CHAPTER XXVII
The Warning of the Waters
Although at times during my first months in Atlantis I may have felt out of place and wished that the waters would open above me and bear me back to my own land, yet my longings were never mixed with misgivings and my regrets never tinged with fears. Even in my most pessimistic moments, I had no doubt but that the Sunken World was secure; that no menace to life or tranquility lurked in its well-ordered depths; that I might live out my days unmolested and in a peaceful routine. Hence I was all the more shocked at discovery of that peril which was to give Atlantis the aspect of a beleaguered city, and to overcast its beauty with foreboding and horror.
I had been in Atlantis over a year when the crisis occurred. It was a crisis as startling and unexpected as the flaming of a meteor out of a calm sky; and yet, had we but known it, it had been preparing its way insidiously during the days of fancied safety, like some mortal disease that burrows through tissues which are apparently sound. And, like such a disease, it might have been checked had it only been discovered in time.
I remember that one night, after many onerous hours devoted to my “History of the Upper World,” I slept but poorly, with an intermittent slumber disturbed by nightmares of huge towers crashing to destruction. And during the wakeful intervals my thoughts framed other nightmares, and I was agitated by a vague alarm and excitement, though I could not understand why. Not until much later did it occur to me that some telegraphic force, akin to the magnetic will power of the Atlanteans, may have conveyed to me the deep unrest that surcharged the atmosphere.
But whether or not this explanation be valid, I know that in the morning, when I had dressed and stood in my roof-bedroom gazing down into the streets, I became acutely conscious that something was wrong. Every few minutes a native or group of natives could be seen rushing by at a speed I had never before observed among the unhurried Atlanteans; and it seemed to me that their faces were convulsed as though with pain or fear; while the voices occasionally borne up to me had the nervousness, almost the hysteria, of men in a panic.
What could have happened? I wondered. Had the Atlanteans all suddenly gone mad? Or were they facing an insurrection or a civil war? Or had the government perhaps been overthrown by a band of insurgents? Or had there been an earthquake through which I had somehow slept? Or was there an invasion from the upper world, and had some of our countrymen, seeking for clues of the lost X-111, discovered the Sunken World and entered?
All these possibilities, as I turned them over in my mind, seemed so fantastic that I had to discard them. Yet it still filled me with apprehension to observe the natives scurrying about the streets--apprehension that was to be speedily justified.
* * * * *
I was just preparing to go out and investigate when there came an excited rapping at my door. Unable to imagine who might be seeking me at this early hour, I cried out sharply, “Come in!”; and the door swung abruptly open to admit--Captain Gavison!
He was far from his composed and normal self. His pale blue costume was all ruffled, and had been flung over his shoulders as though in great haste; his long hair hung dishevelled over his narrow bronzed brow; his face looked all hot and sweaty; his gray eyes burned and sparkled with a vague distress.
He did not wait for a formal greeting. “Have you--have you heard the news?” he gasped, as he strode into the room.
I confessed that I had heard nothing.
“Don’t see how you could help hearing!” he snapped, and began to pace slowly about the floor, with brow wrinkled in bitter thought.
“What news is it?” I demanded. “Just what have you heard?”
“One of the natives told me strange things last night,” he confided, as he continued his restless perambulations about the room. “I haven’t slept a wink, not a wink!”
“What strange things? We’re not going to be sent back home, are we?” I inquired, with an abortive effort to be facetious.
“We’ll be sent to a worse place than that!” he growled, bristling almost into his old military manner. “The glass wall has been cracked!”
“The glass wall cracked?” I cried, stupidly, stunned by the terror of the words.
“Yes, the glass wall has been cracked,” the Captain affirmed, in a more matter-of-fact manner. “One of the patrol boats discovered the damage late yesterday afternoon. There’s a dangerous fracture near the entrance of the Salty River.”
For reply I could only groan. The glass wall of Atlantis cracked!--the whole Atlantic Ocean bearing down upon the Sunken World! Too well I understand what that meant, too well to require comment! And in that first moment of horrible realization I had visions of torrents pouring through a gap in the wall, flooding over the streets and temples and highest towers of the land!
“But how--how under heaven did it happen?” I burst forth, when I had half recovered from the first staggering blow.
“That is not hard to say,” he declared, slowly and in measured tones. “At least, there are suspicions--”
“Suspicions?” I demanded.
