Axel shook his head and his tone carried conviction: 'Many men might judge her to be more beautiful,' he acknowledged. 'But you have something which she lacks. Camilla is by no means perfect yet she might prove no mean rival to this girl, for the love of a man, whereas you are apart—infinitely rarer and more desirable. It is possible to meet such loveliness as hers on earth but yours only in the Garden of the Gods.'
Lulluma accepted this praise but seemed only moderately pleased by it. She looked down on the sleeping girl and murmured : 'I thought she was unique. I am intensely proud of her. She is Danoe—my daughter.'
'What?' exclaimed Axel incredulously. 'But that is impossible.
'Hush!' Lulluma drew him hurriedly back behind a screen of hanging creepers.
'But you?' Axel lowered his voice. 'I don't understand— you can't be more than twenty yourself—or let's be lavish and say twenty-two.'
'That is just it.' Lulluma smiled enigmatically. 'You do not understand. In this place we come normally to maturity in twenty years but after that the fact that we pass two-thirds of each year in sleep preserves our youth almost indefinitely. Presently you will see another of us—Laotzii, a woman of ninety, but to you she will appear to be only a little over forty.'
'But you?' persisted Axel, 'perhaps it is rude to ask but— how old are you?'
'I am young yet.' Lulluma gave her deep gurgling chuckle. 'Only forty-four next birthday.'
Axel surveyed again the warm loveliness which glowed before him; 'I would have wagered a fortune that you could not be more than twenty-three.'
'It is these long periods of sleep,' she repeated. 'How old do you think Nahou is?'
'If one judges by appearances I should say fifty. His muscles are so supple. There is not a single thread of grey in that fine straight black hair of his—he cannot be more.'
Lulluma laughed at his indignant tone. 'He has lived over one hundred years. If I remember he is a hundred and four. He is my grandfather and, with the exception of Menes, the oldest man amongst us. . . . Also he is a most accomplished lover,' she added naively.
'To what age do you live then?' Axel asked, ignoring her last remark.
'A hundred and thirty-eight to a hundred and forty-five. The last is a record I think.'
'How many are there of you here—awake or asleep?'
'Twelve only. Six women and six men. That number was decided on within a few generations of the Flood and it has never been varied since except for brief periods when we are eleven or thirteen. A child is born to one of our women every twelve years and if the eldest of our community is not already dead, they die quite naturally within a few months of the birth because their time is done and they no longer wish to live. Semiramis is the oldest of our women now. She is about a hundred and forty and if she is not dead before she will die soon after my daughter Danoe bears her first child—which will be in about four years' time.'
'You speak as if that was quite certain. Have you the power to control such things?'
She nodded. 'With us the gift of life is at the discretion of the giver's will. Such power was only achieved after innumerable generations of conscious effort by every mother, but concentrated thought is the greatest force in the world. By it we can heal very serious injuries when they occur in the mill or metallurgical workshop—although accidents are very rare with us.'
'Yes—I understand that,' said Axel thoughtfully. 'In the upper world there are now many people who follow a religion which centres largely round faith-healing. They are not always successful in fighting disease but they have worked a lot of cures where the doctors have failed. That you should have developed a similar faculty to a more perfect degree is not so surprising but the control of childbirth by will is a much greater problem, or have you reached that degree of evolution whereby only one sex is necessary for the reproduction of the species?'
'Of course not, you dear fool!' Luiluma laughed as she opened the gate from the jungle to the meadow; 'There was a lot of difficulty at first but our women had already progressed considerably in regulating the size of their families artificially even before the cataclysm. When they wholeheartedly desired to have a child it was considered a sin not to do so though, for only by intent can the most beautiful and balanced children be born.
'Then it was discovered that time and seasons played a great part in determining the child's appearance and character, so people began to choose the planets under which their children should be born in accordance with the type of baby they desired. As the ages passed women went even further and took it upon themselves to prepare with great seriousness for these important events. They spent many months visualising the child they were to bear as a grown man or woman in its full beauty, and by strong thought processes they threw up barriers against the entry of deformed, ugly or evil-natured offspring into life. Eventually through cumulative hereditary effort, the woman's will became the dominant factor so that without the definite desire to become a mother it was impossible for her to bear a child.'
