An Earthman on Venus (Originally titled "The Radio Man"), Ralph Milne Farley [romance novel chinese novels txt] 📗
- Author: Ralph Milne Farley
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I had no weapon. I did not even have anything to use for a weapon, except the folding umbrella which hung at my side.
These umbrellas are of a very light but strong construction. The ribs and handle are made of alloy steel of a great springiness. The covering is remarkable opaque silk cloth. When open they are about four feet in diameter and closely resembled an ordinary parasol such as we have on earth. But when closed they are scarcely larger than a rolled-up copy of a magazine.
Accordingly, in the folded condition in which it hung at my side, it was not likely to prove of much value for defensive purposes; so I endeavored to extend it to its full length, and had to open it first in order to do so. The opened umbrella entirely filled the tunnel, with its point toward the spider and its handle toward me. In an instant I realized that I had effectively blocked the way against my adversary.
The umbrella, although not much good as a sword, might prove quite valuable as a shield.
And so it turned out. The spider hurled himself against it, rending the silk cover, but driving the ends of the ribs firmly into the walls of the passageway. The spring steel proved strong enough to withstand his onslaught, so Lilla and I withdrew out of reach of his legs and waited further developments.
We had not long to wait, for soon we heard the radiations of ant-men outside the entrance.
“They must have gone in here,” said one, “for it is here that I saw their lights flash and heard the scream.”
A light appeared at the opening, and I could see that the spider had turned around and was now facing the other way.
Evidently our pursuers could see this, too, for one of them remarked, “The spider has got them cooped in there. Come, you keep his attention diverted while we go around behind and dig them out.”
I seized Lilla by the hand.
“Come on,” I whispered, “I don’t know where this tunnel leads to, but let us at least go down it as far as possible, and perhaps barricade ourselves with your umbrella at the bottom.”
So we resumed our crawl. The way seemed endless; but the further we went the more my spirits brightened.
“Princess,” I said, “it is very likely that they will miss the tunnel in their digging. Or, if they find it, they will have the spider to cope with, for he seems to be a wild species, and not the domestic kind which the Formians keep to guard their herds of aphids. Or, if they get by the spider, they may hesitate to crawl through a dark tunnel. Come on!”
The air smelled stale and musty, but at last, to our surprise, began to get fresh again. And then the ground felt rough under my knees. A twig snapped, and I found that I could stand erect. We were out in the woods again! And no Formian pursuers within sight or earshot.
Close beside the exit was a thicket of tartan bushes, that plant with the large heart-shaped leaf so beloved of the purple grasshoppers.
“The safest place for us,” I whispered, “will be right here by the mouth of the tunnel. If they follow us through they will never think to look for us close at hand, and the thickness of the foliage will prevent their discovering us accidentally.”
So together we plunged into the center of this bower of hearts. Then we lay down and listened.
Presently we heard voices at the mouth of the tunnel, and I heard the crashing of the ants in the underbrush, but so thick was our leafy covering that we could not catch even a glimmer of their spotlights.
Their voices became fainter and fainter in the distance, and at last we knew we were safe, at least for this night. But, as their conversation died away, another sound came to our antennae: the distant howl of a woofus, answered from another quarter by the cry of his mate. Lilla shuddered at my side as we listened to this new menace grow nearer and nearer.
But at last this, too, died away; and when my straining ears could no longer catch the slightest sound of it I was surprised to find that I was holding the princess clasped tightly in both my arms.
She, too, noticed where she was, and yet made no effort to draw away.
“I was so frightened, Myles,” said she softly. “You will take care of me, won’t you, dear?”
For answer I held her close. She heaved a little sigh, and like a tired baby nestled down to sleep in my arms.
And thus, all through the perfumed tropical night, I held and watched over the beautiful creature who had made life on Poros mean more to me than it had ever meant on earth.
“Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,” I thought, “for she is the princess royal of all Cupia; and you, for all that the professors have decided, may not be even human!”
The fairy orchestra of the wood grasshoppers played its sweetest wind-bell tunes, which earthly ears alone could hear. Delicate fragrances crept in on an occasional breeze. The night was velvet soft. And in my arms lay sweetly breathing, in perfect peace and trust, the dearest being any world could hold.
Thus we lay in our bower of leafy hearts, until the invisible sun rose over Poros the next morning. When Lilla finally awakened it was with the sweet dewey smile of a little child.
I kissed her lightly on the cheek, and she smiled again and said: “You are very good to me, Myles Cabot; better than I deserve, who treated you so.”
“It is morning, my princess,” said I, “and we must be on our way.”
She gave a slight shudder. “That is so,” she regally replied. “I am a princess.”
The spell was broken, and we arose, and set out together through the wood, traveling due west, for we had left the road on the east side the night before. In this way I hoped to reach the road again and continue along it to the border. We were able to tell the points of the compass in the early morning light, owing to the pinkness of the eastern sky and the darkness of the western.
