Gulliver of Mars

by Edwin Lester Linden Arnold

  CHAPTER XVI

  The Martian told me of a merchant boat with ten rowers which was goingup to the capital in a couple of hours, and as the skipper was a friendof his they would no doubt take me as supercargo, thereby saving thenecessity of passenger fees, which was obviously a consideration withme. It was not altogether a romantic approach to the dungeon of animprisoned beauty, but it was practical, which is often better if notso pleasant. So the offer was gladly closed with, and curling myself ina rug of foxskins, for I was tired with much walking, sailors neverbeing good foot-gangers, I slept soundly fill they came to tell me itwas time to go on board.

  The vessel was more like a canal barge than anything else, lean andlong, with the cargo piled in a ridge down the centre as farmers storetheir winter turnips, the rowers sitting on either side of this plyingoars like dessert-spoons with long handles, while they chanted amonotonous cadence of monosyllables:

  Oh, ho, oh, Oh, ho, oh, How high, how high.

  and then again after a pause--

  How high, how high Oh, ho, oh, Oh, ho, oh.

  the which was infinitely sleep-provoking if not a refrain of a highintellectual order.

  I shut my eyes as we pulled away from the wharfs of that namelessemporium and picked a passage through a crowd of quaint shipping,wondering where I was, and asking myself whether I was mentally risingequal to my extraordinary surroundings, whether I adequatelyappreciated the immensity of my remove from those other seas on which Ihad last travelled, tiller-ropes in hand, piloting a captain's galleyfrom a wharf. Good heavens, what would my comrades on my ship say ifthey could see me now steering a load of hairy savages up one of thosewaterways which our biggest telescopes magnify but to the thickness ofan indication? No, I was not rising equal to the occasion, and couldnot. The human mind is of but limited capacity after all, and suchfreaks of fortune are beyond its conception. I knew I was where I was,but I knew I should probably never get the chance of telling of it, andthat no one would ever believe me if I did, and I resigned myself tothe inevitable with sullen acquiescence, smothering the wonder thatmight have been overwhelming in passing interests of the moment.

  There is little to record of that voyage. We passed through a fleet ofAr-hap's warships, empty and at anchor in double line, serviceablehalf-decked cutters, built of solid timber, not pumpkin rind it waspleasant to notice, and then the town dropped away as we proceeded up astream about as broad as the Hudson at its widest, and profuselystudded with islands. This water was bitterly salt and joined anothersea on the other side of the Martian continent. Yet it had apronounced flow against us eastward, this tide running for three springmonths and being followed, I learned, as ocean temperatures varied, bya flow in the opposite direction throughout the summer.

  Just at present the current was so strong eastwards, the moisturebeaded upon my rowers' tawny hides as they struggled against it, andtheir melancholy song dawdled in "linked sweetness long drawn out,"while the swing of their oars grew longer and longer. Truly it wasvery hot, far hotter than was usual for the season, these men declared,and possibly this robbed me of my wonted energy, and you, gentlereader, of a description of all the strange things we passed upon thathighway.

  Suffice it to say we spent a scorching afternoon, the greater part of astifling night moored under a mud-bank with a grove of trees on topfrom which gigantic fire-flies hung as though the place wereilluminated for a garden fete, and then, rowing on again in thecomparatively cool hours before dawn, turned into a backwater atcock-crow.

  The skipper of our cargo boat roused me just as we turned, puttingunder my sleepy nostrils a handful of toasted beans on a leaf, and asmall cup full of something that was not coffee, but smelt as good asthat matutinal beverage always does to the tired traveller.

  Over our prow was an immense arch of foliage, and underneath a longarcade of cool black shadows, sheltering still water, till water andshadow suddenly ended a quarter of a mile down in a patch of brilliantcolour. It was as peaceful as could be in the first morning light, andto me over all there was the inexpressible attraction of the unknown.

  As our boat slipped silently forward up this leafy lane, a thin white"feather" in her mouth alone breaking the steely surface of the stream,the men rested from their work and began, as sailors will, to put ontheir shore-going clothes, the while they chatted in low tones over theprofits of the voyage. Overhead flying squirrels were flitting to andfro like bats, or shelling fruit whereof the husks fell with a pleasantsplash about us, and on one bank a couple of early mothers were washingtheir babies, whose smothered protests were almost the only sound inthis morning world.

  Another silent dip or two of the oars and the colour ahead crystallisedinto a town. If I said it was like an African village on a largescale, I should probably give you the best description in the fewestwords. From the very water's edge up to the crown of a low hill inland,extended a mass of huts and wooden buildings, embowered and partlyhidden in bright green foliage, with here and there patches of millet,or some such food plant, and the flowers that grow everywhere soabundantly in this country. It was all Arcadian and peaceful enough atthe moment, and as we drew near the men were just coming out to thequays along the harbour front, the streets filling and the town wakingto busy life.

  A turn to the left through a watergate defended by towers of wood andmud, and we were in the city harbour itself; boats of many kinds mooredon every side; quaint craft from the gulfs and bays of Nowhere, full ofunheard-of merchandise, and manned by strange-faced crews, every vessela romance of nameless seas, an epitome of an undiscovered world, andevery moment the scene grew busier as the breakfast smoke arose, andwharf and gangway set to work upon the day's labours.

