CHAPTER V
Into the Moon Pool
"Goodwin," Throckmartin went on at last, "I can describe him only as athing of living light. He radiated light; was filled with light;overflowed with it. A shining cloud whirled through and around him inradiant swirls, shimmering tentacles, luminescent, coruscatingspirals.
"His face shone with a rapture too great to be borne by living man,and was shadowed with insuperable misery. It was as though it had beenremoulded by the hand of God and the hand of Satan, working togetherand in harmony. You have seen that seal upon my own. But you havenever seen it in the degree that Stanton bore it. The eyes were wideopen and fixed, as though upon some inward vision of hell and heaven!
"The light that filled and surrounded him had a nucleus, acore--something shiftingly human shaped--that dissolved and changed,gathered itself, whirled through and beyond him and back again. And asits shining nucleus passed through him Stanton's whole body pulsedradiance. As the luminescence moved, there moved above it, still andserene always, seven tiny globes of seven colors, like seven littlemoons.
"Then swiftly Stanton was lifted--levitated--up the unscalable walland to its top. The glow faded from the moonlight, the tinkling musicgrew fainter. I tried again to move. The tears were running down nowfrom my rigid lids and they brought relief to my tortured eyes.
"I have said my gaze was fixed. It was. But from the side,peripherally, it took in a part of the far wall of the outerenclosure. Ages seemed to pass and a radiance stole along it. Soondrifted into sight the figure that was Stanton. Far away he was--onthe gigantic wall. But still I could see the shining spirals whirlingjubilantly around and through him; felt rather than saw his trancedface beneath the seven moons. A swirl of crystal notes, and he hadpassed. And all the time, as though from some opened well of light,the courtyard gleamed and sent out silver fires that dimmed themoonrays, yet seemed strangely to be a part of them.
"At last the moon neared the horizon. There came a louder burst ofsound; the second, and last, cry of Stanton, like an echo of hisfirst! Again the soft sighing from the inner terrace. Then--uttersilence!
"The light faded; the moon was setting and with a rush life and powerto move returned to me. I made a leap for the steps, rushed up them,through the gateway and straight to the grey rock. It was closed--as Iknew it would be. But did I dream it or did I hear, echoing through itas though from vast distances a triumphant shouting?
"I ran back to Edith. At my touch she wakened; looked at mewanderingly; raised herself on a hand.
"'Dave!' she said, 'I slept--after all.' She saw the despair on myface and leaped to her feet. 'Dave!' she cried. 'What is it? Where'sCharles?'
"I lighted a fire before I spoke. Then I told her. And for thebalance of that night we sat before the flames, arms around eachother--like two frightened children."
Abruptly Throckmartin held his hands out to me appealingly.
"Walter, old friend!" he cried. "Don't look at me as though I weremad. It's truth, absolute truth. Wait--" I comforted him as well as Icould. After a little time he took up his story.
"Never," he said, "did man welcome the sun as we did that morning. Asoon as it had risen we went back to the courtyard. The walls whereonI had seen Stanton were black and silent. The terraces were as theyhad been. The grey slab was in its place. In the shallow hollow at itsbase was--nothing. Nothing--nothing was there anywhere on the isletof Stanton--not a trace.
"What were we to do? Precisely the same arguments that had kept usthere the night before held good now--and doubly good. We could notabandon these two; could not go as long as there was the faintest hopeof finding them--and yet for love of each other how could we remain? Iloved my wife,--how much I never knew until that day; and she loved meas deeply.
"'It takes only one each night,' she pleaded. 'Beloved, let it takeme.'
"I wept, Walter. We both wept.
"'We will meet it together,' she said. And it was thus at last thatwe arranged it."
"That took great courage indeed, Throckmartin," I interrupted. Helooked at me eagerly.
"You do believe then?" he exclaimed.
"I believe," I said. He pressed my hand with a grip that nearlycrushed it.
"Now," he told me. "I do not fear. If I--fail, you will follow withhelp?"
I promised.
"We talked it over carefully," he went on, "bringing to bear all ourpower of analysis and habit of calm, scientific thought. We consideredminutely the time element in the phenomena. Although the deep chantingbegan at the very moment of moonrise, fully five minutes had passedbetween its full lifting and the strange sighing sound from the innerterrace. I went back in memory over the happenings of the nightbefore. At least ten minutes had intervened between the firstheralding sigh and the intensification of the moonlight in thecourtyard. And this glow grew for at least ten minutes more before thefirst burst of the crystal notes. Indeed, more than half an hour musthave elapsed, I calculated, between the moment the moon showed abovethe horizon and the first delicate onslaught of the tinklings.
"'Edith!' I cried. 'I think I have it! The grey rock opens fiveminutes after upon the moonrise. But whoever or whatever it is thatcomes through it must wait until the moon has risen higher, or else itmust come from a distance. The thing to do is not to wait for it, butto surprise it before it passes out the door. We will go into theinner court early. You will take your rifle and pistol and hideyourself where you can command the opening--if the slab does open. Theinstant it opens I will enter. It's our best chance, Edith. I thinkit's our only one.'
