BUT WHO IS KING?
Myles Cabot, Lilla, Toron, Nan-nan and Wotsn watched the marching Formians for a moment in amazement from the palace terrace. Then, “They are unarmed!” Nan-nan exclaimed, with relief.
True. Not a single one of the black ant men carried a weapon. And then there appeared in their wake rank upon rank of armed Cupians, the army of liberation.
“Nocoupat all, thank God,” said Cabot, “but merely prisoners of war!”
Lilla, too, sighed with relief.
“And now that that is over,” she said, “Iwillbe heard on the subject of who is king. Our baby is safe and sound, disguised as a peasant child, in the care of my old nurse in the village of Pronth in the Okarze Mountains.”
“But, darling, I buried him myself at Lake Luno,” Cabot remonstrated, still unconvinced.
Lilla explained: “That baby, whom Yuri slew, and whom you buried, was merely a borrowed orphan which we substituted for little Kew immediately after his birth, fearing exactly what eventually did happen, I grew to love the little substitute greatly, and his death grieved me almost as much as though he had been really mine. But our own baby still lives, and is King of Cupia!”
A warm thrill flooded through Myles Cabot’s body. He was still a father. The little hands would yet clasp his. The little toddler would yet walk by his side. All was well with Cupia, and his loved ones were safe.
Prince Toron stood the blow nobly, though his boyish face went a bit haggard.
“I seem to be out of a job,” he remarked grimly. “Today is not our family’s lucky day. First my brother loses his throne, and then in rapid succession I lose the same throne. Let us hope, however, that this run of bad luck does not extend to my infant cousin.”
And he strode over and patted Lilla warmly on the cheek. It was an act of congratulation and renunciation.
“Toron, you are a true sport,” said Cabot, “and some day I hope to repay you for your loyalty.”
Gone was every trace of his long resentment toward the young prince.
Lilla continued her explanation: “To make sure of little Kew’s identification, in case anything went wrong with me, I took several prints of the six little fingers of his right hand, and inscribed each one with the words: ‘The fingerprint of the true king.’ One copy I sewed into his little toga, one I secreted at Luno Castle, and one I took with me.”
“That word ‘pbrs’—truth—well illustrates, in the present instance, Poblath’s proverb: ‘Truth has an unpleasant sound,’” Toron dryly remarked, “for it will certainly have a very unpleasant sound to my brother Yuri when he learns that the true king still lives. There always was some doubt as to the validity of my own claim to the throne, but there can be no question as to the claim of little Kew, so this makes the situation much worse for Yuri.”
Just at this moment Hah Babbuh and the other generals of the army of liberation burst in upon the scene.
“We have been looking for you everywhere, your majesty,” exclaimed Hah.
“Don’t majesty me any more,” Toron replied with a sigh and a smile, “for little Kew still lives. All hail the true King of Cupia!”
And every one present held his right hand aloft as a sign of fealty. Then warm were the greetings between Myles Cabot and his former associates.
When these were finished, “The war must go on,” Hah asserted. “I have made Poblath the commandant of this city. He is already establishing the police, and arranging for the quartering of our troops. All the prisoners have been placed in the stadium. The enemy have fallen back to the line of the old pale, where they are entrenching. Our fliers have passed over them and are now attacking the enemy air base at Wautoosa. What do you propose, excellency?”
“I propose that we dine,” Cabot wearily replied. Once more he must take the field as winko of the troops of a nation. And that being so, the question of prime importance was: “When do we eat?”
So the whole party adjourned to the banquet hall of the palace, where a rough fare, somewhat hastily gathered, was served. And there, after the meal, was held a conference of war. There Portheris, the leader of the whistling bees, joined them.
“First,” Myles Cabot asserted from the head of the table, “let me lay down the principle that the mistake of the last war must not be repeated. We must ask no quarter, and give none. We must go on until there is not a single Formian left living on the face of all Poros. For there is no room on any given planet for more than one race of intelligent beings. What do you say?”
Hah Babbuh, his chief of staff, answered: “I agree with you. And I believe that the rabble have learned their lesson. But it all depends on Count Kamel. It was he, more than anyone else, who blocked the successful completion of the last war.”
“Make him a sarkar, and he’ll stand for anything,” Prince Toron dryly observed. “You remember how he gave up his agitation for a two-hour day, when you made him minister of public works. And he has been fighting loyally in our ranks ever since this present war started.”
A laugh went up from all those present.
“No quarter is all very well,” the Princess Lilla interjected from the other end of the table, “but what about the prisoners in the stadium? You can’t shoot them down in cold blood, can you?”
“We might invoke theley fuego,” replied her husband.
“What is that?”
“That is an old Spanish custom in vogue on my own planet,” he explained. “Political prisoners, whose continued existence might prove embarrassing, are let loose, and then are pursued and shot for ‘attempting to escape.’”
“A dirty trick!” Toron objected.
“Much like that which Satan, the Formian, played on you in Wautoosa years ago,” Lilla added.
Cabot grimaced.
“And,” Hah Babbuh added, with a smile at his chief’s discomfiture, “the situation is complicated by the fact that our old ant friend, Doggo, is one of the prisoners in the stadium.”
Cabot grimaced again.
“I seem to be cornered,” he observed.
“And yet,” said Nan-nan, the priest, “the death of all these black pests is the price of peace on Poros.”
Just then a messenger entered the room and saluted.
“Sire,” said he, addressing Hah Babbuh, “the prisoners in the stadium have obtained arms and are holding it against our troops.”
“Thank the Great Builder,” Nan-nan reverently exclaimed, “for He has solved our problem for us!”
“How did they get the arms?” Cabot asked.
“Airplanes from the south,” the messenger answered, “which took advantage of the fact that our fleet is busy attacking Wautoosa.”
“We must bomb them out,” Toron suggested.
Hah Babbuh gave orders accordingly, and the messenger withdrew.
