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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/31207-8.txt b/31207-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..652298a --- /dev/null +++ b/31207-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1295 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Where the World is Quiet, by Henry Kuttner + +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: Where the World is Quiet + +Author: Henry Kuttner + +Release Date: February 7, 2010 [EBook #31207] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHERE THE WORLD IS QUIET *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from Fantastic Universe May 1954. Extensive + research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this + publication was renewed. + + + _The life of an anthropologist is no doubt filled much of + the time with the monotonous routine of carefully assembling + powdery relics of ancient races and civilizations. But + White's lone Peruvian odyssey was most unusual. A story + pseudonymously penned by one of the greats in the genre._ + + + + where the world is quiet + + _by ... C. H. Liddell_ + + + Fra Rafael saw strange things, impossible things. Then there + was the mystery of the seven young virginal girls of + Huascan. + + * * * * * + + + + +Fra Rafael drew the llama-wool blanket closer about his narrow +shoulders, shivering in the cold wind that screamed down from Huascan. +His face held great pain. I rose, walked to the door of the hut and +peered through fog at the shadowy haunted lands that lifted toward the +sky--the Cordilleras that make a rampart along Peru's eastern border. + +"There's nothing," I said. "Only the fog, Fra Rafael." + +He made the sign of the cross on his breast. "It is the fog that +brings the--the terror," he said. "I tell you, _Seņor_ White, I have +seen strange things these last few months--impossible things. You are +a scientist. Though we are not of the same religion, you also know +that there are powers not of this earth." + +I didn't answer, so he went on: "Three months ago it began, after the +earthquake. A native girl disappeared. She was seen going into the +mountains, toward Huascan along the Pass, and she did not come back. I +sent men out to find her. They went up the Pass, found the fog grew +thicker and thicker until they were blind and could see nothing. Fear +came to them and they fled back down the mountain. A week later +another girl vanished. We found her footprints." + +"The same canyon?" + +"_Si_, and the same result. Now seven girls have gone, one after the +other, all in the same way. And I, _Seņor_ White--" Fra Rafael's pale, +tired face was sad as he glanced down at the stumps of his legs--"I +could not follow, as you see. Four years ago an avalanche crippled me. +My bishop told me to return to Lima, but I prevailed on him to let me +remain here for these natives are my people, _Seņor_. They know and +trust me. The loss of my legs has not altered that." + +I nodded. "I can see the difficulty now, though." + +"Exactly. I cannot go to Huascan and find out what has happened to the +girls. The natives--well, I chose four of the strongest and bravest +and asked them to take me up the Pass. I thought that I could overcome +their superstitions. But I was not successful." + +"How far did you go?" I asked. + +"A few miles, not more than that. The fog grew thicker, until we were +blinded by it, and the way was dangerous. I could not make the men go +on." Fra Rafael closed his eyes wearily. "They talked of old Inca gods +and devils--Manco Capac and Oello Huaco, the Children of the Sun. They +are very much afraid, _Seņor_ White. They huddle together like sheep +and believe that an ancient god has returned and is taking them away +one by one. And--one by one they _are_ taken." + +"Only young girls," I mused. "And no coercion is used, apparently. +What's up toward Huascan?" + +"Nothing but wild llamas and the condors. And snow, cold, desolation. +These are the Andes, my friend." + +"Okay," I said. "It sounds interesting. As an anthropologist I owe it +to the Foundation to investigate. Besides, I'm curious. Superficially, +there is nothing very strange about the affair. Seven girls have +disappeared in the unusually heavy fogs we've had ever since the +earthquake. Nothing more." + +I smiled at him. "However, I think I'll take a look around and see +what's so attractive about Huascan." + +"I shall pray for you," he said. "Perhaps--well, _Seņor_, for all the +loss of my legs, I am not a weak man. I can stand much hardship. I can +ride a burro." + +"I don't doubt your willingness, Fra Rafael," I said. "But it's +necessary to be practical. It's dangerous and it's cold up there. Your +presence would only handicap me. Alone, I can go faster--remember, I +don't know how far I'll have to travel." + +The priest sighed. "I suppose you are right. When--" + +"Now. My burro's packed." + +"Your porters?" + +"They won't go," I said wryly. "They've been talking to your +villagers. It doesn't matter. I'll go it alone." I put out my hand, +and Fra Rafael gripped it strongly. + +"_Vaya con Dios_," he said. + +I went out into the bright Peruvian sunlight. The Indios were standing +in straggling knots, pretending not to watch me. My porters were +nowhere in evidence. I grinned, yelled a sardonic goodbye, and started +to lead the burro toward the Pass. + +The fog vanished as the sun rose, but it still lay in the mountain +canyons toward the west. A condor circled against the sky. In the +thin, sharp air the sound of a distant rock-fall was distinctly +audible. + +White Huascan towered far away. A shadow fell on me as I entered the +Pass. The burro plodded on, patient and obedient. I felt a little +chill; the fog began to thicken. + +Yes, the Indios had talked to me. I knew their language, their old +religion. Bastard descendants of the Incas, they still preserved a +deep-rooted belief in the ancient gods of their ancient race, who had +fallen with Huayna Capac, the Great Inca, a year before Pizarro came +raging into Peru. I knew the Quichua--the old tongue of the mother +race--and so I learned more than I might have otherwise. + +Yet I had not learned much. The Indios said that _something_ had come +into the mountains near Huascan. They were willing to talk about it, +but they knew little. They shrugged with apathetic fatalism. _It_ +called the young virgins, no doubt for a sacrifice. _Quien sabe?_ +Certainly the strange, thickening fog was not of this earth. Never +before in the history of mankind had there been such a fog. It was, of +course, the earthquake that had brought the--the Visitant. And it was +folly to seek it out. + +Well, I was an anthropologist and knew the value of even such slight +clues as this. Moreover, my job for the Foundation was done. My +specimens had been sent through to Callao by pack-train, and my notes +were safe with Fra Rafael. Also, I was young and the lure of far +places and their mysteries was hot in my blood. I hoped I'd find +something odd--even dangerous--at Huascan. + +I was young. Therefore, somewhat of a fool.... + +The first night I camped in a little cave, sheltered from the wind and +snug enough in my fleece-lined sleeping-bag. There were no insects at +this height. It was impossible to make a fire for there was no wood. I +worried a bit about the burro freezing in the night. + +But he survived, and I repacked him the next morning with rather +absurd cheerfulness. The fog was thick, yes, but not impenetrable. + +There were tracks in the snow where the wind had not covered them. A +girl had left the village the day before my arrival, which made my +task all the easier. So I went up into that vast, desolate silence, +the fog closing in steadily, getting thicker and thicker, the trail +getting narrower until at last it was a mere track. + +And then I was moving blind. I had to feel my way, step by step, +leading the burro. Occasional tracks showed through the mist, showed +that the native girl had walked swiftly--had run in places--so I +assumed that the fog was less dense when she had come by this way. As +it happened, I was quite wrong about that.... + +We were on a narrow path above a gorge when I lost the burro. I heard +a scrambling and clashing of hoofs on rock behind me. The rope jerked +out of my hand and the animal cried out almost articulately as it went +over. I stood frozen, pressing against the stone, listening to the +sound of the burro's fall. Finally the distant noise died in a faint +trickling of snow and gravel that faded into utter silence. So thick +was the fog that I had seen nothing. + +I felt my way back to where the path had crumbled and rotten rock had +given way under the burro's weight. It was possible for me to retrace +my steps, but I did not. I was sure that my destination could not be +much further. A lightly clad native girl could not have gone so far as +Huascan itself. No, probably that day I would reach my goal. + +So I went on, feeling my way through the thick silent fog. I was able +to see only a few inches ahead of me for hours. Then, abruptly the +trail grew clearer. Until, at last I was moving in the shadowless, +unearthly mist over hard-packed snow, following the clearly marked +footprints of a girl's sandals. + +Then they vanished without warning, those prints, and I stood +hesitant, staring around. I could see nothing, but a brighter glow in +the misty canopy overhead marked the sun's position. + +I knelt and brushed away the snow with my hands, hoping to undo the +wind's concealing work. But I found no more footprints. Finally I took +my bearings as well as I could and ploughed ahead in the general +direction the girl had been traveling. + +My compass told me I was heading due north. + +The fog was a living, sentient thing now, secretive, shrouding the +secret that lay beyond its gray wall. + +Suddenly I was conscious of a change. An electric tingle coursed +through my body. Abruptly the fog-wall brightened. Dimly, as through a +translucent pane, I could make out vague images ahead of me. + +I began to move toward the images--and suddenly the fog was gone! + +Before me lay a valley. Blue-white moss carpeted it except where +reddish boulders broke the blueness. Here and there were trees--at +least I assumed they were trees, despite their unfamiliar outline. +They were like banyans, having dozens of trunks narrow as bamboo. +Blue-leafed, they stood like immense bird-cages on the pallid moss. +The fog closed in behind the valley and above it. It was like being in +a huge sun-lit cavern. + +I turned my head, saw a gray wall behind me. Beneath my feet the snow +was melting and running in tiny, trickling rivulets among the moss. +The air was warm and stimulating as wine. + +A strange and abrupt change. Impossibly strange! I walked toward one +of the trees, stopped at a reddish boulder to examine it. And surprise +caught at my throat. It was an artifact--a crumbling ruin, the remnant +of an ancient structure whose original appearance I could not fathom. +The stone seemed iron-hard. There were traces of inscription on it, +but eroded to illegibility. And I never did learn the history of those +enigmatic ruins.... They did not originate on Earth. + +There was no sign of the native girl, and the resilient moss retained +no tracks. I stood there, staring around, wondering what to do now. I +was tense with excitement. But there was little to see. Just that +valley covering perhaps a half-mile before the fog closed in around +it. + +Beyond that--I did not know what lay beyond that. + +I went on, into the valley, eyeing my surroundings curiously in the +shadowless light that filtered through the shifting roof of fog. +Foolishly, I expected to discover Incan artifacts. The crumbled red +stones should have warned me. They were, I think, harder than metal, +yet they had been here long enough for the elements to erode them into +featureless shards. Had they been of earthly origin they would have +antedated Mankind--antedated even the Neanderthaler man. + +Curious how our minds are conditioned to run in anthropomorphic lines. +I was, though I did not know it, walking through a land that had its +beginnings outside the known universe. The blue trees hinted at that. +The crimson ruins told me that clearly. The atmospheric +conditions--the fog, the warmth high up in the Cordilleras--were +certainly not natural. Yet I thought the explanation lay in some +geological warp, volcanic activity, subterranean gas-vents.... + +My vision reached a half-mile, no farther. As I went on, the misty +horizon receded. The valley was larger than I had imagined. It was +like Elysium, where the shades of dead men stroll in the Garden of +Proserpine. Streamlets ran through the blue moss at intervals, chill +as death from the snowy plains hidden in the fog. "A sleepy world of +streams...." + +The ruins altered in appearance as I went on. The red blocks were +still present, but there were now also remnants of other structures, +made by a different culture, I thought. + +The blue trees grew more numerous. Leafy vines covered most of them +now, saffron-tinted, making each strange tree a little room, screened +by the lattice of the vines. As I passed close to one a faint clicking +sounded, incongruously like the tapping of typewriter keys, but +muffled. I saw movement and turned, my hand going to the pistol in my +belt. + +The Thing came out of a tree-hut and halted, watching me. I _felt_ it +watching me--though _it had no eyes_! + +It was a sphere of what seemed to be translucent plastic, glowing with +shifting rainbow colors. And I sensed sentience--intelligence--in its +horribly human attitude of watchful hesitation. Four feet in diameter +it was, and featureless save for three ivory elastic tentacles that +supported it and a fringe of long, whip-like cilia about its +diameter--its waist, I thought. + +It looked at me, eyeless and cryptic. The shifting colors crawled over +the plastic globe. Then it began to roll forward on the three +supporting tentacles with a queer, swift gliding motion. I stepped +back, jerking out my gun and leveling it. + +"Stop," I said, my voice shrill. "Stop!" + +It stopped, quite as though it understood my words or the gesture of +menace. The cilia fluttered about its spherical body. Bands of lambent +color flashed. I could not rid myself of the curious certainty, that +it was trying to communicate with me. + +Abruptly it came forward again purposefully. I tensed and stepped +back, holding the gun aimed. My finger was tightening on the trigger +when the Thing stopped. + +I backed off, nervously tense, but the creature did not follow. After +I had got about fifty yards away it turned back and retreated into the +hut-like structure in the banyan tree. After that I watched the trees +warily as I passed them, but there were no other visitations of that +nature. + +Scientists are reluctant to relinquish their so-called logic. As I +walked I tried to rationalize the creature, to explain it in the light +of current knowledge. That it had been alive was certain. Yet it was +not protoplasmic in nature. A plant, developed by mutation? Perhaps. +But that theory did not satisfy me for the Thing had possessed +intelligence, though of what order I did not know. + +But there were the seven native girls, I reminded myself. My job was +to find them, and quickly, too. + +I did, at last, find them. Six of them, anyway. They were sitting in a +row on the blue moss, facing one of the red blocks of stone, their +backs toward me. As I mounted a little rise I saw them, motionless as +bronze statues, and