Darr Veter understood her and his heart beat faster with joy. A second later, however, he had hidden his feelings in a distant corner of his heart and hurried to Veda’s help.
“Do you mean the excavation of the submarine city to the south of Sicily?” he asked. “I saw some wonderful things from there in the Atlantis Palace.”
“No, not there, we’re working on the coasts of the Eastern Mediterranean, the Red Sea and India now. We are looking for cultural treasures under the water, beginning from the Creto-Indian period and ending with the Dark Ages.”
“You mean what was hidden or, more often, simply thrown into the sea when the islands of civilization were destroyed under the impact of new forces, fresh, barbaric, ignorant and reckless — that is something I can understand,” said Darr Veter thoughtfully, his eyes carefully Studying the whitish plain. “I can also understand the great destruction of ancient civilizations, when the states of antiquity, strong in their bonds with nature, were unable to make changes in their world, to cope with the growing horror of slavery and the parasitic upper strata of society.”
"And people exchanged the primitive materialism that had led them into a blind alley for the religious darkness of the Middle Ages,” added Veda, “but what is there that you cannot understand?”
“It’s just that I have a very poor idea of the Creto-Indian civilization.”
“You don’t know the latest researches. Traces of that civilization arc now being found over a huge area from Africa, through Crete, the southern part of Central Asia, Northern India to Western China.”
“I did not suspect that in those ancient days there could have been secret treasure-houses for works of art like tliose of Carthage, Greece and Rome.”
“Come with me and you’ll see,” said Veda, softly. Darr Veter walked beside her in silence. They were ascending a long, gentle slope and had reached the ridge when Darr Veter suddenly stopped.
“Thanks for your offer, I’ll come.”
Veda turned her head towards him somewhat mistrustfully but in the half-light of the northern night her companion’s eyes were dark and impenetrable.
Once past the ridge the lights turned out to be quite close. Lamps in polarizing hoods did not disperse the light rays and that made them seem farther away than they really were. Such concentrated light was a sign of night work and this was confirmed by a low roar that increased in volume as they neared it. Huge latticed trusses shone like silver under blue lamps high up in the air; a warning howl of sirens brought them to a standstill as the protective robots began working.
“Danger, keep to the left, don’t approach the line of posts!” shouted the loudspeaker of an invisible amplifier. They turned obediently towards a group of white portable houses.
“Don’t look in the direction of the field!” the robot continued warning them.
The doors of two houses opened simultaneously and two beams of light crossed on the dark road. A group of men and women gave the travellers a hearty welcome but were surprised at the imperfect means of transport that had brought them there, especially at night.
The cupboard-like cabin of the shower-bath with its streams of aromatic water saturated with gas and electricity, with the merry play of tiny electric charges on the skin, was a place that gave gentle pleasure. Refreshed, the travellers met at table. "Veter, my dear, we’ve come across some of our colleagues!” exclaimed Veda, freshly bathed and extremely young, as she poured out a golden liquid.
‘“The ten tonics, right now!” he exclaimed, reaching for his glass.
“Bullfighter, you’re growing savage in the steppes,” protested Veda. “I’m telling you interesting news and you only think of eating!”
“Are there excavations here?” said Darr Veter, doubtingly.
“There are, only they’re palaeontological, not archaeological. They’re studying the fossilized animals of the Permian period, two hundred million years old. That puts us in the shade with our petty thousands.”
“Are they studying them in the ground, without digging them up? How’s that?”
“Yes, in the ground, although as yet I don’t know how.”
One of those sitting at the table, a thin, yellow-faced man, joined in the conversation.
“Our group is now relieving another. We have just finished preparations and are about to start work on depth photography.”
“Hard irradiation,” hazarded Darr Veter.
“If you are not too tired I would advise you to watch it. Tomorrow we shall be moving the whole apparatus to another site and that will not be interesting.”
Veda and Darr gladly consented. Their hospitable hosts rose from the table and led them into a neighbouring house, where protective clothing hung in niches with a clock-face indicator over each of them.
“There is very great ionization from our powerful electron tubes,” said a tall, slightly round-shouldered woman with a faint suggestion of apology as she helped Veda into a suit of closely-woven fabric and a transparent helmet, and fastened a container with batteries on her back. In the polarized light every hillock in the steppes stood out with unnatural clarity. A dull groan came from a square space marked off by thin rails. The earth heaved, cracked and opened up in a crater in the centre of which appeared a sharp-nosed silver cylinder. Its polished walls were encircled by a spiral ridge and the sharp end was fitted with an intricate electric milling head of blue metal rotating as the machine appeared. The cylinder rolled over the edge of the crater, turned over, showed blades that moved quickly at the rear end and began digging in again a few metres away from the crater, diving almost vertically with its polished nose into the ground.
Darr Veter noticed a double cable that the cylinder pulled behind it, one of the cables was insulated, the other made of some highly-polished metal. Veda jerked his sleeve and pointed in front of them, beyond the fence of magnesium rails. A second cylinder, similar to the first, had come out of the earth and with just the same movements had rolled over to the left and disappeared as though it had dived into water.
The yellow-faced man made a sign to his visitors to hurry.
