Collected Tales (Jerry eBooks)

by Leslie F Stone

  I, Dana Gleason! I reeled and would have fallen if Dick, dear Dick, had not caught me and carried me back to our living quarters and laid me gently on the couch. For what seemed hours he cradled me in his arms. Was ever a man kinder, gentler? And then . . . he kissed me, Dana Gleason, who had never been kissed!

  “ ‘Dana,’ he was whispering, ‘we have lost, it is true, but did we not undertake to leave Earth behind? A little less time to live, but a longer time to learn the meaning of eternity. You have been brave, wonderfully brave. Is this the time to forget your courage?’ He said more and more, that I scarcely heard. Something new was creeping into me, a strange warmness that I had never known. What was it? Was it this newly realized womanhood that was grasping me?

  “A new life was flowing into my body. ‘Dana, Dana,’ he whispered, as if anyone else could hear, ‘How I love you. I loved you before I knew you were a woman, and I have adored you more each day. True I have suffered every day that I was so near you and could not tell you. Always I forced myself to act the role of a friend. I did not dream that it would come this way. . . . I thought that on this other world we should find love together, in the need for each other, work together, live for each other. Instead, God is giving us Death. . . .’

  “Tears stood in his eyes, and now it was I who must give comfort. Was there not at least a year? Our provisions safely guarded would last even longer. At least we had each other. Each other, how sweet that sounds. For hours we did not move, scarcely talking, sitting there, delighting in each other. We fell asleep there with arms intertwined, and the majesty of Mars passed us by.

  “Dick was the first to awaken, and I opened to the sound of his whistle from the bathroom as he bathed and shaved. I had heard him do the same thing every morning aboard the rocket, but this morning it all sounded so different. It made me indescribably happy. Then he came forth, fresh and glowing, and took me in his arms again.

  “As I performed my ablutions I heard him in the kitchen with the coffee percolator, and I hurried to help him prepare breakfast. There were two oranges left and some eggs in a wax jacket. We made bread from our supplies, and for the rest we were now eating chemically compounded pellets that are as nourishing as meats, vegetables, and fruits, except that they do not satisfy the taste. There is still a whole, case of chocolates and the wherewithal to make other sweets, when that supply gives out.

  “Never have I eaten a happier meal than that breakfast. It was as if I had never eaten before, and there would be at least 365 more of such breakfasts. Beyond that we do not try to think. We have begun to live, why think of dying? Imagine happiness aboard a rocket traveling farther and farther into the space where time is an unreckoned quantity, and age is ageless. Was there ever a like honeymoon?

  “We climbed again to the look-out. There was Mars, immense, serene and out of our reach. We turned away with little concern. I hate to think of what might have been had not Dick climbed into the rocket at the very last moment. We laugh to think that I tried to put him out.

  “ ‘I’ll admit that I lied to you in saying I came in the interests of Professor Rollins. No man could be that great. I feared I would lose you irrevocably if I told you the truth.’

  “ ‘I can’t imagine how you learned that I was a woman. I was so careful. Dad taught me that, even to lathering my face each morning and running a bladeless razor over my face!’

  “How he laughed at that. ‘Well, do you recall the little pool set in a circlet of trees about four miles from the bungalow where you so often went for a swim? Incidentally, that was a favorite nook of mine. You startled me one day from a revery when you came, thinking there was no one within several miles of you. Before I could announce myself you had undressed and were swimming in the pool. I crept away without your knowing I was there at all!’

  “ ‘I was astonished, but then I felt I had always known. I could not guess why you were masquerading this way. Of course, I knew your reputation and knew that you had always lived as a boy. At first I thought you were intentionally duping the Professor for some ulterior motive, or perhaps in the interest of others. I hated you then, and I dreaded the moment you would disclose the truth to him. Then when I knew that you really were going through with this I was at my wit’s end. I could not break the Professor’s heart by telling him, nor could I let you go alone. So, in part, I was truthful in saying that it was for Rollins’ interest. That is all, Dana. . . .’

  Breaking the Speed Laws!