as rigid. + +I went down toward them, tense with excitement, expectancy. Odd that +six native girls, sitting in a row, should fill me with such feeling. +They were so motionless that I wondered as I approached them, if they +were dead.... + +But they were not. Nor were they--in the true sense of the +word--alive. + +I gripped one by the bare shoulder, found the flesh surprisingly cold +and the girl seemed not to feel my touch. I swung her around to face +me, and her black, empty eyes looked off into the far distance. Her +lips were tightly compressed, slightly cyanosed. The pupils of her +eyes were inordinately dilated, as if she was drugged. + +Indian style, she squatted cross-legged, like the others. As I pulled +her around, she toppled down on the moss, making no effort to stop +herself. For a moment she lay there. Then with slow, puppet-like +motions, she returned to her former position and resumed that blank +staring into space. + +I looked at the others. They were alike in their sleep-like +withdrawal. It seemed as if their minds had been sucked out of them, +that their very selves were elsewhere. It was a fantastic diagnosis, +of course. But the trouble with those girls was nothing a physician +could understand. It was psychic in nature, obviously. + +I turned to the first one and slapped her cheeks. "Wake up!" I +commanded. "You must obey me! Waken--" + +But she gave no sign of feeling, of seeing. I lit a match, and her eyes +focused on the flame. But the size of her pupils did not alter.... + +A shudder racked me. Then, abruptly I sensed movement behind me. I +turned.... + +Over the blue moss the seventh Indio girl was coming toward us. +"Miranda!" I said. "Can you hear me?" Fra Rafael had told me her name. +Her feet, I saw, were bare and white frost-bite blotches marked them. +But she did not seem to feel any pain as she walked. + +Then I became aware that this was not a simple Indio girl. Something +deep within my soul suddenly shrank back with instinctive revulsion. +My skin seemed to crawl with a sort of terror. I began to shake so +that it was difficult to draw my gun from its holster. + +There was just this young native girl walking slowly toward me, her +face quite expressionless, her black eyes fixed on emptiness. Yet she +was not like other Indios, not like the six other girls sitting behind +me. I can only liken her to a lamp in which a hot flame burned. The +others were lamps that were dead, unlit. + +The flame in her was not one that had been kindled on this earth, or +in this universe, or in this space-time continuum, either. There was +life in the girl who had been Miranda Valle--but it was not _human_ +life! + +Some distant, skeptical corner of my brain told me that this was pure +insanity, that I was deluded, hallucinated. Yes, I knew that. But it +did not seem to matter. The girl who was walking so quietly across the +blue yielding moss had wrapped about her, like an invisible, +intangible veil, something of the alienage that men, through the eons, +have called divinity. No mere human, I thought, could touch her. + + * * * * * + +But I felt fear, loathing--emotions not associated with divinity. I +watched, knowing that presently she would look at me, would realize my +presence. Then--well, my mind would not go beyond that point.... + +She came forward and quietly seated herself with the others, at the +end of the line. Her body stiffened rigidly. Then, the veil of terror +seemed to leave her, like a cloak falling away. Abruptly she was just +an Indio girl, empty and drained as the others, mindless and +motionless. + +The girl beside her rose suddenly with a slow, fluid motion. And the +crawling horror hit me again.... The Alien Power had not left! It had +merely transferred itself to another body! + +And this second body was as dreadful to my senses as the first had +been. In some subtly monstrous way its terror impressed itself on my +brain, though all the while there was nothing overt, nothing _visibly_ +wrong. The strange landscape, bounded by fog, was not actually +abnormal, considering its location, high in the Andes. The blue moss, +the weird trees; they were strange, but possible. Even the seven +native girls were a normal part of the scene. It was the sense of an +alien presence that caused my terror--a fear of the unknown.... + +As the newly "possessed" girl rose, I turned and fled, deathly sick, +feeling caught in the grip of nightmare. Once I stumbled and fell. As +I scrambled wildly to my feet I looked back. + +The girl was watching me, her face tiny and far away. Then, suddenly, +abruptly it was close. She stood within a few feet of me! I had not +moved nor seen her move, but we were all close together again--the +seven girls and I.... + +Hypnosis? Something of that sort. She had drawn me back to her, my +mind blacked out and unresisting. I could not move. I could only stand +motionless while that Alien being dwelling within human flesh reached +out and thrust frigid fingers into my soul. I could feel my mind laid +open, spread out like a map before the inhuman gaze that scanned it. +It was blasphemous and shameful, and I could not move or resist! + +I was flung aside as the psychic grip that held me relaxed. I could +not think clearly. That remote delving into my brain had made me +blind, sick, frantic. I remember running.... + +But I remember very little of what followed. There are vague pictures +of blue moss and twisted trees, of coiling fog that wrapped itself +about me, trying futilely to hold me back. And always there was the +sense of a dark and nameless horror just beyond vision, hidden from +me--though I was not hidden from its eyeless gaze! + +I remember reaching the wall of fog, saw it loomed before me, plunged +into it, raced through cold grayness, snow crunching beneath my boots. +I recall emerging again into that misty valley of Abaddon.... + +When I regained complete consciousness I was with Lhar. + +A coolness as of limpid water moved through my mind, cleansing it, +washing away the horror, soothing and comforting me. I was lying on my +back looking up at an arabesque pattern of blue and saffron; +gray-silver light filtered through a lacy, filigree. I was still weak +but the blind terror no longer gripped me. + +I was inside a hut formed by the trunks of one of the banyan-like +trees. Slowly, weakly I rose on one elbow. The room was empty except +for a curious flower that grew from the dirt floor beside me. I looked +at it dazedly. + +And so I met Lhar.... She was of purest white, the white of alabaster, +but with a texture and warmth that stone does not have. In +shape--well, she seemed to be a great flower, an unopened tulip-like +blossom five feet or so tall. The petals were closely enfolded, +concealing whatever sort of body lay hidden beneath, and at the base +was a convoluted pedestal that gave the odd impression of a ruffled, +tiny skirt. Even now I cannot describe Lhar coherently. A flower, +yes--but very much more than that. Even in that first glimpse I knew +that Lhar was more than just a flower.... + +I was not afraid of her. She had saved me, I knew, and I felt complete +trust in her. I lay back as she spoke to me telepathically, her words +and thoughts forming within my brain.... + +"You are well now, though still weak. But it is useless for you to try +to escape from this valley. No one can escape. The Other has powers I +do not know, and those powers will keep you here." + +I said, "You are--?" + +A name formed within my mind. "Lhar. I am not of your world." + +A shudder shook her. And her distress forced itself on me. I stood up, +swaying with weakness. Lhar drew back, moving with a swaying, bobbing +gait oddly like a curtsey. + +Behind me a clicking sounded. I turned, saw the many-colored sphere +force itself through the banyan-trunks. Instinctively my hand went to +my gun. But a thought from Lhar halted me. + +"It will not harm you. It is my servant." She hesitated, groping for a +word. "A machine. A robot. It will not harm you." + +I said, "Is it intelligent?" + +"Yes. But it is not alive. Our people made it. We have many such +machines." + +The robot swayed toward me, the rim of cilia flashing and twisting. +Lhar said, "It speaks thus, without words or thought...." She paused, +watching the sphere, and I sensed dejection in her manner. + +The robot turned to me. The cilia twisted lightly about my arm, +tugging me toward Lhar. I said, "What does it want?" + +"It knows that I am dying," Lhar said. + +That shocked me. "Dying? No!" + +"It is true. Here in this alien world I do not have my usual food. So +I will die. To survive I need the blood of mammals. But there are none +here save those seven the Other has taken. And I cannot use them for +they are now spoiled." + +I didn't ask Lhar what sort of mammals she had in her own world. +"That's what the robot wanted when it tried to stop me before, isn't +it?" + +"He wanted you to help me, yes. But you are weak from the shock you +have had. I cannot ask you--" + +I said, "How much blood do you need?" + +At her answer, I said, "All right. You saved my life; I must do the +same for you. I can spare that much blood easily. Go ahead." + +She bowed toward me, a fluttering white flame in the dimness of the +tree-room. A tendril flicked out from among her petals, wrapped itself +about my arm. It felt cool, gentle as a woman's hand. I felt no pain. + +"You must rest now," Lhar said. "I will go away but I shall not be +long." + +The robot clicked and chattered, shifting on its tentacle legs. I +watched it, saying, "Lhar, this can't be true. Why am I--believing +impossible things?" + +"I have given you peace," she told me. "Your mind was dangerously +close to madness. I have drugged you a little, physically; so your +emotions will not be strong for a while. It was necessary to save your +sanity." + +It was true that my mind felt--was drugged the word? My thoughts were +clear enough, but I felt as if I were submerged in transparent but +dark water. There was an odd sense of existing in a dream. I +remembered Swinburne's lines: + + _Here, where the world is quiet, + Here, where all trouble seems + Dead winds' and spent waves' riot + In doubtful dreams of dreams...._ + +"What is this place?" I asked. + +Lhar bent toward me. "I do not know if I can explain. It is not quite +clear to me. The robot knows. He is a reasoning machine. Wait...." +She turned to the sphere. Its cilia fluttered in quick, complicated +signals. + +Lhar turned back to me. "Do you know much of the nature of Time? That +it is curved, moves in a spiral...." + +She went on to explain, but much of her explanation I did not +understand. Yet I gathered enough to realize that this valley was not +of Earth. Or, rather, it was not of the earth I knew. + +"You have geological disturbances, I know. The strata are tumbled +about, mixed one with another--" + +I remembered what Fra Rafael had said about an earthquake, three +months before. Lhar nodded toward me. + +"But this was a time-slip. The space-time continuum is also subject to +great strains and stresses. It buckled, and strata--Time-sectors--were +thrust up to mingle with others. This valley belongs to another age, +as do I and the machine, and also--the Other." + +She told me what had happened.... There had been no warning. One +moment she had been in her own World, her own Time. The next, she was +here, with her robot. And with the Other.... + +"I do not know the origin of the Other. I may have lived in either +your future or your past. This valley, with its ruined stone +structures, is probably part of your future. I had never heard of such +a place before. The Other may be of the future also. Its shape I do +not know...." + + * * * * * + +She told me more, much more. The Other, as she called it--giving the +entity a thought-form that implied complete alienage--had a strangely +chameleon-like method of feeding. It lived on life-force, as well as I +could understand, draining the vital powers of a mammal vampirically. +And it assumed the shape of its prey as it fed. It was not possession, +in the strict sense of the word. It was a sort of merging.... + +Humanity is inclined to invest all things with its own attributes, +forgetting that outside the limitations of time and space and size, +familiar laws of nature do not apply. + +So, even now I do not know all that lay behind the terror in that +Peruvian valley. This much I learned: the Other, like Lhar and her +robot, had been cast adrift by a time-slip, and thus marooned here. +There was no way for it to return to its normal Time-sector. It had +created the fog-wall to protect itself from the direct rays of the +sun, which threatened its existence. + +Sitting there in the filigreed, silver twilight beside Lhar, I had a +concept of teeming universes of space-time, of an immense spiral of +lives and civilizations, races and cultures, covering an infinite +cosmos. And yet--what had happened? Very little, in that inconceivable +infinity. A rift in time, a dimensional slip--and a sector of land and +three beings on it had been wrenched from their place in time and +transported to _our_ time-stratum. + +A robot, a flower that was alive and intelligent--and feminine--and +the Other.... + +"The native girls," I said. "What will happen to them?" + +"They are no longer alive," Lhar told me. "They still move and +breathe, but they are dead, sustained only by the life-force of the +Other. I do not think it will harm me. Apparently it prefers other +food." + +"That's why you've stayed here?" I asked. + +The shining velvety calyx swayed. "I shall die soon. For a little +while I thought that I might manage to survive in this alien world, +this alien time. Your blood has helped." The cool tentacle withdrew +from my arm. "But I lived in a younger time, where space was filled +with--with certain energizing vibratory principles. + +"They have faded now almost to nothing, to what you call cosmic rays. +And these are too weak to maintain my life. No, I must die. And then +my poor robot will be alone." I sensed elfin amusement in that last +thought. "It seems absurd to you that I should think affectionately of +a machine. But in our world there is a rapport--a mental +symbiosis--between robot and living beings." + +There was a silence. After a while I said, "I'd better get out of +here. Get help--to end the menace of the other...." What sort of help +I did not know. Was the Other vulnerable? + +Lhar caught my thought. "In its own shape it is vulnerable, but what +that shape is I do not know. As for your escaping from this +valley--you cannot. The fog will bring you back." + +"I've got my compass." I glanced at it, saw that the needle was +spinning at random. + +Lhar said: "The Other has many powers. Whenever you go into the fog, +you will always return here." + +"How do you know all this?" I asked. + +"My robot tells me. A machine can reason logically, better than a +colloid brain." + +I closed my eyes, trying to think. Surely it should not be difficult +for me to retrace my steps, to find a path out of this valley. Yet I +hesitated, feeling a strange impotence. + +"Can't your robot guide me?" I persisted. + +"He will not leave my side. Perhaps--" Lhar turned to the sphere, and +the cilia fluttered excitedly. "No," she said, turning back to me. +"Built into his mind is one rule--never to leave me. He cannot disobey +that." + + * * * * * + +I couldn't ask Lhar to go with me. Somehow I sensed that the frigid +cold of the surrounding mountains would destroy her swiftly. I said, +"It must be possible for me to get out of here. I'm going to try, +anyway." + +"I