CHAPTER XX
A week later they crossed the path of Jupiter, but the giant wasinvisible, far away on the other side of the Sun. Redgrave laid hiscourse so as to avail himself to the utmost of the "pull" of the planetswithout going near enough to them to be compelled to exert too much ofthe priceless R. Force, which the indicators showed to be runningperilously low.
Between the orbits of Jupiter and Mars they made a most valuable economyby landing on Ceres, one of the largest of the asteroids, and travellingabout fifty million miles on her towards the orbit of the Earth withoutany expenditure of force whatever. They found that the tiny worldpossessed a breathable atmosphere and a fluid resembling water, butnearly as dense as mercury. A couple of flasks of it form the greatesttreasures of the British Museum and the National Museum at Washington.The vegetable world was represented by coarse grass, lichens, and dwarfshrubs, and the animal by different species of worms, lizards, flies,and small burrowing animals of the rodent type.
As the orbit of Ceres, like that of the other asteroids, is considerablyinclined to that of the Earth, the _Astronef_ rose from its surface whenthe plane of the Earth's revolution was reached, and the glitteringswarm of miniature planets plunged away into space beneath them.
"Where to now?" said Zaidie, as her husband came down on deck from theconning-tower.
"I am going to try to steer a middle course between the orbits ofMercury and Venus," he replied. "They just happen to be so placed nowthat we ought to be able to get the advantage of the pull of both ofthem as we pass, and that will save us a lot of power. The only thingI'm afraid of is the pull of the Sun, equal to goodness knows how manytimes the attraction of all the planets put together. You see, littlewoman, it's like this," he went on, taking out a pencil and going downon one knee on the deck: "Here's the _Astronef_; there's Venus; there'sMercury; there's the Sun; and there, away on the other side of him, isMother Earth. If we can turn that corner safely and without expendingtoo much power we ought to be all right."
"And if we can't, what will happen?"
"It will be a choice between morphine and cremation in the atmosphere ofthe Sun, dear, or rather gradually roasting as we fall towards it."
"Then, of course, it will be morphine," she said quite quietly, as sheturned away from his diagram and looked at the now fast-increasing discof the Sun. A well-balanced mind speedily becomes accustomed even to themost terrible perils, and Zaidie had now looked this one so long and sosteadily in the face that for her it had already become merely thechoice between two forms of death with just a chance of escape hidden inthe closed hand of Fate.
Thirty-six Earth-hours later the glorious golden disc of Venus lay broadand bright beneath them. Above was the blazing orb of the Sun, nearlyhalf as big again as it appears from the Earth, with Mercury, a roundblack spot, travelling slowly across it.
"My dear Bird-Folk!" said Zaidie, looking down at the lovely world belowthem. "If home wasn't home----"
"We can be back among them in a few hours with absolute safety,"interrupted her husband, catching at the suggestion. "I've told you thetruth about the bare possibility of getting back to the Earth. It's onlya chance at best, and even if we pass the Sun we may not have forceenough left to prevent the _Astronef_ from being smashed to dust orburnt up in the atmosphere. After all we might do worse----"
"What would you do if you were alone, Lenox?" she said, interrupting himin turn.
"I should take my chance and go on. After all home's home and worth astruggle. But you, dear----"
"I'm you, and so I take the same chances as you do. Besides, we're notperfect enough for a world where there isn't any sin. We should probablyget quite miserable there. No, home's home, as you say."
"Then home it is, dear!" he replied.
The resplendent hemisphere of the Love-Star sank swiftly down into thevault of Space, growing smaller and dimmer as the _Astronef_ spedtowards the little black spot on the face of the Sun, which to them waslike a buoy marking a place of utter and hopeless shipwreck in the Oceanof Immensity.
The chronometer, still set to Earth-time, had now begun to mark the lasthours of the _Astronef's_ voyage. She was not only travelling at a speedof which figures could give no comprehensible idea, but the Sun,Mercury, and the Earth were rushing towards her with a compoundvelocity, composed of the movement of the Solar System through Space andof the movement of the two planets round the Sun.
Murgatroyd was at his post in the engine-room. Redgrave and Zaidie hadgone into the conning-tower, perhaps for the last time. For good fortuneor evil, for life or death, they would see the end of the voyagetogether.
"How far yet, dear?" she said, as Venus began to slip away behind them,rising like a splendid moon in their wake.
"Only sixty million miles or so, a matter of a few hours, more orless--it all depends," he replied, without taking his eyes off thecompass.
"Sixty millions! Why I feel almost at home again."
"But we have to turn the corner of the street yet, dear, and after thatthere's a fall of more than twenty-five million miles on to the more orless kindly breast of Mother Earth."
