Chapter XXV
Sacrifice
"The air in this place must be charged with some form of
electricity, but the odd thing is that it does not seem to harm
us," said Bickley in a matter-of-fact fashion as though he were
determined not to be astonished.
"To me it looks more like marsh fires or St. Elmo lights,
though how these can be where there is no vapour, I do not know,"
I answered.
As I spoke a particularly large ball of flame fell from above.
It resembled a shooting star or a meteor more than anything else
that I had ever seen, and made me wonder whether we were not
perhaps standing beneath some inky, unseen sky.
Next moment I forgot such speculations, for in its blue light,
which made him terrible and ghastly, I perceived Oro standing in
front of us clad in a long cloak.
"Dear me!" said Bastin, "he looks just like the devil, doesn't
he, and now I come to think of it, this isn't at all a bad
imitation of hell."
"How do you know it is an imitation?" asked Bickley.
"Because whatever might be the case with you, Bickley, if it
were, the Lady Yva and I should not be here."
Even then I could not help smiling at this repartee, but the
argument went no further for Oro held up his hand and Yva bent
the knee in greeting to him.
"So you have come, all of you," he said. "I thought that
perhaps there were one or two who would not find courage to ride
the flying stone. I am glad that it is not so, since otherwise he
who had shown himself a coward should have had no share in the
rule of that new world which is to be. Therefore I chose yonder
road that it might test you."
"Then if you will be so good as to choose another for us to
return by, I shall be much obliged to you, Oro," said Bastin.
"How do you know that if I did it would not be more terrible,
Preacher? How do you know indeed that this is not your last
journey from which there is no return?"
"Of course I can't be sure of anything, Oro, but I think the
question is one which you might more appropriately put to
yourself. According to your own showing you are now extremely old
and therefore your end is likely to come at any moment. Of
course, however, if it did you would have one more journey to
make, but it wouldn't be polite for me to say in what direction."
Oro heard, and his splendid, icy face was twisted with sudden
rage. Remembering the scene in the temple where he had grovelled
before his god, uttering agonised, unanswered prayers for added
days, I understood the reason of his wrath. It was so great that
I feared lest he should kill Bastin (who only a few hours before,
be it remembered, had tried to kill him) then and there, as
doubtless he could have done if he wished. Fortunately, if he
felt it; the impulse passed.
"Miserable fool!" he said. "I warn you to keep a watch upon
your words. Yesterday you would have slain me with your toy.
Today you stab me with your ill-omened tongue. Be fearful lest I
silence it for ever."
"I am not in the least fearful, Oro, since I am sure that you
can't hurt me at all any more than I could hurt you last night
because, you see, it wasn't permitted. When the time comes for me
to die, I shall go, but you will have nothing to do with that. To
tell the truth, I am very sorry for you, as with all your
greatness, your soul is of the earth, earthy, also sensual and
devilish, as the Apostle said, and, I am afraid, very malignant,
and you will have a great deal to answer for shortly. Yours won't
be a happy deathbed, Oro, because, you see, you glory in your
sins and don't know what repentance means."
I must add that when I heard these words I was filled with the
most unbounded admiration for Bastin's fearless courage which
enabled him thus to beard this super-tyrant in his den. So indeed
were we all, for I read it in Yva's face and heard Bickley
mutter:
"Bravo! Splendid! After all there is something in faith!"
Even Oro appreciated it with his intellect, if not with his
heart, for he stared at the man and made no answer. In the
language of the ring, he was quite "knocked out" and, almost
humbly, changed the subject.
"We have yet a little while," he said, "before that happens
which I have decreed. Come, Humphrey, that I may show you some of
the marvels of this bubble blown in the bowels of the world," and
he motioned to us to pick up the lanterns.
Then he led us away from the wall of the cavern, if such it
was, for a distance of perhaps six or seven hundred paces. Here
suddenly we came to a great groove in the rocky floor, as broad
as a very wide roadway, and mayhap four feet in depth. The bottom
of this groove was polished and glittered; indeed it gave us the
impression of being iron, or other ore which had been welded
together beneath the grinding of some immeasurable weight. Just
at the spot where we struck the groove, it divided into two, for
this reason.
In its centre the floor of iron, or whatever it may have been,
rose, the fraction of an inch at first, but afterwards more
sharply, and this at a spot where the groove had a somewhat steep
downward dip which appeared to extend onwards I know not how far.