will be waiting," she said, and did not move as I slipped out +between two trunks of the banyan-like tree. + +It was daylight and the silvery grayness overhead was palely luminous. +I headed for the nearest rampart of fog. + +Lhar was right. Each time I went into that cloudy fog barrier I was +blinded. I crept forward step by step, glancing behind me at my +footprints in the snow, trying to keep in a straight line. And +presently I would find myself back in the valley.... + +I must have tried a dozen times before giving up. There were no +landmarks in that all-concealing grayness, and only by sheerest chance +would anyone blunder into this valley--unless hypnotically summoned, +like the Indio girls. + +I realized that I was trapped. Finally I went back to Lhar. She hadn't +moved an inch since I had left, nor had the robot, apparently. + +"Lhar," I said. "Lhar, can't you help me?" + +The white flame of the flower was motionless, but the robot's cilia +moved in quick signals. Lhar moved at last. + +"Perhaps," her thought came. "Unless both induction and deduction +fail, my robot has discovered a chance for you. The Other can control +your mind through emotions. But I, too, have some power over your +mind. If I give you strength, wall you with a psychic shield against +intrusion, you may be able to face the Other. But you cannot destroy +it unless it is in its normal shape. The Indio girls must be killed +first...." + +"Killed?" I felt a sense of horror at the thought of killing those +poor simple native girls. + +"They are not actually alive now. They are now a part of the Other. +They can never be restored to their former life." + +"How will--destroying them--help me?" I asked. + +Again Lhar consulted the robot. "The Other will be driven from their +bodies. It will then have no hiding-place and must resume its own +form. Then it can be slain." + +Lhar swayed and curtseyed away. "Come," she said. "It is in my mind +that the Other must die. It is evil, ruthlessly selfish, which is the +same thing. Until now I have not realized the solution to this evil +being. But seeing into your thoughts has clarified my own. And my +robot tells me that unless I aid you, the Other will continue ravening +into your world. If that happens, the time-pattern will be broken.... +I do not quite understand, but my robot makes no mistakes. The Other +must die...." + +She was outside of the banyan now, the sphere gliding after her. I +followed. The three of us moved swiftly across the blue moss, guided +by the robot. + +In a little while we came to where the six Indio girls were squatting. +They had apparently not moved since I had left them. + +"The Other is not here," Lhar said. + +The robot held me back as Lhar advanced toward the girls, the +skirt-like frill at her base convoluting as she moved. She paused +beside them and her petals trembled and began to unfold. + +From the tip of that great blossom a fountain of white dust spurted +up. Spores or pollen, it seemed to be. The air was cloudy with the +whiteness. + +The robot drew me back, back again. I sensed danger.... + +The pollen seemed to be drawn toward the Indios, spun toward them in +dancing mist-motes. It settled on their bronzed bodies, their limbs +and faces. It covered them like a veil until they appeared to be six +statues, white as cold marble, there on the blue moss. + +Lhar's petals lifted and closed again. She swayed toward me, her mind +sending a message into mine. + +"The Other has no refuge now," she told me. "I have slain the--the +girls." + +"They're dead?" My lips were dry. + +"What semblance of life they had left is now gone. The Other cannot +use them again." + +Lhar swayed toward me. A cool tentacle swept out, pressing lightly on +my forehead. Another touched my breast, above the heart. + +"I give you of my strength," Lhar said. "It will be as shield and +buckler to you. The rest of the way you must go alone...." + +Into me tide of power flowed. I sank into cool depths, passionless and +calm. Something was entering my body, my mind and soul, drowning my +fears, stiffening my resolve. + +Strength of Lhar was now my strength! + +The tentacles dropped away, their work done. The robot's cilia +signalled and Lhar said, "Your way lies there. That temple--do you see +it?" + +I saw it. Far in the distance, half shrouded by the fog, a scarlet +structure, not ruined like the others, was visible. + +"You will find the Other there. Slay the last Indio, then destroy the +Other." + +I had no doubt now of my ability to do that. A new power seemed to +lift me from my feet, send me running across the moss. Once I glanced +back, to see Lhar and her robot standing motionless, watching me. + +The temple enlarged as I came nearer. It was built of the same reddish +stone as the other ruined blocks I had seen. But erosion had weathered +its harsh angles till nothing now remained but a rounded, smoothly +sculptured monolith, twenty feet tall, shaped like a rifle shell. + +A doorway gaped in the crimson wall. I paused for a moment on the +threshold. In the dimness within a shadow stirred. I stepped forward, +finding myself in a room that was tall and narrow, the ceiling hidden +in gloom. Along the walls were carvings I could not clearly see. They +gave a suggestion of inhuman beings that watched. + +It was dark but I could see the Indio girl who had been Miranda Valle. +Her eyes were on me, and, even through the protecting armor of Lhar +strength; I could feel their terrible power. + +The life in the girl was certainly not human! + +"Destroy her!" my mind warned. "Destroy her! Quickly!" + +But as I hesitated a veil of darkness seemed to fall upon me. Utter cold, +a frigidity as of outer space, lanced into my brain. My senses reeled +under the assault. Desperately, blind and sick and giddy, I called on the +reserve strength Lhar had given me. Then I blacked out.... + +When I awoke I saw smoke coiling up from the muzzle of the pistol in +my hand. At my feet lay the Indio girl, dead. My bullet had crashed +into her brain, driving out the terrible dweller there. + +My eyes were drawn to the farther wall. An archway gaped there. I +walked across the room, passed under the archway. Instantly I was in +complete, stygian darkness. But I was not alone! + +The power of the Other struck me like a tangible blow. I have no words +to tell of an experience so completely disassociated from human +memories. I remember only this: my mind and soul were sucked down into +a black abyss where I had no volition or consciousness. It was another +dimension of the mind where my senses were altered.... + +Nothing existed there but the intense blackness beyond time and +space. I could not see the Other nor conceive of it. It was pure +intelligence, stripped of flesh. It was alive and it had power--power +that was god-like. + +There in the great darkness I stood alone, unaided, sensing the +approach of an entity from some horribly remote place where all values +were altered. + +I sensed Lhar's nearness. "Hurry!" her thought came to me. "Before it +wakens!" + +Warmth flowed into me. The blackness receded.... + +Against the farther wall something lay, a thing bafflingly human.... a +great-headed thing with a tiny pallid body coiled beneath it. It was +squirming toward me.... + +"Destroy it!" Lhar communicated. + +The pistol in my hand thundered, bucking against my palm. Echoes +roared against the walls. I fired and fired again until the gun was +empty.... + +"It is dead," Lhar's thought entered my mind. + +I stumbled, dropped the pistol. + +"It was the child of an old super-race--a child not yet born." + +Can you conceive of such a race? Where even the unborn had power +beyond human understanding? My mind wondered what the adult Alien must +be. + +I shivered, suddenly cold. An icy wind gusted through the temple. +Lhar's thought was clear in my mind. + +"Now the valley is no longer a barrier to the elements. The Other +created fog and warmth to protect itself. Now it is dead and your +world reclaims its own." + +From the outer door of the temple I could see the fog being driven +away by a swift wind. Snow was falling slowly, great white flakes that +blanketed the blue moss and lay like caps on the red shards that +dotted the valley. + +"I shall die swiftly and easily now, instead of slowly, by +starvation," Lhar said. + +A moment later a thought crossed my mind, faint and intangible as a +snowflake and I knew Lhar was saying goodbye. + +I left the valley. Once I looked back, but there was only a veil of +snow behind me. + +And out of the greatest adventure the cosmic gods ever conceived--only +this: For a little while the eternal veil of time was ripped away and +the door to the unknown was held ajar. + +But now the door is closed once more. Below Huascan a robot guards a +tomb, that is all. + +The snow fell faster. Shivering, I ploughed through the deepening +drifts. My compass needle pointed north. The spell that had enthralled +the valley was gone. + +Half an hour later I found the trail, and the road to safety lay open +before me. Fra Rafael would be waiting to hear my story. + +But I did not think that he would believe it.... + + * * * * * + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Where the World is Quiet, by Henry Kuttner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHERE THE WORLD IS QUIET *** + +***** This file should be named 31207-8.txt or 31207-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/2/0/31207/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +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. 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Liddell + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; background-color: #FFFFFF; +} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; +} + +.tr {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; margin-top: 5%; margin-bottom: 5%; padding: 2em; background-color: #f6f2f2; color: black; border: dotted black 1px;} + +.blockquot { + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + +.center {text-align: center;} + +/* Poetry */ +.poem { + margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; + text-align: left; +} + +.poem br {display: none;} + +.poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + +.poem span.i0 { + display: block; + margin-left: 0em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i2 { + display: block; + margin-left: 2em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i4 { + display: block; + margin-left: 4em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +/* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Where the World is Quiet, by Henry Kuttner + +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: Where the World is Quiet + +Author: Henry Kuttner + +Release Date: February 7, 2010 [EBook #31207] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHERE THE WORLD IS QUIET *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="tr"><p class="center">Transcriber's Note:</p> +<p class="center">This etext was produced from Fantastic Universe May 1954. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.</p></div> +<p> </p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>The life of an anthropologist is no doubt filled much of +the time with the monotonous routine of carefully assembling +powdery relics of ancient races and civilizations. But +White's lone Peruvian odyssey was most unusual. A story +pseudonymously penned by one of the greats in the genre.</i></p></div> + +<p> </p> +<h1>where the world is quiet</h1> +<p> </p> +<h2><i>by ... C. H. Liddell</i></h2> +<p> </p> +<div class="blockquot"><p>Fra Rafael saw strange things, impossible things. Then there +was the mystery of the seven young virginal girls of +Huascan.</p></div> + +<p> </p> +<p>Fra Rafael drew the llama-wool blanket closer about his narrow +shoulders, shivering in the cold wind that screamed down from Huascan. +His face held great pain. I rose, walked to the door of the hut and +peered through fog at the shadowy haunted lands that lifted toward the +sky—the Cordilleras that make a rampart along Peru's eastern border.</p> + +<p>"There's nothing," I said. "Only the fog, Fra Rafael."</p> + +<p>He made the sign of the cross on his breast. "It is the fog that +brings the—the terror," he said. "I tell you, <i>Señor</i> White, I have +seen strange things these last few months—impossible things. You are +a scientist. Though we are not of the same religion, you also know +that there are powers not of this earth."</p> + +<p>I didn't answer, so he went on: "Three months ago it began, after the +earthquake. A native girl disappeared. She was seen going into the +mountains, toward Huascan along the Pass, and she did not come back. I +sent men out to find her. They went up the Pass, found the fog grew +thicker and thicker until they were blind and could see nothing. Fear +came to them and they fled back down the mountain. A week later +another girl vanished. We found her footprints."</p> + +<p>"The same canyon?"</p> + +<p>"<i>Si</i>, and the same result. Now seven girls have gone, one after the +other, all in the same way. And I, <i>Señor</i> White—" Fra Rafael's pale, +tired face was sad as he glanced down at the stumps of his legs—"I +could not follow, as you see. Four years ago an avalanche crippled me. +My bishop told me to return to Lima, but I prevailed on him to let me +remain here for these natives are my people, <i>Señor</i>. They know and +trust me. The loss of my legs has not altered that."</p> + +<p>I nodded. "I can see the difficulty now, though."</p> + +<p>"Exactly. I cannot go to Huascan and find out what has happened to the +girls. The natives—well, I chose four of the strongest and bravest +and asked them to take me up the Pass. I thought that I could overcome +their superstitions. But I was not successful."</p> + +<p>"How far did you go?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"A few miles, not more than that. The fog grew thicker, until we were +blinded by it, and the way was dangerous. I could not make the men go +on." Fra Rafael closed his eyes wearily. "They talked of old Inca gods +and devils—Manco Capac and Oello Huaco, the Children of the Sun. They +are very much afraid, <i>Señor</i> White. They huddle together like sheep +and believe that an ancient god has returned and is taking them away +one by one. And—one by one they <i>are</i> taken."</p> + +<p>"Only young girls," I mused. "And no coercion is used, apparently. +What's up toward Huascan?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing but wild llamas and the condors. And snow, cold, desolation. +These are the Andes, my friend."</p> + +<p>"Okay," I said. "It sounds interesting. As an anthropologist I owe it +to the Foundation to investigate. Besides, I'm curious. Superficially, +there is nothing very strange about the affair. Seven girls have +disappeared in the unusually heavy fogs we've had ever since the +earthquake. Nothing more."</p> + +<p>I smiled at him. "However, I think I'll take a look around and see +what's so attractive about Huascan."</p> + +<p>"I shall pray for you," he said. "Perhaps—well, <i>Señor</i>, for all the +loss of my legs, I am not a weak man. I can stand much hardship. I can +ride a burro."</p> + +<p>"I don't doubt your willingness, Fra Rafael," I said. "But it's +necessary to be practical. It's dangerous and it's cold up there. Your +presence would only handicap me. Alone, I can go faster—remember, I +don't know how far I'll have to travel."</p> + +<p>The priest sighed. "I suppose you are right. When—"</p> + +<p>"Now. My burro's packed."</p> + +<p>"Your porters?"