The world below
without direction or purpose, but this was changed in a moment to the
frantic desperate rushes of rats when the dogs are among them, and they
can find no outlet.
The Dwellers came up the hillside in no appearance of haste, and what
they thought or knew of the events we had occasioned they gave no sign
to indicate.
There were three of them side by side, taking cliffs in their stride
round which our path had wound, and approaching from the only point at
which the sides were not too precipitous and deep, even for their
attempting.
Arriving on the level ground they consulted for a moment, and then one
of them came forward alone. The wall was still blazing in places, or I
think he would have stepped over it without change of pace, but, as it
was, he leapt easily, and then proceeded systematically to investigate
the smouldering ruins of the settlement. The killing-pens, which had
caught fire last, were still blazing, and he approached them with
caution, but I think that ivory-yellow skin, on which I had seen the
teeth of the Frog-mouths bite in vain, must have been insensitive to
fire also, so closely was he standing, as he looked down to observe the
victims that boiled beneath it.
He stood there for a long while, as though he found difficulty--as well
he might--in understanding all that had happened. I tried to avoid
thought, as I had been directed, but the idea crossed me that had the
Bat-wings lived, they would not have failed to disclose the whole tale
of the imprisoned Leader, and of my companion’s presence, if they had
thought that they could have gained anything by so doing. Had it been in
that Leader’s mind when she had directed us to destroy them? I thought
it likely; but at least the minds of my companion and myself had been
free from any such consideration, and the deed itself had been a good
one.
With a heavy thoughtfulness he went back to his companions.
Meanwhile, they had not been idle.
It is probable that it had not been the mere coming of the Dwellers, so
much as the sight of the things they carried, which had produced so
sudden a panic among the Killers who saw them. For they had now shaken
out a net, with which they were sweeping the ground from end to end till
the whole of the Killers were a kicking, whistling confusion within its
ample meshes. One of them then sat on the ground, and taking the basket
from his back, he abstracted from it a lidded vessel or cup, which he
set open before him.
One by one he pulled the frantic victims loose from the net that held
them, and after a glance of inspection, squeezed them in his hand over
the cup, so that their blood drained into it.
When he had squeezed sufficiently, he threw the empty carcase with a
careless aim, high into the air, to fall far off in the boiling tank,
from which its own meals had been so often taken.
This went on for about an hour, during which he dealt with some hundreds
in this way, and also selected about two dozen which he inspected more
carefully, and then passed to his companion, who also looked over them,
and either handed them back to take their turn at the squeezing, or
dropped them into his basket.
I supposed that they had decided to destroy this colony, and to found a
new one with the few which they had saved for that purpose, but I
reflected that this could not have been their intention when they handed
over the Bat-wings for destruction, at a feast which would never be
held, and if they had now come prepared to take that course, it implied
a foresight or knowledge of what was passing, which was sufficiently
disconcerting.
I could not resolve that problem, but it soon became evident that the
occasion was of some further importance, for one by one they were joined
by others, until I had counted fourteen of these giants that were
assembled on the plateau.
More than once their words came over to us as the wind helped them, but
to me they bore no meaning. Whether they conversed among themselves by
other means, as they were able to do with the Amphibians, I could not
tell, but they spoke little outwardly, and mainly monosyllables. They
seemed to be waiting for an event impending.
Thus they waited, till the twilight was nearing. As I saw them on the
plateau, their huge bulks dwarfed by the proportions of the scenery
around them, I thought of them again as Titans of an earlier world, and
of a size the most natural to the background against which they moved.
I was conscious not only of my own insignificance, but of a vulgarity
also, which was not personal to myself, but belonging to the race from
which I came.
I clothed them in imagination with the garments to which I was
accustomed, and their significance and their dignity at once departed.
But for what were they delaying? As the time passed I was increasingly
convinced that they were aware of the Amphibians, and were awaiting
their arrival; and as this conviction grew, there came with it an
increasing fear that I was watching the prelude of a tragedy, for which
the great sweep of the wooded valleys beneath us, and the amphitheatre
of mighty hills, were a setting of appropriate grandeur.
The thought impressed me with an awe which left no space for
consideration of my own relation to the shadow which I believed to be
falling, nor do I think the fear I had was influenced by the expectation
of any personal consequence.
But when this depression was at its worst, and the strain of uncertainty
was becoming unendurable, I was suddenly aware of the influence of a
bolder and more confident spirit, and into my mind there came a music,
such as I had felt when I first watched the Amphibians approach across
the seaward bridge:
From the force that withstands shall we falter or flee,
Who have bent in our hands the untamable sea?
