The Mysterious Force

by J. -H. Rosny aîné

  One of the Eagle’s sons was in command of the Goura-Zannkas warriors. His name was Warzmao, the Python, because he could creep like a reptile and dive deep into the waters for a long time.

  Having departed before moonrise, beneath a sky blanched by stars, the warriors followed the curves of the shore. In the feeble astral luminosity the black bodies seemed to be made of a thicker darkness. At intervals, Houmra lay down on the ground, or Warzmao disappeared silently into a thicket. An hour went by without any indication revealing the presence of Squat Men. They were certainly aware that they were being pursued; perhaps they had retreated into the desert—or perhaps they were setting ambushes.

  Philippe attempted to see and hear. He had ears as fine as, or even finer than, Houmra, but he had hardly begun to decipher the enigmas of the African night.

  “This is a damnable affair!” muttered Dick Nightingale. “How to they expect to fight in the dark? They never find more than one or two of these vermin at a time, and they’d much prefer to die than talk.”

  Dick was a good servant, loyal and brave, but he talked too much. Although he was whispering, Philippe said: “It’s better to keep quiet!”

  “Damn it!” said the other. “I defy a wolf to hear me at six yards—and we’re surrounded by these men.”

  That was true. Around the auxiliaries, the Python maintained a mobile cordon of Goura-Zannkas. He did not want to expose them to a surprise attack, not because of them but because of their weapons, which were capable of winning rapid victories.

  “Let’s shut up, all the same!” Philippe insisted. “And don’t worry, Dick—I don’t think the Goura-Zannkas intend to fight in the dark, any more, no doubt, than the Squat Men. Be sure that they’re not marching without reason!”

  Dick shut up, and the expedition continued its monotonous investigations. The ground was carefully examined everywhere, and Houmra, who had divined their allies’ motives, often listened for some slight noise deep within the earth.

  The wilderness was not silent. Occasionally, they heard the yapping of a jackal, a roar, the cry of distress of a vanquished herbivore, or the plaint of batrachians among the reeds and water-lilies. It was all mysterious, exciting and terrible. A precarious conqueror, man still only possessed a fraction of this savage land, and in the nocturnal opacity he was lost in the bosom of an unvanquished power.

  Philippe’s heartbeat was intolerably fast. It was not fear; he was only thinking of Muriel. She appeared to him in the phosphorescence of the lake, and in the luminous dust of the stars.

  “The Moon’s rising!” muttered Dick Nightingale.

  Extravagantly blurred by cloud, as red as a poppy, still quite dark but more luminous with every passing minute, it traced a river of light over the lake, and the frogs greeted it with plaintive melodies.

  The Goura-Zannkas advance guard had stopped. The scouts crouched down. Then a hundred violent voices roared a war-cry. For a quarter of an hour, there was nothing to be seen but confused flights of projectiles. Those that sprang from clumps of papyrus and grass were aimed at the Goura-Zannkas, who replied by bombarding the coverts with pointed stones.

  “Are the Squat Men there, then?” said Dick, brandishing his fist.

  The combat was a mere simulacrum. Because of the distance, the projectiles remained harmless. The Squat Men’s ambush had failed. They had counted on surprising the Sons of the Stars by means of an unexpected attack, but the scouts had thwarted their plan. Now the adversaries were hesitating, the assegai-points in either side having been dipped in homicidal poison. Before reaching the enemy, the aggressor would sustain serious losses.

  Warzmao, who was well aware of that, kept watch on the papyrus. The Squat Men remained invisible, some lying flat in the vegetation, others sheltering in rocky clefts. Sometimes the chief gave voice to a bellow, which the warriors repeated with such force that alarmed monkeys ceased crying out.

  Both sides had equal patience, and also hatred—a boundless hatred whose origins were lost in time immemorial. If the Goura-Zannkas, being more impetuous, had not launched an all-out attack, it was because they were aware of their numerical inferiority and the strength of their antagonists’ position. Furthermore, the Squat Men had a flotilla of canoes, spotted by the scouts, which ensured a means of retreat across the lake.

  “This could go on for a month!” Dick Nightingale complained. “These savages, sir, are damned cowards.”

