“You see, the Master is a sort of Higher Power. One might as well disagree with the behaviour of a volcano as disagree with Anubis.”
She smiled up at me. And insane wonderment came.
Marusa was a figure of virginal womanhood to which I should have been prepared humbly to offer all I had. That conspiracy, anarchy, assassination could be acceptable to her as part of the creed of life, I found it impossible to believe. Yet what else could I believe?
I thought of Lonergan! Not the truculent, self-sufficient Lonergan I had known, but a subdued Lonergan, servant of the Master. This was comforting. I stared eagerly, perhaps hungrily, into the charming face of my visitor. Then came a second idea.…
Those figures in black armour—that remorseless, soulless thing possessed of the strength of ten men which had captured me! Were these human?
Either the magical beliefs of the past had a firmer foundation than modern science is prepared to grant, vampires and werewolves an actual existence outside mediæval fable, or I was dreaming, had dreamed since that hour when the Voice first addressed me, since the moment I had seen a giant bat alight upon the Felsenweir tomb.…
In blue eyes raised to mine there was none of that queer, oblique evasion, sense of a focus beyond one, which had disturbed me in Lonergan’s glance. Marusa’s regard was passionately intense, as though she hoped to communicate thoughts to which she dared not give utterance.
I turned aside for a moment. I was trying to reject but knew myself helpless to dispel the idea that this girl was not entirely human.… Like other horrors I had met, she was the successful experiment of some mighty modern magician—a perfected laboratory product, a creature responsive to every whim of her creator; but having neither heart nor soul: a shell, a mockery, an allurement to drag me down.…
“It’s so hopelessly unavoidable.”
I turned to her.
Gratefully reassuring, that English schoolgirl accent. But the odd hint of foreign parentage in her intonation touched a note of unreality, deep enough to keep my doubts alive.
“Quite!” I admitted. “What in the name of heaven you’re doing in this galley defeats me. But I suppose it wouldn’t be sane to ask?”
“Well!” Marusa flicked ash from her cigarette. “It’s only natural after all that you should ask. I think I told you I came here straight from school? And I sort of accepted it all. I’ve never known anything different. Do please realize you’re not in the hands of a madman with absurd theories. It’s true, it’s a fact that life on the globe is going to end very shortly. Only those who know will survive. It doesn’t matter whether you think it’s right or wrong. The fact remains, doesn’t it?”
“It would seem to.”
“Of course, I don’t expect you to understand or to believe. But very shortly you’ll know what I say is true. If you think it’s any use dying, nobody can prevent you, I suppose. Frankly, I can’t see that it would serve any purpose.”
My heart turned cold. She spoke of wholesale assassination as she might have spoken of an invitation to a dance. Evidently I showed my feelings, for:
“It sounds awful to you, I realize,” she confessed. “Once it would have seemed awful to me. But when it’s all been explained to you, when you grasp that it’s inevitable, necessary, part of the scheme of things, you won’t feel like that.”
I began to wonder—and I began to hope again.
“One doesn’t curse an earthquake for killing thousands of people. There’s no room for argument about it. We can’t save them all, can we? They’re not meant to be saved. The only reason, I think, why I have been allowed to tell you, is that time’s so short, and… well!”
She glanced aside and made a little moue which filled me with a mad desire to kiss her.
“I like you very much and I should hate you to die!”
My hope had been realized! The truth was welcome, but strange.
Marusa believed Anubis to be not a destroyer, but a saviour! His real part in the pending catastrophe was concealed from her!
“But by what right does this Anubis impose the death penalty?”
“By right of his greater knowledge. Try to imagine what would happen if the masses got to know about their coming destruction! All the same, I must admit I used to think as you do. But there’s an inevitableness about the whole thing which smashes down our poor little laws. I can’t expect you to understand. It’s so colossal. It’s entirely a matter of readjustment, you see… realizing how trivial and petty and silly the things are which we used to consider so big!”
She looked up at me eagerly.
“Has Anubis told you all this?”
Marusa shook her head. Her expression changed, as I suppose my tone had changed.
“I’ve never seen Anubis.… I’m only a sort of—privileged guest: I mean, I don’t take any active part in the work of the order. I can’t even tell you where he is!”
“You amaze me. Please go on.”