  Our boat--loaded, as it turned out, with spoil from Seth--was run to aplace of honour at the bottom of the town square, and was an object ofmuch curiosity to a small crowd which speedily collected and lent ahand with the mooring ropes, the while chatting excitedly with the crewabout further tribute and the latest news from overseas. At the sametime a swarthy barbarian, whose trappings showed him to be some sort offunctionary, came down to our "captain," much wagging of heads andcounting of notched sticks taking place between them.

  I, indeed, was apparently the least interesting item of the cargo, andthis was embarrassing. No hero likes to be neglected, it is fatal tohis part. I had said my prayers and steeled myself to all sorts offine endurance on the way up, and here, when it came to the crisis, noone was anxious to play the necessary villain. They just helped meashore civilly enough, the captain nodded his head at me, mutteringsomething in an indifferent tone to the functionary about a ghost whohad wandered overseas and begged a passage up the canal; the groupabout the quay stared a little, but that was all.

  Once I remember seeing a squatting, life-size heathen idol hoisted froma vessel's hold and deposited on a sugar-box on a New York quay. Someribald passer-by put a battered felt hat upon Vishnu's sacred curls,and there the poor image sat, an alien in an indifferent land, a sackacross its shoulders, a "billycock" upon its head, and honoured at mostwith a passing stare. I thought of that lonely image as almost aslonely I stood on the Thither men's quay, without the support offriends or heroics, wondering what to do next.

  However, a cheerful disposition is sometimes better than a bankingaccount, and not having the one I cultivated the other, sunning myselfamongst the bales for a time, and then, since none seemed interested inme, wandered off into the town, partly to satisfy my curiosity, andpartly in the vague hope of ascertaining if my princess was reallyhere, and, if possible, getting sight of her.

  Meanwhile it turned hot with a supernatural, heavy sort of heataltogether, I overheard passersby exclaiming, out of the common, andafter wandering for an hour through gardens and endless streets ofthatched huts, I was glad enough to throw myself down in the shadow ofsome trees on the outskirts of the great central pile of buildings, awhole village in itself of beam-built towers and dwelling-place,suggesting by its superior size that it might act
ually be Ar-hap'spalace.

  Hotter and hotter it grew, while a curious secondary sunrise in thewest, the like of which I never saw before seemed to add to the heat,and heavier and heavier my eyelids, till I dozed at last, and finallyslept uncomfortably for a time.

  Rousing up suddenly, imagine my surprise to see sitting, chin on knees,about a yard away, a slender girlish figure, infinitely out of place inthat world of rough barbarians. Was it possible? Was I dreaming? No,there was no doubt about it, she was a girl of the Hither folk, slimand pretty, but with a wonderfully sad look in her gazelle eyes, andscarcely a sign of the indolent happiness of Seth in the pale littleface regarding me so fixedly.

  "Good gracious, miss," I said, still rubbing my eyes and doubting mysenses, "have you dropped from the skies? You are the very last personI expected to see in this barbarian place."

  "And you too, sir. Oh, it is lovely to see one so newly from home, andfree-seeming--not a slave."

  "How did you know I was from Seth?"

  "Oh, that was easy enough," and with a little laugh she pointed to apebble lying between us, on which was a piece of battered sweetmeat ina perforated bamboo box. Poor An had given me something just like thatin a playful mood, and I had kept it in my pocket for her sake, being,as you will have doubtless observed, a sentimental young man, and now Iclapped my hand where it should have been, but it was gone.

  "Yes," said my new friend, "that is yours. I smelt the sweetmeatcoming up the hill, and crossed the grass until I found you hereasleep. Oh, it was lovely! I took it from your pocket, and white Sethrose up before my swimming eyes, even at the scent of it. I am Si,well named, for that in our land means sadness, Si, the daughter ofPrince Hath's chief sweetmeat-maker, so I should know something of suchstuff. May I, please, nibble a little piece?"

  "Eat it all, my lass, and welcome. How came you here? But I canguess. Do not answer if you would rather not."

  "Ay, but I will. It is not every day I can speak to ears so friendlyas yours. I am a slave, chosen for my luckless beauty as last year'stribute to Ar-hap."

  "And now?"

  "And now the slave of Ar-hap's horse-keeper, set aside to make room fora fresher face."

  "And do you know whose face that is?"

  "Not I, a hapless maid sent into this land of horrors, to bear ignominyand stripes, to eat coarse food and do coarse work, the miserableplaything of some brute in semi-human form, with but the oneconsolation of dying early as we tribute-women always die. Poorcomrade in exile, I only know her as yet by sympathy."

  "What if I said it was Heru, the princess?"

  The Martian girl sprang to her feet, and clasping her hands exclaimed,

  "Heru, the Slender! Then the end comes, for it is written in our booksthat the last tribute is paid when the best is paid. Oh, how splendidif she gave herself of free will to this slavery to end it once forall. Was it so?"

  "I think, Si, your princess could not have known of that tradition; shedid not come willingly. Besides, I am come to fetch her back, if itmay be, and that spoils the look of sacrifice."