“I remember now who he is,” whispered Veda, as they hastened to overtake the group ahead of them, “he is Liao Lang, the palaeontologist who discovered the secret of the settlement of the Asian continent in the Palaeozoic.’’
“Is he of Chinese origin?’“ asked Darr Veter, recalling the sombre glance of the scientist’s slightly slant eyes. “I’m ashamed to admit it, hut I don’t know anything about his work.”
‘“I see you don't know much about our terrestrial palaeontology,” Veda remarked, "you probably know more about that of other stellar worlds.”
Before Darr’s mind’s eye there passed the countless forms of life, millions of strange skeletons in the rocks of various planets- monuments to the past hidden in the different strata of all inhabited worlds. This was nature’s memory, recorded by her until such times as a reasoning being appeared, a being not only capable of remembering but also of restoring that which had been forgotten.
They went on to a small platform fixed to the end of a half-arch of lattice-work. In the centre of the floor there was a big, unlighted screen with low benches around it on which the visitors sat and waited.
“The ‘moles’ will finish soon,” said Liao Lang. “As you have probably guessed they are carrying the hare wire through the rocks and weaving a metallic net. The skeletons of extinct animals lie in friable sandstone at a depth of fourteen metres below the surface. Lower, at seventeen metres, the whole field is covered by the metallic net which is connected to powerful inductors. A field of reflection is thus created which throws X-rays on to the screen giving us the image of the fossilized bones.”
Two big metal globes turned on massive pedestals. Floodlights were switched on and the howl of sirens warned everybody of danger. Direct current at a tension of a million volts filled the air with the fresh smell of ozone and made the terminals and insulators glow blue in the dark.
&
nbsp; Liao Lang was turning switches and pressing buttons on the control panel with feigned carelessness. The big screen grew brighter and brighter, in its depths some faint, blurred outlines appeared here and there in the field of vision. All movement on the screen then ceased, the fluid outlines of a big patch became clear-cut and filled almost the whole screen.
After a few more manipulations on the control panel the onlookers saw before them the skeleton of an unknown animal showing through a hazy glow. The wide paws with their long claws were bent under the body, the long tail was curled in a loop. An outstanding feature of the skeleton was the unusual thickness of the huge bones with curved ends and ridges to which the animal’s mighty muscles had been attached. The skull with jaws clamped tight was grinning with its front teeth. It was seen from above and looked like a bone slab with a rough, broken surface. Liao Lang changed the depth of focus and the degree of enlargement until the whole screen was filled with the head of the ancient reptile that had lived two hundred million years before on the banks of a river that had once flowed there.
The top of the skull consisted of extraordinarily thick — no less than twenty centimetres — plates of bone. There were bony ridges over the eye-sockets and there were similar excrescences over the temporal hollows and on the convex bones of the skull. From the back part of the skull there rose a big cone with the opening of a tremendous parietal eye. Liao Lang gave a loud gasp of admiration.
Darr Veter could not take his eyes off the clumsy, heavy skeleton of the ancient beast that had been compelled to live as a prisoner of unresolved contradictions. Increases in muscular power had led to thicker bones that were put to great strain and the heavier weight of the bigger bones again required a strengthening of the muscles. This direct dependence led the evolution of archaic organisms into a complete deadlock until some important physiological mutation resolved the old contradictions and brought about a new evolutionary stage. It seemed unbelievable that such creatures were amongst the ancestors of man with his beautiful body capable of great activity and precise movements.
Darr Veter looked at the excrescences over the brows of the Permian reptile that betrayed its stupid ferocity and compared it with lithe, supple Veda with such bright eyes in her intelligent, lively face. What a tremendous difference in the organization of living matter! Involuntarily he squinted sideways, trying to get a glimpse of Veda’s features through her helmet and when his eyes returned to the screen there was something else there. This was the wide, flat, parabolic head of an amphibian, the ancient salamander, doomed to lie in the warm, dark waters of a Permian swamp, waiting until something eatable came within its reach. Then, one swift leap, one snap of the jaws and again the same eternal, patient and senseless lying in wait. Darr Veter felt annoyed and oppressed by pictures of the endlessly long and cruel evolution of life. He straightened up and Liao Lang, guessing his mood, suggested that they return home to rest. It was hard for Veda, with her insatiable curiosity, to tear herself away from her observations until she saw that the scientists were hurrying to switch on the machines to take electron photographs so as not to waste power.
Veda was soon ensconced on a wide divan in the drawing-room of the women’s hostel but Darr Veter remained for some little time walking up and down the smooth terrace in front of the houses, mentally reviewing his impressions.