From the cloud that is close ...
Surely the Amphibians were approaching over the cliffs behind us.
From the nights that have been, from the midnights to be,
There shall dawns intervene, there shall ...
My companion’s mind spoke once only, but very urgently. “It may be the
end of all, if you cannot isolate yourself from that which is near us.”
I closed my thoughts as best I could from everything but a passive
photography of that which was developing before me.
The Dwellers had risen, and were standing in a group of no regular
order, upon the side of the plateau from which descent was possible.
They were looking silently toward the cliffs above us.
Next, on my left hand, I saw the Amphibians descending. The six Leaders
came first. They climbed down as easily as a fly walks on a wall. I
think the long centre toe gripped the rock more firmly and easily than a
human foot could do, and the appendages of the legs helped also, the
little hands grasping and steadying, but there was an ease of balance,
and a certainty in every movement for which these differences were less
than explanation. After them came the whole regiment of the Amphibians.
They formed up below, with the six Leaders in the front. I think their
song was still continued, but I would not hear it. They took no notice
of the smoking ruins, or of the steaming tank, which was now covered
with the floating husks of the bodies which had designed it.
Straight forward went the Amphibians to the spot where the Dwellers
blocked their passage. They did not hesitate, nor did the Dwellers give
way before them.
What would have happened I can only guess, had there not come an
unexpected incident.
From I know not where, there appeared the group of yellow lizards that
had fled from the burning arsenal.
A small bright yellow patch they showed on the sandy soil, and the
Amphibians stopped, and the Dwellers grouped to look down upon them.
I have thought since that they must have timed their appearance,
intending to give such information to the Dwellers as would win favour
to themselves, and bring destruction on others.
Whether they knew of our hiding-place I could not tell, nor whether they
were aware of the confinement of the Leader who had escaped--but of what
use is conjecture?--all I know is what I saw from my hiding-place.
There were long seconds of silence, which seemed minutes as I watched,
and then one of the Dwellers stepped forward and put his foot firmly
down upon the spot of bright yellow malignity. When he lifted it the
colour was gone, and there was nothing left that showed at that
distance.
He stepped back, and the protagonists remained facing one another in a
continued silence.
Then, at last, the Dwellers stepped wide of the path on either hand, and
the Amphibians moved quietly forward between them, filing through till
the last had passed. I noticed that three of the Leaders had remained
aside, and supposed that they might be retained as hostages or culprits,
by surrendering whom the rest had won to safety, but as the last file
passed I saw them fall in behind it, and the Dwellers made no motion
till they had disappeared into the narrow trench which we had traversed
on the night before.
Then they also turned, and departed.
The dusk was already falling over the valley, as my companion’s mind
laughed its relief, and the tension ended.
“I think,” she said, “that this is the beginning of the next adventure.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Book II
THE WORLD BELOW
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER I
COUNSEL
The night had fallen to blackness while we still lay in the rock-cleft.
The ashes of the central buildings glowed with a pale blue light, and an
occasional flame would rise up and lick across them like a ghostly
tongue.
The long curve of the living-wall had fallen in from end to end, but the
ashes were burning still, with a paler flame, so that it showed like a
white bow in the darkness.
There were no stars; the night had clouded while we slept,--for I lay
long in a sleep of utter weariness and exhaustion, both of mind and
body; and so, I think, in her own way, did my companion.
But I waked at length, with a dim sense of peril ended, and the short
pause of security which is so precious to those who walk in dangerous
ways, but conscious also of thirst and hunger, and of the shadow of
great events, of which the significance was beyond my knowing.
I lay for some time in silence, pondering the strange things I had seen;
reviewing--not without some mental discords--my judgment of the
Bat-wings, and the fate to which it had cast them, and wondering vainly
what new marvels or terrors might be before us, when we should penetrate
the subterranean world of which we were about equally ignorant.
As I lay I became aware that the night was chilly, though, being cloudy,
it was less so than we had experienced previously. But I was suffering
from a lowered vitality, and though my wounds were trivial I was
conscious of the throbbing of my scalded foot, and that my right
shoulder was both stiff and painful.
I then fell into a mood of depression, in which I saw very vividly the
folly of the adventure which we had undertaken. How could we hope to
penetrate undetected into the domain of the Dwellers? There was no
sanity in the supposition. If I wished to live till the year of my exile
were over, should I not endeavour to find some crevice in the
surface-world, of which I already knew something, where I might hope
that my insignificance would save me?
If those whom I had come to seek survived at all, was I not more likely
to discover them under such conditions, than among those whom I had seen
squeezing the juice from the living bodies of the Killers, as casually