</p> + +<p>"They won't go," I said wryly. "They've been talking to your +villagers. It doesn't matter. I'll go it alone." I put out my hand, +and Fra Rafael gripped it strongly.</p> + +<p>"<i>Vaya con Dios</i>," he said.</p> + +<p>I went out into the bright Peruvian sunlight. The Indios were standing +in straggling knots, pretending not to watch me. My porters were +nowhere in evidence. I grinned, yelled a sardonic goodbye, and started +to lead the burro toward the Pass.</p> + +<p>The fog vanished as the sun rose, but it still lay in the mountain +canyons toward the west. A condor circled against the sky. In the +thin, sharp air the sound of a distant rock-fall was distinctly +audible.</p> + +<p>White Huascan towered far away. A shadow fell on me as I entered the +Pass. The burro plodded on, patient and obedient. I felt a little +chill; the fog began to thicken.</p> + +<p>Yes, the Indios had talked to me. I knew their language, their old +religion. Bastard descendants of the Incas, they still preserved a +deep-rooted belief in the ancient gods of their ancient race, who had +fallen with Huayna Capac, the Great Inca, a year before Pizarro came +raging into Peru. I knew the Quichua—the old tongue of the mother +race—and so I learned more than I might have otherwise.</p> + +<p>Yet I had not learned much. The Indios said that <i>something</i> had come +into the mountains near Huascan. They were willing to talk about it, +but they knew little. They shrugged with apathetic fatalism. <i>It</i> +called the young virgins, no doubt for a sacrifice. <i>Quien sabe?</i> +Certainly the strange, thickening fog was not of this earth. Never +before in the history of mankind had there been such a fog. It was, of +course, the earthquake that had brought the—the Visitant. And it was +folly to seek it out.</p> + +<p>Well, I was an anthropologist and knew the value of even such slight +clues as this. Moreover, my job for the Foundation was done. My +specimens had been sent through to Callao by pack-train, and my notes +were safe with Fra Rafael. Also, I was young and the lure of far +places and their mysteries was hot in my blood. I hoped I'd find +something odd—even dangerous—at Huascan.</p> + +<p>I was young. Therefore, somewhat of a fool....</p> + +<p>The first night I camped in a little cave, sheltered from the wind and +snug enough in my fleece-lined sleeping-bag. There were no insects at +this height. It was impossible to make a fire for there was no wood. I +worried a bit about the burro freezing in the night.</p> + +<p>But he survived, and I repacked him the next morning with rather +absurd cheerfulness. The fog was thick, yes, but not impenetrable.</p> + +<p>There were tracks in the snow where the wind had not covered them. A +girl had left the village the day before my arrival, which made my +task all the easier. So I went up into that vast, desolate silence, +the fog closing in steadily, getting thicker and thicker, the trail +getting narrower until at last it was a mere track.</p> + +<p>And then I was moving blind. I had to feel my way, step by step, +leading the burro. Occasional tracks showed through the mist, showed +that the native girl had walked swiftly—had run in places—so I +assumed that the fog was less dense when she had come by this way. As +it happened, I was quite wrong about that....</p> + +<p>We were on a narrow path above a gorge when I lost the burro. I heard +a scrambling and clashing of hoofs on rock behind me. The rope jerked +out of my hand and the animal cried out almost articulately as it went +over. I stood frozen, pressing against the stone, listening to the +sound of the burro's fall. Finally the distant noise died in a faint +trickling of snow and gravel that faded into utter silence. So thick +was the fog that I had seen nothing.</p> + +<p>I felt my way back to where the path had crumbled and rotten rock had +given way under the burro's weight. It was possible for me to retrace +my steps, but I did not. I was sure that my destination could not be +much further. A lightly clad native girl could not have gone so far as +Huascan itself. No, probably that day I would reach my goal.</p> + +<p>So I went on, feeling my way through the thick silent fog. I was able +to see only a few inches ahead of me for hours. Then, abruptly the +trail grew clearer. Until, at last I was moving in the shadowless, +unearthly mist over hard-packed snow, following the clearly marked +footprints of a girl's sandals.</p> + +<p>Then they vanished without warning, those prints, and I stood +hesitant, staring around. I could see nothing, but a brighter glow in +the misty canopy overhead marked the sun's position.</p> + +<p>I knelt and brushed away the snow with my hands, hoping to undo the +wind's concealing work. But I found no more footprints. Finally I took +my bearings as well as I could and ploughed ahead in the general +direction the girl had been traveling.</p> + +<p>My compass told me I was heading due north.</p> + +<p>The fog was a living, sentient thing now, secretive, shrouding the +secret that lay beyond its gray wall.</p> + +<p>Suddenly I was conscious of a change. An electric tingle coursed +through my body. Abruptly the fog-wall brightened. Dimly, as through a +translucent pane, I could make out vague images ahead of me.</p> + +<p>I began to move toward the images—and suddenly the fog was gone!</p> + +<p>Before me lay a valley. Blue-white moss carpeted it except where +reddish boulders broke the blueness. Here and there were trees—at +least I assumed they were trees, despite their unfamiliar outline. +They were like banyans, having dozens of trunks narrow as bamboo. +Blue-leafed, they stood like immense bird-cages on the pallid moss. +The fog closed in behind the valley and above it. It was like being in +a huge sun-lit cavern.</p> + +<p>I turned my head, saw a gray wall behind me. Beneath my feet the snow +was melting and running in tiny, trickling rivulets among the moss. +The air was warm and stimulating as wine.</p> + +<p>A strange and abrupt change. Impossibly strange! I walked toward one +of the trees, stopped at a reddish boulder to examine it. And surprise +caught at my throat. It was an artifact—a crumbling ruin, the remnant +of an ancient structure whose original appearance I could not fathom. +The stone seemed iron-hard. There were traces of inscription on it, +but eroded to illegibility. And I never did learn the history of those +enigmatic ruins.... They did not originate on Earth.</p> + +<p>There was no sign of the native girl, and the resilient moss retained +no tracks. I stood there, staring around, wondering what to do now. I +was tense with excitement. But there was little to see. Just that +valley covering perhaps a half-mile before the fog closed in around +it.</p> + +<p>Beyond that—I did not know what lay beyond that.</p> + +<p>I went on, into the valley, eyeing my surroundings curiously in the +shadowless light that filtered through the shifting roof of fog. +Foolishly, I expected to discover Incan artifacts. The crumbled red +stones should have warned me. They were, I think, harder than metal, +yet they had been here long enough for the elements to erode them into +featureless shards. Had they been of earthly origin they would have +antedated Mankind—antedated even the Neanderthaler man.</p> + +<p>Curious how our minds are conditioned to run in anthropomorphic lines. +I was, though I did not know it, walking through a land that had its +beginnings outside the known universe. The blue trees hinted at that. +The crimson ruins told me that clearly. The atmospheric +conditions—the fog, the warmth high up in the Cordilleras—were +certainly not natural. Yet I thought the explanation lay in some +geological warp, volcanic activity, subterranean gas-vents....</p> + +<p>My vision reached a half-mile, no farther. As I went on, the misty +horizon receded. The valley was larger than I had imagined. It was +like Elysium, where the shades of dead men stroll in the Garden of +Proserpine. Streamlets ran through the blue moss at intervals, chill +as death from the snowy plains hidden in the fog. "A sleepy world of +streams...."</p> + +<p>The ruins altered in appearance as I went on. The red blocks were +still present, but there were now also remnants of other structures, +made by a different culture, I thought.</p> + +<p>The blue trees grew more numerous. Leafy vines covered most of them +now, saffron-tinted, making each strange tree a little room, screened +by the lattice of the vines. As I passed close to one a faint clicking +sounded, incongruously like the tapping of typewriter keys, but +muffled. I saw movement and turned, my hand going to the pistol in my +belt.</p> + +<p>The Thing came out of a tree-hut and halted, watching me. I <i>felt</i> it +watching me—though <i>it had no eyes</i>!</p> + +<p>It was a sphere of what seemed to be translucent plastic, glowing with +shifting rainbow colors. And I sensed sentience—intelligence—in its +horribly human attitude of watchful hesitation. Four feet in diameter +it was, and featureless save for three ivory elastic tentacles that +supported it and a fringe of long, whip-like cilia about its +diameter—its waist, I thought.</p> + +<p>It looked at me, eyeless and cryptic. The shifting colors crawled over +the plastic globe. Then it began to roll forward on the three +supporting tentacles with a queer, swift gliding motion. I stepped +back, jerking out my gun and leveling it.</p> + +<p>"Stop," I said, my voice shrill. "Stop!"</p> + +<p>It stopped, quite as though it understood my words or the gesture of +menace. The cilia fluttered about its spherical body. Bands of lambent +color flashed. I could not rid myself of the curious certainty, that +it was trying to communicate with me.</p> + +<p>Abruptly it came forward again purposefully. I tensed and stepped +back, holding the gun aimed. My finger was tightening on the trigger +when the Thing stopped.</p> + +<p>I backed off, nervously tense, but the creature did not follow. After +I had got about fifty yards away it turned back and retreated into the +hut-like structure in the banyan tree. After that I watched the trees +warily as I passed them, but there were no other visitations of that +nature.</p> + +<p>Scientists are reluctant to relinquish their so-called logic. As I +walked I tried to rationalize the creature, to explain it in the light +of current knowledge. That it had been alive was certain. Yet it was +not protoplasmic in nature. A plant, developed by mutation? Perhaps. +But that theory did not satisfy me for the Thing had possessed +intelligence, though of what order I did not know.</p> + +<p>But there were the seven native girls, I reminded myself. My job was +to find them, and quickly, too.</p> + +<p>I did, at last, find them. Six of them, anyway. They were sitting in a +row on the blue moss, facing one of the red blocks of stone, their +backs toward me. As I mounted a little rise I saw them, motionless as +bronze statues, and as rigid.</p> + +<p>I went down toward them, tense with excitement, expectancy. Odd that +six native girls, sitting in a row, should fill me with such feeling. +They were so motionless that I wondered as I approached them, if they +were dead....</p> + +<p>But they were not. Nor were they—in the true sense of the +word—alive.</p> + +<p>I gripped one by the bare shoulder, found the flesh surprisingly cold +and the girl seemed not to feel my touch. I swung her around to face +me, and her black, empty eyes looked off into the far distance. Her +lips were tightly compressed, slightly cyanosed. The pupils of her +eyes were inordinately dilated, as if she was drugged.</p> + +<p>Indian style, she squatted cross-legged, like the others. As I pulled +her around, she toppled down on the moss, making no effort to stop +herself. For a moment she lay there. Then with slow, puppet-like +motions, she returned to her former position and resumed that blank +staring into space.</p> + +<p>I looked at the others. They were alike in their sleep-like +withdrawal. It seemed as if their minds had been sucked out of them, +that their very selves were elsewhere. It was a fantastic diagnosis, +of course. But the trouble with those girls was nothing a physician +could understand. It was psychic in nature, obviously.</p> + +<p>I turned to the first one and slapped her cheeks. "Wake up!" I +commanded. "You must obey me! Waken—"</p> + +<p>But she gave no sign of feeling, of seeing. I lit a match, and her eyes +focused on the flame. But the size of her pupils did not alter....</p> + +<p>A shudder racked me. Then, abruptly I sensed movement behind me. I +turned....</p> + +<p>Over the blue moss the seventh Indio girl was coming toward us. +"Miranda!" I said. "Can you hear me?" Fra Rafael had told me her name. +Her feet, I saw, were bare and white frost-bite blotches marked them. +But she did not seem to feel any pain as she walked.</p> + +<p>Then I became aware that this was not a simple Indio girl. Something +deep within my soul suddenly shrank back with instinctive revulsion. +My skin seemed to crawl with a sort of terror. I began to shake so +that it was difficult to draw my gun from its holster.</p> + +<p>There was just this young native girl walking slowly toward me, her +face quite expressionless, her black eyes fixed on emptiness. Yet she +was not like other Indios, not like the six other girls sitting behind +me. I can only liken her to a lamp in which a hot flame burned. The +others were lamps that were dead, unlit.</p> + +<p>The flame in her was not one that had been kindled on this earth, or +in this universe, or in this space-time continuum, either. There was +life in the girl who had been Miranda Valle—but it was not <i>human</i> +life!</p> + +<p>Some distant, skeptical corner of my brain told me that this was pure +insanity, that I was deluded, hallucinated. Yes, I knew that. But it +did not seem to matter. The girl who was walking so quietly across the +blue yielding moss had wrapped about her, like an invisible, +intangible veil, something of the alienage that men, through the eons, +have called divinity. No mere human, I thought, could touch her.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>But I felt fear, loathing—emotions not associated with divinity. I +watched, knowing that presently she would look at me, would realize my +presence. Then—well, my mind would not go beyond that point....</p> + +<p>She came forward and quietly seated herself with the others, at the +end of the line. Her body stiffened rigidly. Then, the veil of terror +seemed to leave her, like a cloak falling away. Abruptly she was just +an Indio girl, empty and drained as the others, mindless and +motionless.</p> + +<p>The girl beside her rose suddenly with a slow, fluid motion. And the +crawling horror hit me again.... The Alien Power had not left! It had +merely transferred itself to another body!</p> + +<p>And this second body was as dreadful to my senses as the first had +been. In some subtly monstrous way its terror impressed itself on my +brain, though all the while there was nothing overt, nothing <i>visibly</i> +wrong. The strange landscape, bounded by fog, was not actually +abnormal, considering its location, high in the Andes. The blue moss, +the weird trees; they were strange, but possible. Even the seven +native girls were a normal part of the scene. It was the sense of an +alien presence that caused my terror—a fear of the unknown....</p> + +<p>As the newly "possessed" girl rose, I turned and fled, deathly sick, +feeling caught in the grip of nightmare. Once I stumbled and fell. As +I scrambled wildly to my feet I looked back.