"A fall! It does sound rather awful when you put it that way; but I amnot going to let you frighten me. I believe Mother Earth will receiveher wandering children quite as kindly as they deserve."
The moon-like disc of Venus grew swiftly smaller, and the black spot onthe face of the Sun larger and larger as the _Astronef_ rushed silentlyand imperceptibly, and yet with almost inconceivable velocity towardsdoom or fortune. Neither Zaidie nor Redgrave spoke again for nearlythree hours--hours which to them seemed to pass like so many minutes.Their eyes were fixed on the black disc of Mercury, which, as theyapproached it, expanded with magical rapidity till it completelyeclipsed the blazing orb behind it. Their thoughts were far away on thestill invisible Earth and all the splendid possibilities that it heldfor two young lives like theirs.
As the sunlight vanished they looked at each other in the goldenmoonlight of Venus, and Zaidie let her head rest for a moment on herhusband's shoulder. Then a swiftly broadening gleam of light shot outfrom behind the black circle of Mercury. The first crisis had come.Redgrave put out his hand to the signal-board and rang for full power.The planet seemed to swing round as the _Astronef_ rushed into theblaze. In a few minutes it passed through the phases from "new" to"full." Venus became eclipsed in turn as they swung between Mercury andthe Sun, and then Redgrave, after a rapid glance to either side, said:
"If we can only keep the two pulls balanced we shall do it. That willkeep us in a straight line, and our own momentum ought to carry us intothe Earth's attraction."
Zaidie did not reply. She was shading her eyes with her hand from thealmost intolerable brilliance of the Sun's rays, and looking straightahead to catch the first glimpse of the silver-grey orb. Her husbandread her thoughts and respected them. But a few minutes later hestartled her out of her dream of home by exclaiming:
"Good God, we're turning!"
"What do you say, dear? Turning what?"
"On our own centre. Look! I'm afraid only a miracle can save us now,darling."
She glanced to the left-hand side where he was pointing. The Sun, nolonger now a sun, but a vast ocean of flame filling nearly a third ofthe vault of Space, was sinking beneath them. On the right Mercury wasrising. Zaidie knew only too well what this meant. It meant that thekeel of the _Astronef_ was being dragged out of the straight line whichwould cut the Earth's orbit some forty million miles away. It meantthat, in spite of the exertion of the full power that the engines coulddevelop, they had begun to fall into the Sun.
Redgrave laid his hand on hers, and their eyes met. There was no needfor words. Perhaps speech just then would have been impossible. In thatmute glance each looked into the other's soul and was content. Then heleft the conning-tower, and Zaidie dropped on to her knees before theinstrument-table and laid her forehead upon her clasped hands.
Her husband went to the saloon, unlocked a little cupboard in the walland too
k out a blue bottle of corrugated glass labelled "Morphine,Poison." He took another empty bottle of white glass and measured fiftydrops into it. Then he went to the engine-room and said abruptly:
"Murgatroyd, I'm afraid it's all up with us. We're falling into theSun, and you know what that means. In a few hours the _Astronef_ will bered-hot. So it's roasting alive--or this. I recommend this."
"And what might that be, my Lord?" said the old engineer, looking at thebottle which his master held out towards him.
"That's morphine--poison. Fill that up with water, drink it, and in halfan hour you'll be dead without knowing it. Of course, you won't take ituntil there's absolutely no hope; but, granted that, you'll find this abetter death than roasting or baking alive." Then his voice changedsuddenly as he went on, "Of course, I need not say now, Murgatroyd, howdeeply I regret now that I asked you to come in the _Astronef_."
"My Lord, my people have served yours for seven hundred years, and,whether on Earth or among the stars, where you go it is my duty to goalso. But don't ask me to take the poison. It is not for me to say thata journey like this is tempting Providence, but, by my lights, if I amto die I shall die the death that Providence in its wisdom sends."
"I daresay you're right in one way, Murgatroyd, but it's no time toargue about beliefs now. There's the bottle. Do as you think right. Andnow, in case the miracle doesn't happen, goodbye."
"Goodbye, my Lord, if it is to be," replied the old Yorkshireman, takingthe hand which Redgrave held out to him. "I'll keep the power on to thelast, I suppose?"
"Yes, you may as well. If it doesn't keep us away from the Sun it won'tbe much use to us in two or three hours."
He left the engine-room and went back to the conning-tower. Zaidie wasstill on her knees. Beneath and around them the awful gulf of flame wasbroadening and deepening. Mercury was rising higher and growing smaller.He put the bottle down on the table and waited. Then Zaidie looked up.Her eyes were clear, and her face was perfectly calm. She rose and puther arm through his, and said:
"Well, is there any hope, dear? There can't be now, can there? Is thatthe morphine?"