"My wife demurred strongly. She wanted to go with me. But I convincedher that it was better for her to stand guard without, prepared tohelp me if I were forced again into the open by what lay behind therock.
"At the half-hour before moonrise we went into the inner court. Itook my place at the side of the grey rock. Edith crouched behind abroken pillar twenty feet away; slipped her rifle-barrel over it sothat it would cover the opening.
"The minutes crept by. The darkness lessened and through the breachesof the terrace I watched the far sky softly lighten. With the firstpale flush the silence of the place intensified. It deepened; becameunbearably--expectant. The moon rose, showed the quarter, the half,then swam up into full sight like a great bubble.
"Its rays fell upon the wall before me and suddenly upon theconvexities I have described seven little circles of light sprang out.They gleamed, glimmered, grew brighter--shone. The gigantic slabbefore me glowed with them, silver wavelets of phosphorescence pulsedover its surface and then--it turned as though on a pivot, sighingsoftly as it moved!
"With a word to Edith I flung myself through the opening. A tunnelstretched before me. It glowed with the same faint silvery radiance.Down it I raced. The passage turned abruptly, passed parallel to thewalls of the outer courtyard and then once more led downward.
"The passage ended. Before me was a high vaulted arch. It seemed toopen into space; a space filled with lambent, coruscating,many-coloured mist whose brightness grew even as I watched. I passedthrough the arch and stopped in sheer awe!
"In front of me was a pool. It was circular, perhaps twenty feetwide. Around it ran a low, softly curved lip of glimmering silverystone. Its water was palest blue. The pool with its silvery rim waslike a great blue eye staring upward.
"Upon it streamed seven shafts of radiance. They poured down upon theblue eye like cylindrical torrents; they were like shining pillars oflight rising from a sapphire floor.
"One was the tender pink of the pearl; one of the aurora's green; athird a deathly white; the fourth the blue in mother-of-pearl; ashimmering column of pale amber; a beam of amethyst; a shaft of moltensilver. Such are the colours of the seven lights that stream upon theMoon Pool. I drew closer, awestricken. The shafts did not illumine thedepths. They played upon the surface and seemed there to diffuse, tomelt into it. The Pool drank them?
"Through the water tiny gleams of phosphorescence began to dart,sparkles and cor
uscations of pale incandescence. And far, far below Isensed a movement, a shifting glow as of a radiant body slowly rising.
"I looked upward, following the radiant pillars to their source. Farabove were seven shining globes, and it was from these that the rayspoured. Even as I watched their brightness grew. They were like sevenmoons set high in some caverned heaven. Slowly their splendourincreased, and with it the splendour of the seven beams streaming fromthem.
"I tore my gaze away and stared at the Pool. It had grown milky,opalescent. The rays gushing into it seemed to be filling it; it wasalive with sparklings, scintillations, glimmerings. And theluminescence I had seen rising from its depths was larger, nearer!
"A swirl of mist floated up from its surface. It drifted within theembrace of the rosy beam and hung there for a moment. The beam seemedto embrace it, sending through it little shining corpuscles, tiny rosyspiralings. The mist absorbed the rays, was strengthened by them,gained substance. Another swirl sprang into the amber shaft, clung andfed there, moved swiftly toward the first and mingled with it. And nowother swirls arose, here and there, too fast to be counted; hungpoised in the embrace of the light streams; flashed and pulsed intoeach other.
"Thicker and thicker still they arose until over the surface of thePool was a pulsating pillar of opalescent mist steadily growingstronger; drawing within it life from the seven beams falling upon it;drawing to it from below the darting, incandescent atoms of the Pool.Into its centre was passing the luminescence rising from the fardepths. And the pillar glowed, throbbed--began to send out questingswirls and tendrils--
"There forming before me was That which had walked with Stanton, whichhad taken Thora--the thing I had come to find!
"My brain sprang into action. My hand threw up the pistol and I firedshot after shot into the shining core.
"As I fired, it swayed and shook; gathered again. I slipped a secondclip into the automatic and another idea coming to me took careful aimat one of the globes in the roof. From thence I knew came the forcethat shaped this Dweller in the Pool--from the pouring rays came itsstrength. If I could destroy them I could check its forming. I firedagain and again. If I hit the globes I did no damage. The little motesin their beams danced with the motes in the mist, troubled. That wasall.
"But up from the Pool like little bells, like tiny bursting bubbles ofglass, swarmed the tinkling sounds--their pitch higher, all theirsweetness lost, angry.
"And out from the Inexplicable swept a shining spiral.
"It caught me above the heart; wrapped itself around me. There rushedthrough me a mingled ecstasy and horror. Every atom of me quiveredwith delight and shrank with despair. There was nothing loathsome init. But it was as though the icy soul of evil and the fiery soul ofgood had stepped together within me. The pistol dropped from my hand.