</p> + +<p>The girl was watching me, her face tiny and far away. Then, suddenly, +abruptly it was close. She stood within a few feet of me! I had not +moved nor seen her move, but we were all close together again—the +seven girls and I....</p> + +<p>Hypnosis? Something of that sort. She had drawn me back to her, my +mind blacked out and unresisting. I could not move. I could only stand +motionless while that Alien being dwelling within human flesh reached +out and thrust frigid fingers into my soul. I could feel my mind laid +open, spread out like a map before the inhuman gaze that scanned it. +It was blasphemous and shameful, and I could not move or resist!</p> + +<p>I was flung aside as the psychic grip that held me relaxed. I could +not think clearly. That remote delving into my brain had made me +blind, sick, frantic. I remember running....</p> + +<p>But I remember very little of what followed. There are vague pictures +of blue moss and twisted trees, of coiling fog that wrapped itself +about me, trying futilely to hold me back. And always there was the +sense of a dark and nameless horror just beyond vision, hidden from +me—though I was not hidden from its eyeless gaze!</p> + +<p>I remember reaching the wall of fog, saw it loomed before me, plunged +into it, raced through cold grayness, snow crunching beneath my boots. +I recall emerging again into that misty valley of Abaddon....</p> + +<p>When I regained complete consciousness I was with Lhar.</p> + +<p>A coolness as of limpid water moved through my mind, cleansing it, +washing away the horror, soothing and comforting me. I was lying on my +back looking up at an arabesque pattern of blue and saffron; +gray-silver light filtered through a lacy, filigree. I was still weak +but the blind terror no longer gripped me.</p> + +<p>I was inside a hut formed by the trunks of one of the banyan-like +trees. Slowly, weakly I rose on one elbow. The room was empty except +for a curious flower that grew from the dirt floor beside me. I looked +at it dazedly.</p> + +<p>And so I met Lhar.... She was of purest white, the white of alabaster, +but with a texture and warmth that stone does not have. In +shape—well, she seemed to be a great flower, an unopened tulip-like +blossom five feet or so tall. The petals were closely enfolded, +concealing whatever sort of body lay hidden beneath, and at the base +was a convoluted pedestal that gave the odd impression of a ruffled, +tiny skirt. Even now I cannot describe Lhar coherently. A flower, +yes—but very much more than that. Even in that first glimpse I knew +that Lhar was more than just a flower....</p> + +<p>I was not afraid of her. She had saved me, I knew, and I felt complete +trust in her. I lay back as she spoke to me telepathically, her words +and thoughts forming within my brain....</p> + +<p>"You are well now, though still weak. But it is useless for you to try +to escape from this valley. No one can escape. The Other has powers I +do not know, and those powers will keep you here."</p> + +<p>I said, "You are—?"</p> + +<p>A name formed within my mind. "Lhar. I am not of your world."</p> + +<p>A shudder shook her. And her distress forced itself on me. I stood up, +swaying with weakness. Lhar drew back, moving with a swaying, bobbing +gait oddly like a curtsey.</p> + +<p>Behind me a clicking sounded. I turned, saw the many-colored sphere +force itself through the banyan-trunks. Instinctively my hand went to +my gun. But a thought from Lhar halted me.</p> + +<p>"It will not harm you. It is my servant." She hesitated, groping for a +word. "A machine. A robot. It will not harm you."</p> + +<p>I said, "Is it intelligent?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. But it is not alive. Our people made it. We have many such +machines."</p> + +<p>The robot swayed toward me, the rim of cilia flashing and twisting. +Lhar said, "It speaks thus, without words or thought...." She paused, +watching the sphere, and I sensed dejection in her manner.</p> + +<p>The robot turned to me. The cilia twisted lightly about my arm, +tugging me toward Lhar. I said, "What does it want?"</p> + +<p>"It knows that I am dying," Lhar said.</p> + +<p>That shocked me. "Dying? No!"</p> + +<p>"It is true. Here in this alien world I do not have my usual food. So +I will die. To survive I need the blood of mammals. But there are none +here save those seven the Other has taken. And I cannot use them for +they are now spoiled."</p> + +<p>I didn't ask Lhar what sort of mammals she had in her own world. +"That's what the robot wanted when it tried to stop me before, isn't +it?"</p> + +<p>"He wanted you to help me, yes. But you are weak from the shock you +have had. I cannot ask you—"</p> + +<p>I said, "How much blood do you need?"</p> + +<p>At her answer, I said, "All right. You saved my life; I must do the +same for you. I can spare that much blood easily. Go ahead."</p> + +<p>She bowed toward me, a fluttering white flame in the dimness of the +tree-room. A tendril flicked out from among her petals, wrapped itself +about my arm. It felt cool, gentle as a woman's hand. I felt no pain.</p> + +<p>"You must rest now," Lhar said. "I will go away but I shall not be +long."</p> + +<p>The robot clicked and chattered, shifting on its tentacle legs. I +watched it, saying, "Lhar, this can't be true. Why am I—believing +impossible things?"</p> + +<p>"I have given you peace," she told me. "Your mind was dangerously +close to madness. I have drugged you a little, physically; so your +emotions will not be strong for a while. It was necessary to save your +sanity."</p> + +<p>It was true that my mind felt—was drugged the word? My thoughts were +clear enough, but I felt as if I were submerged in transparent but +dark water. There was an odd sense of existing in a dream. I +remembered Swinburne's lines:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>Here, where the world is quiet,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i2"><i>Here, where all trouble seems</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Dead winds' and spent waves' riot</i><br /></span> +<span class="i2"><i>In doubtful dreams of dreams....</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"What is this place?" I asked.</p> + +<p>Lhar bent toward me. "I do not know if I can explain. It is not quite +clear to me. The robot knows. He is a reasoning machine. Wait...." +She turned to the sphere. Its cilia fluttered in quick, complicated +signals.</p> + +<p>Lhar turned back to me. "Do you know much of the nature of Time? That +it is curved, moves in a spiral...."</p> + +<p>She went on to explain, but much of her explanation I did not +understand. Yet I gathered enough to realize that this valley was not +of Earth. Or, rather, it was not of the earth I knew.</p> + +<p>"You have geological disturbances, I know. The strata are tumbled +about, mixed one with another—"</p> + +<p>I remembered what Fra Rafael had said about an earthquake, three +months before. Lhar nodded toward me.</p> + +<p>"But this was a time-slip. The space-time continuum is also subject to +great strains and stresses. It buckled, and strata—Time-sectors—were +thrust up to mingle with others. This valley belongs to another age, +as do I and the machine, and also—the Other."</p> + +<p>She told me what had happened.... There had been no warning. One +moment she had been in her own World, her own Time. The next, she was +here, with her robot. And with the Other....</p> + +<p>"I do not know the origin of the Other. I may have lived in either +your future or your past. This valley, with its ruined stone +structures, is probably part of your future. I had never heard of such +a place before. The Other may be of the future also. Its shape I do +not know...."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>She told me more, much more. The Other, as she called it—giving the +entity a thought-form that implied complete alienage—had a strangely +chameleon-like method of feeding. It lived on life-force, as well as I +could understand, draining the vital powers of a mammal vampirically. +And it assumed the shape of its prey as it fed. It was not possession, +in the strict sense of the word. It was a sort of merging....</p> + +<p>Humanity is inclined to invest all things with its own attributes, +forgetting that outside the limitations of time and space and size, +familiar laws of nature do not apply.</p> + +<p>So, even now I do not know all that lay behind the terror in that +Peruvian valley. This much I learned: the Other, like Lhar and her +robot, had been cast adrift by a time-slip, and thus marooned here. +There was no way for it to return to its normal Time-sector. It had +created the fog-wall to protect itself from the direct rays of the +sun, which threatened its existence.</p> + +<p>Sitting there in the filigreed, silver twilight beside Lhar, I had a +concept of teeming universes of space-time, of an immense spiral of +lives and civilizations, races and cultures, covering an infinite +cosmos. And yet—what had happened? Very little, in that inconceivable +infinity. A rift in time, a dimensional slip—and a sector of land and +three beings on it had been wrenched from their place in time and +transported to <i>our</i> time-stratum.</p> + +<p>A robot, a flower that was alive and intelligent—and feminine—and +the Other....</p> + +<p>"The native girls," I said. "What will happen to them?"</p> + +<p>"They are no longer alive," Lhar told me. "They still move and +breathe, but they are dead, sustained only by the life-force of the +Other. I do not think it will harm me. Apparently it prefers other +food."</p> + +<p>"That's why you've stayed here?" I asked.</p> + +<p>The shining velvety calyx swayed. "I shall die soon. For a little +while I thought that I might manage to survive in this alien world, +this alien time. Your blood has helped." The cool tentacle withdrew +from my arm. "But I lived in a younger time, where space was filled +with—with certain energizing vibratory principles.</p> + +<p>"They have faded now almost to nothing, to what you call cosmic rays. +And these are too weak to maintain my life. No, I must die. And then +my poor robot will be alone." I sensed elfin amusement in that last +thought. "It seems absurd to you that I should think affectionately of +a machine. But in our world there is a rapport—a mental +symbiosis—between robot and living beings."</p> + +<p>There was a silence. After a while I said, "I'd better get out of +here. Get help—to end the menace of the other...." What sort of help +I did not know. Was the Other vulnerable?</p> + +<p>Lhar caught my thought. "In its own shape it is vulnerable, but what +that shape is I do not know. As for your escaping from this +valley—you cannot. The fog will bring you back."</p> + +<p>"I've got my compass." I glanced at it, saw that the needle was +spinning at random.</p> + +<p>Lhar said: "The Other has many powers. Whenever you go into the fog, +you will always return here."</p> + +<p>"How do you know all this?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"My robot tells me. A machine can reason logically, better than a +colloid brain."</p> + +<p>I closed my eyes, trying to think. Surely it should not be difficult +for me to retrace my steps, to find a path out of this valley. Yet I +hesitated, feeling a strange impotence.</p> + +<p>"Can't your robot guide me?" I persisted.</p> + +<p>"He will not leave my side. Perhaps—" Lhar turned to the sphere, and +the cilia fluttered excitedly. "No," she said, turning back to me. +"Built into his mind is one rule—never to leave me. He cannot disobey +that."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>I couldn't ask Lhar to go with me. Somehow I sensed that the frigid +cold of the surrounding mountains would destroy her swiftly. I said, +"It must be possible for me to get out of here. I'm going to try, +anyway."</p> + +<p>"I will be waiting," she said, and did not move as I slipped out +between two trunks of the banyan-like tree.</p> + +<p>It was daylight and the silvery grayness overhead was palely luminous. +I headed for the nearest rampart of fog.</p> + +<p>Lhar was right. Each time I went into that cloudy fog barrier I was +blinded. I crept forward step by step, glancing behind me at my +footprints in the snow, trying to keep in a straight line. And +presently I would find myself back in the valley....</p> + +<p>I must have tried a dozen times before giving up. There were no +landmarks in that all-concealing grayness, and only by sheerest chance +would anyone blunder into this valley—unless hypnotically summoned, +like the Indio girls.</p> + +<p>I realized that I was trapped. Finally I went back to Lhar. She hadn't +moved an inch since I had left, nor had the robot, apparently.</p> + +<p>"Lhar," I said. "Lhar, can't you help me?"</p> + +<p>The white flame of the flower was motionless, but the robot's cilia +moved in quick signals. Lhar moved at last.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," her thought came. "Unless both induction and deduction +fail, my robot has discovered a chance for you. The Other can control +your mind through emotions. But I, too, have some power over your +mind. If I give you strength, wall you with a psychic shield against +intrusion, you may be able to face the Other. But you cannot destroy +it unless it is in its normal shape. The Indio girls must be killed +first...."</p> + +<p>"Killed?" I felt a sense of horror at the thought of killing those +poor simple native girls.</p> + +<p>"They are not actually alive now. They are now a part of the Other. +They can never be restored to their former life."</p> + +<p>"How will—destroying them—help me?" I asked.</p> + +<p>Again Lhar consulted the robot. "The Other will be driven from their +bodies. It will then have no hiding-place and must resume its own +form. Then it can be slain."</p> + +<p>Lhar swayed and curtseyed away. "Come," she said. "It is in my mind +that the Other must die. It is evil, ruthlessly selfish, which is the +same thing. Until now I have not realized the solution to this evil +being. But seeing into your thoughts has clarified my own. And my +robot tells me that unless I aid you, the Other will continue ravening +into your world. If that happens, the time-pattern will be broken.... +I do not quite understand, but my robot makes no mistakes. The Other +must die...."</p> + +<p>She was outside of the banyan now, the sphere gliding after her. I +followed. The three of us moved swiftly across the blue moss, guided +by the robot.</p> + +<p>In a little while we came to where the six Indio girls were squatting. +They had apparently not moved since I had left them.</p> + +<p>"The Other is not here," Lhar said.</p> + +<p>The robot held me back as Lhar advanced toward the girls, the +skirt-like frill at her base convoluting as she moved. She paused +beside them and her petals trembled and began to unfold.</p> + +<p>From the tip of that great blossom a fountain of white dust spurted +up. Spores or pollen, it seemed to be. The air was cloudy with the +whiteness.</p> + +<p>The robot drew me back, back again. I sensed danger....</p> + +<p>The pollen seemed to be drawn toward the Indios, spun toward them in +dancing mist-motes. It settled on their bronzed bodies, their limbs +and faces. It covered them like a veil until they appeared to be six +statues, white as cold marble, there on the blue moss.</p> + +<p>Lhar's petals lifted and closed again. She swayed toward me, her mind +sending a message into mine.</p> + +<p>"The Other has no refuge now," she told me. "I have slain the—the +girls."