"Yes," he replied, slipping his arm beneath hers and round her waist."I'm afraid there's not much chance now, little woman. We're using upthe last of the power, and you see----"
As he said this he looked at the thermometer. The mercury had risen from65 degrees Fahrenheit, the normal temperature of the interior of the_Astronef_, to 93 degrees, and during the half-minute that he watched itrose another degree. There was no mistaking such a warning as that. Hehad brought two little liqueur glasses in his pocket from the saloon. Hedivided the morphine between them, and filled them up with water.
"Not until the last moment, dear," said Zaidie, as he set one of thembefore her. "We have no right to do it until then."
"Very well. When the mercury reaches a hundred and fifty. After that itwill go up ten and fifteen degrees at a jump, and we----"
"Yes, at a hundred and fifty," she replied, cutting short a speech shedared not hear the end of. "I understand. It will be impossible to hopeany more."
Now, side by side, they stood and watched the thermometer.
Ninety-five--ninety-eight--a hundred and three--a hundred andten--eighteen--twenty-four--thirty-two--forty-one.
The silent minutes passed, and with each the silver thread--for them thethread of life--grew, with strange contradiction, longer and longer, andwith every minute it grew more quickly.
A hundred and forty-six.
With his right arm Redgrave drew Zaidie still closer to him. He put outhis left hand and took up the little glass. She did the same.
"Goodbye, dear, till we have slept and wake again!"
"Goodbye, darling, God grant that we may!" But the agony of that lastfarewell was more than Zaidie could bear. She looked away at the littleglass in her hand, a hand which even now did not tremble. Then sheraised her eyes again to take one last look at the glory of the stars,and at the Fate Incarnate in Flame which lay beneath them. Then, even asthe end of the last minute came, a cry broke through her white,half-parted lips:
"The Earth, the Earth--thank God, the Earth!"
With the hand that held the draught of Lethe--which in another momentshe would have swallowed--she caught at her husband's hand, pulled theglass out of it, and then with a little sigh she dropped senseless onthe floor of the conning-tower. Redgrave looked for a moment in thedirection that her eyes had taken. A pale, silver-grey crescent, with alittle white spot near it, was rising out of the blackness beyond theedge of the solar ocean of flame. Home was in sight at last, but wouldthey reach it--and how?
He picked her up and carried her to their room and laid her on the bed.Then he went to the medicine chest again, this time for a very differentpurpose.
An hour later, they were on the upper deck with their telescopes turnedon to the rapidly growing crescent of the Home-World, which, in itseternal march through Space, had come into the line of direct attractionjust in time to turn the scale in which the lives of the Space-voyagerswere trembling. The higher it rose, the bigger and broader and brighterit grew, and, at last, Zaidie--forgetting in her transport of joy allthe perils that were yet to come--sprang to her feet and clapped herhands, and cried:
"There's America!"
Then she dropped back into her long deck-chair and began a good, hearty,healthy cry.
EPILOGUE
There is little now to be told that all the world does not already knowas well as it knows the circumstances of Lord and Lady Redgrave'sdeparture from the Earth, at the beginning of that marvellous voyage,that desperate plunge into the unknown immensities of Space which beganso happily, and yet with so many grave misgivings in the hearts of theirfriends, and which, after passing many perils, the adventurous voyagersfinished even more happily than they had begun.
As I said at the beginning of this narrative the sole purpose of writingit has been to place before the reading public an account of theadventures experienced by Lord Redgrave and his beautiful Countess fromthe time of their departure from the Earth to the hour of their returnto it. Therefore there is no need to re-tell a tale already told, andone that has been read and re-read a thousand times. Every one who hasread his or her newspaper from Chamskatska to Cape Horn, and from Alaskato South Australia, knows how the Commander of the _Astronef_ so nursedthe remains which were left to him of the R. Force after overcoming theattraction of the Sun, that he was able to steer an oblique coursebetween the Moon and the Earth, and to counteract what Zaidie called theall too-loving attraction of the Mother Planet, and, after sixty hoursof agonising suspense, at last re-entered their native atmosphere.
The expenditure of the last few units of the R. Force enabled them tojust clear the summits of the Bolivian Andes, to cross the foothills andwestern slopes of Peru, and finally to let the _Astronef_ drop quietlyon to the bosom of the broad Pacific about twenty miles westward of thePort of Mollendo.