“Suspicions that you and I and the rest of us are to blame.”
“But how is that possible?” I exclaimed.
“It’s possible, all right. It all happened before we got here. The X-111, caught in the whirlpool outside the Salty River, was hurled by the force of the waters against the glass wall, probably striking with its steel prow, which, as you know, was built for ramming our foes. The wall, luckily, was too stout to be shattered; but it was cracked, and the crack must have been growing all this time without being noticed.” “Merciful gods!” I cried. “Then if--if anything happens to Atlantis, it will be all on account of us!”
But before Gavison had had time to reply, there came another rapping at the door. And, hardly waiting for my summons, a wild-eyed Xanocles burst in. Like my other visitor, he did not waste time on greetings. “You--do you know?” he faltered, with a lack of self-command most unusual in him.
Solemnly we assured him that we knew.
Without further delay we plunged into the subject that had brought him to us. “Maybe you’d like to go and see for yourselves?” he suggested.
“But how can we see for ourselves?” I asked.
“The government--that is to say, the High Chief Adviser--has ordered the intra-atomic river boats put at the people’s disposal. Seven of them are now plying back and forth, bearing thousands to the glass wall. The Adviser thinks the people should see for themselves just what has happened.”
“Very well then, let’s go,” decided the Captain.
Without another word the three of us set out together. In silence we strode down the long avenue that meandered toward the river. And as we sped along we encountered dozens of the natives, all of them in as great a hurry as we; and all had faces flushed and excited, or fearful and drawn, or pale as though with apprehension.
* * * * *
Upon arriving at the piers, we found that hundreds of Atlanteans had preceded us, most of them so transformed that I could hardly recognize them as citizens of the Sunken World; for they were chattering wildly, or pacing distractedly back and forth, or uttering half-hysterical exclamations; and one or two were mumbling and muttering to themselves, or moving their lips silently in what might have been prayer. But they did not fail to notice our arrival; angry exclamations broke forth at sight of us, and several of the men and women withdrew visibly from us; and, in my surprise, I did not know whether to ascribe their hostility to the unpopularity of Xanocles or to the part that Gavison and I had played as unconscious agents of disaster.
To calm the excited multitude, a vigorous-looking young man ventured to raise his voice, and proclaim, “Friends, there is still no reason for alarm. We do not yet know how serious the damage may be, but the glass wall still holds; not a drop of water has broken through.... There is reason to believe that the break will be speedily repaired, and that we will go on living as happily as ever....”
These words, I was glad to see, had a soothing effect upon the crowd. Yet I was relieved when at last the boat hove into view, a slender affair as long as the longest river vessel, but not more than twenty-five feet from rail to rail. I did not then give any attention to its details, though I did note how low-lying it was, with but one visible deck, one small cabin and no smokestack or mast. But after it had drawn up to the pier and the gangplank was flung down, I wasted no time about boarding it with my two companions. Benches and chairs were strewn liberally about the deck, sufficient to accommodate the entire crowd; and we had hardly taken seats when the boat commenced to shiver and throb, and we started upstream with the velocity of an express train.
So rapidly did we move that in less than an hour we were approaching the head of the Salty River. And during the interval I only once ventured to break the moody solitude of my own thoughts.
“When did you find out about all this?” I asked Xanocles, who like the rest of us seemed to be absorbed in bitter reveries.
“Last night,” he returned, in an abstracted manner. “I chanced to be in the Hall of Public Enlightenment, and heard the news over the Autophone.”
“The Autophone?” I demanded.
“Well, naturally, you wouldn’t know what that is,” explained Xanocles. “We get our ordinary news by wireless telegraph, of course, and it is then reported by speakers at the various public meeting places. But the Autophone is more effective, and is used only on rare and important occasions. It operates instantaneously, and consists of a tube and electrical attachment, enabling one to hear a speaker miles away.”
“I understand,” said I, for, after all, the Autophone did not impress me as unfamiliar.
And with that we lapsed again into silence, a silence shared by all the hundreds of passengers. For now that they had actually embarked upon the voyage, their excitement seemed to have died down to a mood of solemn waiting, a tense and painful waiting all too apparent in the rigid, staring faces of the men and the women’s pale cheeks and frightened eyes.