The conference resumed its session.
Myles Cabot continued: “As I was saying, there is not room on any given planet for more than one race of intelligent beings.”
A boom in the distance, then—
Bang! A crash shook the palace. A veritable shower of bits of stone and mortar spattered among the diners. The entire company sprang to their feet, overturning the chairs in their haste. The scene instantly became one of wild confusion, every one trying to demonstrate his calmness by taking command and giving orders to every one else. Another boom in the distance.
Bang! A shell broke within the banquet hall itself. Buh Tedn and two of the attendants writhed upon the floor. Several others sustained minor wounds.
Cabot leaped upon the table.
“Ten-shun!” he snapped out.
Every one halted.
“Poblath,” he directed, “take the princess and Bthuh to the cellars! Here, you orderlies, carry the wounded below. Dr. Emsul, accompany them! Hah and the rest of you, to the plaza to take command of your forces! I go to reconnoiter.”
Boom! Bang! Another shell burst somewhere else near by in the palace. But order had been brought out of chaos. Cabot, the radio man, vaulted onto the back of Portheris, the whistling bee, adjusted his radio-set to the latter’s wave-length, and sailed out into the air through one of the broad windows of the banquet hall: Straight up shot the Hymernian, as his rider scanned the surrounding landscape.
A puff of smoke to the south. Boom! The smoke and the sound came unmistakably from the stadium. Bang! A shell exploded on the upper terraces of the palace behind them.
Cupian fliers now appeared from the southward, headed for the stadium, and soon the thud of bursting bombs mingled with the booming of the stadium gun and the detonations of its projectiles.
Cabot had seen enough. He signaled to his mount and they settled down upon the plaza, where the earthman joined Hah Babbuh and his staff.
“Where is the artillery fire coming from?” the Babbuh anxiously inquired.
“From the besieged Formians in the stadium,” his chief replied, “the airships which brought them their rifles, undoubtedly also brought them a field gun.”
“Then we must radio to Wautoosa for more bombing planes,” said Hah, and dispatched one of his attendants with orders to that effect.
Bang! A shell burst upon the plaza itself.
“They have changed target,” Myles remarked. “We were none too early. If Poblath were here, he would undoubtedly say something about ‘Out of the frying pan, into the fire.’”
But no more shells fell, and soon one of the fliers returned with the news that a well-placed bomb had put the Formian gun out of commission.
“I hate to wreck our beautiful stadium with any more bombs,” said Cabot. “Can’t we take the place by assault, or land an attacking force within the arena?”
“I doubt it,” Hah replied, “for the ant men have probably taken cover beneath the stands, whence they could repel an attack from either direction.”
Just then an orderly arrived with a message. One of the jailers, who had been in charge of the prisoners, had escaped when they overthrew the guard and seized the stadium. He reported that before his own escape Prince Yuri had sneaked into the stadium from wherever he had been in hiding in the city, and had taken command of the insurgent Formians.
“We must capture him alive!” Cabot shouted. “The bombing must stop!”
Here at last was an excuse to save his beloved stadium. Hah gave orders to recall the planes, and soon they could be seen proceeding to their base. A special force was then organized for the assault.
But, as they were assembling, three Formian air ships arose from within the stadium and headed due south at full speed. The meaning was only too evident; with the withdrawal of the Cupian bombers there had been nothing to prevent the renegade prince and the survivors of his black allies from making their escape in the planes which had originally brought them their arms, and which must have been kept under cover during the bombing of the stadium. Hurried orders were given for pursuit; but, as the Cupian fliers returned from their base and disappeared over the southern horizon, the silver sky began to darken in the east and to turn red in the west. Another day was at an end. Prince Yuri was still at large.
As the evening fell, the assaulting column was launched against the stadium. But they met with no resistance. As Poblath would say, the pterodactyl had flown. The stadium was empty of all save the corpses of the slain and the remains of what once had been a one-hundredth-of-a-parastad field gun, i.e., just about a seventy-five.
So the council of war resumed its sessions in the palace, where the débris had been removed by the attendants. The ladies were safe. One of the wounded had died, but Buh Tedn and the other were reported to be resting comfortably.
The conference proceeded with its plans for the war. When all the military dispositions had been completed, Toron suggested that baby Kew ought to be crowned at once, in order to consolidate the popular support behind the throne.
So early next morning Lilla was dispatched to the north by plane, amply convoyed, to bring back the little monarch. Not without qualms did Cabot let her go, but something had to be risked in times like these, and it hardly seemed possible that one who had been through so many tribulations could be subjected to any further danger.
Then for several days every one marked time, while Kuana was cleared of skulking Formians, and the army was provisioned and equipped. Brief furloughs were given all who wished to visit their families and to reestablish their homes. Kamel, as predicted, was overwhelmed by his sarkarship, and made stirring patriotic addresses throughout the city. The Popular Assembly, which Yuri had dissolved, was reassembled; and, under the leadership of Kamel and Toron, both parties joined in unanimously voting for war to the hilt.
The Cupian air fleet finally captured Wautoosa, thus giving them an oasis in the midst of the enemy, who still stubbornly continued to hold the line of the old pale.
Then Lilla returned with baby Kew. Such a reunion as there was, when Myles Cabot clasped to his breast his wife and his infant son!
The little boy, whom Cabot had never seen, was all that the proud father could have hoped. He had not dared to ask whether the little one had inherited any of his own earth-born peculiarities. He had feared that such might be the case and might disincline the Cupians to accept the baby as their king; for, much as the country admired and respected, yea, even loved, Myles Cabot, they still regarded him as not one of them; a hero, even a demi-god perhaps, yet still not quite human.
But Cabot’s fears proved groundless. Baby Kew was earless, and had antennae, vestigial wings, twelve fingers, and twelve toes.
“I shall have to invent another line for ‘This little pig went to market,’” Myles remarked, and then explained to Lilla that rite of Anglo Saxon babyhood.
