CHAPTER X
A Peaceful Interval
When Alec Brandon came to his senses again, he was dimly conscious of a feeling of quietness and peace, that was quite different from the noise and clang that was deafening his ears when he lost consciousness. He slowly opened his eyes and looked around. He lay on a bed in a good-sized room, which was lighted by a dimly-burning lamp that hung from the ceiling. He tried to move, but an overpowering weight held him down to the bed, and he felt a dull pain in one of his legs. In a few seconds his head whirled round, and he became unconscious. How long he lay he knew not, but when his senses returned he felt another hand holding his own, while someone was bathing his forehead with a cooling liquid. He opened his eyes, and saw a girl standing by his side. He tried to speak, but his throat was parched and dry.
'Hush!' she said playfully, in a low, musical voice, as she held up one finger. 'You must not speak yet, for you are still very weak. You have nothing to fear; you are in the hands of friends.'
A moment later he saw a young man standing close to him and examining him attentively. Then he walked away from the bed, and talked to the girl in low tones for some time.
'He will do all right,' he whispered, as he left the room. 'He has had a near shave, though. I hardly thought we should have succeeded in bringing him round. You must take care of him and feed him up well.'
There was a click as the door shut, and Alec was left alone with the girl. She came up to him and fed him with some liquid food from a spoon, after which he felt much refreshed. Then he turned over on his side and fell fast asleep. When he awoke again, the girl was sitting by his side doing some fancy work.
'You look better now,' she said, as soon as she noticed that his eyes were open. 'You can talk a little if you like, but only a very little, mind.'
'Where am I? How did I get here?' he asked feebly.
'You are on Herbert Eastland's private yacht, the Mermaid,' she answered. 'That was Herbert you saw just now, and I am his sister Celia. We were cruising about in space, when we came upon a lot of wrecks lying about. I suppose there has been a great battle somewhere. Oh, this terrible war!'
'There has been a great battle,' murmured Alec. 'We were outnumbered and defeated. It was a terrible battle that lasted for more than six days.'
'Oh, this dreadful war!' said Celia as her deep brown eyes filled with tears. 'But never mind,' she added as she noticed the look of pain that passed over Alec's face; 'we shall beat them yet. Now I will tell you how you came here. We were voyaging about in space, when we came upon a lot of wrecks, and among them there was a great metal sphere with some pieces of wreckage still attached to it. Herbert said that it was one of the boxes where the captain goes during an engagement. Then I suggested that there might be someone still alive, shut up in it; but Herbert only laughed at me, and wanted to proceed on our way, in case we might get mixed up in a battle. At last I managed to persuade him to send a diver to attach it to the Mermaid with grappling irons and see if there was anyone inside. After a great deal of trouble the diver managed to unfasten and open the valve and get inside, and there he found you and the captain and two other officers. The others were quite dead, but you were still warm, so we put you to bed and blew air into you and tried to revive you. For a long time all our efforts were in vain, but at last we were relieved by seeing you begin to breathe. You hung between life and death for days. Every time I looked at you I expected to see that you had breathed your last. Herbert said he was so afraid that you had received severe internal injuries from having been in a vacuum, but I don't think you are much the worse for it now, except your broken leg, which we managed to patch together for you.'
'I owe my life to you,' he said gratefully as he pressed her hand.
'To Herbert,' said Celia laughingly.
'To you.'
'Herbert carried you down here. It was his ship that saved you,' with another laugh.
'But you nursed me.'
'Well, what if I did? It would have been very unkind of me if I had not.'
'You are an angel.'
'Don't be silly,' said Celia as a slight blush suffused her cheeks. 'Now let me continue my story. As soon as you had been brought down below, we fastened the captain's sphere on to the outside, and now we are towing it along with us. If you look out of the window, you will be able to see it.'
Alec raised himself up on one hand and peered forth into the star-bespangled space. There, not far from the hull of the Mermaid, he could make out by the light cast from the windows a spherical object much battered and torn about.
'But what have you done with Captain Mainton and the other two?' asked Alec.
'They were left in the sphere,' replied Celia sadly. 'They will be buried when we get to Neptune.'
'To Neptune! Is that where you are bound for?'
'Yes; that is where I live with my brother and sister. Herbert is a great engineer, and we are making this voyage to test the efficiency of a new combination of forces that he has discovered. We expect to be back at Neptune in about eight weeks.'
'How long is it since I was brought here?' asked Herbert.
