XXXVI. — AN ALLY, AND SOLID GROUND
The soldier replied unhesitatingly: “It is the Day of Life, my lord. Others call it the 'first of the Sixteen Days.' Still others, simply the Day of the Prophet, or Jarados.”
“When will it be?”
“Soon. It is but two days hence. And with the going down of the sun on that day the Fulfilment is to begin, and the Life is to come. Hence the crowd below, my lord; yet they are nothing compared with the crowds that today are pressing their way from all D'Hartia and Kospia towards the Mahovisal.”
“All because of the Day?”
“And to see YOU, my lord.”
“All believers in the Jarados?”
“All truly; but they do not all believe in your lordship. There are many sects, including the Bars, that consider you an imposter; but the rest—perhaps the most—believe you the Herald of the Day. All want to see you, for whatever motive.”
“These Bars; who are they?”
“The military priesthood, my lord. As priests they teach a literal interpretation of the prophecy; as soldiers they maintain their own aggrandisement. To be more specific, my lord, it is they who accuse you of being one of the false ones.”
“Why?”
“Because it is written in the prophecy, my lord, that we may expect impostors, and that we are to slay them.”
“Then this coming contest with the Senestro—” beginning to sense the drift of things.
“Yes, my lord; it will be a physical contest, in which the best man destroys the other!”
The guard was a tall, finely made and truly handsome chap of perhaps thirty-five. Watson liked the clear blue of his eyes and the openness of his manner. At the same time he felt that he was being weighed and balanced.
“My lord is not afraid?”
“Not at all! I was just thinking—when does this kill take place?”
“Two days hence, my lord; on the first of the Sixteen Sacred Days.”
And thus Chick found a staunch friend. The soldier's name, he learned, was “the Jan Lucar.” He was supreme in command of the royal guards; and Chick soon came to feel that the man would as cheerfully lay down his life for him, Watson, as for the queen herself. All told, Chick was able to store away in his memory a few very important facts:
First, that the Aradna did not like the Senestro.
Second, that the Jan Lucar hated the great Bar because of the prince's ambition to wed the queen and her cousin, the Nervina; also because of his selfish, autocratic ways.
Next, that were the Nervina on hand she would thwart the Senestro; for she was a very learned woman, as advanced as the Rhamda Avec himself. But that she was a queen first and a scholar afterwards; her motive in going through the Blind Spot was to take care of the political welfare of her people, her purposes were as high as Rhamda Avec's, but partook of statesmanship rather than spirituality.
Finally, that the Rhamdas were perfectly willing for the coming contest to take place, on the evening of the Day of the Prophet, in the Temple of the Bell and Leaf.
“Jan Lucar,” Watson felt prompted to say, “you need have no fear as to the outcome of the ordeal, whatever it may be. With your faith in me, I cannot fail. For the present, I need books, papers, scientific data. Moreover, I want to see the outside of this building.”
The guardsman bowed. “The data is possible, my lord, but as to leaving the building—I must consult the queen and the Rhamda Geos first.”
“But I said MUST” Watson dared to say. “I must go out into your world, see your cities, your lands, rivers, mountains, before I do aught else. I must be sure!”
The other bowed again. He was visibly impressed.
“What you ask, my lord, is full of danger. You must not be seen in the streets—yet. Untold bloodshed would ensue inevitably. To half the Thomahlians you are sacred, and to the other half an impostor. I repeat, my lord, that I must see the Geos and the queen.”
Another bow and the Jan disappeared, to return in a few moments with the Geos.
“The Jan has told me, my lord, that you would go out.”
“If possible. I want to see your world.”
“I think it can be arranged. Is your lordship ready to go?”
“Presently.” Watson laid a hand on the big globe he had already puzzled over. “This represents the Thomahlia?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“How long is your day, Geos?”
“Twenty-four hours.”
“I mean, how many revolutions in one circuit of the sun, in one year-circle?”
As he uttered the question Chick held his breath. It had suddenly struck him that he had touched an extremely definite point. The answer might PLACE him!
“You mean, my lord, how long is a circle in term of days?”
“Yes!”
“Three hundred and sixty-five and a fraction, my lord.”