  “I don’t think so,” Philippe replied, almost severely. “They’re two exceedingly courageous races.” Deep down, he was as impatient as Dick. He had arranged his little troop in the shelter of a mound. If the Squat Men risked a massive attack, the riflemen were to fire at will. They were poor shots, and even Dick was unreliable.

  “Are our monkeys on the march?” Dick exclaimed.

  Thirty Goura-Zannkas were advancing toward the shore in tightly-knit ranks. They were making a frightful racket, incessantly insulting the Squat Men. One might have thought that they were launching an assault. A cloud of projectiles rose up from the papyrus—but the troops had already come to a halt, out of range. The maneuver was obvious: Warzmao wanted to tempt the enemy with the lure of an easy victory. To increase the temptation, he was holding back the remainder of his warriors.

  “Watch out!” Philippe commanded. “Get ready to fire!”

  “They won’t come out!” Dick grumbled. “This is a war of rabbits.”

  Philippe, however, gave precise instructions to his riflemen.

  The Goura-Zannkas continued to challenge the enemy. The advance guard was now very exposed; at least 700 paces separated them from the bulk of the expedition, and an indentation in the shore permitted the Squat Men to mount a flank attack in combination with a frontal assault. As they also had a considerable numerical superiority over the Goura-Zannkas, the chances of victory were good.

  Philippe’s heart was beating wildly. It seemed to him that Muriel’s fate might depend on the Squat Men’s resolve. In his fever, forgetting the obscure horrors and the vile perils, he saw her alive. Imaginary events are obedient to the hazards of the imagination…

  There was no revelatory movement in the papyrus, the grass and the rocks—but the harsh voices of Squat Men replied to the vociferations of the Sons of the Star. Then there was a brief silence. In the distance, a flotilla of canoes moved over the lake. It was approaching. A chain of rocks hid it from view.

  “Reinforcements!” Dick remarked. “This could get hotter!”

  Warzmao had climbed on to a mound. He was undoubtedly hesitant; the position of the advance guard had become dangerous. He did not have time to order a retreat. Frightful roars announced the attack. It was unleashed, massive, crushing and frenetic. Two troops, each of at least 80 men, came forward in tight formation. The one on the flank was evidently attempting to cut off the Goura-Zannkas’ retreat.

  “Fire!” Philippe ordered.

  A hail of bullets decimated the Squat Men on the flank, at which Philippe directed the first wave; seven or eight men fell within an instant.

  By some error of their scouts, the Squat Men had no suspicion of the presence of the white men; the precautions taken by Warzmao had deceived them. As brave as bulldogs before the customary weapons, even when poisoned, they were disturbed by the intervention of the thunderous machines. Many of them remembered the battle in the forest, when the Squat Men had suffered an inconceivable defeat in a matter of moments. Hazard determined that the riflemen were admirably placed, and the Squat Men collapsed in clusters.

  The troop on the left wailed lamentably. The Goura-Zannkas’ advance guard charged the column on the right, which was much more exposed than the one on the left. Warzmao and his men were arriving at great speed. The Squat Men were in turmoil; the mystic terror had astounded them. Like the Athenians at Chaeronea,34 they experienced the vertigo of defeat, and allowed themselves to be killed without resistance. The Goura-Zannkas’ clubs struck them down by dozens, while the fusillade maintained by Philippe and his men continu
ed to fill their obscure souls with horror.

  Soon, the Goura-Zannkas having invaded the entirety of the terrain, it was necessary for the others to cease fire. Philippe continued a methodical fire on his own. A few Squat Men attempted a final resistance; a ferocious attack crushed them—and there was an incoherent and furious massacre, a primitive slaughter in which the vanquished yielded to the mysterious destiny of battles and awaited death, no longer trying to rebel against it.

  If 30,000 Romans perished at Lake Thrasymenus,35 more than 100 Squat Men perished on the shore of Lake Savage. Of those who survived, some lay low in the bushes, others threw themselves into a dozen canoes moored in an inlet and made for open water.

  Other canoes were found—about a dozen of them—each of which could carry a dozen men. Warzmao decided to “clear” the islands that could be seen offshore, where the runaways would doubtless try to hide.

  One of the canoes contained Philippe, Dick Nightingale and the riflemen from the camp.

