The moon era
* * * * *
He sat down deliberately in the large, cushioned chair, beside the
central table, which was evidently intended for the operator. He stared
at me alertly, with calm blue eyes.
I was extremely agitated. My knees had a weak feeling, so that I
desired to sit down also; though I was so nervous that I kept striding
back and forth across the resilient white fiber of the floor.
Three millions! It would mean so much! Books, magazines, maps--I should
have to economize no longer. Years--all my life, if I wished--abroad.
The tombs of Egypt. The sand-covered cities of the Gobi. My theory that
mankind originated in South Africa. All those puzzles that I had longed
to be able to study. Stonehenge! Angkor! Easter Island!
But the adventure seemed madness. A voyage to the moon! In a craft
condemned by the very engineers that had built it. To be hurled away
from the earth at speeds no man had attained before. To face unknown
perils of space. Dangers beyond guessing. Hurtling meteors. The
all-penetrating cosmic ray. The burning heat of the sun. The absolute
zero. What, beyond speculation and theory, did men know of space? I was
no astronomer; how was I to cope with the emergencies that might rise?
"How long will it take?" I demanded suddenly.
My uncle smiled a little. "Glad you are taking it seriously," he said.
"The duration of the voyage depends on the speed you make, of course.
A week each way is a conservative estimate. And perhaps two or three
days on the moon. To take notes. Photograph it. Move around a little,
if possible; land in several different places. There is oxygen and
concentrated food to last six months. But a fortnight should see you
nearly back. I'll go over the charts and calculations with you."
"Can I leave the machine on the moon?"
"No. No atmosphere. And it would be too hot in the day, too cold at
night. Of course an insulated suit and oxygen mask might be devised.
Something like diving armor. But I haven't worked at that. You will be
expected just to take a few pictures, be prepared to describe what you
have seen."
I continued to pace the floor, pausing sometimes to examine some piece
of apparatus. How would it feel, I wondered, to be shut up in here?
Drifting in space. Far from the world of my birth. Alone. In silence.
Entombed. Would it not drive me mad?
My uncle rose suddenly from the chair.
"Sleep on it, Stephen," he advised. "See how you feel in the morning.
Or take longer if you wish."
He switched off the light in the machine. Led the way out into the
shed. And from it into the brilliant moonlight that flooded the wide,
magnificent grounds about the great house that would be one of the
prizes of this mad adventure.
As he was locking the shed, I gazed up at the moon.
Broad, bright disk. Silvery, mottled. Extinguishing the stars with
argent splendor. And all at once it came over me--the desire to
penetrate the enigmatic mystery of this companion world, that men have
watched since the race began.
What an adventure? To be the first human to tread this silver planet.
To be the first to solve its age-old riddles. Why think of Angkor, or
Stonehenge, of Luxor and Karnak, when I might win the secrets of the
moon?
Even if death came, what did it matter against the call of this
adventure? Many men would trade their lives eagerly for such a chance.
Suddenly I was strong. All weakness had left me. All fear and doubt.
A few moments before I had been tired, wishing to sit down. Now vast
energy filled me. I was conscious of an extraordinary elation. Swiftly
I turned to my uncle.
"Let's go back," I said. "Show me as much about it as you can tonight.
I am going."
He gripped my hand tightly, without a word, before he turned back to
the lock.
CHAPTER II
Toward the Moon
It was in the second week, after that sudden decision came to me, that
I started. At the end my uncle became a little alarmed, and tried to
persuade me to stay longer, to make more elaborate preparations. I
believe that he was secretly becoming fond of me, despite his brisk
precise manner. I think he took the opinion of his engineers seriously
enough to consider my return very uncertain.
But I could see no reason for longer delay. The operation of the
machine was simple; he had explained it quite fully.
There was a switch to close, to send current from the batteries through
the coils that raised it to the potential necessary to energize the
copper disks. And a large rheostat that controlled the force, from a
slight decrease in gravity, to a complete reversal.
The auxiliary apparatus, for control of temperature and atmosphere, was
largely automatic. And not beyond my limited mechanical comprehension.
I was certain that I should be able to make any necessary repairs or
adjustments.
Now I was filled with the greatest haste to undertake the adventure. No
doubt or hesitation had troubled me since the moment of the decision. I
felt only a longing to be sweeping away from the earth. To view scenes
that the ages had kept hidden from human eyes; to tread the world that
has always been the symbol of the unattainable.
My uncle recalled one of the engineers, a sallow young fellow named
Gorton. On the second morning, to supplement my uncle's instruction he
went over the machine again, showing me the function of every part.
Before he left, he warned me.
"If you are idiot enough to get in that darned contraption, and turn on
the power," he told me, "you'll never come back. Muller said so. And
he proved it. So long as the batteries and coil are outside the field
of force between the plates, the plates act according to schedule, and
rise up in the air.
"But Muller made self-contained models. With the battery and all
inside. And they didn't rise up. They went out! Vanished. Just like
that!" He snapped his fingers.