Watson was dumbfounded. Could there be, in all the universe, another world with precisely the same revolution period? But he could not afford to show his concern. He said:
“Tell me, have you a moon?”
“Yes; it has a cycle of about twenty-eight days.”
Watson drew a deep breath. Inconceivable though it appeared, he was still on his own earth. For a moment he pondered, wondering if he had been caught up in tangle of time-displacement. Could it be that, instead of living in the present, he had somehow become entangled in the past or in the future?
If so—and by now he was so accustomed to the unusual that he considered this staggering possibility with equanimity—if the time coefficient was at fault, then how to account for the picture of the professor, in that leaf? Had they both been the victims of a ghastly cosmic joke?
There was but one way to find out.
“Come! Lead the way, Geos; let us take a look at your world!”
XXXVII. — LOOKING DOWN
Presently the three men were standing at the door of a vast room, one entire side of which was wide open to the outer air. It was filled by a number of queer, shining objects. At first glance Chick took them to be immense beetles.
The Jan Lucar spoke to the Geos:
“We had best take the June Bug of the Rhamda Avec.”
Watson thought it best to say nothing, show nothing. The Jan ran up to one of the glistening affairs, and without the slightest noise he spun it gracefully around, running it out into the centre of the mosaic floor.
“I presume,” apologised the Geos, “that you have much finer aircraft in your world.”
Aircraft! Watson was all eagerness. He saw that the June Bug was about ten feet high, with a bunchy, buglike body. On closer scrutiny he could make out the outlines of wings folded tight against the sides. As for the material, it must have been metal, to use a term which does not explain very much, after all. In every respect the machine was a duplicate of some great insect, except that instead of legs it had well-braced rollers.
“How does it operate?” Watson wanted to know. “That is, what power do you use, and how do you apply it?”
The Jan Lucar threw back a plate. Watson looked inside, and saw a mass of fine spider-web threads, softer than the tips of rabbit's hair, all radiating from a central grey object about the size of a pea. Chick reached out to touch this thing with his finger.
But the Geos, like a flash, caught him by the shoulder and pulled him back.
“Pardon me, my lord!” he exclaimed. “But you must not touch it! You—even you, would be annihilated!” Then to the Lucar: “Very well.”
Whereupon the other did something in front of the craft; touched a lever, perhaps. Instantly the grey, spidery hairs turned to a dull red.
“Now you may touch it,” said the Geos.
But Chick's desire had vanished. Instead he ventured a question:
“All very interesting, but where is your machinery?”
The Rhamda was slightly amused. He smiled a little. “You must give us a little credit, my lord. We must seem backward to you, but we have passed beyond reliance upon simple machines. That little grey pellet is, of course, our motive force; it is a highly refined mineral, which we mine in vast quantity. It has been in use for centuries. As for the hair-like web, that is our idea of a transmission.”
Watson hoped that he did not look as uncomprehending as he felt. The other continued:
“In aerial locomotion we are content to imitate life as much as possible. We long ago discarded engines and propellers, and instead tried to duplicate the muscular and nervous systems of the birds and insects. We fly exactly as they do; our motive force is intrinsic. In some respects, we have improved upon life.”
“But it is still only a machine, Geos.”
“To be sure, my lord; only a machine. Anything without the life principle must remain so.”
The Jan Lucar pressed another catch, allowing another plate to lower and thereby disclose a glazed door, which opened into a cosy apartment fitted with wicker chairs, and large enough for four persons. There was some sort of control gear, which the Jan Lucar explained was not connected directly with the flying and steering members, but indirectly through the membranes of the web-like system. It was uncannily similar to the nervous connections of the cerebellum with the various parts of the anatomy of an insect.
“Does it travel very fast?”
“We think so, my lord. This is the private machine of the Rhamda Avec. It is rather small, but the swiftest machine in the Thomahlia.”
They entered the compartment, Watson took his seat beside the Geos, while the soldier sat forward next to the control elements. He laid his hands on certain levers; next instant, the machine was gliding noiselessly over the mosaic, on to a short incline and thence, with ever increasing speed, toward and through the open side of the room.