Following along this central rise for a great way, nearly a
mile, I should think, we observed that it became ever more
pronounced, till at length it ended in a razor-edge cliff which
stretched up higher than we could see, even by the light of the
electrical discharges. Standing against the edge of this cliff,
we perceived that at a distance from it there were now two
grooves of about equal width. One of these ran away into the
darkness on our right as we faced the sharp edge, and at an ever-
widening angle, while the other, at a similar angle, ran into the
darkness to the left of the knife of cliff. That was all.
No, there were two more notable things. Neither of the grooves
now lay within hundreds of yards of the cliff, perhaps a quarter
of a mile, for be it remembered we had followed the rising rock
between them. To put it quite clearly, it was exactly as though
one line of rails had separated into two lines of rails, as often
enough they do, and an observer standing on high ground between
could see them both vanishing into tunnels to the right and left,
but far apart.
The second notable thing was that the right-hand groove, where
first we saw it at the point of separation, was not polished like
the left-hand groove, although at some time or other it seemed to
have been subjected to the pressure of the same terrific weight
which cut its fellow out of the bed of rock or iron, as the sharp
wheels of a heavily laden wagon sink ruts into a roadway.
"What does it all mean, Lord Oro?" I asked when he had led us
back to the spot where the one groove began to be two grooves,
that is, a mile or so away from the razor-edged cliff.
"This, Humphrey," he answered. "That which travels along yonder
road, when it reaches this spot on which we stand, follows the
left-hand path which is made bright with its passage. Yet, could
a giant at that moment of its touching this exact spot on which I
lay my hand, thrust it with sufficient strength, it would leave
the left-hand road and take the right-hand road."
"And if it did, what then; Lord Oro?"
"Then within an hour or so, when it had travelled far enough
upon its way, the balance of the earth would be changed, and
great things would happen in the world above, as once they
happened in bygone days. Now do you understand, Humphrey?"
"Good Heavens! Yes, I understand now," I answered. "But
fortunately there is no such giant."
Oro broke into a mocking laugh and his grey old face lit up
with a fiendish exultation, as he cried:
"Fool! I, Oro, am that giant. Once in the dead days I turned
the balance of the world from the right-hand road which now is
dull with disuse, to the left-hand road which glitters so
brightly to your eyes, and the face of the earth was changed. Now
again I will turn it from the left-hand road to the right-hand
road in which for millions of years it was wont to run, and once
more the face of the earth shall change, and those who are left
living upon the earth, or who in the course of ages shall come to
live upon the new earth, must bow down to Oro and take him and
his seed to be their gods and kings."
When I heard this I was overwhelmed and could not answer. Also
I remembered a certain confused picture which Yva had shown to us
in the Temple of Nyo. But supported by his disbelief, Bickley
asked:
"And how often does the balance of which you speak come this
way, Lord Oro?"
"Once only in many years; the number is my secret, Bickley," he
replied.
"Then there is every reason to hope that it will not trouble
us," remarked Bickley with a suspicion of mockery in his voice.
"Do you think so, you learned Bickley?" asked Oro. "If so, I do
not. Unless my skill has failed me and my calculations have gone
awry, that Traveller of which I tell should presently be with us.
Hearken now! What is that sound we hear?"
As he spoke there reached our ears the first, far-off murmurs
of a dreadful music. I cannot describe it in words because that
is impossible, but it was something like to the buzz of a
thousand humming-tops such as are loved by children because of
their weird song.
"Back to the wall!" cried Oro triumphantly. "The time is
short!"
So back we went, Oro pausing a while behind and overtaking us
with long, determined strides. Yva led us, gliding at my side
and, as I thought, now and again glanced at my face with a look
that was half anxious and half pitiful. Also twice she stooped
and patted Tommy.
We reached the wall, though not quite at the spot whence we had
started to examine the grooved roads. at least I think this was
so, since now for the first time observed a kind of little window
in its rocky face. It stood about five feet from its floor level,
and was perhaps ten inches square, not more. In short, except for
its shape it resembled a ship's porthole rather than a window.
Its substance appeared to be talc, or some such material, and
inches thick, yet through it, after Oro had cast aside some sort
of covering, came a glare like that of a search-light. In fact it
was a search-light so far as concerned one of its purposes.