"Muller said the things moved along another dimension, right out of
our world. And he ought to know. String of degrees a mile long. Into
another dimension. No telling what sort of hell you'll blunder into."
I thanked the man. But his warnings only increased my eagerness. I was
about to tear aside the veil of the unknown. What if I did blunder into
new worlds? Might they not yield rewards of knowledge richer than those
of the barren moon? I might be a new Columbus, a greater Balboa.
I slept a few hours in the afternoon, after Gorton had gone. I felt
no conscious need of slumber, but my uncle insisted upon it. And to my
surprise, I fell soundly asleep, almost as soon as I lay down.
At sunset, we went down again to the shed in which the machine was
housed. My uncle started a motor, which opened the roof like a pair of
enormous doors, by means of pulleys and cables. The red light of the
evening sky streamed down upon the machine.
We made a final inspection of all the apparatus. My uncle explained
again the charts and instruments that I was to use in navigating space.
Finally he questioned me for an hour, making me explain the various
parts of the machine, correcting any error.
I was not to start until nearly midnight.
We returned to the house, where an elaborate dinner was waiting. I ate
almost absently, hardly noticing the servants of whom I had been so
conscious upon my arrival. My uncle was full of conversation. Talking
of his own life, and asking me many questions about my own, and about
my father, whom he had seen last when they were boys. My mind was upon
the adventure before me; I could answer him only disjointedly. But I
was aware that he had taken a real liking for me; I was not surprised
at his request that I postpone the departure.
At last we went back down to the machine. The white moon was high; its
soft radiance bathed the gleaming machine, through the opened roof. I
stared up at its bright disk. Was it possible that in a short week I
should be there, looking back upon the earth? It seemed madness! But
the madness of glorious adventure!
Without hesitation, I clambered through the oval door. A last time my
uncle wrung my hand. He had tears in his eyes. And his voice was a
little husky.
"I want you to come back, Stephen."
I swung the door into its cushioned seat, upon massive hinges,
tightened the screws that were to hold it. A final glance about the
white-walled interior of the machine. All was in order. The chronometer
by the wall, ticking steadily, told me that the moment had come.
My uncle's anxious face was pressed against one of the ports. I smiled
at him. Waved. His hand moved across the port. He left the shed.
I dropped into the big chair beside the table, reached for the switch.
With my fingers upon the button, I hesitated the merest second. Was
there anything else? Anything neglected? Anything I had yet to do on
earth? Was I ready to die, if so I must?
The deep, vibrant hum of the coils, beneath the table, answered the
pressure of my finger. I took the handle of the rheostat, swung it to
the zero mark, where gravitation was to be cut off completely.
My sensation was exactly as if the chair, the floor, had fallen from
under me. The same sensation that one feels when an elevator drops very
abruptly. Almost I floated out of the chair. I had to grasp at the arm
of it to stay within it.
For a few moments I experienced nauseating vertigo. The white crowded
room seemed to spin about me. To drop away endlessly beneath me. Sick,
helpless, miserable, I clung weakly to the great chair. Falling ...
falling ... falling. Would I never strike bottom?
* * * * *
Then I realized, with relief, that the sensation was due merely to the
absence of gravity's familiar pull. The machine had worked! My last,
lingering doubt was killed. Strange elation filled me.
I was flying away from the earth. Flying.
The thought seemed to work a miracle of change in my feelings. The
dreadful, dizzy nausea gave way to a feeling of exhilaration. Of
lightness. I was filled with a sense of power and well-being, such as I
had never before experienced.
I left the great chair, floated rather than walked to one of the
windows.
Already I was high in the air. So high that the moon-lit earth was a
dim and misty plain before me. I could see many lights; the westward
sky was aglow, above New York. But already I was unable to pick out the
lights at my uncle's mansion.
The machine had risen through the opened roof of the shed. It was
driving out into space, as it had been planned to do! The adventure was
succeeding.
As I watched, the earth sank visibly. Became a great concave bowl of
misty silver. Expanded slowly, as the minutes went by. And became
suddenly convex. A huge dark sphere, washed with pale gray light.
Presently, after an hour, when the dials showed that I was beyond the
faintest trace of atmosphere, I returned to the table and increased the
power, moving the rheostat to the last contact. I looked at charts and
chronometer. According to my uncle's calculations, four hours at this
acceleration were required, before the controls were set again.
I returned to the window and stared in amazement at the earth, that I
had left vast and silver gray and motionless.
It was spinning madly, backward!
The continents seemed to race beneath me--I was now high enough to see
a vast section of the globe. Asia. North America. Europe. Asia again.
In seconds.
It was madness! The earth spinning in a few moments, instead of the
usual twenty-four hours. And turning backward! But I could not doubt my
eyes. Even as I watched, the planet seemed to spin faster. Ever faster!
The continental outlines merged into dim indistinctness.
I looked away from the mad earth, in bewilderment. The firmament was
very black. And the very stars were creeping about it, with visible
motions!