The slides had all been thrown back; the compartment was enclosed only in glass. Watson could get a clear view, and he was amazed at the speed of the craft. Before he could think they were out in mid-air and ascending skyward. Travelling on a steep slant, there was no vibration, no mechanical noise; scarcely the suggestion of movement, except for the muffled swish of the air.
Were it not for the receding city below him, Chick could have imagined himself sitting in a house while a windstorm tore by. He felt no change in temperature or any other ill effects; the cabin was fully enclosed, and heated by some invisible means. In short, ideal flight: for instance, the seats were swung on gimbals, so that no matter at what angle the craft might fly, the passengers would maintain level positions.
Below stretched the Mahovisal—a mighty city of domes and plazas, and, widely scattered, a few minarets. At the southern end there was a vast, square plaza, covering thousands of acres. Toward it, on two sides, converged scores of streets; they stretched away from it like the ribs of a giant fan. On the remaining two sides there was a tremendously large building with a V-shaped front, opening on the square. The play of opal light on its many-bubbled roof resembled the glimmer from a vast pearl.
In the air above the city an uncountable number of very small objects darted hither and thither like sparkling fireflies. It was difficult to realise that they, too, were aircraft.
To the west lay an immense expanse of silver, melting smoothly into the horizon. Watson took it to be the Thomahlian ocean. Then he looked up at the sky directly above him, and breathed a quick exclamation.
It was a single, small object, perfectly white, dropping out of the amethyst. Tiny at first, amost instantly it assumed a proportion nearly colossal—a great bird, white as the breast of the snowdrift, swooping with the grace of the eagle and the speed of the wind. It was so very large that it seemed, to Chick, that if all the other birds he had ever known were gathered together into one they would still be as the swallow. Down, down it came in a tremendous spiral, until it gracefully alighted in a splash of molten colour on the bosom of the silver sea. For a moment it was lost in a shower of water jewels—and then lay still, a swan upon the ocean.
“What is it, Geos?”
“The Kospian Limited, my lord. One of our great airships—a fast one, we consider it.”
“It must accommodate a good many people, Rhamda.”
“About nine thousand.”
“You say it comes from Kospia. How far away is that?”
“About six thousand miles. It is an eight-hour run, with one stop. Just now the service is every fifteen minutes. They are coming, of course, for the Day of the Prophet.”
Watson continued to watch the great airship, noting the swarm of smaller craft that came out from the Mahovisal to greet it, until the Jan Lucar suddenly altered the course. They stopped climbing, and struck out on a horizontal level. It left the Mahovisal behind them, a shimmering spot of fire beside the gleaming sea. They were travelling eastwards. The landscape below was level and unvaried, of a greenish hue, and much like that of Chick's own earth in the early spring-time—a vast expanse, level and sometimes dotted with opalescent towns and cities. Ribbons of silver cut through the plain at intervals, crookedly lazy and winding, indicating a drainage from north to south or vice versa. Looking back to the west, he could see the great, golden sun, poised as he had seen it that morning, a huge amber plate on the rim of the world. It was sunset.
Then Chick looked straight ahead. Far in the distance a great wall loomed skyward to a terrific height. So vast was it and so remote, at first it had escaped the eye altogether. An incredibly high range of mountains, glowing with a faint rose blush under the touch of the setting sun. Against the sky were many peaks, each of them tipped with curious and sparkling diamond-like corruscations. As Chick continued to gaze the rose began to purple.
The Jan Lucar put the craft to another upward climb. So high were they now that the Thomahlia below was totally lost from view; it was but a maze of lurking shadows. The sun was only a gash of amber—it was twilight down on the ground. And Watson watched the black line of the Thomahlian shadow climb the purple heights before him until only the highest crests and the jewelled crags flashed in the sun's last rays. Then, one by one, they flickered out; and all was darkness.
Still they ascended. Watson became uneasy, sitting there in the night.
“Where are we going?”
“To the Carbon Regions, my lord. It is one of the sights of the Thomahlia.”
“On top of those mountains?”
“Beyond, my lord.”
Whereupon, to Chick's growing amazement, the Geos went on to state that carbon of all sorts was extremely common throughout their world. The same forces that had formed coal so generously upon the earth had thrown up, almost as lavishly, huge quantities of pure diamond. The material was of all colours, as diamonds run, and considered of small value; for every day purposes they preferred substances of more sombre hues. They used it, it seemed, to build houses with.