“I don’t know if you really mean it—but I’ll try to. You see, the world is a sort of schoolroom. And just now it’s overcrowded. Nobody can learn his proper lesson. A clearance is called for. The big war helped quite a lot, but we should need earthquakes and plagues and a score of big wars to put things right.”
She detected my smile and returned it with a charming smile of her own.
“Do you think I’m mad?” she asked naïvely.
“No!”
I had ceased smiling and I suppose I spoke the word rather grimly.
“Are you furious with me?”
“Not at all.”
“Then don’t look at me like that! Because presently you’ll find all your established ideas upset. I can see you don’t believe me. But before judging, at least wait awhile.”
The difference between the carefully preserved casualness of this conversation and that which underlay it impressed me forcibly.
“Am I allowed to ask questions?”
“No! Please don’t!”
“But there are so many things I want to know.”
“Probably things I should be unable to tell you.”
She was watching me in an earnest way which served as a reminder of her warning:
All we say is heard—all we do is seen.
Her beauty, her composed manner, the modern carelessness of her speech combined to make me forget the true facts of my situation. Moreover, I understood, or thought I understood, her place in this bloody saturnalia. And now, Marusa stood up with a little wry smile.
“You surely don’t mean you’re going?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“But,” I said, claimed by a sudden and material curiosity, “how do you notify the mysterious elevator that you desire its presence?”
She laughed lightly. Her youth and gaiety were amazing in that place where artificial sunlight dispelled a gloom which should have been black as that of the Pit. For surely the Thing which I knew as the Voice had arisen straight from hell.
Another possibility regarding the girl, not quite so dreadful as the first, suddenly presented itself. I thought again of Lonergan. Might it not be that all creatures in Felsenweir, human and otherwise, were controlled in some way?
“It’s stupidly simple!”
Marusa spoke the words in so easily natural a manner that my half-formulated theory was swept aside.
From a small handbag which she carried she took out a sort of disk, mounted in what appeared to be dull gold. It vaguely resembled a compass, but in place of a compass needle possessed a movable indicator. She held it up before me.
“You’ll receive one of these,” she said, “very soon… at least, I hope so. I haven’t time to explain it now, but I can show you how it works.”
She moved the indicator to a number and twisted a small knob like that of a watch. The result was that a succession of hieroglyphics appeared in a space immediately below the centre of the dial. Ceasing to turn when a figure resembling the Arab letter ’alif occupied the space, she glanced at me, smiling with schoolgirlish mischief.
“There!”
She replaced the disk and closed her bag. I heard the whine of a rising elevator.
“Please say you won’t be obstinate! I couldn’t bear it, now.…”
Throughout ten minutes of sunlit silence after Marusa’s departure, I sat staring at that wall which masked the elevator shaft. I smoked without knowing I was smoking. I recalled every word she had said during our all too brief interview. By which tokens, if I had paused to consider my condition, I must have known myself in love.
So I was seated when the now familiar whine brought me sharply to my feet. I didn’t know what to expect nor whom to expect. Perhaps that unimaginable being, the Master—Anubis.
The panel slid upward.
I saw that the elevator was empty; but:
“Will you be good enough to enter, Woodville,” the Voice ordered. “When you arrive at your destination, you will be directed.”
Since plainly I had no alternative, I stepped into the narrow car.
Immediately it began to descend. My last view of the room in which I had awakened was one of the floor on my line of sight as the lift dropped, carrying the closing panel with it.
Descent took place in absolute darkness. I still had a half-smoked cigarette between my fingers when light came blindingly.
Before me I saw a vast, luxuriously furnished apartment, not resembling any place that I had hitherto seen. Despite its air of luxury it possessed a sort of simplicity. Growing roses in square stone pots were used as decorations. The walls and floor were of gray stone blocks, the latter being covered with very fine rugs.
A flat ceiling bore a geometrical design in blue and gold. There were many cushioned settees. A strange-looking statue which I had no time or inclination to examine occupied the centre of the place. It was black. Along one side of this hall, vaguely resembling a cloister and separated from the main apartment by solid square pillars, was a sort of corridor.
Since I was plainly intended to do so, I stepped out of the car.
I paused, looking about me. There was no sound. The hall was silent as a tomb. I thought I was alone—until, standing far along the cloisteresque passage, I saw a gigantic armoured figure!