The infant king surveyed his newly-produced father solemnly out of the big blue eyes beneath his long yellow lashes; then shook his curly golden head, and smiled, and holding out one tiny hand, encircled Myles’ forefinger with all six fingers.
It was the thrill of a lifetime, never before experienced, and never to be repeated; the first response of one’s baby son!
On the day after the arrival, Kew XIII, in his mother’s arms, was crowned King of all Poros. He behaved very badly at the ceremony, screaming with rage and dashing to the ground a toy ant man which had been given him to pacify him. But, as this was taken as a good omen by the populace, no harm was done.
Among the guests of honor at the coronation were Portheris the Hymernian king of the bees, Prince Toron, Poblath the mango, Hah Babbuh, Nan-nan, and Glamp-glamp.
Owva, the holy father sent his blessing from the Caves of Kar, but declined to attend.
“The prophecy is not yet fulfilled,” he declared, “for ant men still live.”
In honor of the occasion, Poblath composed a new proverb: “Thrones have no upholstery,” which caught the popular fancy.
Everywhere throughout Kuana fluttered the red pennant of the restored Kew dynasty. Myles Cabot, as regent, delivered the speech from the throne. It was a carefully prepared oration, which quoted from the memorable address of the late Kew XII, and reiterated Cabot’s own determined idea that there could be no peace on Poros until the last Formian was exterminated.
Thus Kew the Thirteenth became the king of a whole planet, and took up his residence at the Palace of Kuana.
And once again the armies of Myles Cabot swept southward against their black enemies. But this time there was no quarter.
Of course the ant men contested every step of the way, and thus many sangths dragged on. Once more, as in the previous war, Myles Cabot had given orders that Doggo, the ant man, and Yuri, the renegade prince, should be captured alive if possible. Once more the serial numbers of all Formian dead were tabulated at headquarters. But Doggo’s number was not among the slain, and no trace was found of Yuri.
For the most part, Cabot directed the war from the palace at Kuana. He had braved much and suffered much, and once more he had saved Cupia from the accursed Formians, so no one begrudged him his well-earned rest. Buh Tedn, who was convalescing from his wounds, remained as a guest and adviser at the palace. Princess Lilla also was a source of constant help and counsel to her husband.
Slowly the Formians were driven southward, and this time there was no demand from the rank and file of the Cupians that the fighting be given up, for all realized that this present war and its hardships were due to the fact that the previous war had not been fought to a finish. There were now no pacifists in Cupia, for that unfortunate country had reaped to the full the fruits of pacifism. Also the fact that the former leader of the pacifists, Kamel, had been promoted to a full sarkarship may have had something to do with it.
So the war progressed without event until word was brought to G. H. Q. that a Formian plane, bearing Prince Yuri himself, had been shot down within the Cupian lines, but that the prince had escaped.
Myles Cabot had experienced once before how Yuri had been able to pass safely among even hostile bodies of his own countrymen, due to their respect for the sacredness of his royal person. Therefore, if Yuri were now within the lines, there was no limit to the trouble which he might cause. Accordingly it behooved Cabot to proceed at once to the front and take personal charge of the man-hunt.
It pleased him much to have an excuse to put an end to his inaction. So he radioed to Hah Babbuh to expect him, and early the next morning set out by kerkool for the front, accompanied by Poblath as aide.
Lilla and Bthuh did not want them to go.
Said Lilla, “I can see disaster ahead. Every time you ever go anywhere, you get into trouble.”
“And always get out of it again,” the earth man added, “for, as Poblath here says, ‘You cannot kill a Minorian.’”
Lilla and Bthuh were a bit reassured as their husbands kissed them an affectionate farewell and departed. The two men were in high spirits at the prospect of fighting.
The day was a perfect one. Silver sky o’erhead, silver woods and fields on each side, and a straight road before them.
Another noon—six hundred o’clock—they reached the air naval base at Wautoosa, and stopped for lunch. It seemed almost like a homecoming to Myles to be once more in the old ant-city where he had been held a captive so long during the early part of his stay on his planet, and where he had first met and loved the Princess Lilla. To Poblath, however, the stop was not so pleasant, for an orderly at once brought him a radiogram from the capitol to the effect that Bthuh had been taken ill.
“I must return at once,” he announced.
And Cabot, who realized that that is what he himself would have done in the same situation, readily assented. So Poblath requisitioned one of the army planes and hurriedly departed.
But this left Cabot without an escort. The commandant of the air base insisted on detailing a bar-pootah to accompany the regent; but the war was on, Wautoosa was short-handed, and every man was needed; so Myles tactfully declined.
Before continuing on his journey, he unbuckled his various accoutrements; and, for relaxation, revisited some of his old haunts; such as the room where he had been confined when the ants had captured him at the time of his arrival on the planet; the garden where he had first seen the lovely Cupian who had later become his bride; the room where he had so often visited her, after his triumphant return from Mooni with the artificial radio speech-organs which he had constructed; and so on. Every spot was crowded with memories.
But finally he tore himself away, and resumed his journey. It would be late at night before he could reach Saltona, his next stopping place.
As he sped along over the smooth concrete road in his silent two-wheeled vehicle, he reflected on a plan of action for the capture of Yuri, the arch trouble-maker of the continent. Poros could not be sure of peace until not only the ant men were exterminated, but also Yuri along with them.
Cabot had chosen for this trip a kerkool, rather than a plane or a whistling bee, because he wished to stop at every town and army post, in order to keep in touch with the development of the man-hunt.
And so, in the course of the afternoon, he received a message which caused him to turn sharp to the right, and give up his plan of spending the night at Saltona. For Yuri had been reported as seen only a few stads west of the point where Cabot had received the message.
As the earthman sped along in this new direction, the sky began to turn black. Not nightfall, but rather the approach of one of those tropical thunderstorms which are so common on Poros. Darker and darker grew the sky. And then the storm burst.