  V. Deep in the Earth

  Squat Men had been seen to disembark on the northernmost island. Philippe landed there with his men, and a boat-load of Goura-Zannkas. The Squat Men’s canoes, sheltered in a cove, showed that their enemies were still on the island. It was not heavily wooded. Grass grew with difficulty on the rocky ground, intermingled with lichens; a few clumps of papyrus were growing at the water’s edge.

  With Dick and six men clad in overcoats impervious to assegais, Philippe undertook a reconnaissance. It revealed no human presence. When the little troop came back to the cove, the oldest of the Goura-Zannkas made signs to Kouram. Three times he pointed to the center of the island.

  “That’s where they disappeared,” said Kouram.

  Philippe looked. There was a red granite rock, on which nothing grew but bearded lichens, surrounded by a little short grass. “No one could hide there,” he objected. “You can see that as well as I can, Kouram. If that’s where they disappeared, they can’t be above ground.”

  “They’re under the ground, Master.” Kouram made a sign to the Goura-Zannkas, who nodded his head gravely.

  An obscure wave of sensations swirled in Philippe’s skull. The human mind is nourished by analogies. Muriel had vanished underground, and it suddenly seemed, strangely, that it would be underground that she would be recovered.

  “How does he know?” asked Philippe.

  Kouram tried in vain to translate the question, but the old warrior perceived that the Phantom Man wanted to see. He gave a brief order, for he was in command of the expedition, and the Goura-Zannkas headed toward the rock, keeping a sharp look-out. Philippe followed, with Dick and his riflemen.

  When they had arrived, the Goura-Zannkas chief called to one of his men. Both of them leaned hard on a crescent-shaped crevice. A block of stone moved sideways, and Philippe saw a black hole extending downwards into the ground. The old warrior held out his arms and pronounced a few words, with a serious expression. He was obviously announcing the presence of Squat Men.

  Philippe, Kouram and Dick looked at one another.

  “What are the Goura-Zannkas going to do?” Philippe asked.

  It seemed that the chief had understood. He pointed at Philippe, Dick, Kouram and the riflemen dressed in impermeable clothing, then to his warriors. At the same time he made signs indicative of succession.

  “Master,” said Kouram, “he wants us to take the lead—he seems to think that we’re invulnerable.”

  “We nearly are,” said Nightingale, with a snigger.

  “He has faith in our weapons.”

  “We’ll go first,” said Philippe. “We need to set an example.”

  Dick shrugged his shoulders carelessly; he was a fatalist of almost unlimited bravery.

  “Are our riflemen ready?” Philippe asked Kouram.

  “They will follow you,” said Kouram, having given an order.

  Philippe turned toward them. Their attitude was resolute; they had faith. Having seen the white men continually victorious, they deemed them invincible.

  “Let’s go!” said Philippe, making sure that his hunting-knife moved easily in its sheath and that the rifles were fully loaded.

  The slope was fairly steep but quite practicable. Philippe’s electric torch projected a violet cone into the darkness. After three minutes the descent ceased; they found themselves in an almost-horizontal corridor, with a cracked floor. Obscure animals fled. The silence was profound.

  Turning round, Philippe saw confused heads and scintillating eyes in the gloom. A few Goura-Zannkas warriors crouched down or put an ear to the wall. Others lay down horizontally.

  “Well?” Maranges asked.

  “They came this way,” replied Kouram, who had participated in the investigations, “but we can’t hear anything. Perhaps they’ve fled, perhaps they’re waiting for us…who can tell whether they might be lying in ambush in another cave whose entrance we can’t see?”

  Philippe peered into the mysterious gloom. Glints revealed pieces of quartz, perhaps gemstones, but there was no indication of the presence of living creatures. “Let’s press on!”

  Warzmao gave an analogous order at the same moment. Two Sons of the Star, skillful in recognizing the tracks of humans and animals, moved to the head of the expedition. They moved slowly, ears pricked, but there was nothing to be seen but stone walls and nothing to be heard but the warriors’ muffled footfalls.

  Suddenly, one would have thought that lights were shining in the ceiling. They found themselves in a large natural hall, almost hexagonal, and the lights that sprang from the rock were only reflections of electric rays from large blocks of rock-crystal.