The Voice addressed me.
“Come to the door before which you see the Watch standing, Woodville. He will admit you.”
I glanced down at my dwindling cigarette, dropped it and set my foot upon it. Resolutely I stepped out, turned left, walked along the cloister, and approached that armoured Thing. Lacking those experiences which had been mine, one could never have supposed this gleaming giant to be animate. One hand upraised held a mace which rested upon the mailed right shoulder. This primitive, formidable weapon would, I verily believe, have shattered the skull of an elephant.
Some three paces I was from the black guardian when slowly his gigantic mace was moved from the shoulder and lowered. Its head dropped with a metallic crash upon the stone floor!
The figure lumberingly took a pace to the right. In the patch of wall revealed I saw such a four-foot opening as that from which I had recently come.
This, I presumed, was another elevator.
I shall not attempt to describe my feelings as I passed the Watch. But I reflected that one sudden death was as good as another and stepped into the narrow car. Immediately it arose, either mechanically as the result of my stepping into it or because of some signal which I did not observe.
Complete darkness—then, suddenly, light, as the elevator became stationary.
I stepped out on to an ancient stone staircase.…
This was part of the former hold of Felsenweir. I looked down to my right. A massive iron grille barred the stair. There were no windows. But sunshine prevailed. Clearly I was meant to go upwards. I began to ascend.
On and on I went. Three times I detected spaces left of the winding staircase (i.e., on the outside of the tower which clearly I was climbing) where windows had been bricked up and cemented over.
A memory came.
I recalled Felsenweir as I had seen it from the Devil’s Elbow. The battlements, the first platform, the keep, and above the keep, jutting up like a minaret, the central watch tower.
This must be the watch tower. I was climbing to the highest point of Felsenweir.
What should I find at the top? Who awaited me there?
Already an age seemed to have elapsed since I had talked with Marusa. I was alone now in this haunted shell of a past tyranny, nearing the heart of that mystery which had brought me to the Black Forest.
Up I went and up.…
There came a change in the form of the staircase. A rather low arch intruded. Beyond, I saw that the steps were narrower; that the spiral which they described was smaller. I consulted memories of Felsenweir based upon my study of the castle from the Devil’s Elbow. Thus far, I reasoned, I had really climbed no higher than the top of the great keep.
This was the base of the watch tower. I passed the arch. The steps now were much hollowed, the masonry of the walls was crumbling with age.
I paused.
An iron gate checked further progress.
Immediately beyond this gate a section of stairway had collapsed. A black pit of unknown depth yawned before me and a draught of cold, clammy air swept up through the warmth of the passage. On the farther brink of the chasm, and about on a level with my eyes, the steps continued again, disappearing around a bend.
But—and I realized that it was an astounding phenomenon—they disappeared into darkness!
Sharply defined on the first step lay a shadow of the iron grille, an outline of the arched passage. In other words, artificial sunlight ended at the gate.…
Clutching the bars, I stared, with a shiver of apprehension, down into the pit. I turned, and looked behind me. What was I expected to do now?
This problem was quickly solved.
A section of seemingly solid wall immediately before me opened silently. It was a masked door. I saw a short corridor, dimly lighted in contrast to that synthetic sunlight on the staircase. Obviously this corridor was new, composed of, or faced with, the same kind of stonework as the great hall below.
At the end, on the right, there was an opening. Upon the bluish illumination of the corridor a light which I judged to be green shone out, forming a square patch on the left-hand wall.
A pace beyond the masked door stood a gigantic black-armoured figure, motionless, inhuman, its huge mace grounded upon the pavement. I wondered, doubted, but knew that my fate was not in my own hands. Then:
“I wish you to inspect the laboratory, Woodville. Dr. Nestor is expecting you.”
The Voice!
Teeth tightly clenched, I passed the guardian figure, walked on, and found myself looking into a large room in which subdued green light prevailed. It was a wonderfully equipped laboratory.
A man in white overalls awaited me. He was slim and of medium height; pallid. He wore a very small moustache, and jet-black hair grew low upon his cheekbones. Seen through the lenses of tortoiseshell-rimmed spectacles, his dark eyes were very cruel. A Greek, I thought.