“But how do they cut it?”
“Very easily. The material which drives this craft—Ilodium—will cut it like butter.”
Later, Watson understood. He watched as the craft continued to climb; the Jan Lucar was steering without the aid of any outside lights whatever, there being only a small light illuminating his instruments. Chick presently turned his gaze outside again; whereupon he got another jolt.
He saw a NEGATIVE sky!
At first he thought his eyes the victims of an illusion; then he looked closer. And he saw that it was true; instead of the familiar starry points of light against a velvet background, the arrangement was just the reverse. Every constellation was in its place, just as Chick remembered it from the earth; but instead of stars there were jet-black spots upon a faint, grey background.
The whole sky was one huge Milky Way, except for the black spots. And from it all there shone just about as much total light as from the heavens he had known.
Of all he experienced, this was the most disturbing. It seemed totally against all reason; for he knew the stars to be great incandescent globes in space. How explain that they were here represented in reverse, their brilliance scattered and diffused over the surrounding sky, leaving points of blackness instead? Afterward he learned that the peculiar chemical constituency of the atmosphere was solely responsible for the inversion of the usual order of things.
All of a sudden the Jan Lucar switched the craft to a level. He held up one hand and pointed.
“Look, my lord, and the Rhamda! Look!”
Both men rose from their seats, the better to stare past the soldier. Straight ahead, where had been one of the corruscating peaks, a streak of blue fire shot skyward, a column of light miles high, differing from the beams of a searchlight in that the rays were WAVY, serpentine, instead of straight. It was weirdly beautiful. Geos caught his breath; he leaned forward and touched the Jan Lucar.
“Wait,” he said in an awed tone. “Wait a moment. It has never come before, but we can expect it now.” And even as he spoke, something wonderful happened.
From the base of the column two other streaks, one red and the other bright green, cut out through the blackness on either side. The three streams started from the same point; they made a sort of trident, red, green, and blue—twisting, alive—strangely impressive, suggestive of grandeur and omnipotence—holy.
Again the Rhamda spoke. “Wait!” said he. “Wait!”
They were barely moving now. Watson watched and wondered. The three streams of light ran up and up, as though they would pierce the heavens; the eye could not follow their ends. All in utter silence, nothing but those beams of glorified light, their reality a hint of power, of life and wisdom—of the certainty of things. Plainly it had a tremendous significance in the minds of the Geos and the Lucar.
Then came the climax. Slowly, but somehow inexorably, like the laws of life itself, and somewhere at a prodigious height above the earth, the three outer ends of the red and the green and the blue spread out and flared back upon themselves and one another, until their combined brilliance bridged a great rainbow across the sky. Blending into all the colours of the prism, the bow became—for a moment—pregnant with an overpowering beauty, symbolical, portentous of something stupendous about to come out of the unknown to the Thomahlians. And next—
The bow began to move, to swirl, and to change in shape and colour. The three great rivers of light billowed and expanded and rounded into a new form. Then they burst—into a vast, three-leafed clover—blue and red and green!
And Watson caught the startled words of the Geos:
“The Sign of the Jarados!”
XXXVIII. — THE VOICE FROM THE VOID
Even while that inexplicable heavenly pageant still burned against the heavens, something else took place, a thing of much greater importance to Chick. And, it happened right before his eyes.
In the front of the car was a dial, slightly raised above the level of the various controlling instruments. And all of a sudden this dial, a small affair about six inches across, broke into light and life.
First, there was a white blaze that covered the whole disc; then the whiteness abruptly gave way to a flood of colour, which resolved itself into a perfect miniature of the tri-coloured cloverleaf in the sky ahead. Chick saw, however that the positions of the red and green were just the obverse of what glowed in the distance; and then he heard the voice, strong and distinct, speaking with a slight metallic twang as from a microphone hidden in that little, blazing, coloured leaf:
“Listen, ye who have ears to listen!”
It was said in the Thomahlian tongue. The Geos breathed:
“The voice of the Prophet Jarados!”
