken +us for friends till they had proved us enemies, which they wouldn't have +done. Nice sort of hospitality that, considering how far we've come, and +we can't shoot back, because we haven't got the ports open." + +"And a very good thing too!" laughed Redgrave; "if we had had them open, +and that volley had caught us unawares, the _Astronef_ would probably +have been full of poisonous gases by this time, and your honeymoon, +dear, would have come to a somewhat untimely end. Ah, they're trying to +follow us! Well, now we'll see how high they can fly." + +He sent another signal to Murgatroyd, and the _Astronef_, still beating +the Martian air with the fans of her propellers, and travelling forward +at about fifty miles an hour, rose in a slanting direction through a +dense bank of rosy-tinted clouds, which hung over the bigger of the two +cities--New York, as Zaidie had named it. + +When they reached the golden-red sunlight above it the _Astronef_ +stopped her ascent, and then, with half a turn of the steering-wheel, +her commander sent her sweeping round in a wide circle. A few minutes +later they saw the Martian fleet rise almost simultaneously through the +clouds. They seemed to hesitate a moment, and then the prow of every +vessel was directed towards the swiftly moving _Astronef_. + +"Well, gentlemen," said Redgrave, "you evidently don't know anything +about Professor Rennick and the R. Force; and yet you ought to know that +we couldn't have come through Space without being able to get beyond +this little atmosphere of yours. Now let us see how fast you can fly." + +Another signal went down to Murgatroyd, the whirling propellers became +two intersecting circles of light. The speed of the _Astronef_ increased +to a hundred-and-fifty miles an hour, and the Martian fleet began to +drop behind and trail out into a triangle like a flock of huge birds. + +"That's lovely; we're leaving them!" exclaimed Zaidie, leaning forward +with the glasses to her eyes and tapping the floor of the conning-tower +with her foot as if she wanted to dance, "and their wings are working +faster than ever. They don't seem to have any screws." + +"Probably because they've solved the problem of bird's flight," said +Redgrave. "They're not gaining on us, are they?" + +"No, they're at about the same distance." + +"Then we'll see how they can soar." + +Another signal went down the tube. The _Astronef's_ propellers slowed +down and stopped, and the vessel began to rise swiftly towards the +zenith, which the sun was now approaching. The Martian fleet continued +the impossible chase until the limits of the navigable atmosphere, about +eight earth-miles above the surface, was reached. Here the air was +evidently too rarefied for their wings to act upon. They came to a +standstill, looking like links of a broken chain, their occupants no +doubt looking up with envious eyes upon the shining body of the +_Astronef_ glittering like a tiny star in the sunlight ten thousand feet +above them. + +"Well, gentlemen," said Redgrave, after a swift glance round, "I think +we have shown you that we can fly faster and soar higher than you can. +Perhaps you'll be a bit more civil now. If you're not we shall have to +teach you manners." + +"But you're not going to fight them all, dear, are you? Don't let us be +the first to bring war and bloodshed with us into another world." + +"Don't trouble about that, little woman, it's here already," he replied, +a trifle savagely. "People don't have air-ships and guns which fire +shells or poison-bombs, or whatever they were, without knowing what war +is. From what I've seen, I should say these Martians have civilised +themselves out of all emotions, and, I daresay, have fought pitilessly +for the possession of the last habitable lands of the planet. + +"They've preyed upon each other till only the fittest are left, and +those, I suppose, were the ones who invented the air-ships and finally +got possession of all that was worth having. Of course that would give +them the command of the planet, land and sea. In fact, if we are able to +make the personal acquaintance of the Martians, we shall probably find +them a set of over-civilised savages." + +"That's a rather striking paradox, isn't it, dear?" said Zaidie, +slipping her hand through his arm; "but still it's not at all bad. You +mean, of course, that they may have civilised themselves out of all the +emotions until they're just a set of cold, calculating, scientific +animals. After all they must be something of the sort, for I'm quite +sure we should not have done anything like that on earth if we'd had a +visitor from Mars. We shouldn't have got out cannons and shot at him +before we'd even made his acquaintance. + +"Now, if he, or they, had dropped in America as we were going down +there, we should have received them with deputations, given them +banquets, which they might not have been able to eat, and speeches, +which they would not understand, and photographed them, and filled the +newspapers with everything that we could imagine about them, and then +put them in a palace car and hustled them round the country for +everybody to look at." + +"And meanwhile," laughed Redgrave, "some of your smart engineers, I +suppose, would have gone over the vessel they had come in, found out how +she was worked, and taken out a dozen patents for her machinery." + +"Very likely," replied Zaidie, with a saucy little toss of her chin; +"and why not? We like to learn things down there--and anyhow that would +be much more really civilised than shooting at them." + +While this little conversation was going on, the _Astronef_ was dropping +rapidly into the midst of the Martian fleet, which had again arranged +itself in a circle. Zaidie soon made out through her glasses that the +guns were pointed upwards. + +"Oh, that's your little game, is it!" said Redgrave, when she had told +him of this. "Well, if you want a fight, you can have it." + +As he said this, his jaws came together, and Zaidie saw a look in his +eyes that she had never seen there before. He signalled rapidly two or +three times to Murgatroyd. The propellers began to whirl at their utmost +speed, and the _Astronef_, making a spiral downward course, swooped down +on to the Martian fleet with terrific velocity. Her last curve coincided +almost exactly with the circle occupied by the ships. Half-a-dozen +spouts of greenish flame came from the nearest vessel, and for a moment +the _Astronef_ was enveloped in a yellow mist. + +"Evidently they don't know that we are air-tight, and they don't use +shot or shell. They've got past that. Their projectiles kill by poison +or suffocation. I daresay a volley like that would kill a regiment. Now +I'll give that fellow a lesson which he won't live to remember." + +They swept through the poison-mist. Redgrave swung the wheel round. The +_Astronef_ dropped to the level of the ring of Martian vessels, which +had now got up speed again. Her steel ram was directed straight at the +vessel which had fired the last shot. Propelled at a speed of nearly two +hundred miles an hour, it took the strange-winged craft amidships. As +the shock came, Redgrave put his arm round Zaidie's waist and held her +close to him, otherwise she would have been flung against the forward +wall of the conning-tower. + +[Illustration: _It took the strange-winged craft amidships._] + +The Martian vessel stopped and bent up. They saw human figures more than +half as large again as men inside her staring at them through the +windows in the sides. There were others at the breaches of the guns in +the act of turning the muzzles on the _Astronef_; but this was only a +momentary glimpse, for in a second the _Astronef's_ spur had pierced +her, the Martian air-ship broke in twain, and her two halves plunged +downwards through the rosy clouds. + +"Keep her at full speed, Andrew," said Redgrave down the speaking-tube, +"and stand by to jump if we want to." + +"All ready, my Lord!" came back up the tube. + +The old Yorkshireman during the last few minutes had undergone a +transformation which he himself hardly understood. He recognised that +there was a fight going on, that it was a case of "burn, sink and +destroy," and the thousand-year-old Berserker awoke in him just, as a +matter of fact, it had done in his lordship. + +"They can pick up the pieces down there, what there is left of them," +said Redgrave, still holding Zaidie tight to his side with one hand and +working the wheel with the other, "and now we'll teach them another +lesson." + +"What are you going to do, dear?" she said, looking up at him with +somewhat frightened eyes. + +"You'll see in a moment," he said, between his shut teeth. "I don't care +whether these Martians are degenerate human beings or only animals; but +from my point of view the reception they have given us justifies any +kind of retaliation. If we'd had a single port-hole open during the +first volley you and I would have been dead by this time, and I'm not +going to stand anything like that without reprisals. They've declared +war on us, and killing in war isn't murder." + +"Well, no, I suppose not," she said; "but it's the first fight I've been +in, and I don't like it. Still, they did receive us pretty meanly, +didn't they?" + +"Meanly? If there was anything like a code of interplanetary morals or +manners one might call it absolutely caddish. I don't believe even Stead +himself could stand that--unless, of course, he wasn't here." + +He sent another message to Murgatroyd. The _Astronef_ sprang a thousand +feet towards the zenith; another touch on the button, and she stopped +exactly over the biggest of the Martian air-ships; another, and she +dropped on to it like a stone and smashed it to fragments. Then she +stopped and mounted again above the broken circle of the fleet, while +the pieces of the air-ship and what was left of her crew plunged +downwards through the crimson clouds in a fall of nearly thirty thousand +feet. + +Within the next few moments the rest of the Martian fleet had followed +it, sinking rapidly down through the clouds and scattering in all +directions. + +"They seem to have had enough of it," laughed Redgrave, as the +_Astronef_, in obedience to another signal, began to drop towards the +surface of Mars. "Now we'll go down and see if they're in a more +reasonable frame of mind. At any rate we've won our first scrimmage, +dear." + +"But it was rather brutal, Lenox, wasn't it?" + +"When you are dealing with brutes, little woman, it is sometimes +necessary to be brutal." + +"And you look a wee bit brutal right now," she replied, looking up at +him with something like a look of fear in her eyes. "I suppose that is +because you have just killed somebody--or somethings--whichever they +are." + +"Do I, really?" + +The hard-set jaw relaxed and his lips melted into a smile under his +moustache, and he bent down and kissed her. + +"Well, what do you suppose I should have thought of them if _you_ had +had a whiff of that poison?" + +"Yes, dear," she whispered in between the kisses, "I see now." + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +The _Astronef_ dropped swiftly down through the crimson-tinged clouds, +and a few minutes later they saw that the rest of the fleet had +scattered in units in all directions, apparently with the intention of +getting as far as possible out of reach of that terrible ram. Only one +of them, the largest, which carried what looked like a flag of woven +gold at the top of its centre mast, remained in sight after a few +minutes. It was almost immediately below them when they had passed +through the clouds, and they could see it sinking straight down towards +the centre of what appeared to be the principal square of the bigger of +the two cities which Zaidie had named New York and Brooklyn. + +"That fellow has gone to report, evidently," said Redgrave. "We'll +follow him just to see what he's up to, but I don't think we'd better +open the ports even then. There's no telling when they might give us a +whiff of that poison-mist, or whatever it is." + +"But how are you going to talk to them, then, if they can talk?--I mean, +if they know any language that we do?" + +"They're something like men, and so I suppose they understand the +language of signs, at any rate. Still, if you don't fancy it, we'll go +somewhere else." + +"No, thanks," she said. "That's not my father's daughter. I haven't come +a hundred million miles from home to go away before the first act's +finished. We'll go down to see if we can make them understand." + +By this time the _Astronef_ was hanging suspended over an enormous +square about half the size of Hyde Park. It was laid out just as a +terrestrial park would be, in grass land, flower-beds, and avenues, and +patches of trees, only the grass was a reddish yellow, the leaves of the +trees were like those of a beech in autumn, and the flowers were nearly +all a deep violet, or a bright emerald green. + +As they descended they saw that the square, or Central Park, as Zaidie +at once christened it, was flanked by enormous blocks of buildings, +palaces built of a dazzlingly white stone, and topped by domed roofs and +lofty cupolas of glass. + +"Isn't that just lovely!" she said, swinging her binoculars in every +direction. "Talk about your Park Lane and the houses round Central Park; +why, it's the Chicago Exposition, and the Paris one, and your Crystal +Palace, multiplied by about ten thousand, and all spread out just round +this one place. If we don't find these people nice, I guess we'd better +go back and build a fleet like this, and come and take it." + +"There spoke the new American imperialism," laughed Redgrave. "Well, +we'll go and see what they're like first, shall we?" + +The _Astronef_ dropped a little more slowly than the air-ship had done, +and remained suspended a hundred feet or so above her after she had +reached the ground. Swarms of human figures but of more than human +stature, clad in tunics and trousers or knickerbockers, came out of the +glass-domed palaces from all sides into the park. They were nearly all +of the same stature, and there appeared to be no difference whatever +between the sexes. Their dress was absolutely plain; there was no +attempt at ornament or decoration of any kind. + +"If there are any of the Martian women among those people," said her +ladyship, "they've taken to rationals, and they've grown about as big as +the men." + +"That's exactly what's happening on earth, you know, dear. I don't mean +about the rationals, but the women growing up, especially in America. I +come of a pretty long family----but, look!" + +"Well, I only come to your ear," she said. + +"And our descendants of ten thousand years hence----" + +"Oh, don't bother about them!" she said. "Look; there's some one who +seems to want to communicate with us. Why, they're all bald! They +haven't got a hair among them--and what a size their heads are!" + +"That's brains--too much brains, in fact. These people have lived too +long. I daresay they've ceased to be animals--civilised themselves out +of everything in the way of passions and emotions, and are just purely +intellectual beings, with as much human nature about them as Russian +diplomacy or those things we saw at the bottom of the Newton Crater. I +don't like the look of them." + +The orderly swarms of figures, which were rapidly filling the park, +divided as he was speaking, making a broad lane from one of its +entrances to where the _Astronef_ was hanging above the air-ship. A +light four-wheeled vehicle, whose framework and wheels glittered like +burnished gold, sped towards them, driven by some invisible agency. + +Its only occupant was a huge man, dressed in the universal costume, +saving only a scarlet sash in place of the cord-girdle which the others +wore round their waists. The vehicle stopped near the air-ship, over +which the _Astronef_ was hanging, and, as the figure dismounted, a door +opened in the side of the vessel and three other figures, similar both +in stature and attire, came out and entered into conversation with him. + +"The Admiral of the Fleet is evidently making his report," said +Redgrave. "Meanwhile, the crowd seems to be taking a considerable amount +of interest in us." + +"And very naturally, too!" replied Zaidie. "Don't you think we might go +down now and see if we can make ourselves understood in any way? You can +have the guns ready in case of accidents, but I don't think they'll try +and hurt us now. Look, the gentleman with the red sash is making signs." + +"I think we can go down now all right," replied Redgrave, "because it's +quite certain they can't use the poison-guns on us without killing +themselves as well. Still, we may as well have our own ready. Andrew, +get that port Maxim ready. I hope we shan't want it, but we may. I don't +quite like the look of these people." + +"They're very ugly, aren't they?" said Zaidie; "and really you can't +tell which are men and which are women. I suppose they've civilised +themselves out of everything that's nice, and are just scientific and +utilitarian and everything that's horrid." + +"I shouldn't wonder. They look to me as if they've just got common +sense, as we call it, and hadn't any other sense; but, at any rate, if +they don't behave themselves, we shall be able to teach them manners of +a sort, though we may possibly have done that to some extent already." + +As he said this Redgrave went into the conning-tower, and the _Astronef_ +moved from above the air-ship, and dropped gently into the crimson grass +about a hundred feet from her. Then the ports were opened, the guns, +which Murgatroyd had loaded, were swung into position, and they armed +themselves with a brace of revolvers each, in case of accident. + +"What delicious air this is!" said her ladyship, as the ports were +opened and she took her first breath of the Martian atmosphere. "It's +ever so much nicer than ours. Oh, Lenox, it's just like breathing +champagne." + +Redgrave looked at her with an admiration which was tempered by a sudden +apprehension. Even in his eyes she had never seemed so lovely before. +Her cheeks were glowing and her eyes were gleaming with a brightness +that was almost feverish, and he was himself sensible of a strange +feeling of exultation, both mental and physical, as his lungs filled +with the Martian air. + +"Oxygen," he said, shortly, "and too much of it! Or I shouldn't wonder +if it was something like nitrous-oxide--you know, laughing gas." + +"Don't!" she laughed; "it may be very nice to breathe, but it reminds +one of other things which aren't a bit nice. Still, if it is anything of +that sort it might account for these people having lived so fast. I know +I feel just now as if I was living at the rate of thirty-six hours a +day, and so, I suppose, the fewer hours we stop here the better." + +"Exactly!" said Redgrave, with another glance of apprehension at her. +"Now, there's his Royal Highness, or whatever he is, coming. How are we +going to talk to him? Are you all ready, Andrew?" + +"Yes, my Lord, all ready," replied the old Yorkshireman, dropping his +huge, hairy hand on the breech of the Maxim. + +"Very well, then, shoot the moment you see them doing anything +suspicious, and don't let any one except his Royal Highness come nearer +than a hundred yards." + +As he said this Redgrave went to the door, from which the gangway steps +had been lowered, and, in reply to a singularly expressive gesture from +the huge Martian, who seemed to stand nearly nine feet high, he beckoned +to him to come up on to the deck. + +As he mounted the steps the crowd closed round the _Astronef_ and the +Martian air-ship; but, as though in obedience to orders which had +already been given, they kept at a respectful distance of a little over +a hundred yards away from the strange vessel which had wrought such +havoc with their fleet. When the Martian reached the deck, Redgrave held +out his hand and the giant recoiled, as a man on earth might have done +if, instead of the open palm, he had seen a clenched hand gripping a +knife. + +"Take care, Lenox," exclaimed Zaidie, taking a couple of steps towards +him, with her right hand on the butt of one of her revolvers. The +movement brought her close to the open door, and in full view of the +crowd outside. + +If a seraph had come on earth and presented itself thus before a throng +of human beings, there might have happened some such miracle as was +wrought when the swarm of Martians beheld the strange beauty of this +radiant daughter of the earth. + +As it seemed to the space-voyagers, when they discussed it afterwards, +ages of purely utilitarian civilisation had brought all conditions of +Martian life up--or down--to the same level. There was no apparent +difference between the males and females in stature; their faces were +all the same, with features of mathematical regularity, pale skin, +bloodless cheeks, and an expression, if such it could be called, utterly +devoid of emotion. + +But still these creatures were human, or at least their forefathers had +been. Hearts beat in their breasts, blood of a sort still flowed through +their veins, and so the magic of this marvellous vision instantly awoke +the long-slumbering elementary instincts of a bygone age. A low murmur +ran through the vast throng, a murmur half-human, half-brutish, which +swiftly rose to a hoarse screaming roar. + +"Look out, my Lord! Quick! Shut the door, they're coming! It's her +ladyship they want; she must look like an angel from Heaven to them. +Shall I fire?" + +"Yes," said Redgrave, gripping the lever, and bringing the door down. +"Zaidie, if this fellow moves put a bullet through him. I'm going to +talk to that air-ship before he gets his poison-guns to work." + +As the last word left his lips Murgatroyd put his thumb on the spring on +the Maxim. A roar such as Martian ears had never heard before resounded +through the vast square, and was flung back with a thousand echoes from +the walls of the huge palaces on every side. A stream of smoke and flame +poured out of the little port-hole, and then the onward-swarming throng +seemed to stop, and the front ranks of it began to sink down silently in +long rows. + +Then through the roaring rattle of the Maxim sounded the deep, sharp +bang of Redgrave's gun, as he sent ten pounds weight of Rennickite, as +he had christened it, into the Martian air-ship. There was the roar of +an explosion which shook the air for miles around. A blaze of greenish +flame and a huge cloud of steamy smoke showed that the projectile had +done its work, and, when the smoke drifted away, the spot on which the +air-ship had lain was only a deep, red, jagged gash in the ground. There +was not even a fragment of the ship to be seen. + +This done, Redgrave went and turned the starboard Maxim on to another +swarm which was approaching the _Astronef_ from that side. When he had +got the range he swung the gun slowly from side to side. The moving +throng stopped, as the other one had done, and sank down to the red +grass, now dyed with a deeper red. + +Meanwhile, Zaidie had been holding the Martian at something more than +arm's length with her revolver. He seemed to understand perfectly that, +if she pulled the trigger, the revolver would do something like what the +Maxims had done. He appeared to take no notice whatever either of the +destruction of the air-ship or of the slaughter that was going on around +the _Astronef_. His big, pale blue eyes were fixed upon her face. They +seemed to be devouring a loveliness such as they had never seen before. +A dim, pinky flush stole for the first time into his waxy cheeks, and +something like a light of human passion came into his eyes. + +Then, to the utter astonishment of both Redgrave and Zaidie, he said +slowly and deliberately, and with only just enough tinge of emotion in +his voice to make Redgrave want to shoot him: + +"Beautiful. Perfect. More perfect than ours. I want it. Give Palace and +Garden of Eternal Summer for it. Two thousand work-slaves and fifty----" + +"And I'll see you damned first, sir, whoever you are!" said Redgrave, +clapping his hand on to the butt of his revolver, and forgetting for the +moment that he was speaking in another world than his own. "What the +devil do you mean, sir, by insulting my wife----?" + +"Insulting. Wife. What is that? We have no words like those." + +"But you speak English," exclaimed Zaidie, going a little nearer to him, +but still keeping the muzzle of her revolver pointing up to his hairless +head. "No, Lenox, don't be afraid about me, and don't get angry. Can't +you see that this person hasn't got any temper? I suppose it was +civilised out of his ancestors ages ago. He doesn't know what a wife or +an insult is. He just looks upon me as a desirable piece of property to +be bought, and I daresay he offered you a very handsome price. Now, +don't look so savage, because you know bargains like that have been made +even on our dear old virtuous Mother Earth. For instance, if you hadn't +met us in the middle of the Atlantic----" + +"That'll do, Zaidie," Redgrave interrupted almost roughly. "That's not +exactly the question, but I see what you mean, and it was a bit silly of +me to get angry." + +"Silly? Angry? What do those words mean?" said the Martian in his