  MANY, many hours, days, and nights, as we figure time on Earth, have passed and faster and faster we are making our way across the Void. We have passed Jupiter and his bright glow is intense. Far ahead and thousands upon thousands of miles to the right we can see Saturn with his numerous satellites and rings. Old Sol grows more distant, less brilliant. The blackness appears blacker. Yet we care naught for any of this. Science has succumbed to Love and we, mites in a cheese box, are living hour for hour, a whole lifetime to be lived in a day!

  “We do not count time. Everything now is in the present. We do not rewind the clock. It is too cruel a reminder. We eat, sleep and live only according to desire.”

  LATER:

  “We have passed the distant planet Uranus. Our Universe lies behind. Before us stretches the inconceivable waste that lies between the solar system and its nearest neighbor millions upon millions of miles away. It is black, inconceivably black. There is only a glow of the great world across this sea of nothingness, and of Worlds and Universes that are more immense than that which we leave behind. Looking at the meters for the first time in many days, we discover that we are now traveling at an incredible rate of speed, nearly as fast now as light itself. And science tells us that it takes many years for light to travel from the nearest stars! And we have only a year to live!”

  LATER:

  “We are wrong! Life is not for us. The God of the Immensity has declared himself. After realizing that we were out of the Universe we did not return to the lookout for over twenty-four hours. We found then that the glass was becoming smoky, so smoky that we could not even see the stars. That can mean only one thing. The smooth shell of our rocket is burning. Friction in a vacuum! It seems impossible, but what else could it be? Friction is wearing away the steel of our smooth coat. How long ere it will burn through? Can the shell of our sealed living chambers withstand that? No, we are not even to have the sanctuary of a coffin. We are to be belched out into Space to fall forever with sightless eyes before the awful grandeur. God is revengeful!

  “After our discovery Dick and I sat staring at each other with hands interclasped for long hours. ‘It is the end,’ we whispered together. ‘How happy we have been!’

  “ ‘How long can we last?’

  “ ‘Only God knows that.’

  “ ‘Must we wait?’ I hated to picture what the end would be. ‘Can’t we go together with arms around each other?’

  “What to do?

  “In answer I pulled out the small automatic that I had carried with me since childhood. I saw the glow come into Dick’s blue eyes. He caught me by the shoulders and looked into my eyes. ‘You are brave, Dana Gleason.’

  “ ‘Only a coward,’ I answered. ‘We will wait until we see that all is lost. A few hours still remain to us.’ ”

  ELSIE ROLLINS looked up from the diary. “That is all, the book ends here.” She turned to the last page of the book and sat staring at it lying in her hands.

  Landing on Abrui

  THE Professor had been drinking in every word. “And, what happened? It must have taken a miracle to save them!”

  Our host, who had been listening with half-closed eyes, looked up. “What happened, the two lovers could not guess, trapped as they were in the rocket. It was a miracle that saved them. For beyond Uranus there lies Abrui, a small planet that has never been discovered by earthly astronomers and follows somewhat the path taken by Uranus. It was this planet that reached out and drew the rocket into its orbit.

  “They thought that Space had set t
heir vehicle on fire, but nothing burns out there. In truth they were circling our planet. Their belief that they were traveling as fast as light was probably incorrect. The meters lied; due perhaps to the attraction of the planet, their velocity had decreased rather than increased.

  “Abrui’s gravity was slowly drawing the rocket within a narrowing circle until men of the planet saw it in their sky. Every hour brought it closer, and the whole world stared in wonder. Astronomers watched and surmised. Heretofore, meteorites had fallen without number on our globe, but never had a meteor acted in such a fashion. By day it shimmered and at night it glowed, for it had, of course, become red hot as soon as it entered our atmosphere, driving at such high speed.

  “Lower and lower it came, and then it was evident that in another day it would fall. It was Moura-weit who was the first to realize that this was no stray skyrocket, but in truth a man-made thing, born of some other world. The conjectures were many. However, it was Moura-weit and Ubca-tor, his companion, who followed the course of the rocket in their flyer, to arrive at its landing. Moura-weit was the only one who conceived the thought that men were riding in that red hot thing.