It was with relief that at length I saw the river growing white and agitated ahead of us, and knew that we were not far from the valve where the torrents were hurled in from the sea. Yet I was filled with impatience before we swerved finally into a little side canal and our boat came to a landing before a long granite dock whence a sister ship was just leaving. I need hardly state that I lost no time in stepping across the gangplank, as soon as the crowded state of the deck permitted; and though we were still three or four miles from the glass wall, I was thankful to be able to walk the distance.
* * * * *
To watch my two companions and myself set out along the clay footpath toward the wall, one might have thought that we were athletes training for a race. But if we moved rapidly, we were in no way exceptional, for there were scores who easily kept pace with us.
For many minutes we hastened parallel to the Salty River. We passed the long, white rapids; we passed the spot where the gigantic jet of water shot thundering out of the pipe-like valve; we saw the wall itself sloping down before us, and near the wall we could make out a long, black mass which ultimately resolved itself into a multitude of humans.
This multitude, as we drew near, showed itself to be in a wildly agitated condition. Men and women were pacing frantically to and fro, swarming and squirming like worms or ants; some were gesticulating vehemently, some speaking in high-pitched tones audible from afar, some merely standing petrified like men dealt a blow too great to bear.
Yet, as we took our places among them, we could observe nothing that gave cause for alarm. To our right loomed the elongated, steely gray valve, a great tube as high as a three-story building, which narrowed as it approached the wall, and passed through it on a level with the ground. And just before us sloped the wall itself, now roped off so that we could not come within a stone’s throw, but apparently still the same smooth, dark greenish barrier I had viewed months before. No sign of any break or crack was visible, and it was almost with disappointment that I noticed how flawless it seemed.
But while I stood there watching I heard a faint swishing sound, like the lapping of sea-waves against the rocks. I may have been mistaken, for amid the chattering and shouting of the mob and the distant roaring of waters from the valve, it was difficult to be sure just what one heard. But Gavison and Xanocles seemed to note that same ominous noise, and both paused to listen, while the anxious expression on their faces did not relieve my misgivings. “It’s the water working through the inner layers of the glass,” I thought I heard Xanocles remark; but here again I could not be sure, for even as he spoke a tumult of shouts burst forth, and I turned in sudden fright to see what was the matter.
This time I did not have long to wait. On one of the great roof-supporting stone columns a searchlight had been mounted; and I observed that it was slowly swinging round, casting a piercing illumination upon the wall from a bright, yellow eye glaring like the headlight of a locomotive. For a moment it shook and wavered as if it could not find a focus; then it became rigid and still, and a circle of the wall, many yards across, stood out in brilliant relief.
Instantly the people began to press forward. So excited were they that for a moment I almost lost touch with Gavison and Xanocles, and could catch no glimpse of the illuminated patch of wall. And at the same time shrill cries of terror and dismay broke forth. A man just to my rear groaned as if in pain; a woman gave a half suppressed sob; somewhere from the rear came a hysterical wailing. Then, when the circle in the wall again became visible, I was wedged in so tightly that I scarcely gave it any attention. It was only by degrees that I made out its features, and saw what resembled an enormous piece of cracked crockery. From an amorphous central blur several feet across, great seams and fissures ran in a hundred directions, with long, spidery arms that reached out like the roots of a tree, gradually growing thinner till they vanished in vacancy. It seemed a miracle that the water had not already burst through, for each of the scores of diverging cracks were rods long and must have been many feet deep.
* * * * *
I do not know how long I stood staring blankly at that tragic break in the glass. I was as one divested of power of thought or movement; I merely hovered there transfixed, listening to the muttering and sighing of the multitude. Strangely enough, it did not occur to me to ask whether the damage could be repaired; it was as though I had known all the while that it was beyond remedy ... and for the moment my attitude was strangely detached, almost impersonal, as though I were the external witness of melancholy and inexorable things....
Yet it was a highly personal thought that startled me back to myself. Somehow, out, of some dim subconscious depth, there swept across my mind the vision of two bright, blue eyes--and, with that vision, acute fear seized me, and longing, and despair. That Atlantis should be in danger was fearful enough--but that Aelios should be imperiled was a thought almost too terrible for belief. And, accompanying that first wild stab of alarm for her, there came a sharp desire to see her, to be with her, to speak with her now; and, hopeful that she might be somewhere in this crowd, I began to search all about me, and then to thread my way at random through the dense ranks of people, scanning all the faces in my anxiety, until Gavison and Xanocles, following me with difficulty, began to ask irrelevantly whether the cracks were in the wall or in my head.