'About a fortnight ago, and you have been unconscious nearly all the time. But come,' added Celia, as she assumed an appearance of mock solemnity: 'you must not talk any more now. You must try and go to sleep like a good boy, or you will never get well again.'
She bent over him as she spoke to arrange his pillows, and he was conscious of a strange thrill that swept through his body as a few stray tresses of her magnificent golden hair lightly touched his face. She bustled about the room for a moment, her fresh light figure brightening everything with its presence. Then she turned the light down a little and vanished altogether. A faint sigh that he could not altogether suppress escaped from Alec's lips, and the sunshine of his life seemed to have gone in a moment.
Oh, faithless and perverse generation of men! Is this your love? Is this your constancy?
Alec Brandon's mind was troubled for some moments with various conflicting thoughts, and then he fell fast asleep. When he awoke again he felt stronger and better. After some days had passed he was able to get up and recline on a sofa, for he was too weak to walk about at all. Herbert Eastland came to see him sometimes, but he could not stay long, for his duties as captain of the ship took up nearly all his time. But Celia was almost always with him, flitting about in his room like a beam of sunshine, smoothing down his pillows and anticipating every wish before he uttered it. Sometimes she would turn round quickly and notice his eyes fixed on her longingly and lovingly, and then a deep blush would suffuse her cheeks, and she had to turn away her head to hide the new feelings that had been born to her heart. Sometimes—oh, delicious moments!—she would support him with one arm while he walked up and down the room trying to regain the strength of his legs. Sometimes their faces almost touched, and he could smell the perfume of her golden hair and feel her hot breath on his cheeks, and he had to put his arm round her shoulders to steady his tottering footsteps. Then he would sit down on the sofa and she would read to him, and later on Herbert would join them at a meal.
And so days and weeks sped by, days which Flora Houghton, tied down to the little earth millions of miles away, spent in watching for the smallest scrap of news of the Anglo-Saxon fleet. As they approached nearer to Neptune the dim shimmering light which pervaded space became brighter as the sun grew larger. They sped on at the same rapid pace, but soon the speed had to be slackened and they proceeded more carefully as they approached the orbit of Neptune; for here there were vast fleets manœuvring about trying to catch one another at a disadvantage.
Herbert Eastland was in his room for hours at a time carefully watching for the needles to indicate any approaching mass. The disc of Neptune became larger, spreading out into a vast glowing sphere, that showed continents, seas, islands, and rivers. The engines were reversed, and they carefully wended their way along as the needles moved this side, that side, passing by single ships, squadrons, and divisions thirsting for one another's destruction. Sometimes they passed quite close to the edge of a battle area, where thousands of guns were vomiting forth fire and smoke, and the blinding flashes caused by the rays of Ednogen meeting together lighted up every cabin in the ship. At last they plunged into the atmosphere of Neptune, and were safe for the time being.
They now cruised leisurely on over Neptune, Celia carefully explaining to Alec every object of interest they passed over. When they were low enough the hatches were opened, and he went up on to the outer deck, so that he could breathe the fresh air of Neptune. In a few days they passed over the capital, and the Mermaid was let down on to the ground in one of the suburbs, in a kind of park that belonged to Herbert Eastland.
'Safe at last!' he muttered; 'but it was a risky voyage. I won't try it again when there is such hot fighting going on.'
Alec was not yet able to walk much, so he was put into a chair, which was let down over the ship's side, and carried into the house under the directions of Celia. As health and strength returned, he began to experience a slight remorse for what he had done, and to think of the absent Flora, to whom he had plighted his troth. But such feelings only took possession of his mind when his pretty nurse was absent. His love for her came rushing back as soon as she returned, putting to flight all prudential considerations. Sometimes he resolved to confess everything to her, and ask to be removed to some other house, where he would not be exposed to her seductive attractions; but as soon as she came into the room his courage gradually oozed away, and perhaps he was not sorry that it did.
And so at last he resigned himself to the inevitable. They always talked together and behaved as lovers, and her brother began to look upon them as already engaged. She effected the conquest of his heart more and more every day as she flitted about before him, a smile on her lips, and her wealth of golden hair falling in silken ripples down her back. He thought he had never seen anyone so pretty or so engaging before. It was many months now since he had seen Flora, and it would be months before he could see her again: for the war was raging all round the planet, and it was unsafe for any boat but an armoured battleship to venture into space. It was impossible to tell when he would be in a fit state to recommence his duties on a war-ship, for he still felt the effects of his narrow escape.