Myles had to run his machine at a mere crawling speed now, not only to prevent skidding, but also because the rain made it difficult to see where he was going. And as he crept along, a figure loomed ahead, holding up its left hand as a signal for him to stop. Cabot slowed down even more, and approached the figure.
It turned out to be a Cupian in an army toga, wearing the insignia of a low-ranking officer, and with a revolver slung at his side. This officer was holding over his head one of those umbrellas which all inhabitants of Poros carry whenever outdoors, not so much for protection against storms like these, as to ward off the blasting heat of the sun if it should happen to shine for a moment through a rift in the silver clouds. For Poros is very close to the center of the solar system, and only the circumambient cloud-envelop keeps it from being shriveled by the sun’s heat.
The umbrella had evidently not protected this particular Cupian very much from the swirling rain, for his toga was dripping wet. Myles brought the car to a full stop and offered the officer a ride; so the latter clambered aboard through the rear door, as Myles sat impatiently at the levers, anxious to be on his way again.
As the other walked forward to a seat just behind the driver, Cabot started up the kerkool.
“Glad to give you a lift,” he said. “Pretty wet out, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” his guest replied. “Very wet.”
The voice sounded familiar. Maybe this Cupian was one whom he had met before.
“I am Myles Cabot,” the regent announced. “Can you tell me anything about the progress of the hunt for Prince Yuri?”
“Perhaps I can,” the other replied, sticking the muzzle of a revolver into Cabot’s ribs, “for I am Prince Yuri.”
AT YURI’S MERCY
As Prince Yuri thrust the muzzle of his revolver between Cabot’s ribs, and at the same time revealed his identity, Cabot instinctively slowed down the kerkool.
“None of that!” the prince shouted in his antennae. “Speed her up!”
The earth-man obeyed.
“What is the idea?” he asked calmly. “Now that you have got me, what do you mean to do with me?”
“I intend to use you as my chauffeur,” the other answered, “to drive me through your lines in safety to Formia. Once there, we will leave your fate to Queen Formis.”
“That is a lie,” Myles calmly asserted, “for the Formis, who is now queen, has no individuality when you are around.”
“You flatter me,” was all that Yuri deigned to reply.
They drove along for some distance without further conversation. The rain stopped. The weather cleared. Finally Cabot broke the silence with, “Seriously speaking, Yuri, I am sorry for you.”
“Sorry forme!” the prince exclaimed with a laugh. “Well, well, that certainlyisa good one! Here I go and get you into my clutches; you, the only person on this whole planet who has ever thwarted my ambitions; and instead of grovelling before me, you merely sympathize with me. How so, you cursed spot of sunshine?”
“You have me in your power, yes,” Cabot countered, “but you have had me in your power before. You induced that ant man, whom I called Satan, to try and kill me at Wautoosa, but Doggo interfered. Because of your scheming, the Formians condemned me to the Valley of the Howling Rocks, from whose frightful din no person had ever escaped; but nevertheless I got away. You overcame me in the strap-duel in the mangool of Kuana, and your knife was about to enter my heart, when I thumbed your ulnar nerve and made you drop your weapon. You arrested me in the stadium the day you killed your uncle, King Kew; you had Trisp, the bar-mango, destroy my antennae; yet I escaped and rejoined my army. You fed me to the woofuses, but one of them turned on you instead. In just what way do you plan to fail this time?”
“This time there will be no slip-up,” Yuri replied grimly. Then, his curiosity getting the better of him, he asked: “But you haven’t yet told me why you are sorry for me.”
“I am sorry for you,” the earthman explained, “because you have missed your opportunities. You had the ability and the following to have led your country to victory over the ants. You would have been a hero and could have had anything that you wanted in the whole kingdom.”
“Not Lilla,” the prince interjected with a sneer.
“Yes, even Lilla,” Cabot soberly replied.
“Well, I shall have her now,” the other asserted. “And ‘what ends well, ends well,’ as Poblath would say.”
“You are incorrigible!” Cabot exclaimed. “And to quote another of Poblath’s proverbs, ‘The saddest thing about a fool is that he doesn’t realize he is one.’”
This irritated Prince Yuri, so he curtly ordered: “Swing to the left at the next crossroad.”
“But what is to prevent my stopping the car and turning you over to the pinqui if there is one stationed there?” Cabot asked.
“This revolver,” the other replied.
“Not enough,” said Cabot. “I could wreck the controls before the bullet could do its work. The pinqui would arrest you. And then where would you be? Yuri, the traitor, in the toils at last! It would be the Valley of the Howling Rocks for you, my friend.”
“I am not so sure of that,” said the prince. “With you out of the way, methinks I could reconquer Cupia, even from a prison cell. In the past, whenever you have been out of the way, I have always won, and I could do so again.”
“Maybe you could,” the earthman mused aloud. “So I think I had better remain alive for the present.”
Accordingly he turned to the left at the next crossroad as he had been directed.
As they approached the battlefront, they were often halted by Cupian sentinels. To each of these Cabot revealed his identity, and was permitted to pass. And each time he was sorely tempted to turn Yuri over, even though this would probably mean his own instant annihilation.
What deterred him? Not fear of death, for he had faced death so often on the silver planet that he and the dark angel were well acquainted. Perhaps it was caution, due to uncertainty as to the outcome. If he could but be sure that Yuri would not get the better of the sentinel, that the sentinel would not yield to the temptations which Yuri would undoubtedly offer, that Yuri would not be able to work his way back into power even from the cell of a mangool, that the courts would condemn Yuri to the Valley and then enforce the sentence—if Myles could have been sure of all this, he would have willingly given his life for his adopted country.
Yet would he? For his fatalism assured him that he could risk his own life, and yet come out on top, as he had done before.