All this time thousands of anxious eyes had been peering throughtelescopes every night in quest of the wanderers who must now bereturning if ever they were to return, and a reward of ten thousanddollars, offered conjointly by the British and United States Governmentsfor the first authentic tidings of the _Astronef_, was won by a smartyoung Californian, who was Assistant Astronomer at the HarvardUniversity Observatory at Arequipa.
One night when he was on duty watching a lunar occultation, he sawsomething sweep across the disc of the full moon just as the captain andofficers of the _St. Louis_ had seen that same something sweep acrossthe disc of the rising sun. What else could it be if not the _Astronef_?He rang for another assistant to go on with the occultation, and wireddown to the coast requesting the British Consul at Mollendo to look outfor an arrival from the skies.
Three hours later the gleam of an electric searchlight flickered downover the huge black cone of the Misti, and by dawn the next morning oneof Her Majesty's cruisers--most appropriately named _Astraea_--attachedto the Pacific Squadron then _en route_ from Lima to Valpa
raiso, steamedout westward from Mollendo and found the long, shining hull of the_Astronef_ waiting quietly on the unrippled rollers of the Pacific, andLord and Lady Redgrave having breakfast in the deck-chamber.
Compliments and congratulations having been duly exchanged, she wastaken in tow by the cruiser, and so reached Valparaiso. Here she lay fora few days while the wires of the world were being kept hot withtelegraphic accounts of her return to Earth, and while her Commander,with the assistance of the officers of the National Laboratory, wasreplenishing his stock of the R. Fluid from the chemicals which they hadplaced at his disposal.
It would, of course, have been quite possible for him and Zaidie to havetaken steamer northward to Panama, crossed the Isthmus, and returned toNew York and Washington _via_ Jamaica. The British Admiral even offeredto place his fastest cruiser at their disposal for a run to SanFrancisco, whence the Overland Limited would have landed them in NewYork in four days and a half, but Zaidie vetoed this as quickly as shehad done the other proposition. If she had her way the _Astronef_ shouldgo back to Washington as she had left it, by means of her own motiveforce, and so, of course, it came to pass.
Even Murgatroyd's grim and homely features seemed irradiated by a glowof what he afterwards thought unholy pride when he once more stood byhis levers and heard the familiar signal coming from the conning-tower.
"A tenth."
And then--"Stand by steering-gear."
The next moment there was another tinkle in the engine-room.
Redgrave, standing with Zaidie in the conning-tower, moved thepower-wheel through ten degrees, and then to the amazement of tens ofthousands of spectators, the hull of the _Astronef_ rose perpendicularlyfrom the waters of the Bay. The British Squadron and a detachment of theChilian fleet thundered out a salute which was answered a few momentslater by the shore batteries, Redgrave went down into the deck-chamberand fired twenty-one shots from one of the Maxim-Nordenfelts--the samewith which he had mown down the crowds of Martians in the square oftheir great city a hundred and thirty million miles away, and while hewas doing this Zaidie in the conning-tower ran the White Ensign up tothe top of the flagstaff.
Then the glass doors were closed again, the propellers began to revolveat their utmost speed, and the Space-Navigator with one tremendous leapcleared the double chain of the Andes and vanished to thenorth-eastward.
To describe the reception of Lord and Lady Redgrave when the _Astronef_dropped a few hours later, on to the very spot in front of the steps ofthe Capitol at Washington from which she had risen just four monthsbefore, would only be to repeat what has already been told in the Pressof the world, and especially of the United States, with a far moreluxuriant wealth of detail than could possibly be emulated here. Sufficeit to say that the first human form that Zaidie embraced after her longwanderings was that of Mrs. Van Stuyler, whom the President of theUnited States had escorted to the gangway.
The most marvellous of human adventures become commonplace byrepetition, and Mrs. Van Stuyler had already spent nearly a fortnightdevouring every item, whether of fact or fancy, with which the AmericanPress had embroidered the adventures of the _Astronef_ and her crew. Andso when the first embracings and emotions were over, all she could findto say was:
"Well, Zaidie dear, and how did you enjoy it, after all?"
"It was just gorgeous, Mrs. Van, and if there was a more gorgeous wordthan that in the American language I'd use it," replied Zaidie, withanother hug, "Why didn't you come? You'd have been--well no, perhaps I'dbetter not say what you would have been. But just think of it, or tryto--A honeymoon trip of over two thousand million miles, andback--safe--thank God!"
As she said this, Zaidie threw her arm over Mrs. Van Stuyler's shoulder,and drew her away towards the forward end of the deck-chamber. At thesame moment the President's hand met Lord Redgrave's in a long, stronggrip. They didn't say anything just then. Men seldom do under suchcircumstances.
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