</p> + +<p>"They're dead?" My lips were dry.</p> + +<p>"What semblance of life they had left is now gone. The Other cannot +use them again."</p> + +<p>Lhar swayed toward me. A cool tentacle swept out, pressing lightly on +my forehead. Another touched my breast, above the heart.</p> + +<p>"I give you of my strength," Lhar said. "It will be as shield and +buckler to you. The rest of the way you must go alone...."</p> + +<p>Into me tide of power flowed. I sank into cool depths, passionless and +calm. Something was entering my body, my mind and soul, drowning my +fears, stiffening my resolve.</p> + +<p>Strength of Lhar was now my strength!</p> + +<p>The tentacles dropped away, their work done. The robot's cilia +signalled and Lhar said, "Your way lies there. That temple—do you see +it?"</p> + +<p>I saw it. Far in the distance, half shrouded by the fog, a scarlet +structure, not ruined like the others, was visible.</p> + +<p>"You will find the Other there. Slay the last Indio, then destroy the +Other."</p> + +<p>I had no doubt now of my ability to do that. A new power seemed to +lift me from my feet, send me running across the moss. Once I glanced +back, to see Lhar and her robot standing motionless, watching me.</p> + +<p>The temple enlarged as I came nearer. It was built of the same reddish +stone as the other ruined blocks I had seen. But erosion had weathered +its harsh angles till nothing now remained but a rounded, smoothly +sculptured monolith, twenty feet tall, shaped like a rifle shell.</p> + +<p>A doorway gaped in the crimson wall. I paused for a moment on the +threshold. In the dimness within a shadow stirred. I stepped forward, +finding myself in a room that was tall and narrow, the ceiling hidden +in gloom. Along the walls were carvings I could not clearly see. They +gave a suggestion of inhuman beings that watched.</p> + +<p>It was dark but I could see the Indio girl who had been Miranda Valle. +Her eyes were on me, and, even through the protecting armor of Lhar +strength; I could feel their terrible power.</p> + +<p>The life in the girl was certainly not human!</p> + +<p>"Destroy her!" my mind warned. "Destroy her! Quickly!"</p> + +<p>But as I hesitated a veil of darkness seemed to fall upon me. Utter cold, +a frigidity as of outer space, lanced into my brain. My senses reeled +under the assault. Desperately, blind and sick and giddy, I called on the +reserve strength Lhar had given me. Then I blacked out....</p> + +<p>When I awoke I saw smoke coiling up from the muzzle of the pistol in +my hand. At my feet lay the Indio girl, dead. My bullet had crashed +into her brain, driving out the terrible dweller there.</p> + +<p>My eyes were drawn to the farther wall. An archway gaped there. I +walked across the room, passed under the archway. Instantly I was in +complete, stygian darkness. But I was not alone!</p> + +<p>The power of the Other struck me like a tangible blow. I have no words +to tell of an experience so completely disassociated from human +memories. I remember only this: my mind and soul were sucked down into +a black abyss where I had no volition or consciousness. It was another +dimension of the mind where my senses were altered....</p> + +<p>Nothing existed there but the intense blackness beyond time and +space. I could not see the Other nor conceive of it. It was pure +intelligence, stripped of flesh. It was alive and it had power—power +that was god-like.</p> + +<p>There in the great darkness I stood alone, unaided, sensing the +approach of an entity from some horribly remote place where all values +were altered.</p> + +<p>I sensed Lhar's nearness. "Hurry!" her thought came to me. "Before it +wakens!"</p> + +<p>Warmth flowed into me. The blackness receded....</p> + +<p>Against the farther wall something lay, a thing bafflingly human ... a +great-headed thing with a tiny pallid body coiled beneath it. It was +squirming toward me....</p> + +<p>"Destroy it!" Lhar communicated.</p> + +<p>The pistol in my hand thundered, bucking against my palm. Echoes +roared against the walls. I fired and fired again until the gun was +empty....</p> + +<p>"It is dead," Lhar's thought entered my mind.</p> + +<p>I stumbled, dropped the pistol.</p> + +<p>"It was the child of an old super-race—a child not yet born."</p> + +<p>Can you conceive of such a race? Where even the unborn had power +beyond human understanding? My mind wondered what the adult Alien must +be.</p> + +<p>I shivered, suddenly cold. An icy wind gusted through the temple. +Lhar's thought was clear in my mind.</p> + +<p>"Now the valley is no longer a barrier to the elements. The Other +created fog and warmth to protect itself. Now it is dead and your +world reclaims its own."</p> + +<p>From the outer door of the temple I could see the fog being driven +away by a swift wind. Snow was falling slowly, great white flakes that +blanketed the blue moss and lay like caps on the red shards that +dotted the valley.</p> + +<p>"I shall die swiftly and easily now, instead of slowly, by +starvation," Lhar said.</p> + +<p>A moment later a thought crossed my mind, faint and intangible as a +snowflake and I knew Lhar was saying goodbye.</p> + +<p>I left the valley. Once I looked back, but there was only a veil of +snow behind me.</p> + +<p>And out of the greatest adventure the cosmic gods ever conceived—only +this: For a little while the eternal veil of time was ripped away and +the door to the unknown was held ajar.</p> + +<p>But now the door is closed once more. Below Huascan a robot guards a +tomb, that is all.</p> + +<p>The snow fell faster. Shivering, I ploughed through the deepening +drifts. My compass needle pointed north. The spell that had enthralled +the valley was gone.</p> + +<p>Half an hour later I found the trail, and the road to safety lay open +before me. Fra Rafael would be waiting to hear my story.</p> + +<p>But I did not think that he would believe it....</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Where the World is Quiet, by Henry Kuttner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHERE THE WORLD IS QUIET *** + +***** This file should be named 31207-h.htm or 31207-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/2/0/31207/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +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. 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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: Where the World is Quiet + +Author: Henry Kuttner + +Release Date: February 7, 2010 [EBook #31207] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHERE THE WORLD IS QUIET *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from Fantastic Universe May 1954. Extensive + research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this + publication was renewed. + + + _The life of an anthropologist is no doubt filled much of + the time with the monotonous routine of carefully assembling + powdery relics of ancient races and civilizations. But + White's lone Peruvian odyssey was most unusual. A story + pseudonymously penned by one of the greats in the genre._ + + + + where the world is quiet + + _by ... C. H. Liddell_ + + + Fra Rafael saw strange things, impossible things. Then there + was the mystery of the seven young virginal girls of + Huascan. + + * * * * * + + + + +Fra Rafael drew the llama-wool blanket closer about his narrow +shoulders, shivering in the cold wind that screamed down from Huascan. +His face held great pain. I rose, walked to the door of the hut and +peered through fog at the shadowy haunted lands that lifted toward the +sky--the Cordilleras that make a rampart along Peru's eastern border. + +"There's nothing," I said. "Only the fog, Fra Rafael." + +He made the sign of the cross on his breast. "It is the fog that +brings the--the terror," he said. "I tell you, _Senor_ White, I have +seen strange things these last few months--impossible things. You are +a scientist. Though we are not of the same religion, you also know +that there are powers not of this earth." + +I didn't answer, so he went on: "Three months ago it began, after the +earthquake. A native girl disappeared. She was seen going into the +mountains, toward Huascan along the Pass, and she did not come back. I +sent men out to find her. They went up the Pass, found the fog grew +thicker and thicker until they were blind and could see nothing. Fear +came to them and they fled back down the mountain. A week later +another girl vanished. We found her footprints." + +"The same canyon?" + +"_Si_, and the same result. Now seven girls have gone, one after the +other, all in the same way. And I, _Senor_ White--" Fra Rafael's pale, +tired face was sad as he glanced down at the stumps of his legs--"I +could not follow, as you see. Four years ago an avalanche crippled me. +My bishop told me to return to Lima, but I prevailed on him to let me +remain here for these natives are my people, _Senor_. They know and +trust me. The loss of my legs has not altered that." + +I nodded. "I can see the difficulty now, though." + +"Exactly. I cannot go to Huascan and find out what has happened to the +girls. The natives--well, I chose four of the strongest and bravest +and asked them to take me up the Pass. I thought that I could overcome +their superstitions. But I was not successful." + +"How far did you go?" I asked. + +"A few miles, not more than that. The fog grew thicker, until we were +blinded by it, and the way was dangerous. I could not make the men go +on." Fra Rafael closed his eyes wearily. "They talked of old Inca gods +and devils--Manco Capac and Oello Huaco, the Children of the Sun. They +are very much afraid, _Senor_ White. They huddle together like sheep +and believe that an ancient god has returned and is taking them away +one by one. And--one by one they _are_ taken." + +"Only young girls," I mused. "And no coercion is used, apparently. +What's up toward Huascan?" + +"Nothing but wild llamas and the condors. And snow, cold, desolation. +These are the Andes, my friend." + +"Okay," I said. "It sounds interesting. As an anthropologist I owe it +to the Foundation to investigate. Besides, I'm curious. Superficially, +there is nothing very strange about the affair. Seven girls have +disappeared in the unusually heavy fogs we've had ever since the +earthquake. Nothing more." + +I smiled at him. "However, I think I'll take a look around and see +what's so attractive about Huascan." + +"I shall pray for you," he said. "Perhaps--well, _Senor_, for all the +loss of my legs, I am not a weak man. I can stand much hardship. I can +ride a burro." + +"I don't doubt your willingness, Fra Rafael," I said. "But it's +necessary to be practical. It's dangerous and it's cold up there. Your +presence would only handicap me. Alone, I can go faster--remember, I +don't know how far I'll have to travel." + +The priest sighed. "I suppose you are right. When--" + +"Now. My burro's packed." + +"Your porters?" + +"They won't go," I said wryly. "They've been talking to your +villagers. It doesn't matter. I'll go it alone." I put out my hand, +and Fra Rafael gripped it strongly. + +"_Vaya con Dios_," he said. + +I went out into the bright Peruvian sunlight. The Indios were standing +in straggling knots, pretending not to watch me. My porters were +nowhere in evidence. I grinned, yelled a sardonic goodbye, and started +to lead the burro toward the Pass. + +The fog vanished as the sun rose, but it still lay in the mountain +canyons toward the west. A condor circled against the sky. In the +thin, sharp air the sound of a distant rock-fall was distinctly +audible. + +White Huascan towered far away. A shadow fell on me as I entered the +Pass. The burro plodded on, patient and obedient. I felt a little +chill; the fog began to thicken. + +Yes, the Indios had talked to me. I knew their language, their old +religion. Bastard descendants of the Incas, they still preserved a +deep-rooted belief in the ancient gods of their ancient race, who had +fallen with Huayna Capac, the Great Inca, a year before Pizarro came +raging into Peru. I knew the Quichua--the old tongue of the mother +race--and so I learned more than I might have otherwise. + +Yet I had not learned much. The Indios said that _something_ had come +into the mountains near Huascan. They were willing to talk about it, +but they knew little. They shrugged with apathetic fatalism. _It_ +called the young virgins, no doubt for a sacrifice. _Quien sabe?_ +Certainly the strange, thickening fog was not of this earth. Never +before in the history of mankind had there been such a fog. It was, of +course, the earthquake that had brought the--the Visitant. And it was +folly to seek it out. + +Well, I was an anthropologist and knew the value of even such slight +clues as this. Moreover, my job for the Foundation was done. My +specimens had been sent through to Callao by pack-train, and my notes +were safe with Fra Rafael. Also, I was young and the lure of far +places and their mysteries was hot in my blood. I hoped I'd find +something odd--even dangerous--at Huascan. + +I was young. Therefore, somewhat of a fool.... + +The first night I camped in a little cave, sheltered from the wind and +snug enough in my fleece-lined sleeping-bag. There were no insects at +this height. It was impossible to make a fire for there was no wood. I +worried a bit about the burro freezing in the night. + +But he survived, and I repacked him the next morning with rather +absurd cheerfulness. The fog was thick, yes, but not impenetrable. + +There were tracks in the snow where the wind had not covered them. A +girl had left the village the day before my arrival, which made my +task all the easier. So I went up into that vast, desolate silence, +the fog closing in steadily, getting thicker and thicker, the trail +getting narrower until at last it was a mere track. + +And then I was moving blind. I had to feel my way, step by step, +leading the burro. Occasional tracks showed through the mist, showed +that the native girl had walked swiftly--had run in places--so I +assumed that the fog was less dense when she had come by this way. As +it happened, I was quite wrong about that.... + +We were on a narrow path above a gorge when I lost the burro. I heard +a scrambling and clashing of hoofs on rock behind me. The rope jerked +out of my hand and the animal cried out almost articulately as it went +over. I stood frozen, pressing against the stone, listening to the +sound of the burro's fall. Finally the distant noise died in a faint +trickling of snow and gravel that faded into utter silence. So thick +was the fog that I had seen nothing. + +I felt my way back to where the path had crumbled and rotten rock had +given way under the burro's weight. It was possible for me to retrace +my steps, but I did not. I was sure that my destination could not be +much further. A lightly clad native girl could not have gone so far as +Huascan itself. No, probably that day I would reach my goal. + +So I went on, feeling my way through the thick silent fog. I was able +to see only a few inches ahead of me for hours. Then, abruptly the +trail grew clearer. Until, at last I was moving in the shadowless, +unearthly mist over hard-packed snow, following the clearly marked +footprints of a girl's sandals. + +Then they vanished without warning, those prints, and I stood +hesitant, staring around. I could see nothing, but a brighter glow in +the misty canopy overhead marked the sun's position. + +I knelt and brushed away the snow with my hands, hoping to undo the +wind's concealing work. But I found no more footprints. Finally I took +my bearings as