Finally there occurred Cabot’s last opportunity. They were in a little ravine, almost at the front. The sentinel who halted him refused to let him pass on to no-man’s land without permission of the officer in charge of that sector; so the sentinel called another soldier to guard the kerkool and went to summon the officer, who proved to be a young bar-pootah, a stranger to Cabot.
“Excellency,” said he, “it must be important business which leads you to risk your life out there, for yonder lie the forces of Formis. The moment that you emerge from this ravine you will be under fire. May I ask what takes our regent into such danger?”
The revolver muzzle of the man crouching hidden beside Cabot, ground into his ribs as a reminder.
“No, you may not,” Myles replied.
Then he had an idea.
“Give me two sticks,” he said.
So the sentinel cut two branches and affixed them to the front of the kerkool in the form of an X. Crossed sticks—these were the Porovian equivalent of a flag of truce! Then the young bar-pootah let them through.
“You improve,” Prince Yuri remarked, as they threaded the ravine and emerged onto the plain beyond.
It was a gruesome scene. Dead bodies of both Cupians and Formians lay strewn about, covered with swarms of little hopping brinks, while among the corpses ambled large orange-colored beetles about three feet in length. Some of these beetles were busily engaged in digging holes, while here and there others of them in large numbers were pulling a body toward a hole which they had dug. These were the burying beetles of Poros.
Cabot carefully steered the kerkool in and out among all these obstructions. His last chance to turn his captor over to the authorities had come and gone. Soon Yuri would be able to take the seat beside him and ride in triumph among his friends.
And then the car began to wobble a bit.
“Hold her steady!” ordered the prince peremptorily. “No fooling! No pretended gyroscope trouble!”
“Don’t you realize,” Myles replied mildly, “that this is a pretty poor place for me topretendto have gyro troubles? If I were going to fake, I would have done so back there in the ravine.”
“That’s true,” Yuri admitted. “Well, stop her and we’ll get out and walk.”
Cabot accordingly brought the kerkool to a standstill. Yuri cautiously backed to the rear of the car and dismounted, keeping his prisoner covered with the revolver.
“Come along now,” he called. “Get out and unhitch the cross, so that we can carry it as a protection.”
For reply the earthman suddenly threw the control into full speed reverse. Down went the astonished prince, his revolver flying from his hand as the kerkool backed onto him. Cabot saw the weapon as it sailed by him; and instantly he stopped the car and reached for his own revolver. But it was not at his side. Quite evidently he had left it at Wautoosa when he had gathered up his accouterments after his sightseeing tour there.
So he jumped from the car and ran over to where the prince’s weapon lay. With it in his hand, he turned and faced his late captor, who was just picking himself up out of the dust and staggering to his feet.
“Halt,” the earthman commanded, “or I fire!”
Yuri halted. Then, to Cabot’s surprise, he grinned.
“What was it that you quoted from Poblath a while ago?” he said, with seeming irrelevance. “Oh, I know. ‘The saddest thing about a fool, is that he doesn’t realize he is one.’ That revolver which you now hold, and which terrorized you into bearing me in safety through your lines, is empty, wholly empty! Better throw it away, you poor fool.”
And he gave a mocking laugh. Myles flushed with shame and humiliation. Bluffed again by the arch-trickster of Poros! So he started to throw the weapon to one side. Then suddenly he realized what a fool he would be to accept any statement from this liar. Perhaps the prince was bluffingnow, rather than before. Perhaps the revolver was loaded, after all.
So Myles fired square in that sneering face. But the sneer continued. No explosion followed the pull on the trigger. Merely a little click.
Cabot pulled the trigger five more times, so as to be certain; then flung the revolver square at the still sneering face.
Whereupon Prince Yuri ducked and charged him, and down went the two in a strangle-hold embrace. Ordinarily they would have been a very even match, but the Cupian had recently been drenched in a rainstorm and had just been knocked down and run over by a kerkool; so the earthman easily triumphed. The proud pretender to the throne of Cupia was soon flat on his back, with Cabot’s hands about his throat.
But he uttered no appeal. He gamely succumbed. Fiery hate glowed in his eyes, as his adversary slowly cut off his wind; but that was all.
Finally his body became limp and his eyes glazed. This was no kind of a way to kill a man! So Myles withdrew his strangle grasp and listened at his victim’s right breast. The heart was still beating.
Cabot arose, seized Prince Yuri’s body and started dragging it to the Cupian lines. The prince should be revived and given a fair trial for treason.
But the two never reached the northern edge of no-man’s-land, for a Formian bullet brought Myles Cabot to the ground.
A terrible crashing noise in his ears, and then all was over!
After a seemingly interminable time the earthman became vaguely conscious again. It was twilight. Shadowy forms were dragging him along the ground.
Then he rolled over and over down a steep decline, and shovelfuls of dirt began to land on him from above. One of the shadowy forms descended and pressed upon his abdomen with a blunt instrument of some sort.
Was he dead? Was this hell? Or where was it?
A sharp pain in his abdomen brought him to his senses. He sprang to his feet, throwing off his tormentor, who thereupon let forth a vile smell. Then Cabot realized his situation.
He was standing in a shallow pit in the midst of the battlefield, surrounded by beetles, one of which had just sought to impale him with its ovipositor. These beasts now scattered and left him alone. A live man was no concern of theirs.
Myles felt of his head. His left earphone was smashed and there was a welt on his left temple. He had been merely stunned, rather than killed, or even seriously wounded.
By the aid of the rapidly fading pink glow in the western sky, the weary man picked his way across the battlefield to the little ravine through which he had entered it. There the Cupian bar-pootah took him in charge and dispatched him by kerkool to the nearest army hospital. In a few days he was himself again.
Then Myles Cabot took the field in person, with Poblath as his aide. Bthuh’s illness had merely been a bluff, and both men were thoroughly disgusted. They had remained behind the lines too long. Now they intended to press the war to a successful conclusion.