  “One might think those blocks were polished,” Dick Nightingale remarked.

  Soon, they made out a series of fissures, each of which was the opening of a more-or-less narrow corridor. Philippe counted ten such exits and turned to the Goura-Zannkas with an anxious expression.

  The chief shook his head, but did not seem astonished. He made it known to Kouram that he had expected something of the sort—doubtless in accordance with his ancestors’ stories. Evidently, neither he nor any of his warriors had been this far before; tree-dwelling men of the daylight, they did not like to descend deep into the earth.

  “What shall we do?” Philippe murmured, full of uncertainty.

  “It’s worse than a labyrinth!” Dick complained. “Before we’d visited three of these damned holes, the Squat Men would be far away…not to mention traps and ambushes…”

  Philippe was overwhelmed by discouragement. All his hopes became chimerical. Besides, what indication was there that Muriel was in these caves? Why would she still be alive? No matter! The momentum of events was beginning to hypnotize the young man. “If the Goura-Zannkas will guard this hall,” he said to Kouram, “we’ll explore the exits.”

  “That will be very dangerous, Master.”

  “No more dangerous that what we’ve already done.”

  “Much more dangerous. We’ll be exposed to all the Squat Men’s traps. The Squat Men are the lords of the underworld.”

  An ardent impulse was driving the young man, though. “We must!” he said.

  Kouram bowed his head fatalistically. “As you wish, Master.”

  “We’ll take half our riflemen. The others will inspire confidence in the Goura-Zannkas. Dick, you’ll command them.”

  “I’d rather follow you!” said Nightingale.

  “We need a chief here. If the Goura-Zannkas only see black men, they won’t trust them—they’ll withdraw.”

  “All right,” Dick said, “but I don’t like it…”

  Kouram succeeded in communicating Philippe’s intention to the Goura-Zannkas all the more easily because the chief had had a similar idea. He offered two skillful scouts to aid the search.

  As there was no reason to prefer one exit to the others, Philippe set off into one of the tunnels at random, followed by Kouram and his little troop. The tunnel narrowed and became lower, soon becoming impract
icable.

  “Either the Squat Men didn’t come this way or the stones hold some secret,” said Kouram, when they were stopped by the narrowness of the fissure.

  “Let’s go back,” said Philippe, after feeling the walls.

  The second fissure ended in a cul-de-sac; the third terminated in a sealed grotto, to which stalactites and stalagmites lent a confused resemblance to some savage temple. The fourth, however, led to a spacious gallery that gave no sign of ending after ten minutes’ march.

  “This is the way the Squat Men came,” Kouram declared.

  One of the Goura-Zannkas scouts touched him on the shoulder, and Kouram turned round. The man showed him his hand; the palm was red and moist.

  “Blood—it’s blood, Master!” Kouram said.

  The Goura-Zannkas indicated that they should follow him. Near the wall, there was a red trail.

  VI. The Subterranean Water

  The Goura-Zannkas scout marched swiftly, sure now that the enemies of his race had passed this way. In the darkness, the little troop followed the violet-tinted beam of the electric torch.

  After a few minutes, there was a bend in the corridor. At the same time, the ceiling lowered and the passage narrowed. Soon, the Goura-Zannkas uttered an exclamation. Kouram, who was close behind him, raised an arm. There was no need for an explanation; the torch-beam was reflecting from a shiny surface.

  “Water!” said Philippe, despairingly.

  Kouram touched his arm. “A canoe, Master.”

  The sheet of water seemed considerable. It broadened out beyond the little harbor where the corridor ended. A vault rich in crystals reflected the torchlight and gave the subterranean water flecks of diamond, sapphire, ruby and topaz.

  Anxiously, Philippe examined the canoe. Why had the Squat Men abandoned it? Should he not fear a trap? The boat, which was quite long but very narrow, seemed fragile; it contained two paddles. There was room for six men at most. Dare they risk themselves on these mysterious waters, in the subterranean darkness, among enemies adapted to a mole-like existence? It was a crazy move, which would almost certainly end in disaster—but Philippe was in the grip of the fever of adventure and a strange exaltation. “I need five volunteers to go with me,” he said.