Axel took her hand as they strolled slowly past the lake. 'Is the fact that there are six women and six men amongst you just chance,' he asked, 'or do you determine sex as well?'
'Oh, that was all planned long ago—it was one of the first steps. Each of the six women here bears two children—a boy and a girl. Your people will reach that stage of development soon I expect.'
'We are fairly near it now, Axel told her. 'I don't know very much about it but I believe it is a matter of the glands. Tell me, could you have more children if you wanted to?'
'I suppose so—but I've had my two. Danoe, the girl you saw, who is twenty, and Ciston, a boy of eight. Therefore I should never give my will to that again. It would be unutterably wrong.'
For a moment they walked in silence then, as they passed through the vine-covered trellis into the vegetable garden, Axel said: 'No one seems to be working here or in the shops. How is this place cultivated if ten out of twelve of you are asleep and the remaining two laze away the hours in the sunshine?'
'We do not laze,' she said quickly. 'The two of us who are here work for long hours tending our fruit trees, flowers and vegetables. It keeps us healthy and we need little sleep because we get so much at other times. Our only holidays are when two of us fall in love—then we are free to laze together for as long as we like. The arrival of your party is a tremendous event and that is why work has ceased in the last few days. Besides, in addition to the two months' labour each of us puts in to provide our necessities we all return for four fortnights in the year during which we sow and harvest our biannual crops. I enjoy those fortnights—just as I am enjoying all the strangeness of having you here—for it is then that we tell each other of our journeys into distant lands and at the end we have a festival!—a Feast of Love.'
'But I thought you told me that you only had affairs every two years or so?
'The serious ones—yes. Those which I was speaking of grow from flirtations during the period of harvest and generally end quite naturally at the Feast—but in them often lies the seed of deep attraction which leads to a more lasting attachment sometimes of months.'
She suddenly caught sight of his face and began to laugh. 'I believe you are shocked,' she said. 'I forgot that the ideas of your people are as ours were before the Flood I'
'I'm not shocked,' he countered her teasing, 'but it is all so strange. Most upper-world people could call you an immoral baggage, but after all it is quite natural to you and nothing,' he added seriously, 'which is natural can be immoral.'
'Only anger and the giving of pain are immoral,' declared Lulluma firmly, 'and, after all there are only six men here to choose from—I'm sure you've known at least a dozen women?'
'Quite,' Axel went so far as to admit, 'but don't let's go into that.'
'Why not?' she asked curiously. 'If we are going to spend a lot of time together it will give us some amusing and" interesting subjects to discuss.'
'I suppose there's no reason why we shouldn't but I w
as1 brought up in the tradition that one might kiss a lot—but never tell I'
'We are not jealous as your women are, so it could do no harm among us, and any confidences you make to me can never reach the upper world because none of you will ever be able to return.'
He sighed happily and put his arm round her shoulders again. 'That is not a distressing thought—in fact I am convinced that I have been waiting all my life for the moment when I should meet you in this garden.'
Lulluma smiled up into his eyes and he caught his breath in wonder at her loveliness as she asked: 'Would you be content to stay here making love a little—working regularly —talking a lot?'
'My dear,' he said and put his hands behind his back. Me 273
felt that he was treading on sacred ground and must be careful not to make the smallest slip which might dash all the great hopes which had risen in him like an overpowering force since he had walked and talked with Lulluma in the Garden.
'My dear,' he said again, 'what more could one do if one had all the upper world to do it in and were a millionaire besides? There, one is beset with constant cares. If you possess no property you go hungry and if you own land or business interests life is one constant war to defend them from others who would take them from you. Here all causes of worry seem to have been eliminated. You have enough work to keep you healthy but no more and interests and food enough for all. What mortal who had eyes to see and understanding could ever wish to leave this Garden of the Gods?'