slow, +passionless, mechanical voice. "Who are you? Whence come you?" + +"I'll answer the last part first," said Redgrave. "We come from the +earth, the planet which you see after sunset and before sunrise." + +"Yes, the Silver Star," said the Martian without any note of wonder or +surprise in his voice. "Are all the dwellers there like the gods and +angels our children read about in the old legends?" + +"Gods and angels!" laughed Zaidie. "There, Lenox, there's a compliment +for you. I really think we ought to be as civil to his Royal Highness +after that as possible." Then she went on, addressing the Martian, "No, +we are not all gods and angels on earth. There are no gods and very few +angels. In fact there are none except those which exist in the fancy of +certain prejudiced persons. But that doesn't matter, at least not just +now," she continued with American directness. "What we want to know just +now is, why you speak English, and what sort of a world this Mars is?" + +The Martian evidently only understood the most direct essentials of her +speech. He saw that she asked two questions, and he answered them. + +"Speak English?" he replied, with a little shake of his huge head. "We +know not English, but there is no other speech. There is only ours. +Cycles ago there were other speeches here, but those who spoke them were +killed. It was inconvenient. One speech for a world is best." + +"I see what he means," said Redgrave, looking towards Zaidie. "The +Martian people have developed along practically the same lines as we are +doing, but they have done it faster and got a long way ahead of us. We +are finding out that the speech we call English is the shortest and most +convenient. The Martians found it out long ago and killed everybody who +spoke anything else. After all, what we call speech is only the +translation of thoughts into sounds. These people have been thinking for +ages with the same sort of brains as ours, and they've translated their +thoughts into the same sounds. What we call English they, I daresay, +call Martian, and that's all there is in it that I can see." + +"Of course," laughed Zaidie. "Wonderful until you know how, eh? Like +most things. Still I must say that our friend here speaks English +something like a phonograph, and if he'll excuse me saying so, which of +course he will, he doesn't seem to have much more human nature about +him." + +"I'm not quite so sure on that point," said Redgrave, "but----" + +"Oh, never mind about that now!" she interrupted, and then, turning +towards the Martian, who had been listening intently as though he was +trying to make sense out of what they had been saying, she went on +speaking slowly and very plainly---- + +"Tell me, sir, if you please, do you know what 'angry' means? Are you +not angry with us for destroying your air-ships up there in the clouds, +and the one that came down, and for shooting all those people of yours?" + +The Martian looked at her with a little light in his big blue eyes, and +two faint little spots of red just under them, and said: + +"Anger! Yes, I remember, that is what we called brain-heat. Our teachers +found it to be madness and it was abolished. It was not convenient. The +air-ships were not convenient to you, so you abolished them. The folk, +too, that you abolished with those things," pointing to the guns, "they +were not convenient. If you hadn't done that they would have abolished +you. There is no more to say." + +"What brutes," said Zaidie, turning away from him, her head thrown back +and her lips curling in unutterable disgust. "Well, if these people have +civilised themselves along the same lines that we are doing, thinking +the same things and speaking something like the same speech, thank God +we shall be dead before our civilisation reaches a stage like this. +That's not a man. It's only a machine of flesh and bone and nerves, and +I suppose it has blood of some sort." + +A beautiful woman always looks most beautiful when she is just a little +angry. Redgrave had never seen Zaidie look quite so lovely as she did +just then. The Martian, whose ancestors had for generations forgotten +what human emotion was like, only saw in her anger a miracle which made +her a thousand times more beautiful than before, and as he looked upon +her glowing cheeks and gleaming eyes some instinct insensibly +transmitted through many generations awoke to sudden life in some unused +corner of his brain. + +His pale clear eyes lit up with something like a glow of human passion. +The pink spots under his eyes spread downwards over his cheeks. Some +half-articulate sounds came from between his thin lips. Then they were +drawn back and showed his smooth, toothless gums. He took a couple of +long, swift strides towards her, and then bent forward, towering over +her with long, outstretched arms, huge, hideous, and half-human. + +Zaidie sprang backwards as he came towards her, her right hand went up, +and, just as Redgrave levelled his revolver, and Murgatroyd, true to the +old Berserk instinct, took a rifle by the barrel and swung the stock +above his head, Zaidie pulled her trigger. The bullet cut a clean hole +through the smooth, hairless skull of the Martian. A dark, red spot came +just between his eyes, his huge frame shrank together and collapsed in a +heap on the deck. + +"Oh, I've killed him! God forgive me, killed a man!" she whispered, as +her hand fell to her side, and the revolver dropped from her fingers. +"But, Lenox, do you really think it was a man?" + +"That thing a man!" he replied between his clenched teeth. "He wanted +you, and spoke English of a sort, so there was something human about +him, but anyhow he's better dead. Here, Andrew, open that door again and +help me to heave this thing overboard. Then I think we'd better be off +before we have the rest of the fleet with their poison guns round us. +Zaidie, I think you'd better go to your room for the present. Take a nip +of cognac and then lie down, and mind you keep the door tight shut. +There's no telling what these animals might do if they had a chance, and +just now it's my business and Andrew's to see that they don't." + +Though she would much rather have remained on deck to see anything more +that might happen, she saw that he was really in earnest, and so like a +wise wife who commands by obeying, she obeyed, and went below. + +Then the dead body of the Martian was tumbled out of the side door. The +windows through which the guns had been fired were hermetically closed, +and a few minutes later the _Astronef_ vanished from the surface of +Mars, to remain a memory and a marvel to the dwindling generations of +the worn-out world which is as this may be in the far-off days that are +to come. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +"How very different Venus looks now to what it does from the earth," +said Zaidie, a couple of mornings later, by earth-time, as she took her +eye away from the telescope through which she had been examining an +enormous golden crescent which spanned the dark vault of Space ahead of +and slightly below the _Astronef_. + +"Yes," replied Redgrave, "she looks----" + +"How do you know that she is a she?" said Zaidie, getting up and laying +a hand on his shoulder as he sat at his own telescope. "Of course I know +what you mean, that according to our own ideas on earth, it is the +planet or the world which has been supposed for ages to, as it were, +shine upon the lovers of earth with the light reflected from +the--the--well, I suppose you know what I mean." + +"Seeing that you are the most perfect terrestrial incarnation of the +said goddess that I have seen yet," he replied, slipping his arm round +her waist and pulling her down on to his knees, "I don't think that that +is quite the view you ought to take. Surely if Venus ever had a +daughter----" + +"Oh, nonsense! After we've travelled all these millions of miles +together do you really expect me to believe stuff like that?" + +"My dear girl-graduate," he said, tightening his grip round her waist a +little, "you know perfectly well that if we had travelled beyond the +limits of the Solar System, if we had outsailed old Halley's Comet +itself, and dived into the uttermost depths of Space outside the Milky +Way, you and I would still be a man and a woman, and, being, as may be +presumed, more or less in love with each other----" + +"Less indeed!" said Zaidie; "you're speaking for yourself, I hope." + +And then when she had partially disengaged herself and sat up straight, +she said between her laughs---- + +"Really, Lenox, you're quite absurd for a person who has been married as +long as you have, I don't mean in time, but in Space. Was it a thousand +years or a couple of hundred million miles ago that we were married? +Really I am getting my ideas of time and space quite mixed up. + +"But never mind that! What I was going to say is that, according to all +the authorities which your girl-graduate has been reading since we left +Mars, Venus--oh, doesn't she look just gorgeous, and our old friend the +Sun behind there blazing out of darkness like one of the furnaces at +Pittsburg--I beg your pardon, Lenox, I'm afraid I'm getting quite +provincial. I suppose we're considerably more than a hundred million +miles away?" + +"Yes, dear; we're about a hundred and fifty millions, and at that +distance, if you'll excuse me saying so, even the United States would +seem almost like a province, wouldn't they?" + +"Well, yes; that's just where distance doesn't lend enchantment to the +view, I suppose." + +"But what was it you were going to say before that----" + +"The interlude, eh? Well, before the interlude you were accusing me of +being a graduate as well as a girl. Of course I can't help that, but +what I was going to say was----" + +"If you are going to talk science, dear, perhaps we'd better sit on +different chairs. I may have been married for a hundred and fifty +million miles, but the honeymoon isn't half way through yet, you know." + +Then there was another interlude of a few seconds' duration. When Zaidie +was seated beside her own telescope again, she said, after another +glance at the splendid crescent which, as the _Astronef_ approached at a +speed of over forty miles a second, increased in size and distinctness +every moment: + +"What I mean is this. All the authorities are agreed that on Venus, her +axis of revolution being so very much inclined to the plane of her +orbit, the seasons are so severe that half the year its temperate zone +and its tropics have a summer about twice as hot as ours and the other +half they have a winter twice as cold as our coldest. I'm afraid, after +all, we shall find the Love-Star a world of salamanders and seals; +things that can live in a furnace and bask on an iceberg; and when we +get back home it will be our painful duty, as the first explorers of the +fields of Space, to dispel another dearly-cherished popular delusion." + +"I'm not so very sure about that," said Lenox, glancing from the rapidly +growing crescent, to the sweet, smiling face beside him. "Don't you see +something very different there to what we saw either on the Moon or +Mars? Now just go back to your telescope and let us take an +observation." + +"Well," said Zaidie, rising, "as our trip is, partly at least, in the +interests of science, I will;" and then when she had got her own +telescope into focus again--for the distance between the _Astronef_ and +the new world they were about to visit was rapidly lessening--she took a +long look through it, and said: + +"Yes, I think I see what you mean. The outer edge of the crescent is +bright, but it gets greyer and dimmer towards the inside of the curve. +Of course Venus has an atmosphere. So had Mars; but this must be very +dense. There's a sort of halo all round it. Just fancy that splendid +thing being the little black spot we saw going across the face of the +Sun a few days ago! It makes one feel rather small, doesn't it?" + +"That is one of the things which a woman says when she doesn't want to +be answered; but, apart from that, you were saying----" + +"What a very unpleasant person you can be when you like! I was going to +say that on the Moon we saw nothing but black and white, light and +darkness. There was no atmosphere, except in those awful places I don't +want to think about. Then, as we got near Mars, we saw a pinky +atmosphere, but not very dense; but this, you see, is a sort of +pearl-grey white shading from silver to black. You notice how much paler +it grows as we get nearer. But look--what are those tiny bright spots? +There are hundreds of them." + +"Do you remember as we were leaving the Earth, how bright the mountain +ranges looked; how plainly we could see the Rockies and the Andes?" + +"Oh, yes, I see; they're mountains; thirty-seven miles high, some of +them, they say; and the rest of the silver-grey will be clouds, I +suppose. Fancy living under clouds like those." + +"Only another case of the adaptation of life to natural conditions, I +expect. When we get there I daresay we shall find that these clouds are +just what make it possible for the inhabitants of Venus to stand the +extremes of heat and cold. Given elevations three or four times as high +as the Himalayas, it would be quite possible for them to choose their +temperature by shifting their altitude. + +"But I think it's about time to drop theory and see to the practice," he +continued, getting up from his chair and going to the signal board in +the conning-tower. "Whatever the planet Venus may be like, we don't want +to charge it at the rate of sixty miles a second. That's about the speed +now, considering how fast she's travelling towards us." + +"And considering that, whether it is a nice world or not it's nearly as +big as the Earth, I guess we should get rather the worst of the charge," +laughed Zaidie as she went back to her telescope. + +Redgrave sent a signal down to Murgatroyd to reverse engines, as it +were, or, in other words, to direct the "R. Force" against the planet, +from which they were now only a couple of hundred thousand miles +distant. The next moment the sun and stars seemed to halt in their +courses. The great golden-grey crescent, which had been increasing in +size every moment, appeared to remain stationary, and then, when he was +satisfied that the engines were developing the Force properly, he sent +another signal down, and the _Astronef_ began to descend. + +The half-disc of Venus seemed to fall below them, and in a few minutes +they could see it from the upper deck spreading out like a huge +semi-circular plain of light ahead and on both sides of them. The +_Astronef_ was falling at the rate of about a thousand miles a minute +towards the centre of the half-crescent, and every moment the brilliant +spots above the cloud-surface grew in size and brightness. + +"I believe the theory about the enormous height of the mountains of +Venus must be correct after all," said Redgrave, tearing himself with an +evident wrench away from his telescope. "Those white patches can't be +anything else but the summits of snow-capped mountains. You know how +brilliantly white a snow-peak looks on earth against the whitest of +clouds." + +"Oh, yes," said Zaidie, "I've often seen that in the Rockies. But it's +lunch-time, and I must go down and see how my things in the kitchen are +getting on. I suppose you'll try and land somewhere where it's morning, +so that we can have a good day before us. Really, it's very convenient +to be able to make your own morning or night as you like, isn't it? I +hope it won't make us too conceited when we get back, being able to +choose our mornings and our evenings; in fact, our sunrises and sunsets +on any world we like to visit in a casual way like this." + +"Well," laughed Redgrave, as she moved away towards the companion +stairs, "after all, if you find the United States, or even the Planet +Terra, too small for you, we've always got the fields of Space open to +us. We might take a trip across the Zodiac or down the Milky Way." + +"And meanwhile," she replied, stopping at the top of the stairs and +looking round, "I'll go down and get lunch. You and I may be king and +queen of the realms of Space, and all that sort of thing, but we've got +to eat and drink, after all." + +"And that reminds me," said Redgrave, getting up and following her, "we +must celebrate our arrival on a new world as usual. I'll go down and get +out the wine. I shouldn't be surprised if we found the people of the +Love-World living on nectar and ambrosia, and as fizz is our nearest +approach to nectar----" + +"I suppose," said Zaidie, as she gathered up her skirts and stepped +daintily down the companion stairs, "if you find anything human, or at +least human enough to eat and drink, you'll have a party and give them +champagne. I wonder what those wretches on Mars would have thought of it +if we'd only made friends with them?" + +Lunch on board the _Astronef_ was about the pleasantest meal of the day. +Of course, there was neither day nor night, in the ordinary sense of the +word, except as the hours were measured off by the chronometers. +Whichever side or end of the vessel received the direct rays of the sun, +was bathed in blazing heat and dazzling light. Elsewhere there was black +darkness and the more than icy cold of Space; but lunch was a convenient +division of the waking hours, which began with a stroll on the upper +deck and a view of the ever-varying splendours about them, and ended +after dinner in the same place with coffee and cigarettes and +speculations as to the next day's happenings. + +This lunch-hour passed even more pleasantly and rapidly than others had +done, for the discussion as to the possibilities of Venus was continued +in a quite delightful mixture of scientific disquisition and that +converse which is common to most human beings on their honeymoon. + +As there was nothing more to be done or seen for an hour or two, the +afternoon was spent in a pleasant siesta in the luxurious deck-saloon; +because evening to them would be morning on that portion of Venus to +which they were directing their course, and, as Zaidie said, when she +subsided into her hammock: + +It would be breakfast-time before they could get dinner. + +As the _Astronef_ fell with ever-increasing velocity towards the +cloud-covered surface of Venus, the remainder of her disc, lit up by the +radiance of her sister-worlds, Mercury, Mars, and the Earth, and also by +the pale radiance of an enormous comet, which had suddenly shot into +view from behind its southern limb, became more or less visible. + +Towards six o'clock it became necessary to exert nearly the whole +strength of her engines to check the velocity of her fall. By eight she +had entered the atmosphere of Venus, and was dropping slowly towards a +vast sea of sunlit cloud, out of which, on all sides, towered thousands +of snow-clad peaks, rounded summits, and widespread stretches of upland +about which the clouds swept and surged like the silent billows of some +vast ocean in Ghostland. + +"I thought so!" said Redgrave, when the propellers had begun to revolve +and Murgatroyd had taken his place in the conning-tower. "A very dense +atmosphere loaded with clouds. There's the Sun just rising, so your +ladyship's wishes are duly obeyed." + +"And doesn't it seem nice and homelike to see him rising through an +atmosphere above the clouds again? It doesn't look a bit like the same +sort of dear old Sun just blazing like a red-hot Moon among a lot of +white-hot stars and planets. Look, aren't those peaks lovely, and that +cloud-sea?--why, for all the world we might be in a balloon above the +Rockies or the Alps. And see," she continued, pointing to one of the +thermometers fixed outside the glass dome which covered the upper deck, +"it's only sixty-five even here. I wonder if we can breathe this air, +and--oh--I do wonder what we shall see on the other side of those +clouds." + +"You shall have both questions answered in a few minutes," replied +Redgrave, going towards the conning-tower. "To begin with, I think we'll +land on that big snow-dome yonder, and do a little exploring. Where +there are snow and clouds there is moisture, and where there is moisture +a man ought to be able to breathe." + +[Illustration: _Snow peaks and cloud seas._] + +The _Astronef_, still falling, but now easily under the command of the +helmsman, shot forwards and downwards towards a vast dome of snow which, +rising some two thousand feet above the cloud-sea, shone with dazzling +brilliance in the light of the rising Sun. She landed just above the +edge of the clouds. Meanwhile they had put on their breathing-suits, and +Redgrave had seen that the air chamber through which they had to pass +from their own little world into the new ones that they visited was in +working order. When the outer door was opened and the ladder lowered he +stood aside, as he had done on the Moon, and Zaidie's was the first +human foot which made an imprint on the virgin snows of Venus. + +The first thing Redgrave did was to raise the visor of his helmet and +taste the air of the new world. It was cool, and fresh, and sweet, and +the first draught of it sent the blood tingling and dancing through his +veins. Perfect as the arrangements of the _Astronef_ were in this +respect, the air of Venus tasted like clear running spring water would +have done to a man who had been drinking filtered water for several +days. He threw the visor right up and motioned to Zaidie to do the same. +She obeyed, and, after drawing a long breath, she said: + +"That's glorious! It's like wine after water, and rather stagnant water +too. But what a world, snow-peaks and cloud-seas, islands of ice and +snow in an ocean of mist! Just look at them! Did you ever see anything +so lovely and unearthly in your life? I wonder how high this mountain +is, and what there is on the other side of the clouds. Isn't the air +delicious! Not a bit too cold after all--but, still, I think we may as +well go back and put on something more becoming. I shouldn't quite like +the ladies of Venus to see me dressed like a diver." + +"Come along, then," laughed Lenox, as he turned back towards the vessel. +"That's just like a woman. You're about a hundred and fifty million +miles away from Broadway or Regent Street. You are standing on the top +of a snow mountain above the clouds of Venus, and the moment that you +find the air is fit to breathe you begin thinking about dress. How do +you know that the inhabitants of Venus, if there are any, dress at all?" + +"What nonsense! Of course they do--at least, if they are anything like +us." + +As soon as they got back on board the _Astronef_ and had taken their +breathing-dresses off, Redgrave and the old engineer, who appeared to +take no visible interest in their new surroundings, threw open all the +sliding doors on the upper and lower decks so that the vessel might be +thoroughly ventilated by the fresh sweet air. Then a gentle repulsion +was applied to the huge snow mass on which the _Astronef_ rested. She +rose a couple of hundred feet, her propellers began to whirl round, and +Redgrave steered her out towards the centre of the vast cloud-sea which +was almost surrounded by a thousand glittering peaks of ice and domes of +snow. + +"I think we may as well put off dinner, or breakfast as it will be now, +until we see what the world below is like," he said to Zaidie, who was +standing beside him on the conning-tower. + +"Oh, never mind about eating just now, this is altogether too wonderful +to be missed for the sake of ordinary meat and drink. Let's go down and +see what there is on the other side." + +He sent a message down the speaking tube to Murgatroyd, who was below +among his beloved engines, and the next moment sun and clouds and +ice-peaks had disappeared and nothing was visible save the +all-enveloping silver-grey mist. + +For several minutes they remained silent, watching and wondering what +they would find beneath the veil which hid the surface of Venus from +their view. Then the mist thinned out and broke up into patches which +drifted past them as they descended on their downward slanting course. + +Below them they saw vast, ghostly shapes of mountains and valleys, lakes +and rivers, continents, islands, and seas. Every moment these became +more and more distinct, and soon they were in full view of the most +marvellous landscape that human eyes had ever beheld. The distances were +tremendous. Mountains, compared with which the Alps or even the Andes +would have seemed mere hillocks, towered up out of the vast depths +beneath them. + +Up to the lower edge of the all-covering cloud-sea they were clad with a +golden-yellow vegetation, fields and forests, open, smiling valleys, and +deep, dark ravines through which a thousand torrents thundered down from +the eternal snows beyond, to spread themselves out in rivers and lakes +in the valleys and plains which lay many thousands of feet below. + +"What a lovely world!" said Zaidie, as she at last found her voice after +what was almost a stupor of speechless wonder and admiration. "And the +light! Did you ever see anything like it? It's neither moonlight nor +sunlight. See, there are no shadows down there, it's just all lovely +silvery twilight. Lenox, if Venus is as nice as she looks from here I +don't think I shall want to go back. It reminds me of Tennyson's Lotus +Eaters, 'the Land where it is always afternoon.' + +"I think you are right after all. We are thirty million miles nearer to +the Sun than we were on the Earth, and the light and heat have to filter +through those clouds. They are not at all like Earth clouds from this +side. It's the other way about. The silver lining is on this side. Look, +there isn't a black or a brown one, or even a grey one, within sight. +They are just like a thin mist, lighted by a million of electric lamps. +It's a delicious world, and if it isn't inhabited by angels it ought to +be." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +While Zaidie was talking the _Astronef_ was sweeping swiftly down +towards the surface of Venus, through scenery of whose almost +inconceivable magnificence no human words could convey any adequate +idea. Underneath the cloud-veil the air was absolutely clear and +transparent, clearer, indeed, than terrestrial air at the highest +elevations reached by mountain-climbers, and, moreover, it seemed to be +endowed with a strange, luminous quality, which made objects, no matter +how distant, stand out with almost startling distinctness. + +The rivers and lakes and seas which spread out beneath them, seemed +never to have been ruffled by blast of storm or breath of wind, and +their surfaces shone with a soft, silvery light, which seemed to come +from below rather than from above. + +"If this isn't heaven it must be the half-way house," said Redgrave, +with what was, perhaps, under the circumstances, a pardonable +irreverence. "Still, after all, we don't know what the inhabitants may +be like, so I think we'd better close the doors, and drop on the top of +that mountain-spur running out between the two rivers into the bay. Do +you notice how curious the water looks after the Earth seas; bright +silver, instead of blue and green?" + +"Oh, it's just lovely," said Zaidie. "Let's go down and have a walk. +There's nothing to be afraid of. You'll never make me believe that a +world like this can be inhabited by anything dangerous." + +"Perhaps, but we mustn't forget what happened on Mars, _Madonna mia_. +Still, there's one thing, we haven't been tackled by any aerial fleets +yet." + +"I don't think the people here want air-ships. They can fly themselves. +Look! there are a lot of them coming to meet us. That was a rather +wicked remark of yours, Lenox, about the half-way house to heaven; but +those certainly do look something like angels." + +As Zaidie said this, after a somewhat lengthy pause, during which the +_Astronef_ had descended to within a few hundred feet of the +mountain-spur, she handed her field-glasses to her husband, and pointed +downwards towards an island which lay a couple or miles or so off the +end of the spur. + +He put the glasses to his eyes, and took a long look through them. +Moving them slowly up and down, and from side to side, he saw hundreds +of winged figures rising from the island and floating towards them. + +"You were right, dear," he said, without taking the glass from his eyes, +"and so was I. If those aren't angels, they're certainly something like +men, and, I suppose, women too who can fly. We may as well stop here and +wait for them. I wonder what sort of an animal they take the _Astronef_ +for." + +He sent a message down the tube to Murgatroyd and gave a turn and a half +to the steering-wheel. The propellers slowed down and the _Astronef_ +dropped with a hardly-perceptible shock in the midst of a little plateau +covered with a thick, soft moss of a pale yellowish green, and fringed +by a belt of trees which seemed to be over three hundred feet high, and +whose foliage was a deep golden bronze. + +They had scarcely landed before the flying figures reappeared over the +tree tops and swept downwards in long spiral curves towards the +_Astronef_. + +"If they're not angels, they're very like them," said Zaidie, putting +down her glasses. + +"There's one thing, they fly a lot better than the old masters' angels +or Dore's could have done, because they have tails--or at least +something that seems to serve the same purpose, and yet they haven't got +feathers." + +"Yes, they have, at least round the edges of their wings or whatever +they are, and they've got clothes, too, silk tunics or something of that +sort--and there are men and women." + +"You're quite right, those fringes down their legs are feathers, and +that's how they can fly. They seem to have four arms." + +The flying figures which came hovering near to the _Astronef_, without +evincing any apparent sign of fear, were the strangest that human eyes +had looked upon. In some respects they had a sufficient resemblance for +them to be taken for winged men and women, while in another they bore a +decided resemblance to birds. Their bodies and limbs were human in +shape, but of slenderer and lighter build; and from the shoulder-blades +and muscles of the back there sprang a second pair of arms arching up +above their heads. Between these and the lower arms, and continued from +them down the side to the ankles, there appeared to be a flexible +membrane covered with a light feathery down, pure white on the inside, +but on the back a brilliant golden yellow, deepening to bronze towards +the edges, round which ran a deep feathery fringe. + +The body was covered in front and down the back between the wings with a +sort of divided tunic of a light, silken-looking material, which must +have been clothing, since there were many different colours all more or +less of different hue among them. Below this and attached to the inner +sides of the leg from the knee downward, was another membrane which +reached down to the heels, and it was this which Redgrave somewhat +flippantly alluded to as a tail. Its obvious purpose was to maintain the +longitudinal balance when flying. + +In stature the inhabitants of the Love-Star varied from about five feet +six to five feet, but both the taller and the shorter of them were all +of nearly the same size, from which it was easy to conclude that this +difference in stature was on Venus as well as on the Earth, one of the +broad distinctions between the sexes. + +They flew round the _Astronef_ with an exquisite ease and grace which +made Zaidie exclaim: + +"Now, why weren't we made like that on Earth?" + +To which Redgrave, after a look at the barometer, replied: + +"Partly, I suppose, because we weren't built that way, and partly +because we don't live in an atmosphere about two and a half times as +dense as ours." + +Then several of the winged figures alighted on the mossy covering of the +plain and walked towards the vessel. + +"Why, they walk just like us, only much more prettily!" said Zaidie. +"And look what funny little faces they've got! Half bird, half human, +and soft, downy feathers instead of hair. I wonder whether they talk or +sing. I wish you'd open the doors again, Lenox. I'm sure they can't +possibly mean us any harm; they are far too pretty for that. What lovely +soft eyes they have, and what a thousand pities it is we shan't be able +to understand them." + +They had left the conning-tower, and both his lordship and Murgatroyd +were throwing open the sliding-doors and, to Zaidie's considerable +displeasure, getting the deck Maxims ready for action in case they +should be required. As soon as the doors were open Zaidie's judgment of +the inhabitants of Venus was entirely justified. + +Without the slightest sign of fear, but with very evident astonishment +in their round golden-yellow eyes, they came walking close up to the +sides of the _Astronef_. Some of them stroked her smooth, shining sides +with their little hands, which Zaidie now found had only three fingers +and a thumb. Many ages before they might have been birds' claws, but now +they were soft and pink and plump, utterly strange to manual work as it +is understood upon Earth. + +"Just fancy getting Maxim guns ready to shoot those delightful things," +said Zaidie, almost indignantly, as she went towards the doorway from +which the gangway ladder ran down to the soft, mossy turf. "Why, not one +of them has got a weapon of any sort; and just listen," she went on, +stopping in the opening of the doorway, "have you ever heard music like +that on Earth? I haven't. I suppose it's the way they talk. I'd give a +good deal to be able to understand them. But still, it's very lovely, +isn't it?" + +"Ay, like the voices of syrens," said Murgatroyd, speaking for the first +time since the _Astronef_ had landed; for this big, grizzled, taciturn +Yorkshireman, who looked upon the whole cruise through Space as a mad +and almost impious adventure, which nothing but his hereditary loyalty +to his master's name and family could have persuaded him to share in, +had grown more and more silent as the millions of miles between the +_Astronef_ and his native Yorkshire village had multiplied day by day. + +"Syrens--and why not, Andrew?" laughed Redgrave. "At any rate, I don't +think they look likely to lure us and the _Astronef_ to destruction." +Then he went on: "Yes, Zaidie, I never heard anything like that before. +Unearthly, of course it is, but then we're not on Earth. Now, Zaidie, +they seem to talk in song-language. You did pretty well on Mars with +your American, suppose we go out and show them that you can speak the +song-language, too." + +"What do you mean?" she said; "sing them something?" + +"Yes," he replied; "they'll try to talk to you in song, and you won't be +able to understand them; at least, not as far as words and sentences go. +But music is the universal language on Earth, and there's no reason why +it shouldn't be the same through the Solar System. Come along, tune up, +little woman!" + +They went together down the gangway stairs, he dressed in an ordinary +suit of grey, English tweed, with a golf cap on the back of his head, +and she in the last and daintiest of the costumes which the art of Paris +and London and New York had produced before the _Astronef_ soared up +from far-off Washington. + +The moment that she set foot on the golden-yellow sward she was +surrounded by a swarm of the winged, and yet strangely human creatures. +Those nearest to her came and touched her hands and face, and stroked +the folds of her dress. Others looked into her violet-blue eyes, and +others put out their queer little hands and stroked her hair. + +This and her clothing seemed to be the most wonderful experience for +them, saving always the fact that she had only two arms and no wings. +Redgrave kept close beside her until he was satisfied that these +exquisite inhabitants of the new-found fairyland were innocent of any +intention of harm, and when he saw two of the winged daughters of the +Love-Star put up their hands and touch the thick coils of her hair, he +said: + +"Take those pins and things out and let it down. They seem to think that +your hair's part of your head. It's the first chance you've had to work +a miracle, so you may as well do it. Show them the most beautiful thing +they've ever seen." + +"What babies you men can be when you get sentimental!" laughed Zaidie, +as she put her hands up to her head. "How do you know that this may not +be ugly in their eyes?" + +"Quite impossible!" he replied. "They're a great deal too pretty +themselves to think _you_ ugly. Let it down!" + +While he was speaking Zaidie had taken off a Spanish mantilla which she +had thrown over her head as she came out, and which the ladies of Venus +seemed to think was part of her hair. Then she took out the comb and one +or two hairpins which kept the coils in position, deftly caught the +ends, and then, after a few rapid movements of her fingers, she shook +her head, and the wondering crowd about her saw, what seemed to them a +shimmering veil, half gold, half silver, in the soft reflected light +from the cloud-veil, fall down from her head over her shoulders. + +They crowded still more closely round her, but so quietly and so gently +that she felt nothing more than the touch of wondering hands on her +arms, and dress, and hair. As Redgrave said afterwards, he was +"absolutely out of it." They seemed to imagine him to be a kind of +uncouth monster, possibly the slave of this radiant being which had come +so strangely from somewhere beyond the cloud-veil. They looked at him +with their golden-yellow eyes wide open, and some of them came up rather +timidly and touched his clothes, which they seemed to think were his +skin. + +Then one or two, more daring, put their little hands up to his face and +touched his moustache, and all of them, while both examinations were +going on, kept up a running conversation of cooing and singing which +evidently conveyed their ideas from one to the other on the subject of +this most marvellous visit of these two strange beings with neither +wings nor feathers, but who, most undoubtedly, had other means of +flying, since it was quite certain that they had come from another +world. + +Their ordinary speech was a low crooning note, like the language in +which doves converse, mingled with a twittering current of undertone. +But every moment it rose into higher notes, evidently expressing wonder +or admiration, or both. + +"You were right about the universal language," said Redgrave, when he +had submitted to the stroking process for a few moments. "These people +talk in music, and, as far as I can see or hear, their opinion of us, +or, at least, of you, is distinctly flattering. I don't know what they +take _me_ for, and I don't care, but as we'd better make friends with +them suppose you sing them 'Home, Sweet Home,' or the 'Swanee River.' I +shouldn't wonder if they consider our talking voices most horrible +discords, so you might as well give them something different." + +While he was speaking the sounds about them suddenly hushed, and, as +Redgrave said afterwards, it was something like the silence that follows +a cannon shot. Then, in the midst of the hush, Zaidie put her hands +behind her, looked up towards the luminous silver surface which formed +the only visible sky of Venus, and began to sing "The Swanee River." + +The clear, sweet notes rang up through the midst of a sudden silence. +The sons and daughters of the Love-Star instantly ceased their own soft +musical conversation, and Zaidie sang the old plantation song through +for the first time that a human voice had sung it to ears other than +human. + +As the last note thrilled sweetly from her lips she looked round at the +crowd of queer half-human shapes about her, and something in their +unlikeness to her own kind brought back to her mind the familiar scenes +which lay so far away, so many millions of miles across the dark and +silent Ocean of Space. + +Other winged figures, attracted by the sound of her singing, had crossed +the trees, and these, during the silence which came after the singing of +the song, were swiftly followed by others, until there were nearly a +thousand of them gathered about the side of the _Astronef_. + +There was no crowding or jostling among them. Each one treated every +other with the most perfect gentleness and courtesy. No such thing as +enmity or ill-feeling seemed to exist among them, and, in perfect +silence, they waited for Zaidie to continue what they thought was her +long speech of greeting. The temper of the throng somehow coincided +exactly with the mood which her own memories had brought to her, and the +next moment she sent the first line of "Home, Sweet Home" soaring up to +the cloud-veiled sky. + +As the notes rang up into the still, soft air a deeper hush fell on the +listening throng. Heads were bowed with a gesture almost of adoration, +and many of those standing nearest to her bent their bodies forward, and +expanded their wings, bringing them together over their breasts with a +motion which, as they afterwards learnt, was intended to convey the idea +of wonder and admiration, mingled with something like a sentiment of +worship. + +Zaidie sang the sweet old song through from end to end, forgetting for +the time being everything but the home she had left behind her on the +banks of the Hudson. As the last notes left her lips, she turned round +to Redgrave and looked at him with eyes dim with the first tears that +had filled them since her father's death, and said, as he caught hold of +her outstretched hand: + +"I believe they've understood every word of it." + +"Or, at any rate, every note. You may be quite certain of that," he +replied. "If you had done that on Mars it might have been even more +effective than the Maxims." + +"For goodness sake don't talk about things like that in a heaven like +this! Oh, listen! They've got the tune already!" + +It was true! The dwellers of the Love-Star, whose speech was song, had +instantly recognised the sweetness of the sweetest of all earthly songs. +They had, of course, no idea of the meaning of the words; but the music +spoke to them and told them that this fair visitant from another world +could speak the same speech as theirs. Every note and cadence was +repeated with absolute fidelity, and so the speech, common to the two +far-distant worlds, became a link connecting this wandering son and +daughter of the Earth with the sons and daughters of the Love-Star. + +The throng fell back a little and two figures, apparently male and +female, came to Zaidie and held out their right hands and began +addressing her in perfectly harmonised song, which, though utterly +unintelligible to her in the sense of speech, expressed sentiments which +could not possibly be mistaken, as there was a faint suggestion of the +old English song running through the little song-speech that they made, +and both Zaidie and her husband rightly concluded that it was intended +to convey a welcome to the strangers from beyond the cloud-veil. + +And then the strangest of all possible conversations began. Redgrave, +who had no more notion of music than a walrus, perforce kept silence. In +fact, he noticed with a certain displeasure which vanished speedily with +a musical, and half-malicious little laugh from Zaidie, that when he +spoke the Bird-Folk drew back a little and looked in something like +astonishment at him; but Zaidie was already in touch with them, and half +by song and half by signs she very soon gave them an idea of what they +were and where they had come from. Her husband afterwards told her that +it was the best piece of operatic acting he had ever seen, and, +considering all the circumstances, this was very possibly true. + +In the end the two who had come to give her what seemed to be the formal +greeting, were invited into the _Astronef_. They went on board without +the slightest sign of mistrust and with only an expression of mild +wonder on their beautiful and strangely childlike faces. + +Then, while the other doors were being closed, Zaidie stood at the open +one above the gangway and made signs showing that they were going up +beyond the clouds and then down into the valley, and as she made the +signs she sang through the scale, her voice rising and falling in +harmony with her gestures. The Bird-Folk understood her instantly, and +as the door closed and the _Astronef_ rose from the ground, a thousand +wings were outspread and presently hundreds of beautiful soaring forms +were circling about the Navigator of the Stars. + +"Don't they look lovely!" said Zaidie. "I wonder what they would think +if they could see us flying above New York or London or Paris with an +escort like this. I suppose they're going to show us the way. Perhaps +they have a city down there. Suppose you were to go and get a bottle of +champagne and see if Master Cupid and Miss Venus would like a drink. +We'll see then if our nectar is anything like theirs." + +Redgrave went below. Meanwhile, for lack of other possible conversation, +Zaidie began to sing the last verse of "Never Again." The melody almost +exactly described the upward motion of the _Astronef_, and she could see +that it was instantly understood, for when she had finished their two +voices joined in an almost exact imitation of it. + +When Redgrave brought up the wine and the glasses they looked at them +without any sign of surprise. The pop of the cork did not even make them +look round. + +"Evidently a semi-angelic people, living on nectar and ambrosia, with +nectar very like our own," he said, as he filled the glasses. "Perhaps +you'd better give it to them. They seem to understand you better than +they do me--you being, of course, a good bit nearer to the angels than I +am." + +"Thanks!" she said, as she took a couple of glasses up, wondering a +little what their visitors would do with them. Somewhat to her surprise, +they took them with a little bow and a smile and sipped at the wine, +first with a swift glint of wonder in their eyes, and then with smiles +which are unmistakable evidence of perfect appreciation. + +"I thought so," said Redgrave, as he raised his own glass, and bowed +gravely towards them. "This is our nearest approach to nectar, and they +seem to recognise it." + +"And don't they just look like the sort of people who live on it, and, +of course, other things?" added Zaidie, as she too lifted her glass, and +looked with laughing eyes across the brim at her two guests. + +But meanwhile Murgatroyd had been applying the repulsive force a little +too strongly. The _Astronef_ shot up with a rapidity which soon left her +winged escort far below. She entered the cloud-veil and passed beyond +it. The instant that the unclouded sun-rays struck the glass-roofing of +the deck-chamber their two guests, who had been moving about examining +everything with a childlike curiosity, closed their eyes and clasped +their hands over them, uttering little cries, tuneful and musical, but +still with a note of strange discord in them. + +"Lenox, we must go down again," exclaimed Zaidie. "Don't you see they +can't stand the light; it hurts them. Perhaps, poor dears, it's the +first time they've ever been hurt in their lives. I don't believe they +have any of our ideas of pain or sorrow or anything of that sort. Take +us back under the clouds--quick, or we may blind them." + +Before she had ceased speaking, Redgrave had sent a signal down to +Murgatroyd, and the _Astronef_ began to drop back again towards the +surface of the cloud-sea. Zaidie had, meanwhile, gone to her lady guest +and dropped the black lace mantilla over her head, and, as she did so, +she caught herself saying: + +"There, dear, we shall soon be back in your own light. I hope it hasn't +hurt you. It was very stupid of us to do a thing like that." + +The answer came in a little cooing murmur, which said, "Thank you!" +quite as effectively as any earthly words could have done, and then the +_Astronef_ passed through the cloud-sea. The soaring forms of her lost +escort came into view again and clustered about her; and, surrounded by +them, she dropped, in obedience to their signs, down between the +tremendous mountains and towards the island, thick with golden foliage, +which lay two or three Earth-miles out in a bay, where four converging +rivers spread out through a vast estuary into the sea. + +As Lady Redgrave said afterwards to Mrs. Van Stuyler, she could have +filled a whole volume with a description of the exquisitely arcadian +delights with which the hours of the next ten days and nights were +filled. Possibly if she had been able to do justice to them, even her +account might have been received with qualified credence; but still some +idea of them may be gathered from this extract of a conversation which +took place in the saloon of the _Astronef_ on the eleventh evening. + +"But look here, Zaidie," said Redgrave, "as we've found a world which is +certainly much more delightful than our own, why shouldn't we stop here +a bit? The air suits us and the people are simply enchanting. I think +they like us, and I'm sure you're in love with every one of them, male +and female. Of course, it's rather a pity that we can't fly unless we do +it in the _Astronef_. But that's only a detail. You're enjoying yourself +thoroughly, and I never saw you looking better or, if possible, more +beautiful; and why on Earth--or Venus--do you want to go?" + +She looked at him steadily for a few moments, and with an expression +which he had never seen on her face or in her eyes before, and then she +said slowly and very sweetly, although there was something like a note +of solemnity running through her tone: + +"I altogether agree with you, dear; but there is something which you +don't seem to have noticed. As you say, we have had a perfectly +delightful time. It's a delicious world, and just everything that one +would think it to be; but if we were to stop here we should be +committing one of the greatest of crimes, perhaps the greatest, that +ever was committed within the limits of the Solar System." + +"My dear Zaidie, what, in the name of what we used to call morals on the +Earth, _do_ you mean?" + +"Just this," she replied, leaning a little towards him in her +deck-chair. "These people, half angels, and half men and women, welcomed +us after we dropped through their cloud-veil, as friends; we were a +little strange to them, certainly, but still they welcomed us as +friends. They had no suspicions of us; they didn't try to poison us or +blow us up as those wretches on Mars did. They're just like a lot of +grown-up children with wings on. In fact they're about as nearly angels +as anything we can think of. They've taken us into their palaces, +they've given us, as one might say, the whole planet. Everything was +ours that we liked to take. You know we have two or three hundredweight +of precious stones on board now, which they would make me take just +because they saw my rings. + +"We've been living with them ten days now, and neither you nor I, nor +even Murgatroyd, who, like the old Puritan that he is, seems to see sin +or wrong in everything that looks nice, has seen a single sign among +them that they know anything about what we call sin or wrong on Earth. +There's no jealousy, no selfishness. In short, no envy, hatred, malice, +and all uncharitableness; no vice, or meanness, or cheating, or any of +the abominations of the planet Terra, and _we come from that planet_. Do +you see what I mean now?" + +"I think I understand what you're driving at," said Redgrave; "you mean, +I suppose, that this world is something like Eden before the fall, and +that you and I--oh--but that's all rubbish you know. I've got my own +share of original sin, of course, but here it doesn't seem to come in; +and as for you, the very idea of _you_ imagining yourself a feminine +edition of the Serpent in Eden. Nonsense!" + +She got up out of her chair and, leaning over his, put her arm round his +shoulder. Then she said very softly: + +"I see you understand what I mean, Lenox. That's just it--original sin. +It doesn't matter how good you think me or I think you, but we have it. +You're an Earth-born man and I'm an Earth-born woman, and, as I'm your +wife, I can say it plainly. We may think a good bit of each other, but +that's no reason why we might not be a couple of plague-spots in a +sinless world like this. Surely you see what I mean, I needn't put it +plainer, need I?" + +Their eyes met, and he read her meaning in hers. He put his arm up over +her shoulder and drew her down towards him. Their lips met, and then he +got up and went down to the engine-room. + +A couple of minutes later the _Astronef_ sprang upwards from the midst +of the delightful valley in which she was resting. No lights were shown. +In five minutes she had passed through the cloud-veil, and the next +morning when their new friends came to visit them and found that they +had vanished back into Space, there was sorrow for the first time among +the sons and daughters of the Love-Star. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +"Five hundred million miles from the Earth, and forty-seven million +miles from Jupiter," said Redgrave as he came into breakfast on the +morning of the twenty-eighth day after leaving Venus. + +During this brief period the _Astronef_ had recrossed the orbits of the +Earth and Mars and had passed through that marvellous region of the +Solar System, the Belt of the Asteroides. Nearly a hundred million miles +of their journey had lain through this zone in which hundreds and +possibly thousands of tiny planets revolve in vast orbits round the Sun. + +Then had come a world less void of over three hundred million miles, +through which they voyaged alone, surrounded by the ever-constant +splendours of the heavens, and visited only now and then by one of those +Spectres of Space, which we call comets. + +Astern the disc of the Sun steadily diminished and ahead the grey-blue +shape of Jupiter, the Giant of the Solar System, had grown larger and +larger until now they could see it as it had never been seen before--a +gigantic three-quarter moon filling up the whole heavens in front of +them almost from zenith to nadir. Three of its satellites, Europa, +Ganymede, and Calisto, were distinctly visible even to the naked eye, +and Europa and Ganymede, happened to be in such a position in regard to +the _Astronef_ that her crew could see not only the bright sides turned +towards the Sun, but also the black shadow-spots which they cast on the +cloud-veiled face of the huge planet. Calisto was above the horizon +hanging like a tiny flicker of yellowish-red light above the rounded +edge of Jupiter, and Io was invisible behind the planet. + +"Five hundred million miles!" said Zaidie, with a little shiver; "that +seems an awful long way from home--I mean America--doesn't it? I often +wonder what they are thinking about us on the dear old Earth. I don't +suppose any one ever expects to see us again. However, it's no good +getting homesick in the middle of a journey when you're outward bound. +And now what is the programme as regards His Majesty King Jove? We shall +visit the satellites of course?" + +"Certainly," replied Redgrave; "in fact, I shouldn't be surprised if our +visit was confined to them." + +"What! do you mean to say we shan't land on Jupiter after coming nearly +six hundred million miles to see him? That would be disappointing. But +why not? don't you think he's ready to be visited yet?" + +"I can't say that, but you must remember that no one has the remotest +notion of what there is behind the clouds or whatever they are which +form those bands. All we really know about Jupiter is that he is of +enormous size, for instance, he's over twelve hundred times bigger than +the Earth and that his density isn't much greater than that of +water--and my humble opinion is that if we're able to go through the +clouds without getting the _Astronef_ red-hot we shall find that Jupiter +is in the same state as the Earth was a good many million years ago." + +"I see," said Zaidie, "you mean just a mass of blazing, boiling rock and +metal which will make islands and continents some day; and that what we +call the cloud-bands are the vapours which will one day make its seas. +Well, if we can get through these clouds we ought to see something worth +seeing. Just fancy a whole world as big as that all ablaze like molten +iron! Do you think we shall be able to see it, Lenox?" + +"I'm not so sure about that, little woman. We shall have to go to work +rather cautiously. You see Jupiter is far bigger than any world we've +visited yet, and if we got too close to him the _Astronef's_ engines +might not be powerful enough to drive us away again. Then we should +either stop there till the R. Force was exhausted or be drawn towards +him and perhaps drop into an ocean of molten rock and metal." + +"Thanks!" said Zaidie, with a shrug of her shapely shoulders. "That +_would_ be an ignominious end to a journey like this, to say nothing of +the boiling oil part of it; so I suppose you'll make stopping-places of +the satellites and use their attraction to help you to resist His +Majesty's." + +"Your Ladyship's reasoning is perfect. I propose to visit them in turn, +beginning with Calisto. I shouldn't be at all surprised if we found +something interesting on them. You know they're quite little worlds of +themselves. They're all bigger than our moon, except Europa. Ganymede, +in fact, is two-thirds bigger than Mercury, and if old Jupiter is still +in a state of fiery incandescence there's no reason why we shouldn't +find on Ganymede or one of the others the same state of things that +existed on our moon when the Earth was blazing hot." + +"I shouldn't wonder," said Zaidie; "I've often heard my father say that +that was probably what happened. It's all very marvellous, isn't it? +death in one place, life in another, all beginnings and endings, and yet +no actual beginning or end of anything anywhere. That's eternity, I +suppose." + +"It's just about as near as the finite intellect can get to it, I should +say," replied Redgrave. "But I don't think metaphysics are much in our +line. If you've finished we may as well go and have a look at the +realities." + +"Which the metaphysicians," laughed Zaidie as she rose, "would tell you +are not realities at all, or only realities so far as you can think +about them. 'Thinks,' in short, instead of real things. But meanwhile +I've got the breakfast _things_ to put away, so you can go up on deck +and put the telescopes in order." + +When she joined him a few minutes later in the deck-chamber the +three-quarter disc of Jupiter was rapidly approaching the full. + +Its phases are invisible from the Earth owing to the enormous distance; +but from the deck of the _Astronef_ they had been plainly visible for +some days, and, since the huge planet turns on its axis in less than ten +hours, or with more than twice the speed of the Earth's rotation, the +phases followed each other very rapidly. + +Thus at twelve o'clock noon by _Astronef_ time they might have seen a +gigantic rim of silver-blue overarching the whole vault of heaven in +front of them. By five o'clock it would be a hemisphere, and by five +minutes to ten the vast sphere would be once more shining full-orbed +upon them. By eight o'clock next morning they would find Jupiter "new" +again. + +They were now falling very rapidly towards the huge planet, and, since +there is no up or down in Space, the nearer they got to it the more it +appeared to sink below them and become, as it were, the floor of the +Celestial Sphere. As the crescent approached the full they were able to +examine the mysterious bands as human observers had never examined them +before. For hours they sat almost silent at their telescopes, trying to +probe the mystery which has baffled human science since the days of +Galileo, and gradually it became plain that Redgrave was correct in the +hypothesis which he had derived from Flammarion and one or two others of +the more advanced astronomers. + +"I believe I was right, or, in other words, those that I got the idea +from are," he said, as they approached the orbit of Calisto, which +revolves at a distance of about eleven hundred thousand miles from the +surface of Jupiter. + +"Those belts are made of clouds or vapour in some stage or other. The +highest--the ones along the Equator and what we should call the +Temperate Zones--are the highest, and therefore coolest and whitest. The +dark ones are the lowest and hottest. I daresay they are more like what +we should call volcanic clouds. Do you see how they keep changing? +That's what's bothered our astronomers. Look at that big one yonder a +bit to the north, going from brown to red. I suppose that's something +like the famous red spot which they have been puzzling about. What do +you make of it?" + +"Well," said Zaidie, looking up from her telescope, "it's quite certain +that the glare must come from underneath. It can't be sunlight, because +the poor old Sun doesn't seem to have strength enough to make a decent +sunset or sunrise here, and look how it's running along to the westward! +What does that mean, do you think?" + +"I should say it means that some half-formed Jovian Continent has been +flung sky high by a big burst-up underneath, and that's the blaze of the +incandescent stuff running along. Just fancy a continent, say ten times +the size of Asia, being split up and sent flying in a few moments like +that. Look! there's another one to the north! On the whole, dear, I +don't think we should find the climate on the other side of those clouds +very salubrious. Still, as they say the atmosphere of Jupiter is about +ten thousand miles thick, we may be able to get near enough to see +something of what's going on. + +"Meanwhile, here comes Calisto. Look at his shadow flying across the +clouds. And there's Ganymede coming up after him, and Europa behind him. +Talk about eclipses! they must be about as common here as thunderstorms +are with us." + +"We don't have a thunderstorm every day--at least not at home," +corrected Zaidie, "but on Jupiter they must have two or three eclipses +every day. Meanwhile, there goes Jupiter himself. What a difference +distance makes! This little thing is only a trifle larger than our Moon, +and it's hiding everything else." + +As she was speaking the full-orbed disc of Calisto, measuring nearly +three thousand miles across, swept between them and the planet. It shone +with a clear, somewhat reddish light like that of Mars. The _Astronef_ +was feeling his attraction strongly, and Redgrave went to the levers and +turned on about a fifth of the R. Force to avoid too sudden contact with +it. + +"Another dead world!" said Redgrave, as the surface of Calisto revolved +swiftly beneath them, "or at any rate a dying one. There must be an +atmosphere of some sort, or else that snow and ice wouldn't be there, +and everything would be either black or white as it was on the Moon. We +may as well land, however, and get a specimen of the rocks and soil to +add to the museum, though I don't expect there will be very much to see +in the way of life." + +In another hour or so the _Astronef_ had dropped gently on to the +surface of Calisto at the foot of a range of mountains crowded with +jagged and splintery peaks, and a mile or two from the edge of a sea of +snow and ice which stretched away in a vast expanse of rugged frozen +billows beyond the horizon. Redgrave, as usual, went into the +air-chamber and tried the atmosphere. A second's experience of it was +enough for him. It was unbreathably thin and unbearably cold, although, +when mixed with the air of the _Astronef_, it distinctly freshened it +up. This proved that its composition was, or had been, fit for human +respiration. + +"There's only one fault about it," he said, when he rejoined Zaidie in +the sitting-room. "You know what the schoolboy said when he started +kissing his first sweetheart, 'It takes too long to get enough of it.'" + +"You seem to be very fond of referring to that particular subject, +Lenox." + +"Well, yes; to tell you the truth I am," and then he referred to it +again in another form. + +After this they went and put on their breathing-dresses and went for a +welcome stroll along the arid shores of the frozen sea after their +lengthy confinement to the decks of the _Astronef_. The Sun was still +powerful enough to keep them comfortably warm in their dresses, and +there was enough atmosphere to make this warmth diffused instead of +direct. So they were able to step out briskly, and every now and then +open their visors a little and take in a breath or two of the thin, +sharp air, which they found quite exhilarating when mixed with the air +supplied by their own oxygen apparatus. + +The attraction of the satellite being only a little more than that of +the Moon--or, say, about a fifth of that of the Earth--they were able to +get along with a series of hops, skips, and jumps which might have +looked rather ridiculous to terrestrial eyes, but which they found a +very pleasant mode of locomotion. They were also able to climb the +steepest mountainsides with no more trouble than they would have had in +walking along a terrestrial plain. + +On the heights they found no sign either of animal or vegetable +life--only rocks and gravel and sand of a brownish red, apparently +uniform in composition. They took a few lumps of rock and a canvas bag +full of sand back with them from the mountain-side. In the valley +sloping towards the ice-sea they found what had once been watercourses +opening out into rivers towards the sea; and in the lowest parts there +was a kind of lichen-growth clinging to the rocks under the snow. On the +surface of the snow they saw traces of what might have been the tracks +of animals, but, as there was no breath of wind in the attenuated +atmosphere, it was quite possible that these might have been frozen into +permanent shape hundreds or thousands of years before. It was also +possible that if they had explored long enough they might have found +some low forms of animal life, but as they had landed almost on the +equator of the satellite, under the full rays of the Sun, and seen +nothing, this was hardly likely. + +"I don't think it is worth while stopping here any longer," said Zaidie, +who was getting a little bit _blase_ with her interplanetary +experiences. "We've got lots to see further on, so if you don't mind I +think I'll just take two or three photographs, then we can get back to +the ship and have dinner and go on and see what Ganymede is like. He's +bigger than Mercury, and nearly as big as Mars, so we ought to find +something interesting there. This is only a sort of combination of the +Moon and the polar regions and I don't think very much of it. Suppose we +go back." + +"Just as your Ladyship pleases," laughed Redgrave over the wire which +connected their helmets, as, with joined hands, they turned back and +danced along the snow-covered ocean shore towards the _Astronef_. + +Zaidie took a couple of photographs of the mountain range and the +ice-sea and another one of the general landscape of Calisto as they rose +from the surface. Then, while she went to get lunch ready, Redgrave took +the pieces of rock and the bag of dust into the laboratory which opened +out of the main engine-room and analysed them. When he came out about an +hour later he saw Murgatroyd going through his beloved engines with an +oil-can and a piece of common cotton-waste which had come from a faraway +Yorkshire mill. + +"Andrew," he said, "should you be surprised if I told you that that moon +we've just left seems to be mostly made of a spongy sort of alloy of +gold and silver?" + +"My lord," said the old engineer, straightening himself up and looking +at him with eyes in which this announcement had not seemed to kindle a +spark of interest, "after what I have seen so far there's nothing +that'll surprise me unless it be that the grace of God allows us to get +back safely." + +"Amen, Andrew, that's well said," replied Redgrave, and then he went +back to the saloon and Murgatroyd went on with his oiling. + +When he told her ladyship of his discovery she just looked up from the +table she was laying and said: + +"Oh, indeed! Well, I'm very glad that it's five or six hundred million +miles from the Earth. A dead world bigger than the Moon, and made of +gold and silver sponge, wouldn't be a nice thing to have too near the +Earth. There's trouble enough about that sort of thing at home as it is. +Still, it'll be a nice addition to the museum, and if you'll put it away +and go and wash your hands lunch will be ready." + +When they got back to the deck-chamber Calisto was already a half moon +in the upper sky nearly five hundred thousand miles away, and the full +orb of Ganymede, shining with a pale golden light, lay outspread beneath +them. A thin, bluish-grey arc of the giant planet overarched its western +edge. + +"I think we shall find something like a world here," said her ladyship, +when she had taken her first look through her telescope; "there's an +atmosphere and what look like thin clouds. Continents and oceans too, or +something like them, and what is that light shining up between the +breaks? Isn't it something like our Aurora?" + +"It might be," replied Redgrave, turning his own telescope towards the +northern pole of Ganymede, "though I never heard of a satellite having +an aurora. Perhaps it's the Sun shining on the ice." + +As the _Astronef_ fell towards the surface of Ganymede she crossed his +northern pole, and the nearer they got the plainer it became that a +light very like the terrestrial Aurora was playing about it, +illuminating the thin, yellow clouds with a bluish-violet light, which +made magnificent contrasts of colouring amongst them. + +"Let us go down there and see what it's like," said Zaidie. "There must +be something nice under all those lovely colours." + +Redgrave checked the R. Force and the _Astronef_ fell obliquely across +the pole towards the equator. As they approached the luminous clouds +Redgrave turned it on again, and they sank slowly through a glowing mist +of innumerable colours, until the surface of Ganymede came into plain +view about ten miles below them. + +What they saw then was the strangest sight they had beheld since they +had left the Earth. As far as their eyes could reach the surface of the +Ganymede was covered with vast orderly patches, mostly rectangular, of +what they at first took for ice, but which they soon found to be a +something that was self-illuminating. + +"Glorified hot-houses, as I'm alive," exclaimed Redgrave. "Whole cities +under glass, fields, too, and lit by electricity or something very like +it. Zaidie, we shall find human beings down there." + +"Well, if we do I hope they won't be like the half-human things we found +on Mars! But isn't it all just lovely! Only there doesn't seem to be +anything outside the cities, at least nothing but bare, flat ground with +a few rugged mountains here and there. See, there's a nice level plain +there near the big glass city, or whatever it is. Suppose we go down +there." + +Redgrave checked the after engine which was driving them obliquely over +the surface of the satellite, and the _Astronef_ fell vertically towards +a bare, flat plain of what looked like deep yellow sand, which spread +for miles alongside one of the glittering cities of glass. + +"Oh, look, they've seen us!" exclaimed Zaidie. "I do hope they're going +to be as friendly as those dear people on Venus were." + +"I hope so," replied Redgrave, "but if they're not we've got the guns +ready." + +As he said this about twenty streams of an intense bluish light suddenly +shot up all round them, concentrating themselves upon the hull of the +_Astronef_, which was now about a mile and a half from the surface. The +light was so intense that the rays of the Sun were lost in it. They +looked at each other, and found that their faces looked almost perfectly +white in it. The plain and the city below had vanished. + +To look downwards was like staring straight into the focus of a ten +thousand candle-power electric arc lamp. It was so intolerable that +Redgrave closed the lower shutters, and meanwhile he found that the +_Astronef_ had ceased to descend. He shut off more of the R. Force, but +it produced no effect. The _Astronef_ remained stationary. Then he +ordered Murgatroyd to set the propellers in motion. The engineer pulled +the starting-levers, and then came up out of the engine-room and said to +him: + +"It's no good, my Lord; I don't know what devil's world we've got into +now, but they won't work. If I thought that engines could be +bewitched----" + +"Oh, nonsense, Andrew!" said his lordship rather testily. "It's +perfectly simple: those people down there, whoever they are, have got +some way of demagnetising us, or else they've got the R. Force too, and +they're applying it against us to stop us going down. Apparently they +don't want us. No, that's just to show us that they can stop us if they +want to. The light's going down. Begin dropping a bit. Don't start the +propellers, but just go and see that the guns are all right in case of +accidents." + +The old engineer nodded and went back to his engines, looking +considerably scared. As he spoke the brilliancy of the light faded +rapidly, and the _Astronef_ began to sink slowly towards the surface. + +As a precaution against their being allowed to drop with force enough to +cause a disaster, Redgrave turned the R. Force on again and they fell +slowly towards the plain, through what seemed like a halo of perfectly +white light. When she was within a couple of hundred yards of the ground +a winged car of exquisitely graceful shape rose from the roof of one of +the huge glass buildings nearest to them, flew swiftly towards them, and +after circling once round the dome of the upper deck, ran close +alongside. + +The car was occupied by two figures of distinctly human form but rather +more than human stature. Both were dressed in long, close-fitting +garments of what seemed like a golden brown fleece. Their heads were +covered with a close hood and their hands with gloves. + +"What an exceedingly handsome man!" said Zaidie, as one of them stood +up. "I never saw such a noble-looking face in my life; it's half +philosopher, half saint. Of course, you won't be jealous?" + +"Oh, nonsense!" he laughed. "It would be quite impossible to imagine +_you_ in love with either. But he is handsome, and evidently +friendly--there's no mistaking that. Answer him, Zaidie; you can do it +better than I can." + +The car had now come close alongside. The standing figure stretched its +hands out, palms upward, smiled a smile which Zaidie thought was very +sweetly solemn, next the head was bowed, and the gloved hands brought +back and crossed over his breast. Zaidie imitated the movements exactly. +Then, as the figure raised its head she raised hers, and she found +herself looking into a pair of large, luminous eyes such as she could +have imagined under the brows of an angel. As they met hers a look of +unmistakable wonder and admiration came into them. Redgrave was standing +just behind her; she took him by the hand and drew him beside her, +saying, with a little laugh: + +"Now, please look as pleasant as you can; I am sure they are very +friendly. A man with a face like that couldn't mean any harm." + +The figure repeated the motions to Redgrave, who returned them, perhaps +a trifle awkwardly. + +Then the car began to descend, and the figure beckoned to them to +follow. + +"You'd better go and wrap up, dear. From the gentleman's dress it seems +pretty cold outside; though the air is evidently quite breathable," said +Redgrave, as the _Astronef_ began to drop in company with the car. "At +any rate, I'll try it first, and if it isn't we can put on our +breathing-dresses." + +When Zaidie had made her winter toilet, and Redgrave had found the air +to be quite respirable, but of Arctic cold, they went down the gangway +ladder about twenty minutes later. The figure had got out of the car, +which was laying a few yards from them on the sandy plain, and came +forward to meet them with both hands outstretched. + +[Illustration: _Came forward to meet them with both hands outstretched._] + +Zaidie unhesitatingly held out hers, and a strange thrill ran through +her as she felt them for the first time clasped gently by other than +earthly hands, for the Venus folk had only been able to pat and stroke +with their gentle little paws, somewhat as a kitten might do. The figure +bowed its head again and said something in a low, melodious voice, which +was, of course, quite unintelligible save for the evident friendliness +of its tone. Then, releasing her hands, he took Redgrave's in the same +fashion, and then led the way towards a vast, domed building of +semi-opaque glass, or rather a substance that seemed to be something +like a mixture of glass and mica, which appeared to be one of the +entrance gates of the city. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +The wondering visitors from far-off Terra had hardly halted before the +magnificent portal when a huge sheet of frosted glass rose silently from +the ground. They passed through and it fell behind them. They found +themselves in a great oval ante-chamber along each side of which stood +triple rows of strangely shaped trees whose leaves gave off a subtle and +most agreeable scent. The temperature here was several degrees higher, +in fact about that of an English spring day, and Zaidie immediately +threw open her big fur cloak, saying: + +"These good people seem to live in Winter Gardens, don't they? I don't +think I shall want these things much while we're inside. I wonder what +dear old Andrew would have thought of this if we could have persuaded +him to leave the ship." + +They followed their host through the ante-chamber towards a magnificent +pointed arch raised on clusters of small pillars each of a differently +coloured, highly polished stone, which shone brilliantly in a light +which seemed to come from nowhere. Another door, this time of pale +transparent blue glass, rose as they approached; they passed under it, +and as it fell behind them half a dozen figures, considerably shorter +and slighter than their host, came forward to meet them. He took off his +gloves and cape and thick outer covering, and they were glad to follow +his example for the atmosphere was now that of a warm June day. + +The attendants, as they evidently were, took their wraps from them, +looking at the furs and stroking them with evident wonder; but with +nothing like the wonder which came into their big soft grey eyes when +they looked at Zaidie, who, as usual when she arrived on a new world, +was arrayed in one of her daintiest costumes. + +Their host was now dressed in a tunic of a light blue material, which +glistened with a lustre greater than that of the finest silk. It reached +a little below his knees, and was confined at the waist by a sash of the +same colour but of somewhat deeper hue. His feet and legs were covered +with stockings of the same material and colour, and his feet, which were +small for his stature and exquisitely shaped, were shod with thin +sandals of a material which looked like soft felt, and which made no +noise as he walked over the delicately coloured mosaic pavement of the +street--for such it actually was--which ran past the gate. + +When he removed his cape they expected to find that he was bald like the +Martians, but they were mistaken. His well-shaped head was covered with +long, thick hair of a colour something between bronze and grey. A broad +band of metal looking like light gold passed round the upper part of his +forehead, and from under this the hair fell in gentle waves to below his +shoulders. + +For a few moments Zaidie and Redgrave stared about them in frank and +silent wonder. They were standing in a broad street running in a +straight line to what seemed to be several miles along the edge of a +city of crystal. It was lined with double rows of trees with beds of +brilliantly coloured flowers between them. From this street others went +off at right angles and at regular intervals. The roof of the city +appeared to be composed of an infinity of domes of enormous extent, +supported by tall clusters of slender pillars standing at the street +corners. The general level of the roof seemed about three hundred feet +above the ground, and the summits of the domes some fifty feet higher. + +The houses, which were all square, were, as a rule, about forty feet +high. The roofs were covered with gardens and shrubberies, from which +creepers, bearing brillantly coloured leaves and flowers, hung down +about the windows in carefully arranged festoons. The walls were +composed of the opaque mica-like glass, relieved by pillars and arched +doorways and windows. The windows, of French form, were of clear glass, +and mostly stood open. A sweet, cool zephyr of hardly perceptible +strength appeared to be blowing along the street and over the house-tops +and in the vast airy space above the roofs. + +Brightly plumaged birds were flitting about among the branches of giant +trees, and keeping up a perpetual chorus of song. + +Presently their host touched Redgrave on the shoulder and pointed to a +four-wheeled car of light framework and exquisite design, containing +seats for four besides the driver, or guide, who sat behind. He held out +his hand to Zaidie, and handed her to one of the front seats just as an +Earth-born gentleman might have done. Then he motioned to Redgrave to +sit beside her, and mounted behind them. + +The car immediately began to move silently, but with considerable speed, +along the left-hand side of the outer street, which, like all the +others, was divided by narrow strips of russet-coloured grass and +flowering shrubs. + +In a few minutes it swung round to the right, crossed the road, and +entered a magnificent avenue, which, after a run of some four miles, +ended in a vast, park-like square, measuring at least a mile each way. + +The two sides of the avenue were busy with cars like their own, some +carrying six people, and others only the driver. Those on each side of +the road all went in the same direction. Those nearest to the broad +side-walks between the houses and the first row of trees went at a +moderate speed of five or six miles an hour, but along the inner sides, +near the central line of trees, they seemed to be running as high as +thirty miles an hour. Their occupants were nearly all dressed in clothes +made of the same glistening, silky fabric as their host wore, but the +colourings were of infinite variety. + +It was quite easy to distinguish between the sexes, although in stature +they were almost equal. The men were nearly all clothed as their host +was. The colours of their garments were quieter, and there was little +attempt at personal adornment, though many wore bands of an intensely +bright, sky-blue metal round their arms above the elbow, and others wore +belts and necklaces of links composed of this and two other metals +resembling gold and aluminum, but of an exceedingly high lustre. + +The women were dressed in flowing garments something after the Greek +style, but they were of brighter hues and much more lavishly embroidered +than the men's tunics were. They also wore much more jewellery. Indeed, +some of the younger ones glittered from head to foot with polished metal +and gleaming stones. There was one more difference which they quickly +noticed. The men's hair, like their host's, was nearly always wavy, but +that of the women, especially the younger, was a mass of either natural +or artificial curls, short and crisp about the head, and flowing down in +glistening ringlets to their waists. + +"Could any one ever have dreamt of such a lovely place?" said Zaidie, +after their wondering eyes had become accustomed to the marvels about +them, "and yet--oh dear, now I know what it reminds me of! Flammarion's +book, 'The End of the World,' where he describes the remnants of the +human race dying of cold and hunger on the Equator in places something +like this. I suppose the life of poor Ganymede is giving out, and that's +why they've got to live in magnified exposition buildings, poor things!" + +"Poor things!" laughed Redgrave. "I'm afraid I can't agree with you +there, dear. I never saw a jollier-looking lot of people in my life. I +daresay you're quite right, but they certainly seem to view their +approaching end with considerable equanimity." + +"Don't be horrid, Lenox! Fancy talking in that cold-blooded way about +such delightful-looking people as these, why, they are even nicer than +our dear bird-folk on Venus, and of course they are a great deal more +like ourselves." + +"Wherefore it stands to reason that they must be a great deal nicer!" he +replied, with a glance which brought a brighter flush to her cheeks. +Then he went on, "Ah, now I see the difference." + +"What difference? Between what?" + +"Between the daughter of Earth and the daughters of Ganymede," he +replied. "You can blush, and I don't think they can. Haven't you noticed +that, although they have the most exquisite skins and beautiful eyes and +hair and all that sort of thing, not a man or woman of them has any +colouring? I suppose that's the result of living for generations in a +hothouse." + +"Very likely," she said; "but has it struck you also that all the girls +and women are either beautiful or handsome, and all the men, except the +ones that seem to be servants or slaves, are something like Greek gods, +or, at least, the sort of men you see on the Greek sculptures?" + +"Survival of the fittest, I presume. These are probably the descendants +of the highest races of Ganymede; the people who conceived the idea of +prolonging the life of their race and were able to carry it out. The +inferior races would either perish of starvation or become their +servants. That's what will happen on Earth, and there is no reason why +it shouldn't have happened here." + +As he said this the car swung out round a broad curve into the centre of +the great square, and a little cry of amazement broke from Zaidie's lips +as her glance roamed over the multiplying splendours about her. + +In the centre of the square, in the midst of smooth lawns and +flower-beds of every conceivable shape and colour, and groves of +flowering trees, stood a great domed building, which they approached +through an avenue of overarching trees interlaced with flowering +creepers. + +The car stopped at the foot of a triple flight of stairs of dazzling +whiteness which led up to a broad arched doorway. Several groups of +people were sprinkled about the avenue and steps and the wide terrace +which ran along the front of the building. They looked with keen, but +perfectly well-mannered surprise at their strange visitors, and seemed +to be discussing their appearance; but not a step was taken towards +them, nor was there the slightest sign of anything like vulgar +curiosity. + +"What perfect manners these dear people have!" said Zaidie, as they +dismounted at the foot of the staircase. "I wonder what would happen if +a couple of them were to be landed from a motor-car in front of the +Capitol at Washington. I suppose this is their Capitol, and we've been +brought here to be put through our facings. What a pity we can't talk to +them! I wonder if they'd believe our story if we could tell it." + +"I've no doubt they know something of it already," replied Redgrave; +"they're evidently people of immense intelligence. Intellectually, I +daresay, we're mere children compared with them, and it's quite possible +that they have developed senses which we have no idea of." + +"And perhaps," added Zaidie, "all the time that we are talking to each +other our friend here is quietly reading everything that is going on in +our minds." + +Whether this was so or not their host gave no sign of comprehension. He +led them up the steps and through the great doorway, where he was met by +three splendidly dressed men even taller than himself. + +"I feel beastly shabby among all these gorgeously attired personages," +said Redgrave, looking down at his plain tweed suit, as they were +conducted with every manifestation of politeness along the magnificent +vestibule into which the door opened. + +"And I'm sure I am quite a dowdy in comparison with these lovely +creatures," added Zaidie, "although this dress was made in Paris. Lenox, +if things are for sale here you'll have to buy me one of those costumes, +and we'll take it back and get one made like it. I wonder what they'd +think of me dressed in one of those costumes at a ball at the +Waldorf-Astoria." + +Before he could make a suitable reply, a door at the end of the +vestibule opened and they were ushered into a large hall which was +evidently a council-chamber. At the further end of it were three +semi-circular rows of seats made of a polished silvery metal, and in the +centre and raised slightly above them another under a canopy of sky-blue +silk. This seat and six others were occupied by men of most venerable +aspect, in spite of the fact their hair was just as long and thick and +glossy as their host's or even as Zaidie's own. + +The ceremony of introduction was exceedingly simple. Though they could +not, of course, understand a word he said, it was evident from his +eloquent gestures that their host described the way in which they had +come from Space and landed on the surface of the World of the Crystal +Cities, as Zaidie subsequently re-christened Ganymede. + +The President of the Senate or Council spoke a few sentences in a deep +musical tone. Then their host, taking their hands, led them up to his +seat, and the President rose and took them by both hands in turn. Then, +with a grave smile of greeting, he bent his head and resumed his seat. +They joined hands in turn with each of the six senators present, bowed +their farewells in silence, and then went back with their host to the +car. + +They ran down the avenue, made a curving sweep round to the left--for +all the paths in the great square were laid in curves, apparently to +form a contrast to the straight streets--and presently stopped before +the porch of one of the hundred palaces which surrounded it. This was +their host's house, and their home during the rest of their sojourn on +Ganymede. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +The period of Ganymede's revolution round its gigantic primary is seven +days, three hours, and forty-three minutes, practically a terrestrial +week, and on their return to their native world both the daring +navigators of Space described this as the most interesting and +delightful week in their lives, excepting always the period which they +spent in the Eden of the Morning Star. Yet in one sense, it was even +more interesting. + +There the inhabitants had never learnt to sin; here they had learnt the +lesson that sin is mere foolishness, and that no really sensible or +properly educated man or woman thinks crime worth committing. + +The life of the Crystal Cities, of which they visited four in different +parts of the satellite, using the _Astronef_ as their vehicle, was one +of peaceful industry and calm, innocent enjoyment. It was quite plain +that their first impressions of this aged world were correct. Outside +the cities spread a universal desert on which life was impossible. There +was hardly any moisture in the thin atmosphere. The rivers had dwindled +into rivulets and the seas into vast, shallow marshes. The heat received +from the Sun was only about a twenty-fifth of that which falls on the +surface of the Earth, and this was drawn to the cities and collected and +preserved under their glass domes by a number of devices which displayed +superhuman intelligence. + +The dwindling supplies of water were hoarded in vast subterranean +reservoirs, and, by means of a perfect system of redistillation, the +priceless fluid was used over and over again both for human purposes and +for irrigating the land within the cities. Still the total quantity was +steadily diminishing, for it was not only evaporating from the surface, +but, as the orb cooled more and more rapidly towards its centre, it +descended deeper and deeper below the surface, and could now only be +reached by means of marvellously constructed borings and pumping +machinery which extended several miles below the surface. + +The fast-failing store of heat in the centre of the little world, which +had now cooled through more than half its bulk, was utilised for warming +the air of the cities, and to drive the machinery which propelled it +through the streets and squares. All work was done by electric energy +developed directly from this source, which also actuated the repulsive +engines which had prevented the _Astronef_ from descending. + +In short, the inhabitants of Ganymede were engaged in a steady, +ceaseless struggle to utilise the expiring natural forces of their world +to prolong their own lives and the exquisitely refined civilisation to +which they had attained to the latest possible date. They were, indeed, +in exactly the same position in which the distant descendants of the +human race may one day be expected to find themselves. + +Their domestic life, as Zaidie and Redgrave saw it while they were the +guests of their host, was the perfection of simplicity and comfort, and +their public life was characterised by a quiet but intense +intellectuality which, as Zaidie had said, made them feel very much like +children who had only just learnt to speak. + +As they possessed magnificent telescopes, far surpassing any on Earth, +their guests were able to survey, not only the Solar System, but the +other systems far beyond its limits as no others of their kind had ever +been able to do before. They did not look through or into the +telescopes. The lens was turned upon the object, and this was thrown, +enormously magnified, upon screens of what looked something like ground +glass some fifty feet square. It was thus that they saw, not only the +whole visible surface of Jupiter as he revolved above them and they +about him, but also their native Earth, sometimes a pale silver disc or +crescent close to the edge of the Sun, visible only in the morning and +the evening of Jupiter, and at other times like a little black spot +crossing the glowing surface. + +But there was another development of the science of the Crystal Cities +which interested them far more than this--for after all they could not +only see the Worlds of Space for themselves, but circumnavigate them if +they chose. + +During their stay they were shown on these same screens the pictorial +history of the world whose guests they were. These pictures, which they +recognised as an immeasurable development of what is called the +cinematograph process on Earth, extended through the whole gamut of the +satellite's life. They formed, in fact, the means by which the children +of Ganymede were taught the history of their world. + +It was, of course, inevitable that the _Astronef_ should prove an object +of intense interest to their hosts. They had solved the problem of the +Resolution of Forces, as Professor Rennick had done, and, as they were +shown pictorially, a vessel had been made which embodied the principles +of attraction and repulsion. It had risen from the surface of Ganymede, +and then, possibly because its engines could not develop sufficient +repulsive force, the tremendous pull of the giant planet had dragged it +away. It had vanished through the cloud-belts towards the flaming +surface beneath--and the experiment had never been repeated. + +Here, however, was a vessel which had actually, as Redgrave had +convinced his hosts by means of celestial maps and drawings of his own, +left a planet close to the Sun, and safely crossed the tremendous gulf +of six hundred and fifty million miles which separated Jupiter from the +centre of the system. Moreover, he had twice proved her powers by taking +his host and two of his newly-made friends, the chief astronomers of +Ganymede, on a short trip across Space to Calisto and Europa, the second +satellite of Jupiter, which, to their very grave interest, they found +had already passed the stage in which Ganymede was, and had lapsed into +the icy silence of death. + +It was these two journeys which led to the last adventure of the +_Astronef_ in the Jovian System. Both Redgrave and Zaidie had +determined, at whatever risk, to pass through the cloud-belts of +Jupiter, and catch a glimpse, if only a glimpse, of a world in the +making. Their host and the two astronomers, after a certain amount of +quiet discussion, accepted their invitation to accompany them, and on +the morning of the eighth day after their landing on Ganymede, the +_Astronef_ rose from the plain outside the Crystal City, and directed +her course towards the centre of the vast disc of Jupiter. + +She was followed by the telescopes of all the observatories until she +vanished through the brilliant cloud-band, eighty-five thousand miles +long and some five thousand miles broad, which stretched from east to +west of the planet. At the same moment the voyagers lost sight of +Ganymede and his sister satellites. + +The temperature of the interior of the _Astronef_ began to rise as soon +as the upper cloud-belt was passed. Under this, spread out a vast field +of brown-red cloud, rent here and there into holes and gaps like those +storm-cavities in the atmosphere of the Sun, which are commonly known as +sun-spots. This lower stratum of cloud appeared to be the scene of +terrific storms, compared with which the fiercest earthly tempests were +mere zephyrs. + +After falling some five hundred miles further they found themselves +surrounded by what seemed an ocean of fire, but still the internal +temperature had only risen from seventy to ninety-five. The engines were +well under control. Only about a fourth of the total R. Force was being +developed, and the _Astronef_ was dropping swiftly, but steadily. + +Redgrave, who was in the conning-tower controlling the engines, beckoned +to Zaidie and said: + +"Shall we go on?" + +"Yes," she said. "Now we've got as far as this I want to see what +Jupiter is like, and where you are not afraid to go, I'll go." + +"If I'm afraid at all it's only because you are with me, Zaidie," he +replied, "but I've only got a fourth of the power turned on yet, so +there's plenty of margin." + +The _Astronef_, therefore, continued to sink through what seemed to be a +fathomless ocean of whirling, blazing clouds, and the internal +temperature went on rising slowly but steadily. Their guests, without +showing the slightest sign of any emotion, walked about the upper deck +now, singly and now together, apparently absorbed by the strange scene +about them. + +At length, after they had been dropping for some five hours by +_Astronef_ time, one of them, uttering a sharp exclamation, pointed to +an enormous rift about fifty miles away. A dull, red glare was streaming +up out of it. The next moment the brown cloud-floor beneath them seemed +to split up into enormous wreaths of vapour, which whirled up on all +sides of them, and a few minutes later they caught their first glimpse +of the true surface of Jupiter. + +It lay, as nearly as they could judge, some two thousand miles beneath +them, a distance which the telescopes reduced to less than twenty; and +they saw for a few moments the world that was in the making. Through +floating seas of misty steam they beheld what seemed to them to be vast +continents shape themselves and melt away into oceans of flames. Whole +mountain ranges of glowing lava were hurled up miles high to take shape +for an instant and then fall away again, leaving fathomless gulfs of +fiery mist in their place. + +[Illustration: _Whole mountain ranges of glowing lava were hurled up +miles high._] + + +Then waves of molten matter rose up again out of the gulfs, tens of +miles high and hundreds of miles long, surged forward, and met with a +concussion like that of millions of earthly thunder-clouds. Minute after +minute they remained writhing and struggling with each other, flinging +up spurts of flaming matter far above their crests. Other waves followed +them, climbing up their bases as a sea-surge runs up the side of a +smooth, slanting rock. Then from the midst of them a jet of living fire +leapt up hundreds of miles into the lurid atmosphere above, and then, +with a crash and a roar which shook the vast Jovian firmament, the +battling lava-waves would split apart and sink down into the +all-surrounding fire-ocean, like two grappling giants who had strangled +each other in their final struggle. + +"It's just Hell let loose!" said Murgatroyd to himself as he looked down +upon the terrific scene through one of the port-holes of the +engine-room; "and, with all respect to my lord and her ladyship, those +that come this near almost deserve to