By this window or porthole lay a pile of cloaks, also four
objects which looked like Zulu battle shields cut in some unknown
metal or material. Very deftly, very quietly, Yva lifted these
cloaks and wrapped one of them about each of us, and while she
was thus employed I noticed that they were of a substance very
similar to that of the gown she wore, which I have described, but
harder. Next she gave one of the metal-like shields to each of
us, bidding us hold them in front of our bodies and heads, and
only to look through certain slits in them in which were
eyepieces that appeared to be of the same horny stuff as the
searchlight window. Further, she commanded us to stand in a row
with our backs against the rock wall, at certain spots which she
indicated with great precision, and whatever we saw or heard on
no account to move.
So there we stood, Bickley next to me, and beyond him Bastin.
Then Yva took the fourth shield, as I noted a much larger one
than ours, and placed herself between me and the search-light or
porthole. On the other side of this was Oro who had no shield.
These arrangements took some minutes and during that time
occupied all our attention. When they were completed, however,
our curiosity and fear began to reassert themselves. I looked
about me and perceived that Oro had his right hand upon what
seemed to be a rough stone rod, in shape not unlike that with
which railway points are moved. He shouted to us to stand still
and keep the shields over our faces. Then very gently he pressed
upon the lever. The porthole sank the fraction of an inch, and
instantly there leapt from it a most terrific blaze of lightning,
which shot across the blackness in front and, as lightning does,
revealed far, far away another wall, or rather cliff, like that
against which we leant.
"All works well," exclaimed Oro in a satisfied voice, lifting
his hand from the rod, "and the strength which I have stored will
be more than enough."
Meanwhile the humming noise came nearer and grew in volume.
"I say," said Bickley, "as you know, I have been sceptical, but
I don't like this business. Oro, what are you going to do?"
"Sink half the world beneath the seas," said Oro, "and raise up
that which I drowned more than two thousand centuries ago. But as
you do not believe that I have this power, Bickley, why do you
ask such questions?"
"I believe that you have it, which was why I tried to shoot you
yesterday," said Bastin. "For your soul's sake I beg you to
desist from an attempt which I am sure will not succeed, but
which will certainly involve your eternal damnation, since the
failure will be no fault of yours."
Then I spoke also, saying:
"I implore you, Lord Oro, to let this business be. I do not
know exactly how much or how little you can do, but I understand
that your object is to slay men by millions in order to raise up
another world of which you will be the absolute king, as you were
of some past empire that has been destroyed, either through your
agency or otherwise. No good can come of such ambitions. Like
Bastin, for your soul's sake I pray you to let them be."
"What Humphrey says I repeat," said Yva. "My Father, although
you know it not, you seek great evil, and from these hopes you
sow you will harvest nothing save a loss of which you do not
dream. Moreover, your plans will fail. Now I who am, like
yourself, of the Children of Wisdom, have spoken, for the first
and last time, and my words are true. I pray you give them
weight, my Father."
Oro heard, and grew furious.
"What!" he said. "Are you against me, every one, and my own
daughter also? I would lift you up, I would make you rulers of a
new world; I would destroy your vile civilisations which I have
studied with my eyes, that I may build better! To you, Humphrey,
I would give my only child in marriage that from you may spring a
divine race of kings! And yet you are against me and set up your
puny scruples as a barrier across my path of wisdom. Well, I
tread them down, I go on my appointed way. But beware how you try
to hold me back. If any one of you should attempt to come between
me and my ends, know that I will destroy you all. Obey or die."
"Well, he has had his chance and he won't take it," said Bastin
in the silence that followed. "The man must go to the devil his
own way and there is nothing more to be said."
I say the silence, but it was no more silent. The distant
humming grew to a roar, the roar to a hellish hurricane of sound
which presently drowned all attempts at ordinary speech.
Then bellowing like ten millions of bulls, at length far away
there appeared something terrible. I can only describe its
appearance as that of an attenuated mountain on fire. When it
drew nearer I perceived that it was more like a ballet-dancer
whirling round and round upon her toes, or rather all the
ballet-dancers in the world rolled into one and then multiplied a
million times in size. No, it was like a mushroom with two
stalks, one above and one below, or a huge top with a point on
which it spun, a swelling belly and another point above. But what
a top! It must have been two thousand feet high, if it was an
inch, and its circumference who could measure?
On it came, dancing, swaying and spinning at a rate
inconceivable, so that it looked like a gigantic wheel of fire.