well as I could and ploughed ahead in the general +direction the girl had been traveling. + +My compass told me I was heading due north. + +The fog was a living, sentient thing now, secretive, shrouding the +secret that lay beyond its gray wall. + +Suddenly I was conscious of a change. An electric tingle coursed +through my body. Abruptly the fog-wall brightened. Dimly, as through a +translucent pane, I could make out vague images ahead of me. + +I began to move toward the images--and suddenly the fog was gone! + +Before me lay a valley. Blue-white moss carpeted it except where +reddish boulders broke the blueness. Here and there were trees--at +least I assumed they were trees, despite their unfamiliar outline. +They were like banyans, having dozens of trunks narrow as bamboo. +Blue-leafed, they stood like immense bird-cages on the pallid moss. +The fog closed in behind the valley and above it. It was like being in +a huge sun-lit cavern. + +I turned my head, saw a gray wall behind me. Beneath my feet the snow +was melting and running in tiny, trickling rivulets among the moss. +The air was warm and stimulating as wine. + +A strange and abrupt change. Impossibly strange! I walked toward one +of the trees, stopped at a reddish boulder to examine it. And surprise +caught at my throat. It was an artifact--a crumbling ruin, the remnant +of an ancient structure whose original appearance I could not fathom. +The stone seemed iron-hard. There were traces of inscription on it, +but eroded to illegibility. And I never did learn the history of those +enigmatic ruins.... They did not originate on Earth. + +There was no sign of the native girl, and the resilient moss retained +no tracks. I stood there, staring around, wondering what to do now. I +was tense with excitement. But there was little to see. Just that +valley covering perhaps a half-mile before the fog closed in around +it. + +Beyond that--I did not know what lay beyond that. + +I went on, into the valley, eyeing my surroundings curiously in the +shadowless light that filtered through the shifting roof of fog. +Foolishly, I expected to discover Incan artifacts. The crumbled red +stones should have warned me. They were, I think, harder than metal, +yet they had been here long enough for the elements to erode them into +featureless shards. Had they been of earthly origin they would have +antedated Mankind--antedated even the Neanderthaler man. + +Curious how our minds are conditioned to run in anthropomorphic lines. +I was, though I did not know it, walking through a land that had its +beginnings outside the known universe. The blue trees hinted at that. +The crimson ruins told me that clearly. The atmospheric +conditions--the fog, the warmth high up in the Cordilleras--were +certainly not natural. Yet I thought the explanation lay in some +geological warp, volcanic activity, subterranean gas-vents.... + +My vision reached a half-mile, no farther. As I went on, the misty +horizon receded. The valley was larger than I had imagined. It was +like Elysium, where the shades of dead men stroll in the Garden of +Proserpine. Streamlets ran through the blue moss at intervals, chill +as death from the snowy plains hidden in the fog. "A sleepy world of +streams...." + +The ruins altered in appearance as I went on. The red blocks were +still present, but there were now also remnants of other structures, +made by a different culture, I thought. + +The blue trees grew more numerous. Leafy vines covered most of them +now, saffron-tinted, making each strange tree a little room, screened +by the lattice of the vines. As I passed close to one a faint clicking +sounded, incongruously like the tapping of typewriter keys, but +muffled. I saw movement and turned, my hand going to the pistol in my +belt. + +The Thing came out of a tree-hut and halted, watching me. I _felt_ it +watching me--though _it had no eyes_! + +It was a sphere of what seemed to be translucent plastic, glowing with +shifting rainbow colors. And I sensed sentience--intelligence--in its +horribly human attitude of watchful hesitation. Four feet in diameter +it was, and featureless save for three ivory elastic tentacles that +supported it and a fringe of long, whip-like cilia about its +diameter--its waist, I thought. + +It looked at me, eyeless and cryptic. The shifting colors crawled over +the plastic globe. Then it began to roll forward on the three +supporting tentacles with a queer, swift gliding motion. I stepped +back, jerking out my gun and leveling it. + +"Stop," I said, my voice shrill. "Stop!" + +It stopped, quite as though it understood my words or the gesture of +menace. The cilia fluttered about its spherical body. Bands of lambent +color flashed. I could not rid myself of the curious certainty, that +it was trying to communicate with me. + +Abruptly it came forward again purposefully. I tensed and stepped +back, holding the gun aimed. My finger was tightening on the trigger +when the Thing stopped. + +I backed off, nervously tense, but the creature did not follow. After +I had got about fifty yards away it turned back and retreated into the +hut-like structure in the banyan tree. After that I watched the trees +warily as I passed them, but there were no other visitations of that +nature. + +Scientists are reluctant to relinquish their so-called logic. As I +walked I tried to rationalize the creature, to explain it in the light +of current knowledge. That it had been alive was certain. Yet it was +not protoplasmic in nature. A plant, developed by mutation? Perhaps. +But that theory did not satisfy me for the Thing had possessed +intelligence, though of what order I did not know. + +But there were the seven native girls, I reminded myself. My job was +to find them, and quickly, too. + +I did, at last, find them. Six of them, anyway. They were sitting in a +row on the blue moss, facing one of the red blocks of stone, their +backs toward me. As I mounted a little rise I saw them, motionless as +bronze statues, and as rigid. + +I went down toward them, tense with excitement, expectancy. Odd that +six native girls, sitting in a row, should fill me with such feeling. +They were so motionless that I wondered as I approached them, if they +were dead.... + +But they were not. Nor were they--in the true sense of the +word--alive. + +I gripped one by the bare shoulder, found the flesh surprisingly cold +and the girl seemed not to feel my touch. I swung her around to face +me, and her black, empty eyes looked off into the far distance. Her +lips were tightly compressed, slightly cyanosed. The pupils of her +eyes were inordinately dilated, as if she was drugged. + +Indian style, she squatted cross-legged, like the others. As I pulled +her around, she toppled down on the moss, making no effort to stop +herself. For a moment she lay there. Then with slow, puppet-like +motions, she returned to her former position and resumed that blank +staring into space. + +I looked at the others. They were alike in their sleep-like +withdrawal. It seemed as if their minds had been sucked out of them, +that their very selves were elsewhere. It was a fantastic diagnosis, +of course. But the trouble with those girls was nothing a physician +could understand. It was psychic in nature, obviously. + +I turned to the first one and slapped her cheeks. "Wake up!" I +commanded. "You must obey me! Waken--" + +But she gave no sign of feeling, of seeing. I lit a match, and her eyes +focused on the flame. But the size of her pupils did not alter.... + +A shudder racked me. Then, abruptly I sensed movement behind me. I +turned.... + +Over the blue moss the seventh Indio girl was coming toward us. +"Miranda!" I said. "Can you hear me?" Fra Rafael had told me her name. +Her feet, I saw, were bare and white frost-bite blotches marked them. +But she did not seem to feel any pain as she walked. + +Then I became aware that this was not a simple Indio girl. Something +deep within my soul suddenly shrank back with instinctive revulsion. +My skin seemed to crawl with a sort of terror. I began to shake so +that it was difficult to draw my gun from its holster. + +There was just this young native girl walking slowly toward me, her +face quite expressionless, her black eyes fixed on emptiness. Yet she +was not like other Indios, not like the six other girls sitting behind +me. I can only liken her to a lamp in which a hot flame burned. The +others were lamps that were dead, unlit. + +The flame in her was not one that had been kindled on this earth, or +in this universe, or in this space-time continuum, either. There was +life in the girl who had been Miranda Valle--but it was not _human_ +life! + +Some distant, skeptical corner of my brain told me that this was pure +insanity, that I was deluded, hallucinated. Yes, I knew that. But it +did not seem to matter. The girl who was walking so quietly across the +blue yielding moss had wrapped about her, like an invisible, +intangible veil, something of the alienage that men, through the eons, +have called divinity. No mere human, I thought, could touch her. + + * * * * * + +But I felt fear, loathing--emotions not associated with divinity. I +watched, knowing that presently she would look at me, would realize my +presence. Then--well, my mind would not go beyond that point.... + +She came forward and quietly seated herself with the others, at the +end of the line. Her body stiffened rigidly. Then, the veil of terror +seemed to leave her, like a cloak falling away. Abruptly she was just +an Indio girl, empty and drained as the others, mindless and +motionless. + +The girl beside her rose suddenly with a slow, fluid motion. And the +crawling horror hit me again.... The Alien Power had not left! It had +merely transferred itself to another body! + +And this second body was as dreadful to my senses as the first had +been. In some subtly monstrous way its terror impressed itself on my +brain, though all the while there was nothing overt, nothing _visibly_ +wrong. The strange landscape, bounded by fog, was not actually +abnormal, considering its location, high in the Andes. The blue moss, +the weird trees; they were strange, but possible. Even the seven +native girls were a normal part of the scene. It was the sense of an +alien presence that caused my terror--a fear of the unknown.... + +As the newly "possessed" girl rose, I turned and fled, deathly sick, +feeling caught in the grip of nightmare. Once I stumbled and fell. As +I scrambled wildly to my feet I looked back. + +The girl was watching me, her face tiny and far away. Then, suddenly, +abruptly it was close. She stood within a few feet of me! I had not +moved nor seen her move, but we were all close together again--the +seven girls and I.... + +Hypnosis? Something of that sort. She had drawn me back to her, my +mind blacked out and unresisting. I could not move. I could only stand +motionless while that Alien being dwelling within human flesh reached +out and thrust frigid fingers into my soul. I could feel my mind laid +open, spread out like a map before the inhuman gaze that scanned it. +It was blasphemous and shameful, and I could not move or resist! + +I was flung aside as the psychic grip that held me relaxed. I could +not think clearly. That remote delving into my brain had made me +blind, sick, frantic. I remember running.... + +But I remember very little of what followed. There are vague pictures +of blue moss and twisted trees, of coiling fog that wrapped itself +about me, trying futilely to hold me back. And always there was the +sense of a dark and nameless horror just beyond vision, hidden from +me--though I was not hidden from its eyeless gaze! + +I remember reaching the wall of fog, saw it loomed before me, plunged +into it, raced through cold grayness, snow crunching beneath my boots. +I recall emerging again into that misty valley of Abaddon.... + +When I regained complete consciousness I was with Lhar. + +A coolness as of limpid water moved through my mind, cleansing it, +washing away the horror, soothing and comforting me. I was lying on my +back looking up at an arabesque pattern of blue and saffron; +gray-silver light filtered through a lacy, filigree. I was still weak +but the blind terror no longer gripped me. + +I was inside a hut formed by the trunks of one of the banyan-like +trees. Slowly, weakly I rose on one elbow. The room was empty except +for a curious flower that grew from the dirt floor beside me. I looked +at it dazedly. + +And so I met Lhar.... She was of purest white, the white of alabaster, +but with a texture and warmth that stone does not have. In +shape--well, she seemed to be a great flower, an unopened tulip-like +blossom five feet or so tall. The petals were closely enfolded, +concealing whatever sort of body lay hidden beneath, and at the base +was a convoluted pedestal that gave the odd impression of a ruffled, +tiny skirt. Even now I cannot describe Lhar coherently. A flower, +yes--but very much more than that. Even in that first glimpse I knew +that Lhar was more than just a flower.... + +I was not afraid of her. She had saved me, I knew, and I felt complete +trust in her. I lay back as she spoke to me telepathically, her words +and thoughts forming within my brain.... + +"You are well now, though still weak. But it is useless for you to try +to escape from this valley. No one can escape. The Other has powers I +do not know, and those powers will keep you here." + +I said, "You are--?" + +A name formed within my mind. "Lhar. I am not of your world." + +A shudder shook her. And her distress forced itself on me. I stood up, +swaying with weakness. Lhar drew back, moving with a swaying, bobbing +gait oddly like a curtsey. + +Behind me a clicking sounded. I turned, saw the many-colored sphere +force itself through the banyan-trunks. Instinctively my hand went to +my gun. But a thought from Lhar halted me. + +"It will not harm you. It is my servant." She hesitated, groping for a +word. "A machine. A robot. It will not harm you." + +I said, "Is it intelligent?" + +"Yes. But it is not alive. Our people made it. We have many such +machines." + +The robot swayed toward me, the rim of cilia flashing and twisting. +Lhar said, "It speaks thus, without words or thought...." She paused, +watching the sphere, and I sensed dejection in her manner. + +The robot turned to me. The cilia twisted lightly about my arm, +tugging me toward Lhar. I said, "What does it want?" + +"It knows that I am dying," Lhar said. + +That shocked me. "Dying? No!" + +"It is true. Here in this alien world I do not have my usual food. So +I will die. To survive I need the blood of mammals. But there are none +here save those seven the Other has taken. And I cannot use them for +they are now spoiled." + +I didn't ask Lhar what sort of mammals she had in her own world. +"That's what the robot wanted when it tried to stop me before, isn't +it?" + +"He wanted you to help me, yes. But you are weak from the shock you +have had. I cannot ask you--" + +I said, "How much blood do you need?" + +At her answer, I said, "All right. You saved my life; I must do the +same for you. I can spare that much blood easily. Go ahead." + +She bowed toward me, a fluttering white flame in the dimness of the +tree-room. A tendril flicked out from among her petals, wrapped itself +about my arm. It felt cool, gentle as a woman's hand. I felt no pain. + +"You must rest now," Lhar said. "I will go away but I shall not be +long." + +The robot clicked and chattered, shifting on its tentacle legs. I +watched it, saying, "Lhar, this can't be true. Why am I--believing +impossible things?" + +"I