Lulluma stretched out her hand and put two cool fingers on his forehead. She seemed to listen for a moment and then she took her hand away and said: 'It is strange but you are, I believe, one of us in spirit—I am glad 1 But your friends —some of them are as different from you as we are from the creatures of the depths. I fear they will make themselves miserable by always craving to get back.'
'I had thought of that too,' acknowledged Axel, and his face clouded. 'I wonder if any of them have woken yet?'
'If so Nahou will look after them—or Rahossis.'
'Who is Rahossis?'
'My mother. She returned from a journey two days ago. She is very beautiful and very gay—red-haired and statuesque—and in the full bloom of her beauty—you will imagine her to be about thirty-two—but really she has lived many more years than that. She is twelve years younger than Quet, the son of Nahou, who was my father, and twelve years older than Peramon, who was the father of my first child Danoe.'
They reached the palm grove and, walking through it, came round the miniature golden temple to find that only Nicky and Vladimir were still asleep. Camilla and Sally had disappeared while the McKay and Doctor Tisch, with only trousers on, sat side by side on the grass near the bathing pool. Their coats were now covering—or partially so—the middle portions of the bodies of their still sleeping friends.
As the McKay's glance fell on the Count, arm in arm with Luiluma and dressed only in a short airy green tunic he clutched the Doctor's arm and exclaimed in a horrified voice:
'Good God 1 Look at Axel—he's gone native.'
The Doctor scratched his bristly head and laughed guttur-ally. He was still vaguely wondering where all this was going to end. It had not yet penetrated to his mind that those great stones he had discovered on the ocean bed were only the ghosts of a past Atlantis, whereas here, he was seated in the very heart of that long dead civilisation which it had been his life's ambition to find.
'Well, how are you both feeling?' Axel asked as he came up. 'I see you've both had a bath and a shave and are looking years younger already so your long sleep must have done you good.'
'Oh, I'm feeling all right,' the McKay agreed guardedly, 'and Mr. Nahou has been kindness itself although when I agreed to him putting me to sleep I didn't know it was to be for a week!'
Axel's lazy smile flitted across his face. 'We should all be most distressed, I know,' he said, 'if that has caused you to miss any important engagements.'
'Eh?—Ohl' the McKay's friendly grin appeared. 'You've caught me out there, Count—but I find it a little difficult to get the hang of our new quarters and he wanted me to put on one of those fancy dress affairs you are wearing. Well, no offence, but I thought that was a trifle thick!'
'Thin you really mean,' giggled Luiluma as she hung on Axel's arm, 'but why have you covered up your friends and where are the two young girls you had with you?'
'The girls went off together with a fine strapping red-haired wench—lady, I beg your pardon—who said her name was Rahossis. As for us putting our coats over our friends —well, I mean . . . !' The McKay shrugged eloquently.
'That was silly of you,' Luiluma said gently. 'We have covered you up each night. But in a health sleep such as you have undergone it is important that the gentle earth-shine should play upon every portion of your bodies.'
'You do have night here then,' said Axel. 'That is interesting because my only fear was that one might tire of perpetual day.'
She nodded. The earthshine is under our control and for ten hours out of every twenty-four we dim it, turning its principal energy into other channels. You saw all the little trenches in the vegetable garden—it pumps the water up which irrigates those and makes the fountains among the clumps of flowers play.'
'I see,' Axel murmured. 'I wondered how you could find time to water everything, but that makes it unnecessary.'
As he spoke a young boy came dashing out of one of the buildings. He raced across the grass and flung his arms round Lulluma.
'My darling,' she cooed in his own tongue, stooping toY embrace him. 'So you are back at last—did you have a good journey?'
'Yes—yes,' his dark eyes were bright with excitement. 'I found a long lonely beach and examined all the shells, then a wooden boat came past with men in it and I went over the water to them. They caught fish out of the sea, and two days later they took it home. I followed, to find out where they lived but they had only dark dirty huts and no gardens —Poor people, I was so sorry for them I...'