  “So these two men came to see the landing. Fate steered toward a wild section of the globe, an arid, infertile place inhabited only by barbarians. It fell with a horrible cacophony of sound, exploding in mid-air and burying half its length in the unprofitable soil of the plain.

  “Moura-weit had wisely kept his plane at a good distance from the rocket, and he and Ubca-tor exclaimed at the beauty and horror of that tremendous fall. They saw debris flying off in every direction; for after the first explosion there came another and another until like a giant firecracker it was popping and cracking wildly. It was Ubca that saw the thing that looked like a body, limp and lifeless, coming toward them.

  “In the great fall of the rocket both of them marveled at the majesty of the breaking up. It could be seen that in falling every piece of debris settled slowly, the larger pieces dropping more rapidly, the smaller following with more deliberation, as a stone that is thrown in a pool of thick mud slowly sinks out of sight, the thick liquid buoying it up until by its own weight it sinks. Abrui being somewhat smaller than Earth has not as great a power of gravity, and consequently the Earth-things were of less weight.

  “And since the body of Dana Gleason was lighter in comparison to those great pieces of steel, her fall was even slower and more gentle. She fell to the ground like a bit of fluff, scarcely sustaining a jar.

  “As soon as the two men descried the human body they were after it and Ubca jumped from the flyer before it touched the ground. Carefully he lifted the lifeless body and returned with it to his companion. Sharply the plane arose, for there was still falling debris; the explosions of the twisted racked structure had not ceased.

  “They laid the body on a couch in the enclosed cabin and Ubca took control of the flyer so that Moura, who was acquainted with the art of medicine, might examine her to see if life still remained. He felt the faint beat of the heart, and taking a phial from his pocket, forced a drop of its contents between her lips. That action was greeted with convulsions at first, then the patient commenced to take deep breaths, and from the moaning it was apparent that she suffered at every gasp. Moura had already discovered that the rocket’s passenger was a woman.

  “From her lips there came a sound. ‘Dick!’ the lips formed. Immediately Moura-weit turned to his companion. ‘Quick, circle about. There was a second passenger!”

  “By this time the air was practically clear of falling debris, except for a few lighter objects that sank slowly to the ground circling and twirling. The great mass of iron and steel lay on the ground glowing and smoking. Ubca directed the plane close to the ground. He was suddenly aware of shapes taking form some hundred yards away. They were the barbarians that had been encamped not far away. Recovering from their fright they were now slowly approaching the ruin to puzzle out what had fallen. Ubca saw a second body lying on the ground. The nearest barbarian was five or six hundred yards away. The plane touched the ground while Moura took control. Kneeling beside the unconscious man, Ubca turned him over. In the red glare from the wreck he saw the face and with an exclamation of disgust he rose to his feet and scurried back.

  “It’s naught but a Goran[2],” he declared.

  “Circling about another few minutes they could discover nothing else. By this time the barbarians were coming in full force. Their eyes turned to the flyer and their weapons were unslung. They found the man Ubca had disdained.

  “Moura-weit was confident now that if there was another passenger in the rocket with the woman, he had died in the flames. He did not know that Ubca had mistaken the reddish hair and tanned skin of Richard Dorr for one of the barbarians, whose skin is likewise bronze. Turning the plane about, they headed for Carajama, the capital of their own country.”

  “So came Dana Gleason and Richard Dorr to Abrui, my friends.” Our host smiled down upon us. During this narration he had been pacing back and forth before.

  “Surely, you are going to tell us more?” demanded the Professor.

  “It grows late, sir. Already the sky is becoming light!” he protested.

  “What does that matter? I insist that you tell us all.”

  The Story of Sa-Dak

  THE other shrugged his shoulders. “It will delay our departure, but since you wish it, sir . . . First, however, I should suggest a swim in the pool to refresh us, and a hit to eat and drink.”