Reaching the road in safety, we set out northward along it, I blessing my sense of hearing which enabled me to keep a keen ear out for approaching kerkools, each one of which we dodged by hiding in the woods at the side of the road.
In this manner, we kept on without further adventure for the entire day, slaking our thirst at an occasional brook, and staving off hunger by means of certain edible plants with which the princess was well acquainted.
At last, on topping a slight rise, we saw before us a long wall stretching away out of sight in the distance to both right and left.
“Is this the pale of which I had heard so much?” I asked.
“It is,” Lilla replied, “and beyond it lies Cupia, and safety. Look! Directly before us at the foot of the hill is the Third Gate.”
With a cry of joy, we rushed down the hill, hand in hand together. Sure enough, there stood Yuri talking with the Cupian sentinel. Just beyond the gate stood a kerkool.
Yuri greeted the princess respectfully and assisted her into the car, the sentinel offering no objection.
But as I sought to follow her, the sentinel stepped before me and drew a short broadsword, which he held menacingly in his hand.
“Yuri,” I called, “this guard won’t let me pass. Please tell him that it is all right.”
Yuri turned around in his seat in the car, and gradually a mocking smile spread over his features. Then he spoke to the sentinel.
“I don’t know the fellow,” he declared. “Probably he is an escaped Cupian slave. You had better arrest him.”
The princess shrieked, Yuri’s car shot ahead, and they disappeared northward, leaving me staring after them with mouth agape.
Perhaps I could have argued it out, or even fought it out with my bare hands, with the Cupian sentinel; but at that minute a Formian sentinel emerged from the guardhouse at the gate, to take his tour of duty. Together the pair seized and shackled me, and placed me in a cell.
Thus, just as my hopes had been highest, they were dashed to the ground. Here was I, alone, in chains, still in Formia, awaiting transportation to the south again; while my beloved, free, was speeding northward with my deceitful rival!
before Queen Formis
And so, while my princess was borne northward by her cousin and lover, Prince Yuri, I was led southward in chains, a prisoner charged with high treason against the Ant Empire. Yuri had tricked me, and had used me as a cat’s-paw to rescue his sweetheart from her captors. But if I had not been so blindly in love, I should have seen through him, and could have married Lilla at peace under Formian auspices.
Yet, somehow, I did not feel sorry for what I had done. I had set Lilla free. I had won her love and trust for one night, and I was prepared to pay the penalty. In fact, I was glad to pay the penalty, for I realized that marriage between her, a princess, and me, a commoner, would of course never have been possible.
Back in my old room again in Wautoosa! It seemed like home, somehow; and yet how different from before, for now I was no longer a guest, but a prisoner.
Tabby, my pet buntlote, was glad to smell me again; and my conscience gave me a twinge for having so unceremoniously left her behind. Yet if I had taken her with me, what would have become of her in the wreck of the kerkool and the flight through the spider’s tunnel?
Doggo was overwhelmed with grief at the jam I was in; and he was reproachful, too.
“Why did you do it?” he would ask again and again; and, in spite of my repeated and detailed explanations, would reiterate: “Why did you do it, when all was going so well here?”
Guards were placed over me again, as on my first arrival on the planet. But this time, instead of being high ranking officers such as Doggo, they were mere common soldier ants, who jested coarsely at me and without sympathy.
I complained to Doggo, and he promptly put a stop to their tormenting; and, when they found that I was still in the good graces of one of their eklats, they became on the surface quite deferential, although they continued to annoy me in many petty and underhanded ways.
Doggo spent a great deal of his time with me, and kept me posted on the latest news from Kuana, the capital of Cupia. In fact, he even dispatched one of his bar-pootahs to ascertain for me just how the princess fared.
Report had it that the princess was almost constantly in the company of Prince Yuri, and that he was hailed as a popular hero for having rescued her. That she seemed unaccountably sad—which item cheered me. That the king was momentarily expected to announce her betrothal to Prince Yuri—which item did not cheer me. That an influential faction, headed by Prince Toron, insisted upon an explanation being demanded from Queen Formis because of the detention of Princess Lilla by the ant-men. And that only the new popularity of Prince Yuri was able to control this movement of his younger brother.
Oh, what a fool I had been not to have told Lilla that Yuri had been responsible for her imprisonment at Wautoosa! Now, of course, she believed him a hero, rather than the scoundrel he was. But how could he satisfactorily explain to her his repudiation of me?
No, if she retained the slightest friendly feeling for me, she could not regard him as anything other than a double-crossing crook. And did not the reports state that she seemed sad? Why else than either because of my fate or because she did not look forward with pleasure to a union with Yuri? But if the latter, then why did she associate with him? It must be that he was holding over her head a threat of some sort. My poor princess of the butterfly wings and graceful antennae!
I tried to get word to her, but Doggo informed me that criminals were not allowed the privilege of letter-writing.
My interest was so centered in the beautiful Lilla that it never occurred to me to inquire as to my own fate, but Doggo insisted on bringing it to my attention. He had obtained his own assignment as my defense
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