But the next moment the unseen speaker began in another language—clear, silver, musical—in English, and in a voice that Chick recognised!
“Chick! You have done well, my boy. Your courage and your intuition may lead us out. Follow the prophecy to the letter, Chick; it MUST come to pass, exactly as it is written! Don't fail to read it, there on the walls of the Temple of the Bell, when you encounter the Bar Senestro on the Day of the Prophet!
“I have discovered many things, my boy, but I am not omnipotent. Your coming has made possible my last hope that I may return to my own kind, and take with me the secrets of life. You have done right to trust your instinct; have no fear, yet remember that if you—if we—make one false step we are lost.
“Finally, if you should succeed in your contest with the Senestro, I shall send for you; but if you fail, I know how to die.
“Return at once to the Mahovisal. Don't cross into the Region of Carbon. Take care how you go back; the Bars are waiting. But you can put full confidence in the Rhamdas.”
Then the speaker dropped the language of the earth and used the Thomahlian tongue again: “It is I who speak—I, the Prophet; the Prophet Jarados!”
All in the voice of Dr. Holcomb.
The blazing leaf faded into blackness, and the talking ceased. Chick was glad of the darkness; the whole thing was like magic, and too good to believe. The first actual words from the missing professor! Each syllable was frozen into Watson's memory.
The Geos was clutching his arm.
“Did you understand, my lord? We heard the voice of the prophet! What did he say?”
“Yes, I understand. He used his own language—my language. And he said”—taking the reins firmly into his hands—“he said that we must return to the Thomahlia. And we must beware of the Bars.”
There was no thought of questioning him. Without waiting the Geos' command, the Jan Lucar began putting the craft about. Watson glanced at the sky; the great spectacle was gone; and he demanded of the soldier:
“How can we get back? How do we find our way?”
For there was no visible light save the strange, fitful glow from that uncanny sky to guide them; no lights from the inky carpet of the Thomahlia, lights such as one would expect for the benefit of fliers. But the soldier touched a button, and instantly another and larger dial was illumined above the instruments.
It revealed a map or chart of a vast portion of the Thomahlia. On the farther edge there appeared an area coloured to represent water, and adjoining this area was a square spot labeled “The Mahovisal.” And about midway from this point to the near edge of the dial a red dot hung, moving slowly over the chart.
“The red dot, my lord, indicates our position,” explained the Jan. “In that manner we know at all times where we are located, and which way we are flying. We shall arrive in the Mahovisal shortly.”
As he spoke the craft was gaining speed, and soon was travelling at an even greater rate than before. The red dot began to crawl at an astonishing speed. Of course, they had the benefit of the pull of gravity, now; apparently they would make the journey in a few minutes. But incredible though the speed might be, there was nothing but the red dot to show it.
The Geos felt like talking. “My lord, the sign is conclusive. It is a marvel, such as only the prophet could possibly have produced; with all our science we could not duplicate such splendour. Only once before has the Thomahlia seen it.”
Already they were near enough to the surface to make out the clustered, blinking lights of the towns on the plain below. Ahead of them queer streamers of pale rays thrust through the darkness. Watson recognised them as the beams of the far-distant searchlights; and then and there he gave thanks for one thing, at least, in which the Thomahlians had seemingly progressed no further than the people of the earth.
Coming a little nearer, Chick made out a number of bright, glittering, insect-like objects, revealed by these searchlights. The Jan Lucar said:
“The Bars, my lord. They are waiting; and they will head us off if they can.”
“The work of Senestro, I suppose. I thought he claimed to some honour.”
“It is not the prince's work, my lord,” replied the soldier. “His D'Hartian and Kospian followers, some of them, have no scruples as to how they might slay the 'false one', as they think you.”
“Suppose,” hazarded Watson, “suppose I WERE the false one?”
Both the Geos and the Jan smiled. But the Rhamda's voice was very sure as he replied:
“If you were false, my lord, I would slay you myself.”
They were very near the Mahovisal now. Below was the unmistakable opalescence, somehow produced by powerful illumination, as intense as sunlight itself. The red dot was almost above the black square on the lighted chart. And directly ahead, the air was becoming alive with the beam-revealed aircraft. How could they get by in safety?
