He checked himself, sighed, and grew pensive.
"What a place for languishing eyes and necks of ivory, Maskull!" rasped Krag mockingly. "Why isn't Sullenbode here?"
Maskull gripped him roughly and flung him against the nearest tree. Krag recovered himself, and burst into a roaring laugh, seeming not a whit discomposed.
"Still what I said - was it true or untrue?"
Maskull gazed at him sternly. "You seem to regard yourself as a necessary evil. I'm under no obligation to go on with you any farther. I think we had better part."
Krag turned to Gangnet with an air of grotesque mock earnestness.
"What do you say - do we part when Maskull pleases, or when I please?"
"Keep your temper, Maskull," said Gangnet, showing Krag his back. "I know the man better than you do. Now that he has fastened onto you there's only one way of making him lose his hold, by ignoring him. Despise him - say nothing to him, don't answer his questions. If you refuse to recognise his existence, he is as good as not here."
"I'm beginning to be tired of it all," said Maskull. "It seems as if I shall add one more to my murders, before I have finished."
"I smell murder in the air," exclaimed Krag, pretending to sniff. "But whose?"
"Do as I say, Maskull. To bandy words with him is to throw oil on fire."
"I'll say no more to anyone… When do we get out of this accursed forest?"
"It's some way yet, but when we're once out we can take to the water, and you will be able to rest, and think."
"And brood comfortably over your sufferings," added Krag.
None of the three men said anything more until they emerged into the open day. The slope of the forest was so steep that they were forced to run, rather than walk, and this would have prevented any conversation, even if they had otherwise felt inclined toward it. In less than half an hour they were through. A flat, open landscape lay stretched in front of them as far as they could see.
Three parts of this country consisted of smooth water. It was a succession of large, low-shored lakes, divided by narrow strips of tree-covered land. The lake immediately before them had its small end to the forest. It was there about a third of a mile wide. The water at the sides and end was shallow, and choked with dolm-colored rushes; but in the middle, beginning a few yards from the shore, there was a perceptible current away from them. In view of this current, it was difficult to decide whether it was a lake or a river. Some little floating islands were in the shallows.
"Is it here that we take to the water?" inquired Maskull.
"Yes, here," answered Gangnet.
"But how?"
"One of those islands will serve. It only needs to move it into the stream."
Maskull frowned. "Where will it carry us to?"
"Come, get on, get on!" said Krag, laughing uncouthly. "The morning's wearing away, and you have to die before noon. We are going to the Ocean."
"If you are omniscient, Krag, what is my death to be?"
"Gangnet will murder you."
"You lie!" said Gangnet. "I wish Maskull nothing but good."
"At all events, he will be the cause of your death. But what does it matter? The great point is you are quitting this futile world… Well, Gangnet, I see you're as slack as ever. I suppose I must do the work."
He jumped into the lake and began to run through the shallow water, splashing it about. When he came to the nearest island, the water was up to his thighs. The island was lozenge-shaped, and about fifteen feet from end to end. It was composed of a sort of light brown peat; there was no form of living vegetation on its surface. Krag went behind it, and started shoving it toward the current, apparently without having unduly to exert himself. When it was within the influence of the stream the others waded out to him, and all three climbed on.
The voyage began. The current was not travelling at more than two miles an hour. The sun glared down on their heads mercilessly, and there was no shade or prospect of shade. Maskull sat down near the edge, and periodically splashed water over his head. Gangnet sat on his haunches next to him. Krag paced up and down with short, quick steps, like an animal in a cage. The lake widened out more and more, and the width of the stream increased in proportion, until they seemed to themselves to be floating on the bosom of some broad, flowing estuary.
Krag suddenly bent over and snatched off Gangnet's hat, crushing it together in his hairy fist and throwing it far out into the stream.
"Why should you disguise yourself like a woman?" he asked with a harsh guffaw - "Show Maskull your face. Perhaps he has seen it somewhere."
Gangnet did remind Maskull of someone, but he could not say of whom. His dark hair curled down to his neck, his brow was wide, lofty, and noble, and there was an air of serious sweetness about the whole man that was strangely appealing to the feelings.
"Let Maskull judge," he said with proud composure, "whether I have anything to be ashamed of."
"There can be nothing but magnificent thoughts in that head," muttered Maskull, staring hard at him.
"A capital valuation. Gangnet is the king of poets. But what happens when poets try to carry through practical enterprises?"
"What enterprises?" asked Maskull, in astonishment.
"What have you got on hand, Gangnet? Tell Maskull."
"There are two forms of practical activity," replied Gangnet calmly. "One may either build up, or destroy."
"No, there's a third species. One may steal - and not even know one is stealing. One may take the purse and leave the money."
Maskull raised his eyebrows. "Where have you two met before?"
"I'm paying Gangnet a visit today, Maskull, but once upon a time Gangnet paid me a visit."
"Where?"
"In my home - whatever that is. Gangnet is a common thief."
"You are speaking in riddles, and I don't understand you. I don't know either of you, but it's clear that if Gangnet is a poet, you're a buffoon. Must you go on talking? I want to be quiet."