The dew of the northern morning washed the previous day’s dust off the grass. The imperturbable Liao Lang returned from his night’s work and proposed sending his guests to the nearest aerodrome on an Elf, a small accumulator-driven car. There was a base for jumping jet aircraft a hundred kilometres to the south-east, on the lower reaches of the River Trom-Yugan. Veda wanted to get in touch with her expedition but there was no radio transmitter of sufficient power at the dig. Since our ancestors discovered the harmful influence of radioactivity and introduced strict regulation into the use of radio, directed radio communication has required much more complicated apparatus, especially for long-distance conversations. In addition to that the number of stations has been greatly reduced. Liao Lang decided to get in touch with the nearest herdsmen’s watch tower. These watch towers had radio intercommunication and could also communicate directly with the centre of their district. A young girl student who proposed driving the Elf in order to bring it back, suggested calling in at a watch tower on the way so that the visitors could use the televisophone for their conversation. Darr Veter and Veda were glad of the opportunity. A strong wind blew the occasional wisps of dust away from them and ruffled the abundant, short-cropped hair of their driver. There was scarcely room for the three of them in the narrow car, Darr Veter’s huge body made it a tight fit for the two women. The slim silhouette of the watch tower was visible in the distance against the clear blue of the sky. Very soon the Elf came to a standstill at the foot of the tower. A plastic roof was built between the straddling legs of the structure where another Elf was garaged. The guide bars of a tiny lift led up through this roof and took them one by one past the living quarters to the platform at the top of the tower where they were met by an almost naked young man. The sudden confusion displayed by their hitherto self-reliant driver gave Veda to understand that the reason for her having been so accommodating was a deep-rooted one.
The circular room with crystal walls swayed noticeably and the metal structure of the tower thrummed monotonously like a taut violin string. The floor and ceiling of the room were painted in dark colours. On the narrow curved tables under the windows there were binoculars, calculating machines and notebooks. The tower, from its height of ninety metres, had a full view of the surrounding steppe as far as the limits of visibility of neighbouring towers. The staff maintained constant watch over the herds and kept records of fodder supplies. The milking labyrinths, through which the herds of milk cows were driven twice a day, lay in the steppe in green concentric rings. The milk which, like that of the African antelope, did not turn sour, was poured into containers and frozen on the spot after which it could be kept for a long time in the underground refrigerators. The herds were driven from one pasture to another with the aid of the Elfs kept at each of the watch towers. The observers were mostly young people who had not completed their education and they had plenty of time to study during their tour of duty. The young man led Veda and Darr Veter down a spiral staircase to living quarters suspended between the supports of the tower a few yards below the platform. The rooms were equipped with sound insulation and the travellers found themselves in absolute silence. Only the constant swaying of the room served to remind them that they were at a height that could be dangerous in the event of the slightest carelessness.
Another youth was working at the radio. The exotic hair-do and brightly coloured dress of the girl in the televisophone screen showed that he was talking to the central station; women working in the steppes wore short overall suits. The girl on the screen connected them with the zonal station and soon the sad face and tiny figure of Miyiko Eigoro, Veda’s chief assistant, appeared on the screen. There was pleasurable astonishment in her slightly slant eyes, like those of Liao Lang, and her tiny mouth opened at the suddenness of it all. A second later, however, Veda Kong and Darr Veter were confronted with a passionless face that expressed nothing except businesslike attention. Darr Veter went back upstairs and found the girl student of palaeontology engaged in a lively conversation with the first youth; Veter went outside on to the verandah surrounding the circular room. The damp of early morning had long since given way to a noonday heat that robbed the colours of their freshness and levelled out irregularities in the ground. The steppe spread far and wide, under a burning clear sky. Veter again recalled his vague longing for the northern land of his ancestors. Leaning on the rail of the swaying platform he could feel how the dreams of ancient peoples were coining true, and feel it with greater strength than ever before. Stern nature had been driven to the far north by the conquering hand of man and the vitalizing warmth of the south had been poured over these great plains that had formerly lain fr
ozen under a cold, cloudy sky.
Veda Kong entered the round room and announced that the radio operator had agreed to take them farther on their journey. The girl with the cropped hair thanked the historian with a long glance. Through the transparent wall they could see the broad back of Darr Veter, as he stood there lost in contemplation.
“Perhaps you were thinking of me?” he heard a voice say behind his back.
“No, Veda, I was thinking of one of the postulates of ancient Indian philosophy. It was to the effect that the world is not made for man and that man himself becomes great only when he understands the value and beauty of another life, the life of nature.”
“That idea seems incomplete and I don’t understand it.’’’ "I suppose I didn’t finish it. I should have added that man alone can understand not only the beauty but also the dark and difficult sides of life. Only man possesses the ability to dream and the strength to make life better!”
“Now I understand,”‘ said Veda, softly, and after a long pause added, “You’ve changed, Veter.”
"Of course, I’ve changed. Four months of digging with a simple spade amongst the stones and rotting logs of your kurgans is enough to change anybody. Like it or not, you begin to look at life more simply and its simple joys become dearer to you.”
“Don’t make a joke of it, Veter, I’m talking seriously,” said Veda with a frown. “When I first knew you, you had command over all the power of Earth, and used to speak to distant worlds; in your observatories in those days, you might well have been the supernatural being whom the ancients called God. And here, at our simple work, where you are the equal of everybody else, you have…” Veda stopped.
“What have I done?” he insisted, his curiosity aroused. “Have I lost my majesty? What would you have said if you’d seen me before I joined the Institute of Astrophysics? When I was an engine driver on the Spiral Way? That is still less majestic. Or a mechanic on the fruit-gathering machines in the tropics?” Veda laughed loudly.
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