Nothing further was seen or heard of the renegade prince, although the ground was dug up all around the wrecked kerkool, in the hope of finding his body.
So, through many weary sangths, the Formians were driven to the southern tip of the continent and totally exterminated. Even their numerous pets—some fifteen hundred varieties—were killed off, too. For, with all the sport loving proclivities of the Cupians, they do not waste very much time and affection on pets.
The only ants spared were the royal husbands. They, poor stupid drones, were not to blame for the tyranny and treachery of their race. So they were shut up in cages in the gr-ool—i.e. zoo—of Kuana, for the edification of the children of Cupia.
The serial numbers of all slain Formians were recorded, even those buried by the beetles being exhumed for this purpose.
The battle for the extreme southern tip of the continent was the fiercest of the entire war; and when finally the last ramparts of the enemy were stormed, there arose from this fortress a considerable fleet of planes. It had not been known that the Formians still had any of these left; but nevertheless the Cupian fliers and their bee allies were ready for them, and instantly rose into the air to meet them. And at the head of the Cupian fleet rode Myles Cabot on the back of Portheris, king of the bees.
But to his surprise and horror, the enemy flew southeast, instead of north, bent on escape rather than on battle. And there was no possible escape in that direction, for the way was barred by the steam clouds which overhung the boiling seas. Probably, therefore, this squadron was due soon to execute some feint. But no, they kept straight on; and before the forces of the earthman could catch up with them, they disappeared within the clouds. Cabot’s fleet wheeled and returned, driven back by the intense heat.
Thus perished—presumably—the last of the ant men, for when the Cupian army stormed the fortress from which these had flown, it was devoid of defenders.
No trace of Doggo or of Prince Yuri was ever found. As to Doggo, perhaps he had been slain and his serial number had been incorrectly reported by those who had found his body. Or perhaps he had been among those who had braved the steam in a heroic attempt to cheat Cabot of his final victory, by a flight to unknown lands beyond the boiling seas.
It was just as well, for Cabot’s hands were not drenched with the blood of a friend. His conscience was clear, and yet he was relieved of the embarrassing alternative of having to choose between putting to death one who had saved his life, or permitting to live a member of the proscribed race.
As for Yuri, undoubtedly he, too, had been among these fliers; for never could one of his spirit brook to remain, even in hiding, in a land completely dominated by his enemy and rival, Myles Cabot.
Thus passed from the continent the race of black insects which had long exercised dominion over it. Poros was safe at last.
The stadium was repaired, and an appropriate celebration was held therein. The lands and other property of the Formians were distributed among the war widows and the leading heroes of the Cupian soldiery.
Under the regency of Myles Cabot, Cupia prospered. Luno Castle was rebuilt. Myles and his fellow scientists perfected many devices for the welfare of the people.
Among these devices was a new source of power, namely, a compound engine devised by Cabot himself. Mercury was boiled and its vapor used as steam. The exhaust vapor was condensed, in a water-tube boiler, at such a high temperature that the water turned to steam, which was used to drive a second set of pistons. Thus very little energy was lost. These novel steam engines were located at the coal mines in the northern mountains, thus obviating the transportation of fuel. Huge generators converted the energy into electricity which was conveyed to the southward over wireless power lines, made up of the Toron ray. Thus Kuana and the other large cities were supplied with power.
But in the course of his experiments, Cabot found many gaps which he could not fill by his meager recollection of earth devices. And so he finally persuaded the Princess Lilla to permit him to return to the earth for a brief visit. A perfecting of his instrument for the wireless transmission of matter, and several trips between Luno and Kuana, showed that this was entirely feasible.
And so one day he turned the reins of government over to Prince Toron, kissed his wife and baby good-by and stepped between the co-ordinate axes of the huge radio set at Luno Castle, with Toron and Oya Buh at the levers. The next thing that he knew, he was lying on the floor of the laboratory of the General Electric Company in Lynn, Massachusetts, as already recounted.
How he was there attacked by the night operator, how he reached Boston, and how the newspapers thought that he was an escaped inmate of an insane asylum, has been told in the first chapter of this story.
He put up for the night in a cheap Boston lodging house, and early the next morning took the elevated out to Dudley Street, where he had kept a small bank account during college days, under an assumed name, as a provision for possible escapades, which somehow he had never found time to commit. In after years he had maintained this account, largely as a matter of sentiment, and had even, with strange foresight, transferred quite a block of his securities to their safe deposit vault.
It all certainly came in handy that morning. In spite of his absence of five years and his workman clothes, the bank clerk instantly recognized him as the “Mr. M. S. Camp,” who had kept an account there, and so cashed a check for him and obligingly arranged for the sale of some of his securities.
Then he returned to town, bought a complete outfit, took a hotel room, and bathed, shaved and changed. Once more he was Myles Standish Cabot, the Bostonian.
His next need was to buy newspapers and magazines, to learn what had happened in the world since he left it. And it was in the course of making these purchases that he ran across an installment of “The Radio Man,” edited by me, and thus was led to make the trip down to my farm.
TOO MUCH STATIC
Thus ends the second story of Myles Cabot, the radio man.
The first was written by his own hand, and was shot from Venus to the earth, swathed in the fur of the fire-worm, and concealed in the heart of a streamline projectile. The second he told to me in person from time to time during his stay on my Massachusetts farm on his return from Venus.
The tale was a long time in telling, for Myles, in his assumed name of course, at once matriculated at Harvard to study electricity under Kennelly and Hammond. Although he spent nearly every week-end at my farm, he devoted most of his spare time even here to reading assorted books on nearly every form of practical science, and to the installation of a radio set for the purpose of communicating with his friends and family on Venus, and so as to be prepared to transmit himself back eventually. Hence the two huge steel towers on Cow Hill, which have recently excited the wonder and curiosity of my fellow-townsmen.