He broke off suddenly to stare at the strangers. Lulluma translated what he had said then, as an afterthought, introduced him: This is Ciston—the youngest amongst us.'
Apparently he understood the drift of her last words for he bowed gravely giving the Doctor, Axel and the McKay a friendly smile apiece.
The McKay grinned back and held out his hand. 'Shake me'lad,' he said. 'You and I will make some boats to float on that pond together.'
Ciston took the proffered hand though he could not understand what the stranger was saying, but Lulluma did and in that second, all thought of him as a weatherbeaten, truculent little man with absurd inhibitions passed from her. He could be gentle with a child and would make toy boats for the boy's amusement. Her heart warmed towards him and, to his intense embarrassment, she stooped and kissed him impulsively upon the neck.
'Now for your swim,' she said quickly to Ciston, giving the McKay a moment to recover from her assault, and the boy bounded away like some young faun. His head was covered with dark thick close-cropped curls and his body was a golden brown. Axel thought of a young Sicilian fisher-boy as Ciston plunged fearlessly into the pool.
He swam with ease and grace and they were still watching him when Camilla and Sally appeared. Their corn-coloured hair now hung round their shoulders and both wore only Atlantean tunics. Camilla's was blue with a silver border and Sally's a dove-grey edged with something which looked like mother of pearl. Rahossis accompanied them. She was a good few inches taller than either of the cousins and a magnificent woman of Junoesque proportions. Her skin was very white and her hair Titian red—shorter than Lulluma's. It made a halo for her head and clustered all over it in a forest of auburn curls.
The McKay put his hand in front of his eyes as Sally approached in her almost transparent tunic and she flushed a bright lobster pink as she said abruptly: 'Don't be a fool, Nelson—Andy—McKay, and get rid of those hideous trousers. When in Rome, you know ..
Then he removed his hand and she saw that he was l
aughing so she added defensively: 'Don't you think this suits me?'
'Very becoming, me'dear,' he chuckled, 'very becoming. God forbid that I should ever prevent any Roman lady doing her duty.'
'We're not Romans,' said Camilla, who caught the last words as she preened herself in front of Axel, 'we're Atlanteans now—and we've got to stay like this for the rest of our lives.'
Rahossis had drawn Lulluma aside. 'Well,' she said indulgently in Atlantean, 'this is a fine piece of good fortune for you, my sweet—I'm so glad that you were here when they arrived.'
'And for you, darling, too,' replied Lulluma. 'None of the five men will look at me now that they have seen you.'
'Nonsense.' Rahossis shrugged her fine shoulders. 'The one they call the Count is kissing your little feet already in his mind. I can tell from the way he's watching you out of the corner of his eye. As for myself—I could take any of the others if I wished but I do not think I want to. They are such intensely stupid people. Those girls are like small children—why, your little boy, Ciston, is more entertaining to talk to and any one of the men would bore me in an hour, But if you wish to enjoy yourself lose no time about it.'
'Why, darling?' asked Lulluma quickly.
'Because Menes has returned and he will exercise his sole right of re-calling all the others. There will be a council tonight for nothing like this has ever happened in our history before.'
Lulluma shrugged. 'What of it, dearest?'
'Our ancient law limits our number to twelve, and it may be thought that by allowing the strangers to remain we should bring about our own destruction. If so, Menes will order them to leave the island.'
Menes Speaks
It was a certain awe that the McKay's party watched the procession of Atlanteans going into their temple some six hours later.
The earthshine had just begun to dim and it was the first suggestion of 'night' which the strangers had experienced in this subterranean island. The flowers lost colour though much of their fragrance still perfumed the air; a vague mysterious twilight crept stealthily among the shrubs and trees, veiling them in a new secrecy, and a renewed sense of unreality troubled the newcomers, except Vladimir and Camilla, with fresh speculations as to whether they were alive or dead.
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