But Chick did not know the Jan Lucar. The soldier said:
“My lord is not uneasy?”
“Of course not,” with unconcern. “Why?”
“Because I propose something daring. I am free to admit, my lord, that were the Geos and I alone, I should not attempt it. But not even the Bars,” with magnificent confidence, “can stand before us now! We have had the proof of the Jarados, and we know that no matter what the odds, he will carry us through.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I propose to shoot it, my lord.” And without explaining the Jan asked the Geos: “Are you agreeable? The June Bug will hold; the prophet will protect us.”
“Surely,” returned the Rhamda. “There is nothing to fear, now, for those who are in the company of the chosen.”
Watson wondering watched the Jan as he tilted the nose of the June Bug and began to climb at an all but perpendicular angle straight into the heavens. Mile after mile, in less than as many minutes, they hurtled towards the zenith, so that the lights of the city dimmed until only the searching shafts could be seen. Chick began to guess what they were going to do; that the Jan Lucar was nearly as reckless as he was handsome.
At last the soldier brought the craft to a level. They soared along horizontally for a while; the Jan kept his eye fixed on the red dot. And when it was directly above the black square he stated:
“It is considered a perilous feat, my lord. We are going to drop. If we make it from this height, not only will we break all records, but will have proved the June Bug the superior in this respect, as she is in speed. It is our only chance in any circumstances, but with the Jarados at our side, we need not fear that the craft will stand the strain. We shall go through them like stone; before they know it we shall be in the drome—in less than a minute.”
“From this height?” Chick concealed a shudder behind a fair show of scepticism. “A minute is not much time.”
“Does my lord fear the drop?”
“Why should I? I have in mind the June Bug; she might be set afire through friction, in dropping so quickly through the air.” Watson had a vivid picture of a blazing meteorite, containing the charred bodies of three men, dropping out of—
“My lord need not be concerned with that,” the Jan assured him. “The shell of the car is provided with a number of tiny pores, through which a heat-resisting fluid will be pumped during the manoeuvre. The temperature may be raised a little, but no more.
“You see this plug,” touching a hitherto unused knob among the instruments. “By pulling that out, the mechanism of the craft is automatically adjusted to care for every phase of the descent. Nothing else remains to be done, after removing that plug, save to watch the red dot and prepare to step out upon the floor of our starting-place.”
“Has the thing ever been done before?” Watson was sparring for time while he gathered his nerve.
“I myself have seen it, my lord. The June Bug has been sent up many times, weighted with ballast; the plug was abstracted by clockwork; and in fifty-eight seconds she returned through the open end of the drone, without a hitch. It was beautiful. I have always envied her that plunge. And now I shall have the chance, with the hand of the Jarados as my guide and protector!”
Chick had just time to reflect that, if by any chance he got through with this, he ought to be able to pass any test conceivable. He ought to be able to get away with anything. He started to murmur a prayer; but before he could finish, the Jan Lucar leaned over the dial-map for the last time, saw that the red dot was now exactly central over the square that represented the city, and unhesitatingly jerked out the plug.
Of what happened next Watson remembered but little. The bottom seemed to have dropped out of the universe. He was conscious of a crushing blur of immensity, of a silent thundering within him—then mental chaos and a stunned oblivion.
XXXIX. — WHO IS THE JARADOS?
It was all over. Chick opened his eyes to see the Jan throwing open the plate on the side of the compartment. Neither the soldier nor the Rhamda seemed to have noted Chick's daze. As for the Jan, his blue eyes were dancing with dare-devilry.
“That's what I call living!” he grinned. “They can keep on looking for the June Bug all night!”
Chick looked out. They were inside the great room from which they had started; the trip was over; the plunge had been made in safety. Chick took a long breath, and held out a hand.
“A man after my own heart, Jan Lucar. I foresee that we may have great sport with the Senestro.”
“Aye, my lord,” cheerfully. “The presumptuous usurper! I only wish I could kill him, instead of you.”
“You are not the only one,” commented the Rhamda. “Half of the Rhamdas would cheerfully act as the chosen one's proxy.”