Yet it was not fire that clothed it but rather some
phosphorescence, since from it came no heat. Yes, a
phosphorescence arranged in bands of ghastly blue and lurid red,
with streaks of other colours running up between, and a kind of
waving fringe of purple.
The fire-mountain thundered on with a voice like to that of
avalanches or of icebergs crashing from their parent glaciers to
the sea. Its terrific aspect was appalling, and its weight caused
the solid rock to quiver like a leaf. Watching it, we felt as
ants might feel at the advent of the crack of doom, for its mere
height and girth and size overwhelmed us. We could not even
speak. The last words I heard were from the mouth of Oro who
screamed out:
"Behold the balance of the World, you miserable, doubting men,
and behold me change its path--turning it as the steersman turns
a ship!"
Then he made certain signs to Yva, who in obedience to them
approached the porthole or search-light to which she did
something that I could not distinguish. The effect was to make
the beam of light much stronger and sharper, also to shift it on
to the point or foot of the spinning mountain and, by an aiming
of the lens from time to time, to keep it there.
This went on for a while, since the dreadful thing did not
travel fast notwithstanding the frightful speed of its
revolutions. I should doubt indeed if it advanced more quickly
than a man could walk; at any rate so it seemed to us. But we had
no means of judging its real rate of progress whereof we knew as
little as we did of the course it followed in the bowels of the
earth. Perhaps that was spiral, from the world's deep heart
upwards, and this was the highest point it reached. Or perhaps it
remained stationary, but still spinning, for scores or hundreds
of years in some central powerhouse of its own, whence, in
obedience to unknown laws, from time to time it made these
terrific journeys.
No one knows, unless perhaps Oro did, in which case he kept the
information to himself, and no one will ever know. At any rate
there it was, travelling towards us on its giant butt, the peg of
the top as it were, which, hidden in a cloud of friction-born
sparks that enveloped it like the cup of a curving flower of
fire, whirled round and round at an infinite speed. It was on
this flaming flower that the search-light played steadily,
doubtless that Oro might mark and measure its monstrous progress.
"He is going to try to send the thing down the right-hand
path," I shouted into Bickley's ear.
"Can't be done! Nothing can shift a travelling weight of tens
of millions of tons one inch," Bickley roared back, trying to
look confident.
Clearly, however, Yva thought that it could be done, for of a
sudden she cast down her shield and, throwing herself upon her
knees, stretched out her hands in supplication to her father. I
understood, as did we all, that she was imploring him to abandon
his hellish purpose. He glared at her and shook his head. Then,
as she still went on praying, he struck her across the face with
his hand and pushed her to her feet again. My blood boiled as I
saw it and I think I should have sprung at him, had not Bickley
caught hold of me, shouting, "Don't, or he will kill her and us
too."
Yva lifted her shield and returned to her station, and in the
blue discharges which now flashed almost continuously, and the
phosphorescent glare of the advancing mountain, I saw that though
her beautiful face worked beneath the pain of the blow, her eyes
remained serene and purposeful. Even then I wondered--what was
the purpose shining through them. Also I wondered if I was about
to be called upon to make that sacrifice of which she had spoken,
and if so, how. Of one thing I was determined--that if the call
came it should not find me deaf. Yet all the while I was horribly
afraid.
At another sign from Oro, Yva did something more to the lens--
again, being alongside of her, I could not see what it was. The
beam of light shifted and wandered till, far away, it fell
exactly upon that spot where the rock began to rise into the
ridge which separated the two grooves or roads and ended in the
razor-edged cliff. Moreover I observed that Oro, who left it the
last of us, had either placed something white to mark this first
infinitesimal bulging of the floor of the groove, or had smeared
it with chalk or shining pigment. I observed also what I had not
been able to see before, that a thin white line ran across the
floor, no doubt to give the precise direction of this painted
rise of rock, and that the glare of the search-light now lay
exactly over that line.
The monstrous, flaming gyroscope fashioned in Nature's
workshop, for such without doubt it was, was drawing near,
emitting as it came a tumult of sounds which, with the echoes
that they caused, almost over-whelmed our senses. Poor little
Tommy, already cowed, although he was a bold-natured beast, broke
down entirely, and I could see from his open mouth that he was
howling with terror. He stared about him, then ran to Yva and
pawed at her, evidently asking to be taken into her arms. She
thrust him away, almost fiercely, and made signs to me to lift
him up and hold him beneath my shield. This I did, reflecting
sadly that if I was to be sacrificed, Tommy must share my fate. I
even thought of passing him on to Bickley, but had no time.