  "You to fetch her back, and from Ar-hap's arms? My word, Sir Spirit,you must know some potent charms; or, what is less likely, mycountrymen must have amazingly improved in pluck since I left them.Have you a great army at hand?"

  But I only shook my head, and, touching my sword, said that here wasthe only army coming to rescue Heru. Whereon the lady replied that shethought my valour did me more honour than my discretion. How did Ipropose to take the princess from her captors?

  "To tell the truth, damsel, that is a matter which will have to be leftto your invention, or the kindness of such as you. I am here on ahare-brained errand, playing knight-errant in a way that shocks mycommon sense. But since the matter has gone so far I will see itthrough, or die in the attempt. Your bully lord shall either give meHeru, stock, lock, and block, or hang me from a yard-arm. But I wouldrather have the lady. Come, you will help me; and, as a beginning, ifshe is in yonder shanty get me speech with her."

  Poor Si's eyes dilated at the peril of the suggestion, and I saw thesluggish Martian nature at war against her better feelings. Butpresently the latter conquered. "I will try," she said. "What mattera few stripes more or less?" pointing to her rosy shoulders where redscars crisscross upon one another showed how the Martian girls fared inAr-hap's palace when their novelty wore off. "I will try to help you;and if they kill me for it--why, that will not matter much." Andforthwith in that blazing forenoon under the flickering shadow of thetrees we put our heads together to see what we might do for Heru.

  It was not much for the moment. Try what we would that afternoon, Icould not persuade those who had charge of the princess to let me evenapproach her place of imprisonment, but Si, as a woman, was moresuccessful, actually seeing her for a few moments, and managed towhisper in her ear that I had come, theSpirit-with-the-gold-buttons-down-his front, afterwards describing tome in flowing Martian imagery--but doubtless not more highly colouredthan poor Heru's emotion warranted--how delightedly that lady hadreceived the news.

  Si also did me another service, presenting me to the porter's wife, whokept a kind of boarding-house at the gates of Ar-hap's palace forgentlemen and ladies with grievances. I had heard of lobbying before,and the presentation of petitions, though I had never indulged myselfin the pastime; but the crowd of petitioners here, with petitions aswild and picturesque as their own motley appearances, was surely thestrangest that ever gathered round a seat of supreme authority.

  Si whispered in the ear of that good woman the nature of my errand,with doubtless some blandishment of her own; and my errand being one somuch above the vulgar and so nearly touching the sovereign, I was atonce accorded a separate room in the gate-house, whence I could lookdown in comparative peace on the common herd of suitors, and listen tothe buzz of their invective as they practised speeches which Icalculated it would take Ar-hap all the rest of his reign to listen to,without allowing him any time for pronouncing verdicts on them.

  Here I made myself comfortable, and awaited the return of the sovereignas placidly as might be. Meanwhile fate was playing into my feeblehands.

  I have said it was hot weather. At first this seemed but an outcome ofthe Martian climate, but as the hours went by the heat developed to anincredible extent. Also that red glare previously noted in the westgrew in intensity, till, as the hours slipped by, all the town wasstaring at it in panting horror. I have seen a prairie on fire,luckily from the far side of a comfortably broad river, and have riddenthrough a pine-forest when every tree for miles was an uplifted torch,and pungent yellow smoke rolled down each corrie side in grey riverscrested with dancing flame. But that Martian glare was more sombre andterrible than either.

  "What is it?" I asked of poor Si, who came out gasping to speak to meby the gate-house.

  "None of us know, and unless the gods these Thither folk believe in areangry, and intend to destroy the world with yonder red sword in thesky, I cannot guess. Perhaps," she added, with a sudden flash ofinspiration, "it comes by your machinations for Heru's help."

  "No!"

  "If not by your wish, then, in the name of all you love, set your wishagainst it. If you know any incantations suitable for the occasion,oh, practise them now at once, for look, even the very grass iswithering; birds are dropping from trees; fishes, horribly bloated, arebeginning to float down the steaming rills; and I, with all others,have a nameless dread upon me."

  Hotter and hotter it grew, until about sunset the red blaze upon thesky slowly opened, and showed us for about half an hour, through theopening a lurid, flame-coloured meteor far out in space beyond; thenthe cleft closed again, and through that abominable red curtain camethe very breath of Hades.

  What was really happening I am not astronomer enough to say, though oncooler consideration I have come to the conclusion that our planet, ingoing out to its summer pastures in the remoter fields of space, hadsomehow come across a wandering lesser world and got pretty well singed
in passing. This is purely my own opinion, and I have not yetsubmitted it to the kindly authorities of the Lick Observatory forverification. All I can say for certain is that in an incredibly shortspace of time the face of the country changed from green to sear,flowers drooped; streams (there were not many in the neighbourhoodapparently) dried up; fishes died; a mighty thirst there was nothing toquench settled down on man and beast, and we all felt that unlessProvidence listened to the prayers and imprecations which the wholetown set to work with frantic zeal to hurl at it, or that abominablecomet in the sky sheered off on another tack with the least possibledelay, we should all be reduced to cinders in a very brief space oftime.