And so ended the events of Chick Watson's first day beyond the Blind Spot, his first day on the Thomahlia; that is, disregarding the previous months of unconsciousness. He had good reason to pass a sleepless night in legitimate worry for the outcome of it all; but instead he slept the sound sleep of exhaustion, awakening the next morning much refreshed.
He reminded himself, first of all, that today was the one immediately preceding that of his test—the Day of the Prophet. He had only a little more than twenty-four hours to prepare. What was the best and wisest proceeding?
He called for the Geos. He told him what data he wanted. The Rhamda said that he could find everything in a library in that building, and inside a half-hour he returned with a pile of manuscripts.
Left to himself, Chick found that he now had data relating to all the sciences, to religion, to education and political history and the law. The chronology of the Thomahlians, Chick found, dates back no less than fifteen thousand years. An abiding civilisation of that antiquity, it need not be said, presented somewhat different aspects from what is known on the earth.
It seemed that the Jarados had come miraculously. That is, he had come out of the unknown, through a channel which he himself later termed the Spot of Life.
He had taught a religion of enlightenment, embracing intelligence, love, virtue, and the higher ethics such as are inherent in all great philosophies. But he did not call himself a religionist. That was the queer point. He said that he had come to teach an advanced philosophy of life; and he expressly stated that his teachings were absolute only to a limited extent.
“Man must seek and find,” was one of his epigrams; “and if he find no more truths, then he will find lies.” Which was merely a negative way of saying that some of his philosophy was only provisional.
But on some points he was adamant. He had arrived at a time when the unthinking, self-glorifying Thomahlians had all but exterminated the lower orders of creation. The Jarados sought to remove the handicap which the people had set upon themselves, and gave them, in the place of kindness which they had forgotten, how to use, a burning desire for a positive knowledge, where before had been only blind faith. Also, he taught good-fellowship, as a means to this end. He taught beauty, love, and laughter, the three great cleansers of humanity. And yet, through it all—
The Jarados was a mystic.
He studied life after a manner of his own. He was a stickler for getting down to the very heart of things, for prodding around among causes until he found the cause itself. And thus he learned the secret of the occult.
For so he taught. And presently the Jarados was recognized as an authority on what the Thomahlia called “the next world.” Only he showed that death, instead of being an ushering into a void, was merely a translation onto another plane of life, a higher plane and a more glorious one. In short, a thing to be desired and attained, not to be avoided.
This put the Spot of Life on an entirely different basis. No longer was it a fearsome thing. The Jarados elevated death to the plane of motherhood—something to glory in. And Chick gathered that his famous prophecy—which he had yet to read, where it hung on the wall of the temple—gave every detail of the Jarados' profound convictions and teachings regarding the mystery of the next life.
And now comes a curious thing. As Chick read these details, he became more and more conscious of—what shall it be called?—the presence of someone or something beside him, above and all about him, watching his every movement. He could not get away from the feeling, although it was broad daylight, and he was seemingly quite alone in the room. Chick was not frightened; but he could have sworn that a very real personality was enveloping his own as he read.
Every word, somehow, reminded him of the miraculous sequence of facts as he knew them; the unerring accuracy with which he, quite unthinkingly and almost without volition, had solved problem after problem, although the chances were totally against him. He became more and more convinced that he himself had practically no control over his affairs; that he was in the hands of an irresistible Fate; and that—he could not help it—his good angel was none other than the prophet who, almost ninety centuries ago, had lived and taught upon the Thomahlia, and in the end had returned to the unknown.
But how could such a thing be? Watson did not even know where he was! Small wonder that, again and again, he felt the need of assurance. He asked for the Jan Lucar.
“In the first place,” began Chick without preamble, “you accept me, Jan Lucar; do you not?”
“Absolutely, my lord.”
“You conceive me to be out of the spiritual world, and yet flesh and blood like yourself?”
“Of course,” with flat conviction.
That settled it. Watson decided to find out something he had not had time to locate in the library.
“The Rhamda may have told you, Jan Lucar, that I am here to seek the Jarados. Now, I suspect the Senestro. Can you imagine what he has done to the prophet?”
“My lord,” remonstrated the other, “daring as the Bar might be, he could do nothing to the Jarados. He would not dare.”
“Then he is afraid to run counter to the prophecy?”