Of course, there were many questions which we asked him, when his story was completed. My little daughter Jacqueline was particularly resourceful in this connection.
Almost the moment he finished, she inquired: “And what became of your beautiful pet woofus? Did he die?”
Cabot smiled. Like most Bostonians, he was always very adept with children.
“You never could guess,” he replied, “so I will tell you. After the flight of the ants from the stadium, my woofus was found, still alive, in one of the passageways beneath the seats, where he had evidently dragged his poor mangled body and hidden himself. His life was spared by some one who recognized him as the beast who had rescued me on the day of the games. Word was brought me, and I at once went to him with Emsul. At my command, the woofus submitted to treatment, and soon recovered. He became a great pet of Lilla and little Kew. Always he lies on guard by the crib while the baby sleeps. And the baby’s favorite game when awake is to play horsey astride of his back.”
“How cunning!” Jacqueline murmured. “Wouldn’t it be nice if we had a pet woofus to take care of Stuart?” Stuart being my own youngest.
But Mrs. Farley was a bit incredulous.
“Mr. Cabot,” she asked, “how could Baby Kew know anything about playing horse, seeing as there are no horses on Poros?”
Myles laughed good-naturedly.
“I said ‘horse’,” he explained, “merely to give an earthly allusion. What the little king thinks he is riding on is a whistling bee.”
This suggested another question.
“What of Portheris and his swarm?” I inquired. “Has it never occurred to you that these Hymernians, as you call them, are a race of intelligent beings almost on a par with the Cupians and the Formians, and that, therefore, there are stilltworaces of intelligent beings on the Planet Poros? How about your assertion, made in the council hall of the palace at Kuana, that ‘there is no room on any given planet for more than one race of intelligent beings’?”
Cabot tried to laugh it off, but I could see that the suggestion worried him.
“The Hymernians are not exactly human,” he objected.
“Neither were the ants,” I countered.
After which he remained for some time in abstracted silence, evidently turning over the possibilities in his mind.
Finally he came out with: “Portheris I can trust. And his followers will be all right, so long as my people keep them supplied with plenty of green cows to eat. Toron, the regent, and Kamel, our leader in the Assembly, realize the need of that.”
At this point little Jacqueline had a suggestion:
“Suppose Prince Yuri didn’t die in his flight across the boiling seas. Suppose he comes back and organizes the bees against your people. What then?”
“That is the least of my worries,” Myles answered, smiling. “No one could live in that heat. No, I am confident that Yuri is dead, or I never would have dared to make this trip back to earth.”
But, I fear, all the same, that we sowed the seeds of some serious worries in the mind of our guest.
Myles Cabot’s story was finished, except for his answers to various questions which we asked him from time to time. For instance, how it was possible for my friend to have worn a set of such short wave length on his person, without body capacity playing hob with his adjustment. I had not been able to give them a satisfactory answer. So now I put that question up to Cabot.
“Very simple,” said he, laughing, “for, as my apparatus was fixed firmly upon me, my body capacity was invariable, and so could be reckoned with like any other constant. But some radio fan is likely to refuse to accept that statement, and to come back with the suggestion that when I moved my hand to adjust the controls, I would bring into play a wonderfully efficient variable capacity, consisting of my hand and my abdomen as two connected plates.”
“Well, wouldn’t he be right?” I asked. “Doesn’t that completely floor you? It sounds reasonable enough, with what little I know of radio.”
Cabot laughed again, and replied: “If that could floor me, it would mean that I never could have talked to Cupians, to ant men, and to whistling bees on Poros. But it is true that I did experience considerable difficulty from that quarter. Nevertheless I eliminated all the trouble by enclosing, in a copper sheath, my belt, and the batteries, bulbs and tuning means which it carried; and by running my lead wires through a copper tube. This had the bad feature of slightly increasing the capacity of my apparatus, but it eliminated entirely all outside interference. Only when I put my hands near my antennae was my receptivity disturbed.”
As they would say on Poros, that was an antennaeful!
Of course, Mrs. Farley, womanlike, had to ask him if his radio set, which he always wore on Poros, was not awfully uncomfortable.
“Not at all!” he replied. “I see that you wear glasses. Do they not bother you?”
“No,” she said. “At first they did, but now I really never notice I have them on.”
“And I’ll venture to state,” he asserted, “that they are as natural to you as a part of your own body; that you never bother about them, except to adjust them or to clean them occasionally; and that, even then, you do it unconsciously and instinctively?”
“Yes,” she admitted.
“Well, that is just the way my artificial speech organs are to me.”
Shortly after, or perhaps it was during, his narration of his adventures, it occurred to me to ask him about the device which had shot him from Poros back to earth.
“How were you able to transmit yourself through space?” I inquired.
“That is a secret known only to Prince Toron, Oya Buh and myself. I doubt if the world is ready for it. And yet, it is very simple. Invention merely consists in realizing a need, and then in devising means to fulfill that need.”
“Humph! Absurdly simple, isn’t it?” I interjected sarcastically, for I was peeved at his superior tone.
“It really is,” he replied, a bit hurt, “and furthermore, the biggest part of invention consists in merely realizing the need. Once this is done, the means of filling the need can usually be found, staring one in the face, just waiting to be used.”
“And what simple means stared you in the face when you realized the need of projecting yourself back to earth?” asked Mrs. Farley, doubtless hoping to steer him gently around to a description of his device.
This was exactly the result of her question. The answer was full of intense scientific interest. For the next ten or twelve minutes, Myles Cabot regaled us with a detailed technical explanation of his apparatus, finally ending up with: “I hope you understand this somewhat sketchy and involved exposition.”
We didn’t, but we said we did. In those days I knew little of radio. But in the months which followed the reappearance of Myles Cabot, I learned many things of which the world as yet little dreams, but which I have not his permission to disclose.
The details of his apparatus for transmitting objects through space were not, however, again imparted, and so I am unable to describe it here.