So Alec Brandon, partly from pleasure, partly from necessity, resigned himself to the inevitable, and the delights afforded by Celia's society drowned any qualms of conscience that he might be afflicted with. He did not mix much with the people of Neptune, and therefore he had little society but that of his late nurse, for Herbert was engaged in his laboratory all day long and did not leave it even for meals. So he took his meals alone with Celia, enjoying her lively conversation without a thought for the future or consequences. He walked with her, he flirted with her all day, weaving the silken chains that bound them together ever tighter.
While all this gentle love play was going on at Neptune, the surrounding space was echoing with the crash of battle. Sometimes the stillness of the air and the peacefulness of some quiet country scenery would be rudely interrupted by a frightful shriek as a flaming mass of metal crashed down on trees, rocks, and buildings and made the ground quiver with the shock for miles around. As soon as the mass of twisted and scoriated metal was cool enough, the inhabitants crowded round it with feelings of reverential awe. They knew that it was the wreck of some battleship that had met its fate in the distant regions of space far above their heads. When these wandering masses got within the sphere of the planet's attraction they were drawn towards it with ever-increasing velocity until they reached the atmosphere, when they were heated to incandescence by the friction. Sometimes the magazine was exploded by the heat, and then the terrible projectiles would be flung far and wide, bursting as they fell. These occurrences impressed the minds of those who saw them with greater terror, as the contending fleets were quite invisible, and no one would have known what was going on but for the occasional fall of the battered wrecks.
At night the scene was more brilliant but more awful. Frightful detonations disturbed the season of darkness. The awakened inhabitants rushed out into the open air, fearing to be buried under the ruins of their houses. They saw a fiery object falling to the ground in the distance accompanied by a long trail of flame. Sometimes the flaming meteorite would emit terrific explosions all the time that it was falling, and after it had touched the ground, as shell after shell exploded, and the air around it would be filled with clouds of smoke and steam. At other times there would be long flashes of green and purple light and distant detonations as wandering projectiles struck the air and blew up. Sometimes on clear nights thousands of inhabitants would turn out and gaze upwards in awe at the silent flashes and sheets of flame that darted about in the sky. Then, far beyond these, they could see a flaming nebulous cloud that moved slowly over the sky, vibrating and palpitating, and gradually changing its form, but always glowing with the same brightness. When examined by powerful telescopes, it was found to consist of sheets and jets of flame that continually dashed forth, apparently out of nothing, and clashed against one another. Beyond this and in the direction of Jupiter was another similar cloud moving slowly across the sky, sometimes like a long bright thread, then circular, then like a dim mist. These clouds lasted for some days; then, one after another, they broke up into small pieces. Evidently terrible battles were being fought in the neighbourhood of the second line of defence. Those who witnessed the appalling nature of the forces that were being used trembled for their husbands, brothers, and sons, who might be perishing even before their eyes.
But the omniscient Deity was about to punish the impiety of men for carrying their hates and jealousies into the silent abodes of space, and their wickedness in unchaining the giant forces with which He had provided them, for the purpose of destroying one another. A terrible event was about to happen, which would send a thrill of horror through the Universe. The contending nations had been recklessly letting loose enormous forces, and sending them quivering and destroying through the regions of space. A catastrophe which had never been hinted at by the calculations of scientists, admirals, and strategists was about to occur and precipitate both sides alike into the extremities of woe.
One night the inhabitants of Neptune were standing out in the open air watching the distant flashes in the sky, when suddenly there was a blinding glare of light somewhere in the orbit of Jupiter's moons. Columns of incandescent vapour shot out into space, enveloping Jupiter and his moons, and covering a large portion of the sky. So bright was the light that it cast cold, dark shadows all over the part of Neptune that was turned towards it. Tongues of flame shot up from the luminous cloud of vapour, and waved this way, that way, as if they were agitated by a violent tempest. A thrill of horror and fear passed through the innumerable multitudes who were standing with their faces turned towards the sky and blanched by the white glare. What had happened? Had some terrible new explosive been discovered and used now for the first time, or had some awful convulsion of Nature overtaken the fighting myriads and overwhelmed both conqueror and conquered alike in an awful ruin? Telegraphic messages were sent, but no answer was received; all the means of communication had broken down. Night after night the seething, heaving mass shone in the sky, quenching the stars by its brightness, and casting cold shadows over the ground; night after night it shone through space, sending a wave of terror through the minds of all who saw it.