Indeed I could not attract his attention, for Bickley was staring
with all his eyes at the nightmare-like spectacle which was in
progress about us. Indeed no nightmare, no wild imagination of
which the mind of man is capable, could rival the aspect of its
stupendous facts.
Think of them! The unmeasured space of blackness threaded by
those globes of ghastly incandescence that now hung a while and
now shot upwards, downwards, across, apparently without origin or
end, like a stream of meteors that had gone mad. Then the
travelling mountain, two thousand feet in height, or more, with
its enormous saucer-like rim painted round with bands of lurid
red and blue, and about its grinding foot the tulip bloom of
emitted flame. Then the fierce-faced Oro at his post, his hand
upon the rod, waiting, remorseless, to drown half of this great
world, with the lovely Yva standing calm-eyed like a saint in
hell and watching me above the edge of the shield which such a
saint might bear to turn aside the fiery darts of the wicked. And
lastly we three men flattened terror-stricken, against the wall.
Nightmare! Imagination! No, these pale before that scene which
it was given to our human eyes to witness.
And all the while, bending, bowing towards us--away from us--
making obeisance to the path in front as though in greeting, to
the path behind as though in farewell; instinct with a horrible
life, with a hideous and gigantic grace, that titanic Terror
whirled onwards to the mark of fate.
At the moment nothing could persuade me that it was not alive
and did not know its awful mission. Visions flashed across my
mind. I thought of the peoples of the world sleeping in their
beds, or going about their business, or engaged even in the work
of war. I thought of the ships upon the seas steaming steadily
towards their far-off ports. Then I thought of what presently
might happen to them, of the tremors followed by convulsions, of
the sudden crashing down of cities, such as we had seen in the
picture Yva showed us in the Temple, of the inflow of the waters
of the deep piled up in mighty waves, of the woe and desolation
as of the end of the world, and of the quiet, following death. So
I thought and in my heart prayed to the great Arch-Architect of
the Universe to stretch out His Arm to avert this fearsome ruin
of His handiwork.
Oro glared, his thin fingers tightened their grip upon the rod,
his hair and long beard seemed to bristle with furious and
delighted excitement. The purple-fringed rim of the Monster had
long overshadowed the whited patch of rock; its grinding foot was
scarce ten yards away. Oro made more signs to Yva who, beneath
the shelter of her shield, again bent down and did something that
I could not see. Then, as though her part were played, she rose,
drew the grey hood of her cloak all about her face so that her
eyes alone remained visible, took one step towards me and in the
broken English we had taught her, called into my ear.
"Humphrey, God you bless! Humphrey, we meet soon. Forget not
me!"
She stepped back again before I could attempt to answer, and
next instant with a hideous, concentrated effort, Oro bending
himself double, thrust upon the rod, as I could see from his open
mouth, shouting while he thrust.
At the same moment, with a swift spring, Yva leapt immediately
in front of the lens or window, so that the metallic shield with
which she covered herself pressed against its substance.
Simultaneously Oro flung up his arms as though in horror.
Too late! The shutter fell and from behind it there sprang out
a rush of living flame. It struck on Yva's shield and expanded to
right and left. The insulated shield and garments that she wore
seemed to resist it. For a fraction of time she stood there like
a glowing angel, wrapped in fire.
Then she was swept outwards and upwards and at a little
distance dissolved like a ghost and vanished from our sight.
Yva was ashes! Yva was gone! The sacrifice was consummated!
And not in vain! Not in vain! On her poor breast she had
received the full blast of that hellish lightning flash. Yet
whilst destroying, it turned away from her, seeking the free
paths of the air. So it came about that its obstructed strength
struck the foot of the travelling gyroscope, diffused and did not
suffice to thrust it that one necessary inch on which depended
the fate of half the world, or missing it altogether, passed away
on either side. Even so the huge, gleaming mountain rocked and
trembled. Once, twice, thrice, it bowed itself towards us as
though in majestic homage to greatness passed away. For a second,
too, its course was checked, and at the check the earth quaked
and trembled. Yes, then the world shook, and the blue globes of
fire went out, while I was thrown to the ground.
When they returned again, the flaming monster was once more
sailing majestically upon its way and down the accustomed
left-hand path!
Indeed the sacrifice was not in vain. The world shook--but Yva
had saved the world!