Between the various members of the family, we asked him many questions about the present status of the principal characters of his story.
Poblath, the philosopher, had become mangool of Kuana again, and was thinking of publishing his proverbs in book form. His dark and beautiful wife, Bthuh, was still lady-in-waiting to the Princess Lilla. Emsul, the veterinary, and Mitchfix, the trophil engine expert, were given associate professorships in their respective subjects at the Royal University of Kuana. Colonel Wotsn was made chief of the palace guards, in recognition of his assuming command of the palace the day it was seized, and of his subsequent rescue of Myles Cabot. Buh Tedn recovered from his wounds and resumed his duties at the University. Hah Babbuh was admitted to the nobility as a Sarkar, and was made field marshal, the rank which he had virtually occupied all during the war. Kamel, now a Sarkar, too, and no longer a pacifist and radical, became the leader of the court party in the Assembly. And, as already stated, the loyal Prince Toron assumed the regency during Myles Cabot’s visit to the earth.
One more point. I asked Myles why he had not brought his wonderful portable radio set down with him, to show to us.
“You forget,” was his reply, “that, for some unexplained reason, my apparatus will not transmit metals through space. Do you not remember all the steel buttons, gartersnaps and other metallic objects which were left behind in my Beacon Street laboratory that day when I disappeared from the earth?”
True! Now, that he mentioned it, I did remember. It would never be possible to bring any such Porovian souvenirs down to our own planet.
And that will be about all of Poros for the present. Let us now turn our attention to Myles Cabot on earth.
His life with us was very regular. From Monday until Friday of every week he attended Harvard. His week-ends he devoted to study and, with some slight assistance from myself and family and farmhands, to erecting the two huge steel towers on Cow Hill, and to installing his apparatus in a shack which we built at their base. This apparatus comprised a long-range long-wave-length sending and receiving set, and a matter-transmitting set.
Finally both were completed. One Sunday night in October, at the end of an unusually sultry day for that time of year, Cabot came down to supper full of suppressed excitement.
“I have nearly gotten Luno Castle on the air,” he announced, “but there is too much static to-night. Poor dear Lilla, she must be worried about me, for not a word have I sent her to let her know of my safe arrival. But I will get her tonight, if the static will only let up for a few minutes.”
“Why haven’t you used the G. E. set in Lynn?” I asked.
“I had thought of that,” Myles replied. “In fact I planned to do so, before I left Poros. But unfortunately they have recently dismantled their set, for the purpose of rebuilding it, and I could not very well ask them to hurry, without revealing my identity, which would never do, for that would get me so much publicity that my dear cousins would undoubtedly have me locked up in the asylum on the strength of my absurd belief that I have been on Venus. If they did that, then how could I ever get back to that planet again? My cousins would just as leave get hold of my property through a conservatorship, as by inheriting it. That lets Lynn out! But my set here is now complete, and is the equal of the G. E. installation; so I’ll talk to my princess tonight, if the static will only let up.”
He seemed very happy.
After the evening meal was over, he lit a lantern and started back to his laboratory. As we accompanied him to the door, he pointed to the evening sky.
“Late tonight, long after midnight,” said he, “there will appear above that horizon the star which holds all that is dear to me in this universe. My wife, my child, my people, and my home. Good night. Do not sit up for me. I may be very late.”
It was a sultry night. Not a breath was stirring. Storm clouds hung dark in the west with heat-lightning playing intermittently across their face. An occasional October asteroid flitted fireflylike through the sky. The weather was too oppressive to think of going to bed, so we sat up and waited for Myles Cabot. It got very late. But still he did not come.
Finally, along toward morning, the storm broke. I was for going up to Cow Hill to see how Myles was getting along, but Mrs. Farley restrained me.
“He has oilskins in the laboratory, if he wishes to come down,” she said. “In the meantime, leave him alone. He is phoning to his sweetheart, and ought not to be disturbed. When you were courting me, you never used to phone to me in public.”
“Nor in a thunderstorm either,” was my reply.
The rain fell in torrents, and the lightning was very vivid, though I suppose that the storm was a mere trifle compared with those which Cabot describes as occurring on Poros. Finally the weather began to clear; but not without a Parthian shot, which fell so close that the lightning and the thunder-clap seemed simultaneous. When the next flash came, the momentary light revealed the fact that only one of the two towers remained standing on Cow Hill.
Myles might be in trouble! Seizing my sou’wester and a lantern, I hurried out into the night. The rain had now stopped. The sky had begun to clear. As I neared the wireless station, I could see that the stricken tower had fallen across one end of the laboratory, caving it in. This was the end which held most of the apparatus, so I quickened my pace and flung open the door.
But Myles Cabot was not there. One glance satisfied me on that score. Probably he had passed me, without my noticing him, my gaze having been fixed intently on the hill.
Next I explored the room to ascertain the extent of the damage. The matter-transmitting apparatus was hopelessly wrecked; the radio set partially so. The head phones were lying on his desk, and by their side a pencil and pad. The pad was all scribbled over with letters, as though Myles had been trying to take down a message.
These letters made no sense at all, until the end of the sheet, where suddenly they stood forth with unexpected vividness and distinctness “S.O.S. Lilla.”
Only that, and nothing more.
This led me to hunt for further clues, and I found just what I expected. For, amid the ruins of the matter-transmitting apparatus, there lay a pile of metallic objects; a pocket knife, suspender buttons, garter clasps and such, as on that first day five years and a half ago, when Myles Cabot had disappeared from his laboratory in Boston.
We never saw or heard from him again.
But we have often wondered, Mrs. Farley, Jacqueline and I, just what was the dire trouble that led the Princess Lilla to send through space that frantic call for help, and whether Myles got back to Venus in time to save her.
TRANSCRIBER NOTES
Mis-spelled words and printer errors have been fixed.
Inconsistency in hyphenation has been retained.