Krag laughed, but said no more. Presently he lay down at full length, with his face to the sun, and in a few minutes was fast asleep, and snoring disagreeably. Maskull kept glancing over at his yellow, repulsive face with strong disfavour.
Two hours passed. The land on either side was more than a mile distant. In front of them there was no land at all. Behind them, the Lichstorm Mountains were blotted out from view by a haze that had gathered together. The sky ahead, just above the horizon, began to be of a strange colour. It was an intense jale-blue. The whole northern atmosphere was stained with ulfire.
Maskull's mind grew disturbed. "Alppain is rising, Gangnet."
Gangnet smiled wistfully. "It begins to trouble you?"
"It is so solemn - tragical, almost - yet it recalls me to Earth. Life was no longer important - but this is important."
"Daylight is night to this other daylight. Within half an hour you will be like a man who has stepped from a dark forest into the open day. Then you will ask yourself how you could have been blind."
The two men went on watching the blue sunrise. The entire sky in the north, halfway up to the zenith, was streaked with extraordinary colours, among which jale and dolm predominated. Just as the principal character of an ordinary dawn is mystery, the outstanding character of this dawn was wildness. It did not baffle the understanding, but the heart. Maskull felt no inarticulate craving to seize and perpetuate the sunrise, and make it his own. Instead of that, it agitated and tormented him, like the opening bars of a supernatural symphony.
When he looked back to the south, Branchspell's day had lost its glare, and he could gaze at the immense white sun without flinching. He instinctively turned to the north again, as one turns from darkness to light.
"If those were Crystalman's thoughts that you showed me before, Gangnet, these must be his feelings. I mean it literally. What I am feeling now, he must have felt before me."
"He is all feeling, Maskull - don't you understand that?"
Maskull was feed
ing greedily on the spectacle before him; he did not reply. His face was set like a rock, but his eyes were dim with the beginning of tears. The sky blazed deeper and deeper; it was obvious that Alppain was about to lift itself above the sea. The island had by this time floated past the mouth of the estuary. On three sides they were surrounded by water. The haze crept up behind them and shut out all sight of land. Krag was still sleeping - an ugly, wrinkled monstrosity.
Maskull looked over the side at the flowing water. It had lost its dark green colour, and was now of a perfect crystal transparency.
"Are we already on the Ocean, Gangnet?"
"Yes."
"Then nothing remains except my death."
"Don't think of death, but life."
"It's growing brighter - at the same time, more sombre, Krag seems to be fading away…"
"There is Alppain!" said Gangnet, touching his arm.
The deep, glowing disk of the blue sun peeped above the sea. Maskull was struck to silence. He was hardly so much looking, as feeling. His emotions were unutterable. His soul seemed too strong for his body. The great blue orb rose rapidly out of the water, like an awful eye watching him… it shot above the sea with a bound, and Alppain's day commenced.
"What do you feel?" Gangnet still held his arm.
"I have set myself against the Infinite," muttered Maskull.
Suddenly his chaos of passions sprang together, and a wonderful idea swept through his whole being, accompanied by the intensest joy.
"Why, Gangnet - I am nothing."
"No, you are nothing."
The mist closed in all around them. Nothing was visible except the two suns, and a few feet of sea. The shadows of the three men cast by Alppain were not black, but were composed of white daylight.
"Then nothing can hurt me," said Maskull with a peculiar smile.
Gangnet smiled too. "How could it?"
"I have lost my will; I feel as if some foul tumour had been scraped away, leaving me clean and free."
"Do you now understand life, Maskull?"
Gangnet's face was transfigured with an extraordinary spiritual beauty; he looked as if he had descended from heaven.
"I understand nothing, except that I have no self any more. But this is life."
"Is Gangnet expatiating on his famous blue sun?" said a jeering voice above them. Looking up, they saw that Krag had got to his feet.
They both rose. At the same moment the gathering mist began to obscure Alppain's disk, changing it from blue to a vivid jale.
"What do you want with us, Krag?" asked Maskull with simple composure.
Krag looked at him strangely for a few seconds. The water lapped around them.
"Don't you comprehend, Maskull, that your death has arrived?"
Maskull made no response. Krag rested an arm lightly on his shoulder, and suddenly he felt sick and faint. He sank to the ground, near the edge of the island raft. His heart was thumping heavily and queerly; its beating reminded him of the drum taps. He gazed languidly at the rippling water, and it seemed to him as if he could see right through it… away, away down… to a strange fire…
The water disappeared. The two suns were extinguished. The island was transformed into a cloud, and Maskull - alone on it - was floating through the atmosphere… Down below, it was all fire - the fire of Muspel. The light mounted higher and higher, until it filled the whole world…
He floated toward an immense perpendicular cliff of black rock, without top or bottom. Halfway up it Krag, suspended in midair, was dealing terrific blows at a blood-red spot with a huge hammer. The rhythmical, clanging sounds were hideous.
Presently Maskull made out that these sounds were the familiar drum beats. "What are you doing, Krag?" he asked.
Krag suspended his work, and turned around.