“Yes, my lord; that is, its literal interpretation. He is opposed only to the broader version as held by such liberals as the Rhamda Avec. The Bars are always warning the people against the false one.”
“And the Senestro is at their head,” mused Chick aloud. “This brother of his who died—usually there are two such princes and chiefs?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“And the Senestro plans to marry both queens, according to the custom!”
“My lord”—and the Jan suddenly snapped erect—“the Bar will do exceedingly well if he succeeds in marrying one of them! Certainly he shall never have the Aradna—not while I live and can fight!”
“Good! How about the Nervina?”
“He'll do well to find her first!”
“True enough. What would you say was his code of honour?”
“My lord, the Senestro actually has no code. He believes in nothing. He is so constituted, mentally and morally, that he cares for and trusts in none but himself. He is a sceptic pure and simple; he cares nothing for the Jarados and his teachings. He is an opportunist seeking for power, wicked, lustful, cruel—”
“But a good sportsman!”
“In what way, my lord?”
“Didn't he allow me the choice of combat?”
The Jan laughed, but his handsome face could not hide his contempt.
“It is ever so with a champion, my lord. He has never been defeated in a matter of physical prowess. It would be far more to his glory to overcome you in combat of your own selection. It will be spectacular—he knows the value of dramatic climax—and he would kill you in a moment, before a million Thomahlians.”
“It's a nice way to die,” said Watson. “You must grant that much.”
“I don't know of any nice way to die, my lord. But it is a good way of living—to kill the Bar Senestro. I would that I could have the honour.”
“How does it come that the Rhamdas, superintellectual as they are, can consent to such a contest? Is it not degrading, to their way of thinking? It smacks of barbarism.”
“They do not look upon it in that light, my lord. Our civilisation has passed beyond snobbery. Of course there was a time, centuries ago when we were taught that any physical contest was brutal. But that was before we knew better.”
“You don't believe it now?”
“By no means, my lord. The most wonderful physical thing in the Thomahlia is the human body. We do not hide it. We admire beauty, strength, prowess. The live body is above all art; it is the work of God himself; art is but an imitation. And there is nothing so splendid as a physical contest—the lightning correlation of mind and body. It is a picture of life.”
“Do the Rhamdas think this?”
“Most assuredly. A Rhamda is always first an athlete.”
“Why?”
“Perfection, my lord. A perfect mind does not always dwell in a perfect body, but they strive for it as much as possible. The first test of a Rhamda is his body. After he passes that he must take the mental test.”
“Mental?”
“Moral first. The most rigid, perhaps of all; he must be a man above suspicion. The honour of a Rhamda must never be questioned. He must be upright and absolutely unselfish. He must be broad-minded, human, lovable, and a leader of men. After that, my lord, comes the intellectual test.”
“He must be a learned man?”
“Not exactly, your lordship. There are many very learned men who could not be Rhamdas; and there are many who have had no learning at all who eventually were admitted. The qualifications are intellectual, not educational; the mind is put to a rigid test. It is examined for alertness, perception, memory, reason, emotion, and control. There is no greater honour in all the Thomahlia.”
“And they are all athletes?”
“Every one, my lord. In all the world there is no finer body of men, I myself would hesitate before entering a match with even the old Rhamda Geos.”
“How about the Rhamda Avec?”
“Nor he, either; in the gymnasium he was always the superior, just as he topped all others morally and mentally.”
Did this explain the Avec's physical prowess, on the one hand, and the fact that he would not stoop to take that ring by force, on the other?
“Just one more thing, Jan Lucar. You have absolutely no fear that I may fail tomorrow?”
“Not the slightest, my lord. You cannot fail!”
“Why not?”
“I have already said—because you are from the Jarados.”
And Chick, facing the greatest experience of his life, submerged in a sea wherein only a few islands of fact were visible, had to be content with this: his only friends were those who were firmly convinced of something which, he knew only too well, was a flat fraud! All this backing was based upon a misled faith.
No, not quite. Was there not that strange feeling that the Jarados himself was at his back? And had he not found that the prophet had been real? Did he not feel, as positively as he felt anything, that the Jarados was still a reality?
Chick went to bed that night with a light heart.