have given you peace," she told me. "Your mind was dangerously +close to madness. I have drugged you a little, physically; so your +emotions will not be strong for a while. It was necessary to save your +sanity." + +It was true that my mind felt--was drugged the word? My thoughts were +clear enough, but I felt as if I were submerged in transparent but +dark water. There was an odd sense of existing in a dream. I +remembered Swinburne's lines: + + _Here, where the world is quiet, + Here, where all trouble seems + Dead winds' and spent waves' riot + In doubtful dreams of dreams...._ + +"What is this place?" I asked. + +Lhar bent toward me. "I do not know if I can explain. It is not quite +clear to me. The robot knows. He is a reasoning machine. Wait...." +She turned to the sphere. Its cilia fluttered in quick, complicated +signals. + +Lhar turned back to me. "Do you know much of the nature of Time? That +it is curved, moves in a spiral...." + +She went on to explain, but much of her explanation I did not +understand. Yet I gathered enough to realize that this valley was not +of Earth. Or, rather, it was not of the earth I knew. + +"You have geological disturbances, I know. The strata are tumbled +about, mixed one with another--" + +I remembered what Fra Rafael had said about an earthquake, three +months before. Lhar nodded toward me. + +"But this was a time-slip. The space-time continuum is also subject to +great strains and stresses. It buckled, and strata--Time-sectors--were +thrust up to mingle with others. This valley belongs to another age, +as do I and the machine, and also--the Other." + +She told me what had happened.... There had been no warning. One +moment she had been in her own World, her own Time. The next, she was +here, with her robot. And with the Other.... + +"I do not know the origin of the Other. I may have lived in either +your future or your past. This valley, with its ruined stone +structures, is probably part of your future. I had never heard of such +a place before. The Other may be of the future also. Its shape I do +not know...." + + * * * * * + +She told me more, much more. The Other, as she called it--giving the +entity a thought-form that implied complete alienage--had a strangely +chameleon-like method of feeding. It lived on life-force, as well as I +could understand, draining the vital powers of a mammal vampirically. +And it assumed the shape of its prey as it fed. It was not possession, +in the strict sense of the word. It was a sort of merging.... + +Humanity is inclined to invest all things with its own attributes, +forgetting that outside the limitations of time and space and size, +familiar laws of nature do not apply. + +So, even now I do not know all that lay behind the terror in that +Peruvian valley. This much I learned: the Other, like Lhar and her +robot, had been cast adrift by a time-slip, and thus marooned here. +There was no way for it to return to its normal Time-sector. It had +created the fog-wall to protect itself from the direct rays of the +sun, which threatened its existence. + +Sitting there in the filigreed, silver twilight beside Lhar, I had a +concept of teeming universes of space-time, of an immense spiral of +lives and civilizations, races and cultures, covering an infinite +cosmos. And yet--what had happened? Very little, in that inconceivable +infinity. A rift in time, a dimensional slip--and a sector of land and +three beings on it had been wrenched from their place in time and +transported to _our_ time-stratum. + +A robot, a flower that was alive and intelligent--and feminine--and +the Other.... + +"The native girls," I said. "What will happen to them?" + +"They are no longer alive," Lhar told me. "They still move and +breathe, but they are dead, sustained only by the life-force of the +Other. I do not think it will harm me. Apparently it prefers other +food." + +"That's why you've stayed here?" I asked. + +The shining velvety calyx swayed. "I shall die soon. For a little +while I thought that I might manage to survive in this alien world, +this alien time. Your blood has helped." The cool tentacle withdrew +from my arm. "But I lived in a younger time, where space was filled +with--with certain energizing vibratory principles. + +"They have faded now almost to nothing, to what you call cosmic rays. +And these are too weak to maintain my life. No, I must die. And then +my poor robot will be alone." I sensed elfin amusement in that last +thought. "It seems absurd to you that I should think affectionately of +a machine. But in our world there is a rapport--a mental +symbiosis--between robot and living beings." + +There was a silence. After a while I said, "I'd better get out of +here. Get help--to end the menace of the other...." What sort of help +I did not know. Was the Other vulnerable? + +Lhar caught my thought. "In its own shape it is vulnerable, but what +that shape is I do not know. As for your escaping from this +valley--you cannot. The fog will bring you back." + +"I've got my compass." I glanced at it, saw that the needle was +spinning at random. + +Lhar said: "The Other has many powers. Whenever you go into the fog, +you will always return here." + +"How do you know all this?" I asked. + +"My robot tells me. A machine can reason logically, better than a +colloid brain." + +I closed my eyes, trying to think. Surely it should not be difficult +for me to retrace my steps, to find a path out of this valley. Yet I +hesitated, feeling a strange impotence. + +"Can't your robot guide me?" I persisted. + +"He will not leave my side. Perhaps--" Lhar turned to the sphere, and +the cilia fluttered excitedly. "No," she said, turning back to me. +"Built into his mind is one rule--never to leave me. He cannot disobey +that." + + * * * * * + +I couldn't ask Lhar to go with me. Somehow I sensed that the frigid +cold of the surrounding mountains would destroy her swiftly. I said, +"It must be possible for me to get out of here. I'm going to try, +anyway." + +"I will be waiting," she said, and did not move as I slipped out +between two trunks of the banyan-like tree. + +It was daylight and the silvery grayness overhead was palely luminous. +I headed for the nearest rampart of fog. + +Lhar was right. Each time I went into that cloudy fog barrier I was +blinded. I crept forward step by step, glancing behind me at my +footprints in the snow, trying to keep in a straight line. And +presently I would find myself back in the valley.... + +I must have tried a dozen times before giving up. There were no +landmarks in that all-concealing grayness, and only by sheerest chance +would anyone blunder into this valley--unless hypnotically summoned, +like the Indio girls. + +I realized that I was trapped. Finally I went back to Lhar. She hadn't +moved an inch since I had left, nor had the robot, apparently. + +"Lhar," I said. "Lhar, can't you help me?" + +The white flame of the flower was motionless, but the robot's cilia +moved in quick signals. Lhar moved at last. + +"Perhaps," her thought came. "Unless both induction and deduction +fail, my robot has discovered a chance for you. The Other can control +your mind through emotions. But I, too, have some power over your +mind. If I give you strength, wall you with a psychic shield against +intrusion, you may be able to face the Other. But you cannot destroy +it unless it is in its normal shape. The Indio girls must be killed +first...." + +"Killed?" I felt a sense of horror at the thought of killing those +poor simple native girls. + +"They are not actually alive now. They are now a part of the Other. +They can never be restored to their former life." + +"How will--destroying them--help me?" I asked. + +Again Lhar consulted the robot. "The Other will be driven from their +bodies. It will then have no hiding-place and must resume its own +form. Then it can be slain." + +Lhar swayed and curtseyed away. "Come," she said. "It is in my mind +that the Other must die. It is evil, ruthlessly selfish, which is the +same thing. Until now I have not realized the solution to this evil +being. But seeing into your thoughts has clarified my own. And my +robot tells me that unless I aid you, the Other will continue ravening +into your world. If that happens, the time-pattern will be broken.... +I do not quite understand, but my robot makes no mistakes. The Other +must die...." + +She was outside of the banyan now, the sphere gliding after her. I +followed. The three of us moved swiftly across the blue moss, guided +by the robot. + +In a little while we came to where the six Indio girls were squatting. +They had apparently not moved since I had left them. + +"The Other is not here," Lhar said. + +The robot held me back as Lhar advanced toward the girls, the +skirt-like frill at her base convoluting as she moved. She paused +beside them and her petals trembled and began to unfold. + +From the tip of that great blossom a fountain of white dust spurted +up. Spores or pollen, it seemed to be. The air was cloudy with the +whiteness. + +The robot drew me back, back again. I sensed danger.... + +The pollen seemed to be drawn toward the Indios, spun toward them in +dancing mist-motes. It settled on their bronzed bodies, their limbs +and faces. It covered them like a veil until they appeared to be six +statues, white as cold marble, there on the blue moss. + +Lhar's petals lifted and closed again. She swayed toward me, her mind +sending a message into mine. + +"The Other has no refuge now," she told me. "I have slain the--the +girls." + +"They're dead?" My lips were dry. + +"What semblance of life they had left is now gone. The Other cannot +use them again." + +Lhar swayed toward me. A cool tentacle swept out, pressing lightly on +my forehead. Another touched my breast, above the heart. + +"I give you of my strength," Lhar said. "It will be as shield and +buckler to you. The rest of the way you must go alone...." + +Into me tide of power flowed. I sank into cool depths, passionless and +calm. Something was entering my body, my mind and soul, drowning my +fears, stiffening my resolve. + +Strength of Lhar was now my strength! + +The tentacles dropped away, their work done. The robot's cilia +signalled and Lhar said, "Your way lies there. That temple--do you see +it?" + +I saw it. Far in the distance, half shrouded by the fog, a scarlet +structure, not ruined like the others, was visible. + +"You will find the Other there. Slay the last Indio, then destroy the +Other." + +I had no doubt now of my ability to do that. A new power seemed to +lift me from my feet, send me running across the moss. Once I glanced +back, to see Lhar and her robot standing motionless, watching me. + +The temple enlarged as I came nearer. It was built of the same reddish +stone as the other ruined blocks I had seen. But erosion had weathered +its harsh angles till nothing now remained but a rounded, smoothly +sculptured monolith, twenty feet tall, shaped like a rifle shell. + +A doorway gaped in the crimson wall. I paused for a moment on the +threshold. In the dimness within a shadow stirred. I stepped forward, +finding myself in a room that was tall and narrow, the ceiling hidden +in gloom. Along the walls were carvings I could not clearly see. They +gave a suggestion of inhuman beings that watched. + +It was dark but I could see the Indio girl who had been Miranda Valle. +Her eyes were on me, and, even through the protecting armor of Lhar +strength; I could feel their terrible power. + +The life in the girl was certainly not human! + +"Destroy her!" my mind warned. "Destroy her! Quickly!" + +But as I hesitated a veil of darkness seemed to fall upon me. Utter cold, +a frigidity as of outer space, lanced into my brain. My senses reeled +under the assault. Desperately, blind and sick and giddy, I called on the +reserve strength Lhar had given me. Then I blacked out.... + +When I awoke I saw smoke coiling up from the muzzle of the pistol in +my hand. At my feet lay the Indio girl, dead. My bullet had crashed +into her brain, driving out the terrible dweller there. + +My eyes were drawn to the farther wall. An archway gaped there. I +walked across the room, passed under the archway. Instantly I was in +complete, stygian darkness. But I was not alone! + +The power of the Other struck me like a tangible blow. I have no words +to tell of an experience so completely disassociated from human +memories. I remember only this: my mind and soul were sucked down into +a black abyss where I had no volition or consciousness. It was another +dimension of the mind where my senses were altered.... + +Nothing existed there but the intense blackness beyond time and +space. I could not see the Other nor conceive of it. It was pure +intelligence, stripped of flesh. It was alive and it had power--power +that was god-like. + +There in the great darkness I stood alone, unaided, sensing the +approach of an entity from some horribly remote place where all values +were altered. + +I sensed Lhar's nearness. "Hurry!" her thought came to me. "Before it +wakens!" + +Warmth flowed into me. The blackness receded.... + +Against the farther wall something lay, a thing bafflingly human.... a +great-headed thing with a tiny pallid body coiled beneath it. It was +squirming toward me.... + +"Destroy it!" Lhar communicated. + +The pistol in my hand thundered, bucking against my palm. Echoes +roared against the walls. I fired and fired again until the gun was +empty.... + +"It is dead," Lhar's thought entered my mind. + +I stumbled, dropped the pistol. + +"It was the child of an old super-race--a child not yet born." + +Can you conceive of such a race? Where even the unborn had power +beyond human understanding? My mind wondered what the adult Alien must +be. + +I shivered, suddenly cold. An icy wind gusted through the temple. +Lhar's thought was clear in my mind. + +"Now the valley is no longer a barrier to the elements. The Other +created fog and warmth to protect itself. Now it is dead and your +world reclaims its own." + +From the outer door of the temple I could see the fog being driven +away by a swift wind. Snow was falling slowly, great white flakes that +blanketed the blue moss and lay like caps on the red shards that +dotted the valley. + +"I shall die swiftly and easily now, instead of slowly, by +starvation," Lhar said. + +A moment later a thought crossed my mind, faint and intangible as a +snowflake and I knew Lhar was saying goodbye. + +I left the valley. Once I looked back, but there was only a veil of +snow behind me. + +And out of the greatest adventure the cosmic gods ever conceived--only +this: For a little while the eternal veil of time was ripped away and +the door to the unknown was held ajar. + +But now the door is closed once more. Below Huascan a robot guards a +tomb, that is all. + +The snow fell faster. Shivering, I ploughed through the deepening +drifts. My compass needle pointed north. The spell that had enthralled +the valley was gone. + +Half an hour later I found the trail, and the road to safety lay open +before me. Fra Rafael would be waiting to hear my story. + +But I did not think that he would believe it.... + + * * * * * + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Where the World is Quiet, by Henry Kuttner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHERE THE WORLD IS QUIET *** + +***** This file should be named 31207.txt or 31207.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/2/0/31207/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +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. 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