"Beating on Your heart, Maskull," was his grinning response.
The cliff and Krag vanished. Maskull saw Gangnet struggling in the air - but it was not Gangnet - it was Crystalman. He seemed to be trying to escape from the Muspel-fire, which kept surrounding and licking him, whichever way he turned. He was screaming… The fire caught him. He shrieked horribly. Maskull caught one glimpse of a vulgar, slobbering face - and then that too disappeared.
He opened his eyes. The floating island was still faintly illuminated by Alppain. Krag was standing by his side, but Gangnet was no longer there.
"What is this Ocean called?" asked Maskull, bringing out the words with difficulty.
"Surtur's Ocean."
Maskull nodded, and kept quiet for some time. He rested his face on his arm. "Where's Nightspore?" he asked suddenly.
Krag bent over him with a grave expression. "You are Nightspore."
The dying man closed his eyes, and smiled.
Opening them again, a few moments later, with an effort, he murmured, "Who are you?"
Krag maintained a gloomy silence.
Shortly afterward a frightful pang passed through Maskull's heart, and he died immediately.
Krag turned his head around. "The night is really past at last, Nightspore… The day is here."
Nightspore gazed long and earnestly at Maskull's body. "Why was all this necessary?"
"Ask Crystalman," replied Krag sternly. "His world is no joke. He has a strong clutch - but I have a stronger… Maskull was his, but Nightspore is mine."
Chapter 21
MUSPEL
The fog thickened so that the two suns wholly disappeared, and all grew as black as night. Nightspore could no longer see his companion. The water lapped gently against the side of the island raft.
"You say the night is past," said Nightspore. "But the night is still here. Am I dead, or alive?"
"You are still in Crystalman's world, but you belong to it no more. We are approaching Muspel."
Nightspore felt a strong, silent throbbing of the air - a rhythmical pulsation, in four-four time. "There is the drumming," he exclaimed.
"Do you understand it, or have you forgotten?"
"I half understand it, but I'm all confused."
"It's evident Crystalman has dug his claws into you pretty deeply," said Krag. "The sound comes from Muspel, but the rhythm is caused by its travelling through Crystalman's atmosphere. His nature is rhythm as he loves to call it - or dull, deadly repetition, as I name it."
"I remember," said Nightspore, biting his nails in the dark.
The throbbing became audible; it now sounded like a distant drum. A small patch of strange light in the far distance, straight ahead of them, began faintly to illuminate the floating island and the glassy sea around it.
"Do all men escape from that ghastly world, or only I, and a few like me?" asked Nightspore.
"If all escaped, I shouldn't sweat, my friend… There's hard work, and anguish, and the risk of total death, waiting for us yonder."
Nightspore's heart sank. "Have I not yet finished, then?"
"If you wish it. You have got through. But will you wish it?"
The drumming grew loud and painful. The light resolved itself into a tiny oblong of mysterious brightness in a huge wall of night. Krag's grim and rocklike features were revealed.
"I can't face rebirth," said Nightspore. "The horror of death is nothing to it."
"You will choose."
"I can do nothing. Crystalman is too powerful. I barely escaped with - my own soul."
"You are still stupid with Earth fumes, and see nothing straight," said Krag.
Nightspore made no reply, but seemed to be trying to recall something. The water around them was so still, colourless, and transparent, that they scarcely seemed to be borne up by liquid matter at all. Maskull's corpse had disappeared.
The drumming was now like the clanging of iron. The oblong patch of light grew much bigger; it burned, fierce and wild. The darkness above, below, and on either side of it, began to shape itself into the semblance of a huge, black wall, without bounds.
"Is that really a wall we are coming to?"
"You will soo
n find out. What you see is Muspel, and that light is the gate you have to enter."
Nightspore's heart beat wildly.
"Shall I remember?" he muttered.
"Yes, you'll remember."
"Accompany me, Krag, or I shall be lost."
"There is nothing for me to do in there. I shall wait outside for you."
"You are returning to the struggle?" demanded Nightspore, gnawing his fingertips.
"Yes."
"I dare not."
The thunderous clangor of the rhythmical beats struck on his head like actual blows. The light glared so vividly that he was no longer able to look at it. It had the startling irregularity of continuous lightning, but it possessed this further peculiarity - that it seemed somehow to give out not actual light, but emotion, seen as light. They continued to approach the wall of darkness, straight toward the door. The glasslike water flowed right against it, its surface reaching up almost to the threshold.
They could not speak any more; the noise was too deafening.
In a few minutes they were before the gateway. Nightspore turned his back and hid his eyes in his two hands, but even then he was blinded by the light. So passionate were his feelings that his body seemed to enlarge itself. At every frightful beat of sound, he quivered violently.
The entrance was doorless. Krag jumped onto the rocky platform and pulled Nightspore after him.
Once through the gateway, the light vanished. The rhythmical sound - blows totally ceased. Nightspore dropped his hands… All was dark and quiet as an opened tomb. But the air was filled with grim, burning passion, which was to light and sound what light itself is to opaque colour.
Voyage to Arcturus Page 28