  Rollins said he did not swim, but the bath would be welcome. Miss Rollins was delighted. I was declared unfit for swimming because of my shoulder, yet I would be allowed to take a dip. The golden slave appeared without a summons and escorted us to the various bedrooms. Swimming-suits were brought. These consisted of one-piece affairs of a strange white material that was silky to the touch and as heavy as jersey. The trunks reached half-way down the thigh, and the neck and arm holes were cut low. The slave aided me in undressing, and insisted upon rubbing my shoulder again with his salve.

  Neither the thin frame of the professor, nor my own, already inclined to corpulency, cut a very fine figure, but the sight of the two silver men held the eye. Never have I seen two finer-looking men, both over six feet tall and with the smooth, flowing muscles of highly developed bodies. Both wore no more than short trunks. Miss Rollins looked pretty in her suit.

  Rollins and I descended into the pool by way of a flight of steps, but the other three dived off the side of the pool into the deep water. They had a race. The stroke used by the silver men was strange. It mostly resembled the breast-stroke, except that it was more “frog-fashion,” both propelled the body through the water by jerks, hands and feet moving in unison in one great effort; and each stroke carried the men almost twice their length through the water. Naturally enough, Miss Rollins, with her pretty side-stroke, was left a considerable distance behind.

  They joined us; and as the two men stood beside us I saw that the water ran from their broad chests and shoulders without seeming to wet them. “That,” said Sa-Dak reading my thought, “is due to the oil with which we polish our bodies. It is a matter of pride to keep our bodies highly polished. The bronze man who neglects this vanity is not a pretty fellow with his dull ochre body. We have a saying that ‘a well-oiled body gives evidence of a well-ordered mind.’ And the poorest of men oils his body.”

  Our bath finished, we returned to the dressing-rooms and were given great towels that were very absorbent. I noted how well I felt, how my body glowed, and how the spirit of well-being pervaded me. Later, we were informed that a small quantity of a solution of radium in the water produced these effects. My shoulder seemed completely healed, so that I was never to feel more discomfort from it.

  In the atoll we found food awaiting us on small tables set beside our couches. There was a fresh fruit that had the taste of both apple and peach and looked like a melon, some sort of cooked meal, and a hot beverage that had the taste of many flowers. After eating, we
settled ourselves on our couches once more to hear what remained to be told of the story of Dana Gleason and Richard Dorr.

  “I am telling this in the third person,” began our host, “to avoid any unnecessary personal references, and for easier sequence. Perhaps first I had better explain a little about the planet, its peoples, its geography, its history.”

  The Narrative

  ON Abrui there are three races. The Tabora, who hold in their grasp the single ocean of the planet, and esteem themselves the only civilized people of the planet, though once they were barbarians occupying the “backlands,” into which they drove the Gora, the simple-minded. From the Moata, a more ancient race than themselves, they got their culture, their science and their social codes, subjugating these people to their will and enslaving them.

  The Tabora is the silver man of Abrui, a fine upstanding man, taller in stature than men of the other races, with well-formed features and a quick, ready, clear-thinking mind. The Moata are golden, smaller than their masters, weaker, and with fear bred in their minds. The Gora is the barbarian, made so by circumstances. He is bronze-colored, bronze-skinned, bronze-haired, and brown-eyed. He is not quite so tall as the Tabora, but he has a stockier, more powerful body; is fearless, though superstitious, and his imagination peoples his country with hobgoblins and god-things. He has little science, since all his days are spent in forcing his barren plains and swamps and deserts to yield him a livelihood.

  Moura-weit and Ubca-tor were of the Tabora. They were Doatans, and Doata is the most powerful of the three nations of Tabora. Of Tabora there are the three countries, Doata, Zoada, and Loata, all bordering on the one ocean, Sehti. Sehti covers a little more than a third of the planet. Rich, fertile plains border the sea; and beyond the plains are the great mountains, Hopli, which almost entirely encircle the ocean and are the backbone of Tabora, separating one fertile plain from another. Deserts, swamps, wide rivers, all help to separate Gora from Tabora. Tabora has thousands of cities on the broad plains, in the rolling tablelands and foothills, and in the mountains themselves, which are not overly high but are great irregular chains.