"So I stood while the Pool gleamed and sparkled; the streams of lightgrew more intense and the radiant Thing that held me gleamed andstrengthened. Its shining core had shape--but a shape that my eyes andbrain could not define. It was as though a being of another sphereshould assume what it might of human semblance, but was not able toconceal that what human eyes saw was but a part of it. It was neitherman nor woman; it was unearthly and androgynous. Even as I found itshuman semblance it changed. And still the mingled rapture and terrorheld me. Only in a little corner of my brain dwelt somethinguntouched; something that held itself apart and watched. Was it thesoul? I have never believed--and yet--
"Over the head of the misty body there sprang suddenly out sevenlittle lights. Each was the colour of the beam beneath which itrested. I knew now that the Dweller was--complete!
"I heard a scream. It was Edith's voice. It came to me that she hadheard the shots and followed me. I felt every faculty concentrate intoa mighty effort. I wrenched myself free from the gripping tentacle andit swept back. I turned to catch Edith, and as I did so slipped--fell.
"The radiant shape above the Pool leaped swiftly--and straight into itraced Edith, arms outstretched to shield me from it! God!
"She threw herself squarely within its splendour," he whispered. "Itwrapped its shining self around her. The crystal tinklings burst forthjubilantly. The light filled her, ran through and around her as it hadwith Stanton; and dropped down upon her face--the look!
"But her rush had taken her to the very verge of the Moon Pool. Shetottered; she fell--with the radiance still holding her, stillswirling and winding around and through her--into the Moon Pool! Shesank, and with her went--the Dweller!
"I dragged myself to the brink. Far down was a shining, many-colourednebulous cloud descending; out of it peered Edith's face,disappearing; her eyes stared up at me--and she vanished!
"'Edith!' I cried again. 'Edith, come back to me!'
"And then a darkness fell upon me. I remember running back throughthe shimmering corridors and out into the courtyard. Reason had leftme. When it returned I was far out at sea in our boat wholly estrangedfrom civilization. A day later I was picked up by the schooner inwhich I came to Port Moresby.
"I have formed a plan; you must hear it, Goodwin--" He fell upon hisberth. I bent over him. Exhaustion and the relief of telling his storyhad been too much for him. He slept like the dead.
All that night I watched over him. When dawn broke I went to my roomto get a little sleep myself. But my slumber was haunted.
The next day the storm was unabated. Throckmartin came to me atlunch. He had regained much of his old alertness.
"Come to my cabin," he said. There, he stripped his shirt from him."Something is happening," he said. "The mark is smaller." It was as hesaid.
"I'm escaping," he whispered jubilantly, "Just let me get to Melbournesafely, and then we'll see who'll win! For, Walter, I'm not at allsure that Edith is dead--as we know death--nor that the others are.There is something outside experience there--some great mystery."
And all that day he talked to me of his plans.
"There's a natural explanation, of course," he said. "My theory isthat the moon rock is of some composition sensitive to the action ofmoon rays; somewhat as the metal selenium is to sun rays. The littlecircles over the top are, without doubt, its operating agency. Whenthe light strikes them they release the mechanism that opens the slab,just as you can open doors with sun or electric light by an ingeniousarrangement of selenium-cells. Apparently it takes the strength of thefull moon both to do this and to summon the Dweller in the Pool. Wewill first try a concentration of the rays of the waning moon uponthese circles to see whether that will open the rock. If it does wewill be able to investigate the Pool without interruptionfrom--from--what emanates.
"Look, here on the chart are their locations. I have made this induplicate for you in the event--of something happening--to me. And ifI lose--you'll come after us, Goodwin, with help--won't you?"
And again I promised.
A little later he complained of increasing sleepiness.
"But it's just weariness," he said. "Not at all like that otherdrowsiness. It's an hour till moonrise still," he yawned at last."Wake me up a good fifteen minutes before."
He lay upon the berth. I sat thinking. I came to myself with aguilty start. I had completely lost myself in my deep preoccupation.What time was it? I looked at my watch and jumped to the port-hole. Itwas full moonlight; the orb had been up for fully half an hour. Istrode over to Throckmartin and shook him by the shoulder.
"Up, quick, man!" I cried. He rose sleepily. His shirt fell open atthe neck and I looked, in amazement, at the white band around hischest. Even under the electric light it shone softly, as though littleflecks of light were in it.
Throckmartin seemed only half-awake. He looked down at his breast,saw the glowing cincture, and smiled.
"Yes," he said drowsily, "it's coming--to take me back to Edith!Well, I'm glad."
"Throckmartin!" I cried. "Wake up! Fight!"
"Fight!" he said. "No use; come after us!"
He went to the port and sleepily drew aside the curtain. The moon
traced a broad path of light straight to the ship. Under its rays theband around his chest gleamed brighter and brighter; shot forth littlerays; seemed to writhe.
The lights went out in the cabin; evidently also throughout the ship,for I heard shoutings above.
Throckmartin still stood at the open port. Over his shoulder I saw agleaming pillar racing along the moon path toward us. Through thewindow cascaded a blinding radiance. It gathered Throckmartin to it,clothed him in a robe of living opalescence. Light pulsed through andfrom him. The cabin filled with murmurings--
A wave of weakness swept over me, buried me in blackness. Whenconsciousness came back, the lights were again burning brightly.
But of Throckmartin there was no trace!