stop in it." + +Meanwhile, Redgrave and Zaidie and their three guests were so absorbed +in the tremendous spectacle, that for a few moments no one noticed that +they were dropping faster and faster towards the world which Murgatroyd, +according to his lights, had not inaptly described. As for Zaidie, all +her fears were for the time being lost in wonder, until she saw her +husband take a swift glance round upwards and downwards, and then go up +into the conning-tower. She followed him quickly, and said: + +"What is the matter, Lenox, are we falling too quickly?" + +"Much faster than we should," he replied, sending a signal to Murgatroyd +to increase the force by three-tenths. + +The answering signal came back, but still the _Astronef_ continued to +fall with terrific rapidity, and the awful landscape beneath them--a +landscape of fire and chaos--broadened out and became more and more +distinct. + +He sent two more signals down in quick succession. Three-fourths of the +whole repulsive power of the engines was now being exerted--a force +which would have been sufficient to hurl the _Astronef_ up from the +surface of the Earth like a feather in a whirlwind. Her downward course +became a little slower, but still she did not stop. Zaidie, white to the +lips, looked down upon the hideous scene beneath and slipped her hand +through Redgrave's arm. He looked at her for an instant and then turned +his head away with a jerk, and sent down the last signal. + +The whole energy of the engines was now directing the maximum of the R. +Force against the surface of Jupiter, but still, as every moment passed +in a speechless agony of apprehension, it grew nearer and nearer. The +fire-waves mounted higher and higher, the roar of the fiery surges grew +louder and louder. Then in a momentary lull, he put his arm round her, +drew her close up to him and kissed her and said: + +"That's all we can do, dear. We've come too close and he's too strong +for us." + +She returned his kiss and said quite steadily: + +"Well, at any rate, I'm with you, and it won't last long, will it?" + +"Not very long now, I'm afraid," he said between his clenched teeth. And +then he pulled her close to him again, and together they looked down +into the storm-tossed hell towards which they were falling at the rate +of nearly a hundred miles a minute. + +Almost the next moment they felt a little jerk beneath their feet--a +jerk upwards; and Redgrave shook himself out of the half stupor into +which he was falling and said: + +"Hullo, what's that? I believe we're stopping--yes, we are--and we're +beginning to rise, too. Look, dear, the clouds are coming down upon +us--fast too! I wonder what sort of miracle that is. Ay, what's the +matter, little woman?" + +Zaidie's head had dropped heavily on his shoulder. A glance showed him +that she had fainted. He could do nothing more in the conning-tower, so +he picked her up and carried her towards the companion-way, past his +three guests, who were standing in the middle of the upper deck round a +table on which lay a large sheet of paper. + +He took her below and laid her on her bed, and in a few minutes he had +brought her to and told her that it was all right. Then he gave her a +drink of brandy-and-water and went back to the upper deck. As he reached +the top of the stairway one of the astronomers came towards him with a +sheet of paper in his hand, smiling gravely, and pointing to a sketch +upon it. + +He took the paper under one of the electric lights and looked at it. The +sketch was a plan of the Jovian System. There were some signs written +along one side, which he did not understand, but he divined that they +were calculations. Still, there was no mistaking the diagram. There was +a circle representing the huge bulk of Jupiter; there were four smaller +circles at varying distances in a nearly straight line from it, and +between the nearest of these and the planet was the figure of the +_Astronef_, with an arrow pointing upwards. + +"Ah, I see!" he said, forgetting for a moment that the other did not +understand him, "that was the miracle! The four satellites came into +line with us just as the pull of Jupiter was getting too much for our +engines, and their combined pull just turned the scale. Well, thank God +for that, sir, for in a few minutes more we should have been cinders!" + +The astronomer smiled again as he took the paper back. Meanwhile the +_Astronef_ was rushing upward like a meteor through the clouds. In ten +minutes the limits of the Jovian atmosphere were passed. Stars and suns +and planets blazed out of the black vault of Space, and the great disc +of the World that Is to Be once more covered the floor of Space beneath +them--an ocean of cloud, covering continents of lava and seas of flame, +the scene of the natal throes of a world which some day will be. + +They passed Io and Europa, which changed from new to full moons as they +sped by towards the Sun, and then the golden yellow crescent of Ganymede +also began to fill out to the half and full disc, and by the tenth hour +of Earth-time, after they had risen from its surface, the _Astronef_ was +once more lying beside the gate of the Crystal City. + +At midnight on the second night after their return, the ringed shape of +Saturn, attended by his eight satellites, hung in the zenith +magnificently inviting. The _Astronef's_ engines had been replenished +after the exhaustion of their struggle with the might of Jupiter. They +said farewell to their friends of the dying world. The doors of the +air-chamber closed. The signal tinkled in the engine-room, and a few +moments later a blurr of white lights on the brown background of the +surrounding desert was all they could see of the Crystal City under +whose domes they had seen and learnt so much. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +The relative position of the two giants of the Solar System at the +moment when the _Astronef_ left the surface of Ganymede, was such that +she had to make a journey of rather more than 340,000,000 miles before +she passed within the confines of the Saturnine System. + +At first her speed, as shown by the observations which Redgrave took +with the instruments which Professor Rennick had designed for the +purpose, was comparatively slow. This was due to the tremendous pull of +Jupiter and its four moons on the fabric of the vessel. The backward +drag rapidly decreased as the pull of Saturn and his system began to +overmaster that of Jupiter. + +It so happened, too, that Uranus, the next outer planet of the Solar +System, 1,700,000,000 miles away from the Sun, was approaching its +conjunction with Saturn, and so assisted in producing a constant +acceleration of speed. + +Jupiter and his satellites dropped behind, sinking, as it seemed to the +wanderers, down into the bottomless gulf of Space, but still forming by +far the most brilliant and splendid object in the skies. The far-distant +Sun, which, seen from the Saturnian System, has only about a nineteenth +of the superficial extent which it presents to the Earth, dwindled away +rapidly until it began to look like a huge planet, with the Earth, +Venus, Mars, and Mercury as satellites. Beyond the orbit of Saturn, +Uranus, with his eight moons, was shining with the lustre of a star of +the first magnitude, and far above and beyond him again hung the pale +disc of Neptune, the Outer Guard of the Solar System, separated from the +Sun by a gulf of more than 2,750,000,000 miles. + +When two-thirds of the distance between Jupiter and Saturn had been +traversed, Ringed Orb lay beneath them like a vast globe surrounded by +an enormous circular ocean of many-coloured fire, divided, as it were, +by circular shores of shade and darkness. On the side opposite to them a +gigantic conical shadow extended beyond the confines of the ocean of +light. It was the shadow of half the globe of Saturn cast by the Sun +across his rings. Three little dark spots were also travelling across +the surface of the rings. They were the shadows of Mimas, Enceladus, and +Tethys, the three inner satellites. Japetus, the most distant, which +revolves at a distance ten times greater than that of the Moon from the +Earth, was rising to their left above the edge of the rings, a pale, +yellow, little disc shining feebly against the black background of +Space. The rest of the eight satellites were hidden behind the enormous +bulk of the planet and the infinitely vaster area of the rings. + +Day after day Zaidie and her husband had been exhausting the +possibilities of the English language in attempting to describe to each +other the multiplying marvels of the wondrous scene which they were +approaching at a speed of more than a hundred miles a second, and at +length Zaidie, after nearly an hour's absolute silence, during which +they sat with eyes fastened to their telescopes, looked up and said: + +"It's no use, Lenox, all the fine words that we've been trying to think +of have just been wasted. The angels may have a language that you could +describe that in, but we haven't. If it wouldn't be something like +blasphemy I should drop down to the commonplace, and call Saturn a +celestial spinning-top, with bands of light and shadow instead of +colours all round it." + +"Not at all a bad simile either," laughed Redgrave, as he got up from +his chair with a yawn and a stretch of his long limbs, "still, it's as +well that you said celestial, for, after all, that's about the best word +we've found yet. Certainly the Ringed World is the most nearly heavenly +thing we've seen so far. + +"But," he went on, "I think it's about time we were stopping this +headlong fall of ours. Do you see how the landscape is spreading out +round us? That means that we are dropping pretty fast. Whereabouts would +you like to land? At present we're heading straight for Saturn's north +pole." + +"I think I'd rather see what the rings are like first," said Zaidie; +"couldn't we go across them?" + +"Certainly we can," he replied, "only we'll have to be a bit careful." + +"Careful, what of--collisions? Are you thinking of Proctor's hypothesis +that the rings are formed of multitudes of tiny satellites?" + +"Yes, but I should go a little farther than that, I should say that his +rings and his eight satellites are to Saturn what the planets generally +and the ring of the Asteroides are to the Sun, and if that is the +case--I mean if we find the rings made up of myriads of tiny bodies +flying round with Saturn--it might get a bit risky. + +"You see the outside ring is a bit over 160,000 miles across, and it +revolves in less than eleven hours. In other words we might find the +ring a sort of celestial maelstrom, and if we once got into the whirl, +and Saturn exerted his full pull on us, we might become a satellite, +too, and go on swinging round with the rest for a good bit of eternity." + +"Very well then," she said, "of course we don't want to do anything of +that sort, but there's something else I think we could do," she went on, +taking up a copy of Proctor's "Saturn and its System," which she had +been reading just after breakfast. "You see those rings are, all +together, about 10,000 miles broad; there's a gap of about 1,700 miles +between the big dark one and the middle bright one, and it's nearly +10,000 miles from the edge of the bright ring to the surface of Saturn. +Now why shouldn't we get in between the inner ring and the planet? If +Proctor was right and the rings are made of tiny satellites and there +are myriads of them, of course they'll pull up while Saturn pulls down. +In fact Flammarion says somewhere that along Saturn's equator there is +no weight at all." + +"Quite possible," replied Redgrave, "and, if you like, we'll go and +prove it. Of course, if the _Astronef_ weighs absolutely nothing between +Saturn and the rings, we can easily get away. The only thing that I +object to is getting into this 170,000-mile vortex, being whizzed round +with Saturn every ten and a half hours, and sauntering round the Sun at +21,000 miles an hour." + +"Don't!" she said. "Really it isn't good to think about these things, +situated as we are. Fancy, in a single year of Saturn there are nearly +25,000 Earth-days. Why, we should each of us be about thirty years older +when we got round, even if we lived, which, of course, we shouldn't. By +the way, how long could we live for, if the worst came to the worst?" + +"Given water, about one Earth-year at the outside;" "but, of course, we +shall be home long before that." + +"If we don't become one of the satellites of Saturn," she replied, "or +get dragged away by something into the outer depths of Space." + +Meanwhile the downward speed of the _Astronef_ had been considerably +checked. The vast circle of the rings seemed to suddenly expand, and +soon it covered the whole floor of the Vault of Space. + +As she dropped towards what might be called the limit of the northern +tropic of Saturn, the spectacle presented by the rings became every +minute more and more marvellous--purple and silver, black and gold, +dotted with myriads of brilliant points of many-coloured light, they +stretched upwards like vast rainbows into the Saturnian sky as the +_Astronef's_ position changed with regard to the horizon of the planet. +The nearer they approached the surface, the nearer the gigantic arch of +the many-coloured rings approached the zenith. Sun and stars sank down +behind it, for now they were dropping through the fifteen-year-long +twilight that reigns over that portion of the globe of Saturn which, +during half of his year of thirty terrestrial years, is turned away from +the Sun. + +The further they fell towards the rings the more certain it became that +the theory of the great English astronomer was the correct one. Seen +through the telescopes at a distance of only thirty or forty thousand +miles, it became perfectly plain that the outer or darker ring as seen +from the Earth was composed of myriads of tiny bodies so far separated +from each other that the rayless blackness of Space could be seen +through them. + +"It's quite evident," said Redgrave, after a long look through his +telescope, "that those are rings of what we should call meteorites on +Earth, atoms of matter which Saturn threw off into Space after the +satellites were formed." + +"And I shouldn't wonder, if you will excuse my interrupting you," said +Zaidie, "if the moons themselves have been made up of a lot of these +things going together when they were only gas, or nebula, or something +of that sort. In fact, when Saturn was a good deal younger than he is +now, he may have had a lot more rings and no moons, and now these +aerolites, or whatever they are, can't come together and make moons, +because they've got too solid." + +Meanwhile the _Astronef_ was rapidly approaching that portion of +Saturn's surface which was illuminated by the rays of the Sun, streaming +under the lower arch of the inner ring. + +As they passed under it the whole scene suddenly changed. The rings +vanished. Overhead was an arch of brilliant light a hundred miles thick, +spanning the whole of the visible heavens. Below lay the sunlit surface +of Saturn divided into light and dark bands of enormous breadth. + +The band immediately below them was of a brilliant silver-grey, very +much like the central zone of Jupiter. North of this on the one side +stretched the long shadow of the rings, and southward other bands of +alternating white and gold and deep purple succeeded each other till +they were lost in the curvature of the vast planet. The poles were of +course invisible since the _Astronef_ was now too near the surface; but +on their approach they had seen unmistakable evidence of snow and ice. + +As soon as they were exactly under the Ring-arch, Redgrave shut off the +R. Force, and, somewhat to their astonishment, the _Astronef_ began to +revolve slowly on its axis, giving them the idea that the Saturnian +System was revolving round them. The arch seemed to sink beneath their +feet while the belts of the planet rose above them. + +"What on earth is the matter?" said Zaidie. "Everything has gone upside +down." + +"Which shows," replied Redgrave, "that as soon as the _Astronef_ became +neutral the rings pulled harder than the planet, I suppose because we're +so near to them, and, instead of falling on to Saturn, we shall have to +push up at him." + +"Oh yes, I see that," said Zaidie, "but after all it does look a little +bit bewildering, doesn't it, to be on your feet one minute and on your +head the next?" + +"It is, rather; but you ought to be getting accustomed to that sort of +thing now. In a few minutes neither you, nor I, nor anything else will +have any weight. We shall be just between the attraction of the rings +and Saturn, so you'd better go and sit down, for if you were to give a +bit of an extra spring in walking you might be knocking that pretty head +of yours against the roof," said Redgrave, as he went to turn the R. +Force on to the edge of the rings. + +A vast sea of silver cloud seemed now to descend upon them. Then they +entered it, and for nearly half an hour the _Astronef_ was totally +enveloped in a sea of pearl-grey luminous mist. + +"Atmosphere!" said Redgrave, as he went to the conning-tower and +signalled to Murgatroyd to start the propellers. They continued to rise +and the mist began to drift past them in patches, showing that the +propellers were driving them ahead. + +They now rose swiftly towards the surface of the planet. The cloud-wrack +got thinner and thinner, and presently they found themselves floating in +a clear atmosphere between two seas of cloud, the one above them being +much less dense than the one below. + +"I believe we shall see Saturn on the other side of that," said Zaidie, +looking up at it. "Oh dear, there we are going round again." + +"Reaching the point of neutral attraction," said Redgrave; "once more +you'd better sit down in case of accidents." + +Instead of dropping into her deck-chair as she would have done on Earth, +she took hold of the arms and pulled herself into it, saying: + +"Really, it seems rather absurd to have to do this sort of thing. Fancy +having to hold yourself into a chair. I suppose I hardly weigh anything +at all now." + +"Not much," said Redgrave, stooping down and taking hold of the end of +the chair with both hands. Without any apparent effort he raised her +about five feet from the floor, and held her there while the _Astronef_ +made another revolution. For a moment he let go, and she and the chair +floated between the roof and the floor of the deck-chamber. Then he +pulled the chair away from under her, and as the floor of the vessel +once more turned towards Saturn, he took hold of her hands and brought +her to her feet on deck again. + +[Illustration: _Without any apparent effort he raised her about five +feet from the floor._] + +"I ought to have had a photograph of you like that!" he laughed. "I +wonder what they'd think of it at home?" + +"If you had taken one I should certainly have broken the negative. The +very idea--a photograph of me standing on nothing! Besides, they'd never +believe it on Earth." + +"We might have got old Andrew to make an affidavit as to the true +circumstances," he began. + +"Don't talk nonsense, Lenox! Look! there's something much more +interesting. There's Saturn at last. Now I wonder if we shall find any +sort of life there--and shall we be able to breathe the air?" + +"I hardly think so," he said, as the _Astronef_ dropped slowly through +the thin cloud-veil. "You know spectrum analysis has proved that there +is a gas in Saturn's atmosphere which we know nothing about, and, +however good it may be for the Saturnians, it's not very likely that it +would agree with us, so I think we'd better be content with our own. +Besides, the atmosphere is so enormously dense that even if we could +breathe it it might squash us up. You see we're only accustomed to +fifteen pounds on the square inch, and it may be hundreds of pounds +here." + +"Well," said Zaidie, "I haven't got any particular desire to be +flattened out, or squeezed dry like an orange. It's not at all a nice +idea, is it? But look, Lenox," she went on, pointing downwards, "surely +this isn't air at all, or at least it's something between air and water. +Aren't those things swimming about in it--something like fish in the +sea? They can't be clouds, and they aren't either fish or birds. They +don't fly or float. Well, this is certainly more wonderful than anything +else we've seen, though it doesn't look very pleasant. They're not +nice-looking, are they? I wonder if they are at all dangerous!" + +While she was saying this Zaidie had gone to her telescope, and was +sweeping the surface of Saturn, which was now about a hundred miles +distant. Her husband was doing the same. In fact, for the time being +they were all eyes, for they were looking on a stranger sight than man +or woman had ever seen before. + +Underneath the inner cloud-veil the atmosphere of Saturn appeared to +them somewhat as the lower depths of the ocean would appear to a diver, +granted that he was able to see for hundreds of miles about him. Its +colour was a pale greenish yellow. The outside thermometers showed that +the temperature was a hundred and seventy-five Fahrenheit. In fact, the +interior of the _Astronef_ was getting uncomfortably like a Turkish +bath, and Redgrave took the opportunity of at once freshening and +cooling the air by releasing a little oxygen from the cylinders. + +From what they could see of the surface of Saturn it seemed to be a dead +level, greyish brown in colour, and not divided into oceans and +continents. In fact there were no signs whatever of water within range +of their telescopes. There was nothing that looked like cities, or any +human habitations, but the ground, as they got nearer to it, seemed to +be covered with a very dense vegetable growth, not unlike gigantic forms +of seaweed, and of somewhat the same colour. In fact, as Zaidie +remarked, the surface of Saturn was not at all unlike what the floors of +the ocean of the Earth might be if they were laid bare. + +It was evident that the life of this portion of Saturn was not what, for +want of a more exact word, might be called terrestrial. Its inhabitants, +however they were constituted, floated about in the depths of this +semi-gaseous ocean as the denizens of earthly seas did in the +terrestrial oceans. Already their telescopes enabled them to make out +enormous moving shapes, black and grey-brown and pale red, swimming +about, evidently by their own volition, rising and falling and often +sinking down on to the gigantic vegetation which covered the surface, +possibly for the purpose of feeding. But it was also evident that they +resembled the inhabitants of earthly oceans in another respect, since it +was easy to see that they preyed upon each other. + +"I don't like the look of those creatures at all," said Zaidie, when the +_Astronef_ had come to a stop and was floating about ten miles above the +surface. "They're altogether too uncanny. They look to me something like +jelly-fish about the size of whales, only they have eyes and mouths. Did +you ever see such awful-looking eyes, bigger than soup-plates and as +bright as a cat's. I suppose that's because of the dim light. And the +nasty wormy sort of way they swim, or fly, or whatever it is. Lenox, I +don't know what the rest of Saturn may be like, but I certainly don't +like this part. It's quite too creepy and unearthly for my taste. Look +at the horrors fighting and eating each other. That's the only bit of +earthly character they've got about them; the big ones eating the little +ones. I hope they won't take the _Astronef_ for something nice to eat." + +"They'd find her a pretty tough morsel if they did," laughed Redgrave, +"but still we may as well get some steering way on her in case of +accident." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +A few moments later he sent a signal to Murgatroyd in the engine-room. +The propellers began to revolve slowly, beating the dense air and +driving the _Astronef_ at a speed of about twenty miles an hour through +the depths of this strangely peopled ocean. + +They approached nearer and nearer to the surface, and as they did so the +uncanny creatures about them grew more and more numerous. They were +certainly the most extraordinary living things that human eyes had ever +looked upon. Zaidie's comparison to the whale and the jelly-fish was by +no means incorrect; only when they got near enough to them they found, +to their astonishment, that they were double-headed--that is to say, +they had a head with a mouth, nostrils, ear-holes, and eyes at each end +of their bodies. + +The larger of the creatures appeared to have a certain amount of respect +for each other. Now and then they witnessed a battle-royal between two +of the monsters who were pursuing the same prey. Their method of attack +was as follows: The assailant would rise above his opponent or prey, and +then, dropping on to its back, envelop it and begin tearing at its sides +and under parts with huge beak-like jaws, somewhat resembling those of +the largest kind of the earthly octopus, only infinitely more +formidable. The substance composing their bodies appeared to be not +unlike that of a terrestrial jelly-fish, but much denser. It seemed from +their motions to have the tenacity of soft indiarubber save at the +headed ends, where it was much harder. The necks were protected for +about fifty feet by huge scales of a dull, greenish hue. + +When one of them had overpowered an enemy or a victim the two sank down +into the vegetation, and the victor began to eat the vanquished. Their +means of locomotion consisted of huge fins, or rather half-fins, +half-wings, of which they had three laterally arranged behind each head, +and four much longer and narrower, above and below, which seemed to be +used mainly for steering purposes. + +They moved with equal ease in either direction, and they appeared to +rise or fall by inflating or deflating the middle portions of their +bodies, somewhat as fish do with their swimming bladders. + +The light in the lower regions of this strange ocean was dimmer than +earthly twilight, although the _Astronef_ was steadily making her way +beneath the arch of the rings towards the sunlit hemisphere. + +"I wonder what the effect of the searchlight would be on these fellows!" +said Redgrave. "Those huge eyes of theirs are evidently only suited to +dim light. Let's try and dazzle some of them." + +"I hope it won't be a case of the moths and the candle!" said Zaidie. +"They don't seem to have taken much interest in us so far. Perhaps they +haven't been able to see properly, but suppose they were attracted by +the light and began crowding round us and fastening on to us, as the +horrible things do with each other. What should we do then? They might +drag us down and perhaps keep us there; but there's one thing, they'd +never eat us, because we could keep closed up and die respectably +together." + +"Not much fear of that, little woman," he said, "we're too strong for +them. Hardened steel and toughened glass ought to be more than a match +for a lot of exaggerated jelly-fish like these," said Redgrave, as he +switched on the head searchlight. "We've come here to see strange things +and we may as well see them. Ah, would you, my friend. No, this is not +one of your sort, and it isn't meant to eat." + +An enormous double-headed monster, apparently some four hundred feet +long, came floating towards them as the searchlight flashed out, and +others began instantly to crowd about them, just as Zaidie had feared. + +"Lenox, for Heaven's sake be careful!" cried Zaidie, shrinking up beside +him as the huge, hideous head, with its saucer eyes and enormous +beak-like jaws wide open, came towards them. "And look! there are more +coming. Can't we go up and get away from them?" + +"Wait a minute, little woman," replied Redgrave, who was beginning to +feel the passion of adventure thrilling along his nerves. "If we fought +the Martian air fleet and licked it I think we can manage these things. +Let's see how he likes the light." + +As he spoke he flashed the full glare of the five thousand candle-power +lamp full on to the creature's great cat-like eyes. Instantly it bent +itself up into an arc. The two heads, each the exact image of the other, +came together. The four eyes glared half-dazzled into the conning-tower, +and the four fearful jaws snapped viciously together. + +"Lenox, Lenox, for goodness' sake let us go up!" cried Zaidie, shrinking +still closer to him. "That thing's too horrible to look at." + +"It is a beast, isn't it?" he said; "but I think we can cut him in two +without much trouble." + +He signalled for full speed. The _Astronef_ ought to have sprung forward +and driven her ram through the huge, brick-red body of the hideous +creature which was now only a couple of hundred yards from them; but +instead of that a slow, jarring, grinding thrill seemed to run through +her, and she stopped. The next moment Murgatroyd put his head up through +the companion-way which led from the upper deck to the conning-tower, +and said, in a tone whose calm indicated, as usual, resignation to the +worst that could happen: + +"My Lord, two of those beasts, fishes or live balloons, or whatever they +are, have come across the propellers. They're cut up a good bit, but +I've had to stop the engines, and they're clinging all round the after +part. We're going down, too. Shall I disconnect the propellers and turn +on the repulsion?" + +"Yes, certainly, Andrew!" cried Zaidie, "and all of it, too. Look, +Lenox, that horrible thing is coming. Suppose it broke the glass, and we +couldn't breathe this atmosphere!" + +As she spoke the enormous, double-headed body advanced until it +completely enveloped the forward part of the _Astronef_. The two hideous +heads came close to the sides of the conning-tower; the huge, palely +luminous eyes looked in upon them. Zaidie, in her terror, even thought +that she saw something like human curiosity in them. + +[Illustration: _The huge palely luminous eyes looked in upon them._] + +Then, as Murgatroyd disappeared to obey the orders which Redgrave had +sanctioned with a quick nod, the heads approached still closer, and she +heard the ends of the pointed jaws, which she now saw were armed with +shark-like teeth, striking against the thick glass walls of the +conning-tower. + +"Don't be frightened, dear!" he said, putting his arm round her, just as +he had done when they thought they were falling into the fiery seas of +Jupiter. "You'll see something happen to this gentleman soon. Big and +all as he is there won't be much left of him in a few minutes. They are +like those monsters they found in the lowest depths of our own seas. +They can only live under tremendous pressure. That's why we didn't find +any of them up above. This chap'll burst like a bubble presently. +Meanwhile, there's no use in stopping here. Suppose you go below and +brew some coffee and bring it up on deck while I go and see how things +are looking aft. It doesn't do you any good, you know, to be looking at +monsters of this sort. You can see what's left of them later on. You +might bring the cognac decanter up too." + +Zaidie was not at all sorry to obey him, for the horrible sight had +almost sickened her. + +They were still under the arch of the rings, and so, when the full +strength of the R. Force was directed against the body of Saturn, the +vessel sprang upwards like a projectile fired from a cannon. + +Redgrave went back into the conning-tower to see what happened to their +assailant. It was already trying to detach itself and sink back into a +more congenial element. As the pressure of the atmosphere decreased its +huge body swelled up into still huger proportions. The scaly skin on the +two heads and necks puffed up as though air was being pumped in under +it. The great eyes protruded out of their sockets; the jaws opened +widely as though the creature were gasping for breath. + +Meanwhile Murgatroyd was seeing something very similar at the after end, +and wondering what was going to happen to his propellers, the blades of +which were deeply imbedded in the jelly-like flesh of the monsters. + +The _Astronef_ leaped higher and higher, and the hideous bodies which +were clinging to her swelled out huger and huger. Redgrave even fancied +that he heard something like the cries of pain from both heads on either +side of the conning-tower. They passed through the inner cloud-veil, and +then the _Astronef_ began to turn on her axis, and, just as the outer +envelope came into view the enormously distended bulk of the monsters +collapsed, and their fragments, seeming now like the tatters of a burst +balloon than portions of a once living creature, dropped from the body +of the _Astronef_, and floated away down into what had been their native +element. + +"Difference of environment means a lot, after all," said Redgrave to +himself. "I should have called that either a lie or a miracle if I +hadn't seen it, and I'm jolly glad I sent Zaidie down below." + +"Here's your coffee, Lenox," said her voice from the upper deck the next +moment, "only it doesn't seem to want to stop in the cups, and the cups +keep getting off the saucers. I suppose we're turning upside down +again." + +Redgrave stepped somewhat gingerly on to the deck, for his body had so +little weight under the double attraction of Saturn and the Rings that a +very slight effort would have sent him flying up to the roof of the +deck-chamber. + +"That's exactly as you please," he said, "just hold that table steady a +minute. We shall have our centre of gravity back soon. And now, as to +the main question, suppose we take a trip across the sunlit hemisphere +of Saturn to, what I suppose we should call on Earth, the South Pole. We +can get resistance from the Rings, and as we are here we may as well see +what the rest of Saturn is like. You see, if our theory is correct as to +the Rings gathering up most of the atmosphere of Saturn about its +equator, we shall get to higher latitudes where the air is thinner and +more like our own, and therefore it's quite possible that we shall find +different forms of life in it too--or if you've had enough of Saturn and +would prefer a trip to Uranus----" + +"No, thanks," said Zaidie quickly. "To tell you the truth, Lenox, I've +had almost enough star-wandering for one honeymoon, and though we've +seen nice things as well as horrible things--especially those ghastly, +slimy creatures down there--I'm beginning to feel a bit homesick for +good old Mother Earth. You see, we're nearly a thousand million miles +from home, and, even with you, it makes one feel a bit lonely. I vote we +explore the rest of this hemisphere up to the pole, and then, as they +say at sea--I mean our sea--'bout ship, and try if we can find our own +old world again. After all, it _is_ more homelike than any of these, +isn't it?" + +"Just take our telescope and look at it," said Redgrave, pointing +towards the Sun, with its little cluster of attendant planets. "It looks +something like one of Jupiter's little moons down there, doesn't it, +only not quite as big?" + +"Yes, it does, but that doesn't matter. The fact is that it's there, and +we know what it's like, and it's _home_, if it _is_ a thousand million +miles away, and that's everything." + +By this time they had passed through the outer band of clouds. The vast, +sunlit arch of the Rings towered up to the zenith, apparently spanning +the whole visible heavens. Below and in front of them lay the enormous +semicircle of the hemisphere which was turned towards the Sun, shrouded +by its many-coloured bands of clouds. The R. Force was directed strongly +against the lower ring, and the _Astronef_ descended rapidly in a +slanting direction through the cloud-bands towards the southern +temperate zone of the planet. + +They passed through the second, or dark, cloud-band at the rate of about +three thousand miles an hour, aided by the repulsion against the Rings +and the attraction of the planets, and soon after lunch, the materials +of which now consented to remain on the table, they passed through the +clouds and found themselves in a new world of wonders. + +On a far vaster scale, it was the Earth during that period of its +development which is called the Reptilian Age. The atmosphere was still +dense and loaded with aqueous vapour, but the waters had already been +divided from the land. + +They passed over vast, marshy continents and islands, and warm seas, +above which thin clouds of steam still hung, and as they swept southward +with the propellers working at their utmost speed they caught glimpses +of giant forms rising out of the steamy waters near the land, of others +crawling slowly over it, dragging their huge bulk through a tremendous +vegetation, which they crushed down as they passed, as a sheep on Earth +might push its way through a field of standing corn. + +Other and even stranger shapes, broad-winged and ungainly, fluttered +with a slow, bat-like motion through the lower strata of the atmosphere. + +Every now and then during the voyage across the temperate zone the +propellers were slowed down to enable them to witness some Titanic +conflict between the gigantic denizens of land and sea and air. But +Zaidie had had enough of horrors on the Saturnian equator, and so she +was content to watch this phase of evolution working itself out (as it +had done on the Earth thousands of ages ago) from a convenient distance. +Wherefore the _Astronef_ sped on without approaching the surface nearer +than was necessary to get a clear general view. + +"It'll be all very nice to see and remember and dream about afterwards," +she said, "but I don't think I can stand any more monsters just now, at +least not at close quarters, and I'm quite sure that if those things can +live there we couldn't, any more than we could have lived on Earth a +million years or so ago. No, really I don't want to land, Lenox; let's +go on." + +They went on at a speed of about a hundred miles an hour, and, as they +progressed southward, both the atmosphere and the landscape rapidly +changed. The air grew clearer and the clouds lighter. Land and sea were +more sharply divided, and both teeming with life. The seas still swarmed +with serpentine monsters of the saurian type, and the firmer lands were +peopled by huge animals, mastodons, bears, giant tapirs, mylodons, +deinotheriums, and a score of other species too strange for them to +recognise by any Earthly likeness, which roamed in great herds through +the vast twilit forests and over boundless plains covered with grey-blue +vegetation. + +Here, too, they found mountains for the first time on Saturn; mountains +steep-sided, and many Earth-miles high. + +As the _Astronef_ was skirting the side of one of these ranges Redgrave +allowed it to approach more closely than he had so far done to the +surface of Saturn. + +"I shouldn't wonder if we found some of the higher forms of life up +here," he said. "If there is any kind of being that is going to develop +some day into the human race of Saturn it would naturally get up here." + +"I should hope so," said Zaidie, "and just as far as possible out of the +reach of those unutterable horrors on the equator. That would be one of +the first signs they would show of superior intelligence. Look! I +believe there are some of them. Do you see those holes in the +mountain-side there? And there they are, something like gorillas, only +twice as big, and up the trees, too--and what trees! They must be seven +or eight hundred feet high." + +"Tree-men and cave-dwellers, and ancestors of the future royal race of +Saturn, I suppose!" said Redgrave. "They don't look very nice, do they? +Still, there's no doubt about their being far superior in intelligence +to those other brutes we saw. Evidently this atmosphere is too thin for +the two-headed jelly-fishes and the saurians to breathe. These creatures +have found that out in a few hundreds of generations, and so they have +come to live up here out of the way. Vegetarians, I suppose, or perhaps +they live on smaller monkeys and other animals, just as our ancestors +did." + +"Really, Lenox," said Zaidie, turning round and facing him, "I must say +that you have a most unpleasant way of alluding to one's ancestors. They +couldn't help what they were." + +"Well, dear," he said, going towards her, "marvellous as the miracle +seems, I'm heretic enough to believe it possible that your ancestors +even, millions of years ago, perhaps, may have been something like +those; but then, of course, you know I'm a hopeless Darwinian." + +"And, therefore, entirely horrid, as I've often said before, when you +get on subjects like these. Not, of course, that I'm ashamed of my poor +relations; and then, after all, your Darwin was quite wrong when he +talked about the descent of man--and woman. We--especially the +women--have _as_cended from that sort of thing, if there's any truth in +the story at all; though, personally, I must say I prefer dear old +Mother Eve." + +"Who never had a sweeter daughter than----!" he replied, drawing her +towards him. + +"Very prettily put, my Lord," she laughed, releasing herself with a +gentle twirl; "and now I'll go and get dinner ready. After all, it +doesn't matter what world one's in, one gets hungry all the same." + +The dinner, which was eaten somewhere in the middle of the +fifteen-year-long day of Saturn, was a more than usually pleasant one, +because they were now nearing the turning-point of their trip into the +depths of Space, and thoughts of home and friends were already beginning +to fly back across the thousand-million-mile gulf which lay between them +and the Earth which they had left only a little more than two months +ago. + +While they were at dinner the _Astronef_ rose above the mountains and +resumed her southward course. Zaidie brought the coffee up on deck as +usual after dinner, and, while Redgrave smoked his cigar and Zaidie her +cigarette, they luxuriated in the magnificent spectacle of the sunlit +side of the Rings towering up, rainbow built on rainbow, to the zenith +of their visible heavens. + +"What a pity there aren't any words to describe it!" said Zaidie. "I +wonder if the descendants of the ancestors of the future human race on +Saturn will invent anything like a suitable language. I wonder how +they'll talk about those Rings millions of years hence." + +"By that time there may not be any Rings," Lenox replied, blowing one of +blue smoke from his own lips. "Look at that--made in a moment and gone +in a moment--and yet on exactly the same principle, it gives one a dim +idea of the difference between time and eternity. After all it's only +another example of Kelvin's theory of vortices. Nebulae, and asteroids, +and planet-rings, and smoke-rings are really all made on the same +principle." + +"My dear Lenox, if you're going to get as philosophical and as +commonplace as that, I'm going to bed. Now that I come to think of it, +I've been up about fifteen Earth-hours, so it's about time I went and +had a sleep. It's your turn to make the coffee in the morning--our +morning, I mean--and you'll wake me in time to see the South Pole of +Saturn, won't you? You're not coming yet, I suppose?" + +"Not just yet, dear. I want to see a bit more of this, and then I must +go through the engines and see that they're all right and ready for that +thousand million mile homeward voyage you're talking about. You can have +a good ten hours' sleep without missing much, I think, for there doesn't +seem to be anything more interesting than our own Arctic life down +there. So good-night, little woman, and don't have too many nightmares." + +"Good-night!" she said; "if you hear me shout you'll know that you're to +come and protect me from monsters. Weren't those two-headed brutes just +too horrid for words? Good-night, dear!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +A little before six (Earth time) on the fourth morning after they had +cleared the confines of the Saturnian System, Redgrave went as usual +into the conning-tower to examine the instruments, and to see that +everything was in order. To his intense surprise he found, on looking at +the gravitational compass, which was to the _Astronef_ what the ordinary +compass is to a ship at sea, that the vessel was a long way out of her +course. + +Such a thing had never yet occurred. Up to now the _Astronef_ had obeyed +the laws of gravitation and repulsion with absolute exactness. He made +another examination of the instruments; but no, all were in perfect +order. + +"I wonder what the deuce is the matter," he said, after he had looked +for a few moments with frowning eyes at the multitude of orbs ahead. "By +Jove, we're swinging more. This is getting serious." + +He went back to the compass. The long, slender needle was slowly +swinging farther and farther out of the middle line of the vessel. + +"There can only be two explanations of that," he went on, thrusting his +hands deep into his trousers pockets; "either the engines are not +working properly, or some enormous and invisible body is pulling us +towards it out of our course. Let's have a look at the engines first." + +When he reached the engine-room he said to Murgatroyd, who was indulging +in his usual pastime of cleaning and polishing his beloved charges: + +"Have you noticed anything wrong during the last hour or so, +Murgatroyd?" + +"No, my Lord; at least not so far as concerns the engines. They're all +right. Hark, now, they're not making more noise than a lady's sewing +machine," replied the old Yorkshireman, with a note of resentment in his +voice. The suspicion that anything could be wrong with his shining +darlings was almost a personal offence to him. "But is anything the +matter, my Lord, if I might ask?" + +"We're a long way off our course, and for the life of me I can't +understand it," replied Redgrave. "There's nothing about here to pull us +out of our line. Of course the stars--good Lord, I never thought of +that! Look here, Murgatroyd, not a word about this to her ladyship, and +stand by to raise the power by degrees, as I signal to you." + +"Ay, my lord. I hope it's nothing bad!" + +Redgrave went back to the conning-tower without replying. The only +possible solution of the mystery of the deviation had suddenly dawned +upon him, and a very serious solution it was. He remembered there were +such things as dead suns--the derelicts of the Ocean of Space--vast, +invisible orbs, lightless and lifeless, too distant from any living sun +to be illumined by its rays, and yet exercising the only force left to +them--the force of attraction. Might not one of these have wandered near +enough to the confines of the Solar System to exert this force, a force +of absolutely unknown magnitude, upon the _Astronef_? + +He went to the desk beside the instrument-table and plunged into a maze +of mathematics, of masses and weights, angles and distances. Half an +hour later he stood looking at the last symbol on the last sheet of +paper with something like fear. It was the fatal _x_ which remained to +satisfy the last equation, the unknown quantity which represented the +unseen force that was dragging them into the outer wilderness of +insterstellar space, into far-off regions from which, with the remaining +force at his disposal, no return would be possible. + +He signalled to Murgatroyd to increase the development of the R. Force +from a tenth to a fifth. Then he went to the lower saloon, where Zaidie +was busy with her usual morning tidy-up. Now that the mystery was +explained there was no reason to keep her in the dark. Indeed, he had +given her his word that he would conceal from her no danger, however +great, that might threaten them when he had once assured himself of its +existence. + +She listened to him in silence and without a sign of fear beyond a +little lifting of the eyelids and a little fading of the colour in her +cheeks. + +"And if we can't resist this force," she said, when he had finished, "it +will drag us millions--perhaps millions of millions--of miles away from +our own system into outer space, and we shall either fall on the surface +of this dead sun and be reduced to a puff of lighted gas in an instant, +or some other body will pull us away from it, and then another away from +that, and so on, and we shall wander among the stars for ever and ever +until the end of time!" + +"If the first happens, darling, we shall die--together--without knowing +it. It's the second that I'm most afraid of. The _Astronef_ may go on +wandering among the stars for ever--but we have only water enough for +three weeks more. Now come into the conning-tower and we'll see how +things are going." + +As they bent their heads over the instrument-table Redgrave saw that the +remorseless needle had moved two degrees more to the right. The keel of +the _Astronef_, under the impulse of the R. Force, was continually +turning. The pull of the invisible orb was dragging her slowly but +irresistibly out of her line. + +"There's nothing for it but this," said Redgrave, putting out his hand +to the signal-board, and signalling to Murgatroyd to put the engines to +their highest capacity. "You see, dear, our greatest danger is this: we +had to exert such a tremendous lot of power getting away from Jupiter +and Saturn, that we haven't any too much to spare, and if we have to +spend it in counteracting the pull of this dead sun, or whatever it is, +we may not have enough of what I call the R. fluid left to get home +with." + +"I see," she said, staring with wide-open eyes at the needle. "You mean +that we may not have enough to keep us from falling into one of the +planets or perhaps into the Sun itself. Well, supposing the dangers are +equal, this one is the nearest, and so I guess we've got to fight it +first." + +"Spoken like a good American!" he said, putting his arm across her +shoulders and looking at once with infinite pride and infinite regret at +the calm, proud face which the glory of resignation had adorned with a +new beauty. + +She bowed her head and then looked away again so that he should not see +that there were tears in her eyes. He took his hand from her shoulder +and stared in silence down at the needle. It was stationary again. + +"We've stopped!" he said, after a pause of several moments. "Now, if the +body that's taken us out of our course is moving away from us we win, if +it's coming towards us we lose. At any rate, we've done all we can. Come +along, Zaidie, let's go and have a walk on deck." + +They had scarcely reached the upper deck when something happened which +dwarfed all the other experiences of their marvellous voyage into utter +insignificance. + +Above and around them the constellations blazed with a splendour +inconceivable to an observer on Earth, but ahead of them gaped the vast, +black void which sailors call "the Coal Hole," and in which the most +powerful telescopes have only discovered a few faintly luminous bodies. +Suddenly, out of the midst of this infinity of darkness, there blazed a +glare of almost intolerably brilliant radiance. Instantly the forward +end of the _Astronef_ was bathed in light and heat--the light and heat +of a re-created sun, whose elements had been dark and cold for uncounted +ages. + +Hundreds of tiny points of light, unknown worlds which had been dark for +myriads of years, twinkled out of the blackness. Then the fierce glare +grew dimmer. A vast mantle of luminous mist spread out with +inconceivable rapidity, and in the midst of this blazed the central +nucleus--the sun which in far-off ages to come would be the giver of +light and heat, of life and beauty to worlds unborn, to planets which +were now only little eddies of atoms whirling in that ocean of nebulous +flame. + +For more than an hour the two wanderers from the far-off Earth stood +motionless and silent, gazing on the indescribable splendours of the +fearfully magnificent spectacle before them. Every mundane thought +seemed burnt out of their souls by the glory and the wonder of it. It +was almost as though they were standing in the very presence of God. +Indeed, were they not witnessing the supreme act of Omnipotence, a new +creation? Their peril, a peril such as had never threatened mortals +before, was utterly forgotten. They had even forgotten each other's +presence. For the time being they existed only to look and to wonder. + +They were called at length out of their trance by the matter-of-fact +voice of Murgatroyd saying-- + +"My Lord, she's back to her course. Will I keep the power on full?" + +"Eh! What's that?" exclaimed Redgrave, as they both turned quickly +round. "Oh, it's you, Murgatroyd. The power? Yes, keep it on full till I +have taken the bearings." + +"Ay, my Lord, very good," replied the engineer. + +As he left the deck Redgrave put his arm round Zaidie and drew her +gently towards him and said, "Zaidie, truly you are favoured among +women! You have seen the beginning of a new creation. You will certainly +be saved somehow after that." + +"Yes, and you too, dear," she murmured, as though still half-dreaming. +"It is very glorious and wonderful; but what is it all--I mean, what is +the explanation of it?" + +"The merely scientific explanation, dear, is very simple. I see it all +now. The force that was dragging us out of our course was the united +pull of two dead stars approaching each other in the same orbit. They +may have been doing that for millions of years. The shock of their +meeting has transformed their motion into light and heat. They have +united to form a single sun and a nebula, which will some day condense +into a system of planets like ours. To-night the astronomers on Earth +will discover a new star--a variable star as they'll call it--for it +will grow dimmer as it moves away from our system. It has often happened +before." + +Then they turned back to the conning-tower. + +The needle had swung to its old position. The new star, henceforth to be +known in the annals of astronomy as Lilla-Zaidie, had already set for +them to the right of the _Astronef_ and risen on the left, and, at a +distance of more than nine hundred million miles from the Earth, the +corner was turned, and the homeward voyage began. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +A week later they crossed the path of Jupiter, but the giant was +invisible, far away on the other side of the Sun. Redgrave laid his +course so as to avail himself to the utmost of the "pull" of the planets +without going near enough to them to be compelled to exert too much of +the priceless R. Force, which the indicators showed to be running +perilously low. + +Between the orbits of Jupiter and Mars they made a most valuable economy +by landing on Ceres, one of the largest of the asteroids, and travelling +about fifty million miles on her towards the orbit of the Earth without +any expenditure of force whatever. They found that the tiny world +possessed a breathable atmosphere and a fluid resembling water, but +nearly as dense as mercury. A couple of flasks of it form the greatest +treasures of the British Museum and the National Museum at Washington. +The vegetable world was represented by coarse grass, lichens, and dwarf +shrubs, and the animal by different species of worms, lizards, flies, +and small burrowing animals of the rodent type. + +As the orbit of Ceres, like that of the other asteroids, is considerably +inclined to that of the Earth, the _Astronef_ rose from its surface when +the plane of the Earth's revolution was reached, and the glittering +swarm of miniature planets plunged away into space beneath them. + +"Where to now?" said Zaidie, as her husband came down on deck from the +conning-tower. + +"I am going to try to steer a middle course between the orbits of +Mercury and Venus," he replied. "They just happen to be so placed now +that we ought to be able to get the advantage of the pull of both of +them as we pass, and that will save us a lot of power. The only thing +I'm afraid of is the pull of the Sun, equal to goodness knows how many +times the attraction of all the planets put together. You see, little +woman, it's like this," he went on, taking out a pencil and going down +on one knee on the deck: "Here's the _Astronef_; there's Venus; there's +Mercury; there's the Sun; and there, away on the other side of him, is +Mother Earth. If we can turn that corner safely and without expending +too much power we ought to be all right." + +"And if we can't, what will happen?" + +"It will be a choice between morphine and cremation in the atmosphere of +the Sun, dear, or rather gradually roasting as we fall towards it." + +"Then, of course, it will be morphine," she said quite quietly, as she +turned away from his diagram and looked at the now fast-increasing disc +of the Sun. A well-balanced mind speedily becomes accustomed even to the +most terrible perils, and Zaidie had now looked this one so long and so +steadily in the face that for her it had already become merely the +choice between two forms of death with just a chance of escape hidden in +the closed hand of Fate. + +Thirty-six Earth-hours later the glorious golden disc of Venus lay broad +and bright beneath them. Above was the blazing orb of the Sun, nearly +half as big again as it appears from the Earth, with Mercury, a round +black spot, travelling slowly across it. + +"My dear Bird-Folk!" said Zaidie, looking down at the lovely world below +them. "If home wasn't home----" + +"We can be back among them in a few hours with absolute safety," +interrupted her husband, catching at the suggestion. "I've told you the +truth about the bare possibility of getting back to the Earth. It's only +a chance at best, and even if we pass the Sun we may not have force +enough left to prevent the _Astronef_ from being smashed to dust or +burnt up in the atmosphere. After all we might do worse----" + +"What would you do if you were alone, Lenox?" she said, interrupting him +in turn. + +"I should take my chance and go on. After all home's home and worth a +struggle. But you, dear----" + +"I'm you, and so I take the same chances as you do. Besides, we're not +perfect enough for a world where there isn't any sin. We should probably +get quite miserable there. No, home's home, as you say." + +"Then home it is, dear!" he replied. + +The resplendent hemisphere of the Love-Star sank swiftly down into the +vault of Space, growing smaller and dimmer as the _Astronef_ sped +towards the little black spot on the face of the Sun, which to them was +like a buoy marking a place of utter and hopeless shipwreck in the Ocean +of Immensity. + +The chronometer, still set to Earth-time, had now begun to mark the last +hours of the _Astronef's_ voyage. She was not only travelling at a speed +of which figures could give no comprehensible idea, but the Sun, +Mercury, and the Earth were rushing towards her with a compound +velocity, composed of the movement of the Solar System through Space and +of the movement of the two planets round the Sun. + +Murgatroyd was at his post in the engine-room. Redgrave and Zaidie had +gone into the conning-tower, perhaps for the last time. For good fortune +or evil, for life or death, they would see the end of the voyage +together. + +"How far yet, dear?" she said, as Venus began to slip away behind them, +rising like a splendid moon in their wake. + +"Only sixty million miles or so, a matter of a few hours, more or +less--it all depends," he replied, without taking his eyes off the +compass. + +"Sixty millions! Why I feel almost at home again." + +"But we have to turn the corner of the street yet, dear, and after that +there's a fall of more than twenty-five million miles on to the more or +less kindly breast of Mother Earth." + +"A fall! It does sound rather awful when you put it that way; but I am +not going to let you frighten me. I believe Mother Earth will receive +her wandering children quite as kindly as they deserve." + +The moon-like disc of Venus grew swiftly smaller, and the black spot on +the face of the Sun larger and larger as the _Astronef_ rushed silently +and imperceptibly, and yet with almost inconceivable velocity towards +doom or fortune. Neither Zaidie nor Redgrave spoke again for nearly +three hours--hours which to them seemed to pass like so many minutes. +Their eyes were fixed on the black disc of Mercury, which, as they +approached it, expanded with magical rapidity till it completely +eclipsed the blazing orb behind it. Their thoughts were far away on the +still invisible Earth and all the splendid possibilities that it held +for two young lives like theirs. + +As the sunlight vanished they looked at each other in the golden +moonlight of Venus, and Zaidie let her head rest for a moment on her +husband's shoulder. Then a swiftly broadening gleam of light shot out +from behind the black circle of Mercury. The first crisis had come. +Redgrave put out his hand to the signal-board and rang for full power. +The planet seemed to swing round as the _Astronef_ rushed into the +blaze. In a few minutes it passed through the phases from "new" to +"full." Venus became eclipsed in turn as they swung between Mercury and +the Sun, and then Redgrave, after a rapid glance to either side, said: + +"If we can only keep the two pulls balanced we shall do it. That will +keep us in a straight line, and our own momentum ought to carry us into +the Earth's attraction." + +Zaidie did not reply. She was shading her eyes with her hand from the +almost intolerable brilliance of the Sun's rays, and looking straight +ahead to catch the first glimpse of the silver-grey orb. Her husband +read her thoughts and respected them. But a few minutes later he +startled her out of her dream of home by exclaiming: + +"Good God, we're turning!" + +"What do you say, dear? Turning what?" + +"On our own centre. Look! I'm afraid only a miracle can save us now, +darling." + +She glanced to the left-hand side where he was pointing. The Sun, no +longer now a sun, but a vast ocean of flame filling nearly a third of +the vault of Space, was sinking beneath them. On the right Mercury was +rising. Zaidie knew only too well what this meant. It meant that the +keel of the _Astronef_ was being dragged out of the straight line which +would cut the Earth's orbit some forty million miles away. It meant +that, in spite of the exertion of the full power that the engines could +develop, they had begun to fall into the Sun. + +Redgrave laid his hand on hers, and their eyes met. There was no need +for words. Perhaps speech just then would have been impossible. In that +mute glance each looked into the other's soul and was content. Then he +left the conning-tower, and Zaidie dropped on to her knees before the +instrument-table and laid her forehead upon her clasped hands. + +Her husband went to the saloon, unlocked a little cupboard in the wall +and took out a blue bottle of corrugated glass labelled "Morphine, +Poison." He took another empty bottle of white glass and measured fifty +drops into it. Then he went to the engine-room and said abruptly: + +"Murgatroyd, I'm afraid it's all up with us. We're falling into the +Sun, and you know what that means. In a few hours the _Astronef_ will be +red-hot. So it's roasting alive--or this. I recommend this." + +"And what might that be, my Lord?" said the old engineer, looking at the +bottle which his master held out towards him. + +"That's morphine--poison. Fill that up with water, drink it, and in half +an hour you'll be dead without knowing it. Of course, you won't take it +until there's absolutely no hope; but, granted that, you'll find this a +better death than roasting or baking alive." Then his voice changed +suddenly as he went on, "Of course, I need not say now, Murgatroyd, how +deeply I regret now that I asked you to come in the _Astronef_." + +"My Lord, my people have served yours for seven hundred years, and, +whether on Earth or among the stars, where you go it is my duty to go +also. But don't ask me to take the poison. It is not for me to say that +a journey like this is tempting Providence, but, by my lights, if I am +to die I shall die the death that Providence in its wisdom sends." + +"I daresay you're right in one way, Murgatroyd, but it's no time to +argue about beliefs now. There's the bottle. Do as you think right. And +now, in case the miracle doesn't happen, goodbye." + +"Goodbye, my Lord, if it is to be," replied the old Yorkshireman, taking +the hand which Redgrave held out to him. "I'll keep the power on to the +last, I suppose?" + +"Yes, you may as well. If it doesn't keep us away from the Sun it won't +be much use to us in two or three hours." + +He left the engine-room and went back to the conning-tower. Zaidie was +still on her knees. Beneath and around them the awful gulf of flame was +broadening and deepening. Mercury was rising higher and growing smaller. +He put the bottle down on the table and waited. Then Zaidie looked up. +Her eyes were clear, and her face was perfectly calm. She rose and put +her arm through his, and said: + +"Well, is there any hope, dear? There can't be now, can there? Is that +the morphine?" + +"Yes," he replied, slipping his arm beneath hers and round her waist. +"I'm afraid there's not much chance now, little woman. We're using up +the last of the power, and you see----" + +As he said this he looked at the thermometer. The mercury had risen from +65 degrees Fahrenheit, the normal temperature of the interior of the +_Astronef_, to 93 degrees, and during the half-minute that he watched it +rose another degree. There was no mistaking such a warning as that. He +had brought two little liqueur glasses in his pocket from the saloon. He +divided the morphine between them, and filled them up with water. + +"Not until the last moment, dear," said Zaidie, as he set one of them +before her. "We have no right to do it until then." + +"Very well. When the mercury reaches a hundred and fifty. After that it +will go up ten and fifteen degrees at a jump, and we----" + +"Yes, at a hundred and fifty," she replied, cutting short a speech she +dared not hear the end of. "I understand. It will be impossible to hope +any more." + +Now, side by side, they stood and watched the thermometer. + +Ninety-five--ninety-eight--a hundred and three--a hundred and +ten--eighteen--twenty-four--thirty-two--forty-one. + +The silent minutes passed, and with each the silver thread--for them the +thread of life--grew, with strange contradiction, longer and longer, and +with every minute it grew more quickly. + +A hundred and forty-six. + +With his right arm Redgrave drew Zaidie still closer to him. He put out +his left hand and took up the little glass. She did the same. + +"Goodbye, dear, till we have slept and wake again!" + +"Goodbye, darling, God grant that we may!" But the agony of that last +farewell was more than Zaidie could bear. She looked away at the little +glass in her hand, a hand which even now did not tremble. Then she +raised her eyes again to take one last look at the glory of the stars, +and at the Fate Incarnate in Flame which lay beneath them. Then, even as +the end of the last minute came, a cry broke through her white, +half-parted lips: + +"The Earth, the Earth--thank God, the Earth!" + +With the hand that held the draught of Lethe--which in another moment +she would have swallowed--she caught at her husband's hand, pulled the +glass out of it, and then with a little sigh she dropped senseless on +the floor of the conning-tower. Redgrave looked for a moment in the +direction that her eyes had taken. A pale, silver-grey crescent, with a +little white spot near it, was rising out of the blackness beyond the +edge of the solar ocean of flame. Home was in sight at last, but would +they reach it--and how? + +He picked her up and carried her to their room and laid her on the bed. +Then he went to the medicine chest again, this time for a very different +purpose. + +An hour later, they were on the upper deck with their telescopes turned +on to the rapidly growing crescent of the Home-World, which, in its +eternal march through Space, had come into the line of direct attraction +just in time to turn the scale in which the lives of the Space-voyagers +were trembling. The higher it rose, the bigger and broader and brighter +it grew, and, at last, Zaidie--forgetting in her transport of joy all +the perils that were yet to come--sprang to her feet and clapped her +hands, and cried: + +"There's America!" + +Then she dropped back into her long deck-chair and began a good, hearty, +healthy cry. + + + + +EPILOGUE + + +There is little now to be told that all the world does not already know +as well as it knows the circumstances of Lord and Lady Redgrave's +departure from the Earth, at the beginning of that marvellous voyage, +that desperate plunge into the unknown immensities of Space which began +so happily, and yet with so many grave misgivings in the hearts of their +friends, and which, after passing many perils, the adventurous voyagers +finished even more happily than they had begun. + +As I said at the beginning of this narrative the sole purpose of writing +it has been to place before the reading public an account of the +adventures experienced by Lord Redgrave and his beautiful Countess from +the time of their departure from the Earth to the hour of their return +to it. Therefore there is no need to re-tell a tale already told, and +one that has been read and re-read a thousand times. Every one who has +read his or her newspaper from Chamskatska to Cape Horn, and from Alaska +to South Australia, knows how the Commander of the _Astronef_ so nursed +the remains which were left to him of the R. Force after overcoming the +attraction of the Sun, that he was able to steer an oblique course +between the Moon and the Earth, and to counteract what Zaidie called the +all too-loving attraction of the Mother Planet, and, after sixty hours +of agonising suspense, at last re-entered their native atmosphere. + +The expenditure of the last few units of the R. Force enabled them to +just clear the summits of the Bolivian Andes, to cross the foothills and +western slopes of Peru, and finally to let the _Astronef_ drop quietly +on to the bosom of the broad Pacific about twenty miles westward of the +Port of Mollendo. + +All this time thousands of anxious eyes had been peering through +telescopes every night in quest of the wanderers who must now be +returning if ever they were to return, and a reward of ten thousand +dollars, offered conjointly by the British and United States Governments +for the first authentic tidings of the _Astronef_, was won by a smart +young Californian, who was Assistant Astronomer at the Harvard +University Observatory at Arequipa. + +One night when he was on duty watching a lunar occultation, he saw +something sweep across the disc of the full moon just as the captain and +officers of the _St. Louis_ had seen that same something sweep across +the disc of the rising sun. What else could it be if not the _Astronef_? +He rang for another assistant to go on with the occultation, and wired +down to the coast requesting the British Consul at Mollendo to look out +for an arrival from the skies. + +Three hours later the gleam of an electric searchlight flickered down +over the huge black cone of the Misti, and by dawn the next morning one +of Her Majesty's cruisers--most appropriately named _Astraea_--attached +to the Pacific Squadron then _en route_ from Lima to Valparaiso, steamed +out westward from Mollendo and found the long, shining hull of the +_Astronef_ waiting quietly on the unrippled rollers of the Pacific, and +Lord and Lady Redgrave having breakfast in the deck-chamber. + +Compliments and congratulations having been duly exchanged, she was +taken in tow by the cruiser, and so reached Valparaiso. Here she lay for +a few days while the wires of the world were being kept hot with +telegraphic accounts of her return to Earth, and while her Commander, +with the assistance of the officers of the National Laboratory, was +replenishing his stock of the R. Fluid from the chemicals which they had +placed at his disposal. + +It would, of course, have been quite possible for him and Zaidie to have +taken steamer northward to Panama, crossed the Isthmus, and returned to +New York and Washington _via_ Jamaica. The British Admiral even offered +to place his fastest cruiser at their disposal for a run to San +Francisco, whence the Overland Limited would have landed them in New +York in four days and a half, but Zaidie vetoed this as quickly as she +had done the other proposition. If she had her way the _Astronef_ should +go back to Washington as she had left it, by means of her own motive +force, and so, of course, it came to pass. + +Even Murgatroyd's grim and homely features seemed irradiated by a glow +of what he afterwards thought unholy pride when he once more stood by +his levers and heard the familiar signal coming from the conning-tower. + +"A tenth." + +And then--"Stand by steering-gear." + +The next moment there was another tinkle in the engine-room. + +Redgrave, standing with Zaidie in the conning-tower, moved the +power-wheel through ten degrees, and then to the amazement of tens of +thousands of spectators, the hull of the _Astronef_ rose perpendicularly +from the waters of the Bay. The British Squadron and a detachment of the +Chilian fleet thundered out a salute which was answered a few moments +later by the shore batteries, Redgrave went down into the deck-chamber +and fired twenty-one shots from one of the Maxim-Nordenfelts--the same +with which he had mown down the crowds of Martians in the square of +their great city a hundred and thirty million miles away, and while he +was doing this Zaidie in the conning-tower ran the White Ensign up to +the top of the flagstaff. + +Then the glass doors were closed again, the propellers began to revolve +at their utmost speed, and the Space-Navigator with one tremendous leap +cleared the double chain of the Andes and vanished to the +north-eastward. + +To describe the reception of Lord and Lady Redgrave when the _Astronef_ +dropped a few hours later, on to the very spot in front of the steps of +the Capitol at Washington from which she had risen just four months +before, would only be to repeat what has already been told in the Press +of the world, and especially of the United States, with a far more +luxuriant wealth of detail than could possibly be emulated here. Suffice +it to say that the first human form that Zaidie embraced after her long +wanderings was that of Mrs. Van Stuyler, whom the President of the +United States had escorted to the gangway. + +The most marvellous of human adventures become commonplace by +repetition, and Mrs. Van Stuyler had already spent nearly a fortnight +devouring every item, whether of fact or fancy, with which the American +Press had embroidered the adventures of the _Astronef_ and her crew. And +so when the first embracings and emotions were over, all she could find +to say was: + +"Well, Zaidie dear, and how did you enjoy it, after all?" + +"It was just gorgeous, Mrs. Van, and if there was a more gorgeous word +than that in the American language I'd use it," replied Zaidie, with +another hug, "Why didn't you come? You'd have been--well no, perhaps I'd +better not say what you would have been. But just think of it, or try +to--A honeymoon trip of over two thousand million miles, and +back--safe--thank God!" + +As she said this, Zaidie threw her arm over Mrs. Van Stuyler's shoulder, +and drew her away towards the forward end of the deck-chamber. At the +same moment the President's hand met Lord Redgrave's in a long, strong +grip. They didn't say anything just then. 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