Essential Science Fiction Novels - Volume 10. Edward Bellamy

the name of His Highness the Emperor Bobinet, I hereby summon the royal City of Hradec Králové to place the keys of the city gates in my hands. If this is not done by sunset, I will put into effect the military measures I have prepared and will attack the city at dawn with artillery, cavalry and bayonets. I will spare the lives and property only of those who join my camp at the “Little Mill” by dawn at latest, bringing all their usable weapons, and take the oath of allegiance to His Majesty the Emperor Bobinet. Parlementaires will be shot. The Emperor does not parley.

      General Hampl.

      This proclamation was read out and caused a considerable commotion, especially when the sexton of the Church of the Holy Spirit began to ring the tocsin in the White Tower. Mr. Skocdopole called on Bishop Linda, who, however, laughed at his fears. Then he summoned an extraordinary meeting of the City Council, at which he proposed that the keys of the city gates should be given up to General Hampl. It was then ascertained that there were no such keys in existence; a few locks and keys of historical interest which used to repose in the City Museum had been carried off by the Swedes. Amid these perplexities night came on.

      All the afternoon, but more particularly towards evening, people were trickling along the pleasant lanes towards the Little Mill. “Oh, well,” they said to each other when they met, “I thought I might as well come along too, just to have a look at that crazy fellow’s camp.” When they arrived at the Little Mill, they beheld the meadows already crowded with people, and Hampl’s aide-de-camp standing beside the two drums administering the oath of allegiance to the Emperor Bobinet. Here and there bonfires were burning, with shadowy figures flitting about them: in short, it all looked very picturesque. Several people went back to Hradec visibly depressed.

      By night the sight was even finer. Skocdopole, the Burgomaster, crept up the White Tower after midnight, and there to the east along the Orlice river hundreds of fires were burning, thousands of figures were moving about in the firelight, which cast a blood-red glow over the countryside. It looked as though entrenchments were being made. The Burgomaster came down from the tower deeply perturbed. It was evident that General Hampl’s menaces regarding his military strength had not been exaggerated.

      At dawn General Hampl emerged from the wooden mill, where he had sat up all night studying the plans of the city. Several thousand men, all of them in civilian clothes, but for the most part armed, had drawn themselves up in fours; women, old men, and children thronged around them.

      “Forward,” cried Hampl, and at the same instant the trumpets rang out in the brass band from Mr. Cerveny’s world-famous wind-instrument works, and to the tune of a merry march (“The Girls along the Highway”) Hampl’s forces advanced upon the city.

      General Hampl brought his troops to a halt before the city and sent forward a trumpeter and a herald with the demand that all non-combatants should leave their houses. No one came out, however. The houses were empty.

      The Little Square was empty.

      The Great Square was empty.

      The whole city was empty.

      General Hampl twirled his moustache and made his way to the City Hall. It was open. He entered the Council Chamber. He took his seat in the Burgomaster’s Chair. Sheets of paper were lying spread out in front of him on the green cloth, and on each of them these words had been written in a beautiful hand:

      “In the name of His Majesty the Emperor Bobinet.”

      General Hampl stepped to the window and cried: “Soldiers, the battle is ended. You have crushed with the mailed fist the clerical tyranny of the Council clique. An era of progress and freedom has dawned for our beloved city. Return now, all of you, to your homes. You have played your part nobly. Nazdar! (Good luck go with you!)”

      “Nazdar!” responded the army, and dispersed.

      One of Hampl’s warriors (they came to be called simply Hampelmen) went back home to the Burgomaster’s house; he had shouldered a rifle left behind by a Chinese soldier.

      And so it was that Hampl became Mayor. It has to be acknowledged that amid the prevailing anarchy his prudent administration also was blessed with comparative peace, thanks to the wise counsels of Bishop Linda and the Worshipful City Fathers.

      XXVII

      A CORAL ISLAND IN THE

      PACIFIC

      “Well, I’ll go to blazes,” said Captain Trouble, “if that lanky fellow over there isn’t their leader!”

      “That’s Jimmy,” remarked G. H. Bondy. “He used to work here at one time. I thought he was quite tame by now.”

      “The devil must have owed me something,” the Captain growled, “or I shouldn’t have had to land here on this wretched . . . Hereheretua!!! Eh?”

      “Listen,” said G. H. Bondy, laying his gun on the table on the veranda. “Is it the same as this in other places?”

      “I should say so,” boomed Captain Trouble. “Not far off, on Rawaiwai, Captain Barker and his whole crew were eaten. And on Mangai they had a banquet on three millionaires like yourself.”

      “Sutherland Bros.?” asked Bondy.

      “I think so. And on Starbuck Island they roasted a High Commissioner. It was that fat MacDeon; you know him, don’t you?”

      “No.”

      “You don’t know him?” shouted the Captain. “How long have you been here, man?”

      “This is my ninth year,” said Mr. Bondy.

      “Then you might well have known him,” the Captain said. “So you’ve been here nine years? Business, eh? Or a little home of refuge, is it? On account of your nerves, I suppose?”

      “No,” said Mr. Bondy. “You see, I foresaw that they were all going to be at loggerheads over there, so I got out of the way. I thought that here I would find more peace.”

      “Aha, peace! You don’t know our big black fellows! There’s a bit of a war going on here all the time, my lad.”

      “Oh well,” G. H. Bondy demurred, “there really was peace here. They’re quite decent chaps, these Papuans or whatever you call them. It’s only just recently that they’ve begun to be . . . rather disagreeable. I don’t quite understand them. What are they really after?”

      “Nothing special,” said the Captain. “They only want to eat us.”

      “Are they as hungry as all that?” asked Bondy in amazement.

      “I don’t know. I think they do it more out of religion. It’s one of their religious rites, don’t you see? Something like communion, I take it. It takes them that way every now and then.”

      “Indeed,” said Mr. Bondy thoughtfully.

      “Everyone has his hobby,” growled the Captain. “The local hobby here is to eat up the stranger and dry his head in smoke.”

      “What, smoke it as well?” Mr. Bondy exclaimed with horror.

      “Oh, that’s not done till after you’re dead,” said the Captain consolingly. “They cherish the smoked head as a souvenir. Have you ever seen those dried heads they’ve got in the Ethnographical Museum at Auckland?”

      “No,” said Bondy. “I don’t think . . . that . . . that I’d look very attractive if I were smoked.”

      “You’re a bit too fat for it,” observed the Captain, inspecting him critically. “It doesn’t make so very much difference to a thin man.”

      Bondy still looked anything but tranquil. He sat droopingly on the veranda of his bungalow on the coral island of Hereheretua, which he had purchased just before the outbreak of the Greatest War. Captain Trouble was glowering suspiciously at the thicket of mangroves and bananas which surrounded