But no Aelios was to be seen; and at last I was forced reluctantly to abandon the quest. A dull and settled sadness had fallen over me; and, depressed for no reason that I would have acknowledged, I expressed my purpose of returning at once to Archeon, saying that I had already seen everything there was to be seen.
“But you haven’t seen a thing yet,” demurred Xanocles, who seemed determined that I should remain. “The submersible repair ships have not yet arrived--and when they come, they should be a sight worth watching.”
And he slipped his arm about mine, and drew me with him toward the wall, while I still protested that it would be better for me to return to Archeon.
No doubt in the end I should have had my way, had not another hubbub arisen to distract my attention. Once more the thousands of voices, were lifted in excitement; but this time a note of joy was manifest, and even seemed to predominate. At the same time, many hands pointed eagerly toward the illuminated circle in the glass; and from just behind me I heard a thankful murmur that sounded encouragingly like “The repair ships; They’re here! They’re here!”
Indeed, the repair ships had arrived. Even through the darkest sections of the wall, half a dozen faintly phosphorescent cigar-shaped forms were dimly apparent. They were all rather small, scarcely more than a third of the size of the X-111; but they seemed to be exceedingly agile, and were darting lithely back and forth like great fishes, or else were whirling or pirouetting or standing almost on end, as though stricken with giddiness and unable to control their movements.
“They’re having the devil’s own time!” muttered Xanocles, as he stood watching. “That’s the worst danger-spot in all the ocean, for the waters are constantly in a whirlpool because of the torrents emptied into the Salty River. But our men are brave, and somehow they’ll manage it.”
“But how can they set about it?” I inquired, unable to imagine any way of making repairs.
“It’s far from easy, but it can be done,” continued Xanocles. “One of the ships will have to press itself against the wall, so closely that there is no space between. Once all water has been excluded between the vessel and the wall, you understand, the pressure on the ocean side will keep the ship in place. And after the ship is in the proper position, a porthole will be opened, and through this the men will pour cement into the crack.”
Even as Xanocles explained, an anchor was dropped from one of the ships into the rocky sea bottom; and the vessel, having steadied itself, began to drift slowly toward the wall, so that at length its side was pressed tightly against the cracked glass. Then a little circle of light seemed suddenly to open on the ship’s side; and in that circle I could make out the rigid, determined faces of half a dozen men, while in their hands I could observe a variety of strange rods, tubes, and lantern-like contrivances.
Pessimistic as I had been before, I could not but feel a burst of hope when I watched the capable, courageous way in which these men set to work. And evidently the waiting throng had become hopeful too, for murmurs of admiration and approval were repeatedly on their lips; and as they saw tube after tube of cement poured skilfully into the cracks, they became almost mad with relief; and some began to clap their hands and caper childishly, and some sighed in thanksgiving, and some wept silently, for, after all, Atlantis seemed to have been saved!
Then, with the suddenness of a thunderbolt, all their hopes were dashed out. So swiftly did disaster descend that none had a chance to say how or whence it came--but it was disaster complete and irretrievable. Perhaps it was that the anchor-chain holding the submarine had snapped, or that some water had seeped in between the side of the vessel and the glass wall. At all events, the submarine was plainly visible one moment, the men pumping the viscid cement through long tubes to the very extremities of the crack; and the next moment there was only a dim shadow flitting away into a watery obscurity.
For an instant there was an awed silence. Then, as comprehension dawned upon the crowd, a convulsive shudder swept it through and through, and a howl of horror and dismay rang forth. Men glanced askance at their neighbors, blank terror gaping from their eyes; and all at once, as by a common impulse, hundreds pressed confusedly toward the wall, as though they might succor thus those unfortunates lost in the briny wastes. But many, conscious of the futility of all action, sadly remained in their places, and mutely bowed their heads--a tribute of respect for the drowned.
* * * * *
[Illustration: It was only by degrees that I made out its features, and saw what resembled an enormous piece of cracked crockery. From an amorphous central blur several feet across, great seams and fissures ran in different directions with long spidery arms ... one of the ships pressed itself against the wall, after which the port hole was opened and the men poured cement into the cracks.]
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