Essential Science Fiction Novels - Volume 6. Richard Jefferies

woman, and seeing that Bernardino knew not which way to turn, she guided them to a door opening into a dimly-lighted corridor. “It will take you out to the balconies and down to the audience-chamber,” she said. The princess thanked her, and she and the Englishman descended several flights of stairs. Reaching one of the balconies they met the denser darkness of the outside and the deafening clang and clamor of the multitude. There was no light of any kind, and Thorndyke and his charge had to press close against the balustrade of the balcony to keep from being crushed by the mad torrent of humanity.

      Now and then a strident voice would rise above the din:—

      “Down with the palace! Death to the king!”

      The trumpet in the tower sounded again and again.

      “It is my father trying to attract their attention,” explained the princess. “Something very serious has happened for once. In speaking of the time the sun went out before, he told me that he had made an invention which, in such a crisis, would instantly restore confidence to the people. I cannot understand why he does not use it. Oh, I am afraid they will kill him!”

      Thorndyke tried to console her, for he saw that she was weeping, but just then there was a strange lull in the general tumult. What could have happened?

      “The dawn! the ideal dawn!” cried Bernardino, pointing to the eastern sky. Thorndyke looked in wonder. A purple light had spread along the horizon, and as it gradually softened into gray and slowly turned to pink, the noise of the populace died down. No sound could now be heard save the low groans of wounded men and women. What a sight met the view as the rose-light shimmered over the city! The dead and dying lay under the feet of the crowd. Almost every creature bore some mark of violence. Eyes were blood-shot, clothing torn, limbs were bleeding, and mingled fury and sudden hope struggled in each ashen face. The young trees and shrubbery had been trampled under foot, and walls, arcades and triumphal arches had been thrown down. The fragments of statues lay here and there, and the bodies of human beings filled the basins of broken fountains.

      “It is not the sun,” explained Bernardino; “but the invention my father spoke of. He is doing it to calm them.”

      Thorndyke made no answer. He stood as if transfixed, gazing at the horizon. The rose-light had spread over a third of the sky when gradually there appeared in its centre a bright circle of yellow light. The yellow light faded, leaving a perfect picture of the throne of the king; and as the now silent masses looked at the picture, a curtain behind the throne parted and the king himself appeared. He advanced and sat on the throne, and turned a calm face towards his subjects.

      “Wonderful!” ejaculated Bernardino, and her face was full of hope. “See what he will do!”

      “Where is the picture?” asked Thorndyke; “can it be seen by all of—of the people?”

      “Yes, by all Alpha, for it is on the sky.”

      Thorndyke said nothing further, for the king had stood up, and with hands out-stretched was bowing. Above the circle of light, as if cut out of the solid blackness, in flaming letters stood the word,

      “SILENCE!”

      And there was silence. Even the lips of the wounded men closed as the king began to speak. The sound of his voice seemed as far away as the stars, and to permeate all space:—

      “All danger is over. Tidings from the west state that the sun is setting. No harm has come to it. It will rise in the morning, and the moon and stars will be out in a few hours. Let the dead be removed, the wounded cared for, and everything be repaired. This is my will.”

      That was all. The king bowed sedately and retired from the throne, and the circle and pink glow faded from the black sky. The stillness was unbroken for a moment, then glad murmurings were heard in all directions.

      “They are lighting the palace,” cried the princess. “See, down there is the arcade leading to the rotunda.”

      “I am glad it is over,” said Thorndyke.

      She grasped his arm and impulsively looked into his face. “But your friend, we have forgotten him, and done nothing to save him, and now it is too late.”

      “We could not help it; we had to think of our own safety.”

      “I shall send for Captain Tradmos and try to devise some other plan,” she said, as they descended the stairs.

      “We should not be seen together,” she added, as they approached the throne-room; “besides, you ought to go to your chambers. No one is allowed to be out when the dead is being removed.”

      “Where is the dead taken?”

      “Over the wall, to be burned in the internal fires,” she concluded, as she was leaving him.

      He found everything in order in his rooms and he lay down and tried to sleep, but he was too much excited over the happenings of the day. Hours must have passed when his attention was drawn to a bright light shining on the wall of his room. He went to a window and looked out on the court. The light came from the rising moon.

      Below lay the ruins of fallen columns, capitals, cornices and statues. Figures in black cloaks and cowls were removing the dead from the debris. With a fluttering sound something swooped down past his window to the ground. It looked like a great bird, carrying the car of a flying-machine. Thorndyke watched its circular descent to the earth, and shuddered with horror as the black figures filled the car with bodies and the gruesome machine spread its wings and rose slowly till it was clear of the domes and pinnacles of the palace, and then flew away westward.

      Other machines came, and, one after another, received their ghastly burdens and departed. In a short time all the dead was removed, and hundreds of workmen came from the palace and began repairing the fallen masonry.

      Thorndyke went back to his couch and tried to sleep, but in vain. Slowly the hours of night passed, and as the purple of dawn rose in the east he dressed himself and went up on the roof. The moon had gone down and the stars were fading from the sky. The dark earth below showed no signs of life; but as the purple light softened into gray he saw that the streets of the city were filled with silent expectant people, all watching the eastern sky. And, as the gray light flushed into rose, and the rose began to scintillate with gold, they began to stir, and a hum of joyful voices was heard. The promised day had come.

      XV

      The sun was, indeed, slowing up. The two men peered out at the door.

      “It would be unlucky for us if it should not come so near to the earth as it did on the other side,” whispered Branasko.

      “I can hardly feel any motion to the thing at all,” replied the American. “Look! for some reason it is not so dark below. I can see the rocks. Surely we have already passed over the wall.”

      “That's so,” returned the Alphian. “Come; we must be quick and watch our opportunity to land. I can't imagine where the light comes from unless it be from the people waiting for the arrival of the sun.” Every instant the speed was lessening. Overhead the cables were beginning to creak and groan, and, now and then, the great globe swung perilously near some tall stony peak, or passed under a mighty stalactite. Slower and slower it got till, when within a few feet of the ground, it stopped its onward motion and only swung back and forth like a pendulum.

      “Quick,” whispered Branasko, “we must get down while it is swinging, no time to lose—not an instant!” And as the sun moved backward, with his hand on the doorsill, he leaped to the earth. Johnston followed him. They were not a moment too soon, for about fifty yards away they saw a body of sixty or seventy men with lights in their hands hastening toward them.

      “Just in time,” exulted Branasko, and he quickly drew Johnston into a little cave in the face of a cliff. Crouching behind a great rock, they saw and heard the men as they approached.

      Some of them walked around the sun, and two, evidently in authority, entered the door.