“Ah, Mr. Woodville,” he said, and smiled unpleasantly. “My name is Nestor. I’m the second chemist here and my instructions are to show you around the laboratory. The chief chemist will be along any moment. Please come right in.”
The world’s greater universities endow their inmates with certain peculiarities of accent sometimes amounting to a dialect. I had no difficulty in placing this man. Dr. Nestor was a graduate of Harvard.
I went in. I resigned myself to what I recognized to be inevitable. Anger, violence were alike uncalled for. I must accept, and endeavour to behave normally.
“It would probably interest you,” the second chemist continued, “to see one of our more simple devices. It has a certain personal interest.”
He spoke perfect Harvard, but my first theory that he was of Greek parentage remained unshaken.
“Please avoid touching things. Some of them are very delicate; some, very dangerous. If you will come this way…”
I followed him through such a maze of scientific paraphernalia as surely never before had been assembled. By the farther wall of the place he paused, pointing to a sort of square desk, the top of which was covered with what appeared to be ground glass. A foot or so above it a peculiarly shaped lamp was suspended.
“I can’t offer you a cigar,” he went on, “as smoking isn’t allowed here; but”—he held out a packet of chewing gum—“this is a fair substitute.… No? Well, you won’t mind if I do?”
He stripped a slip of gum and placed it between his teeth.
“Now, sir, I will explain why you experienced such difficulty in exploring the woods below Felsenweir. This, you see, is a map of the territory.”
He touched a button. Upon the glazed surface appeared a delicately outlined map.
“These red dots”—he indicated them—“mark the highroad surrounding the grounds of the castle. Of course, you remember the highroad? Now these, Mr. Woodville, are the three zones.”
He manipulated a switchboard. A shimmering, changing wave of violet light sprang up within the dotted line which marked the highroad.
“The third zone.”
An inner, irregular circle of violet light appeared upon the map.
“The second zone—to which you so nearly penetrated.”
A third wave of light appeared surrounding the ground plan of the castle.
“The first zone.”
I was silent.
“These are sound waves, Mr. Woodville. The Master, if he wishes, will give you further particulars. But these barrages consist of zones of sound, tuned to so high a key as to be inaudible but instantly fatal to animal life. If you’ll notice”—the second zone disappeared in response to some manipulation—“they can be put down or raised at will. So, as you must realize, not all Hindenburg’s shock troops could reach us! Felsenweir survived five sieges in mediæval times. To-day, notwithstanding air power, artillery development, and modern tactics, it’s impregnable as ever.”
The zones disappeared. The map disappeared.
“I’m further instructed,” my unpleasant guide continued, “to explain to you the death of the man Hans Pfal. He died in your friend’s car on the way back to Baden. Will you please follow me very carefully. There are several danger spots in this part of the laboratory.”
He moved away, chewing industriously; and I followed. The floor was slippery, being composed of what looked like green glass. The walls also were green and glistening; the ceiling was dull gray. Right and left of the path along which he led me stood glass tables bearing incomprehensible apparatus.
I shrank from touching anything, following my white-clad guide, who wore rubber-soled shoes, as one follows the light of salvation.
We passed from one end to the other of the lofty, silent room.
Dr. Nestor stopped before a sort of gigantic index which occupied nearly the whole of one wall. It consisted of hundreds of columns of figures, running from tens into thousands, irregularly arranged. In some respects it resembled the time table of trains used at railway termini. At its base was set a long, shallow desk.
“Here,” said Dr. Nestor, smiling, “are the Brothers of Anubis—each bearing a number.”
He pulled back a white sleeve, revealing a disk chained to his arm. I saw it to be identical with that worn by the man who had died in Max’s car.
“363,” he explained, “is my own number.”
Reversing the disk, he glanced at me. It bore an Egyptian figure which I recognized.
“Only the first grade of initiates understand the significance of these amulets, or badges, which every member of the order must wear—I may add, under penalty of death. As a matter of fact, they’re tuned in to this keyboard. Distance doesn’t count. Melbourne’s as near as Berlin. I’ll show you what I mean and then you can draw your own conclusions as to how Hans Pfal died.”
He moved one of many levers upon the desk. A round spot of white light mounted a column of figures. Immediately over a number it stopped.
“Note!” said the demonstrator—“my own number: 363!”
Again he displayed the disk upon his wrist.
“It’s only necessary now, Mr. Woodville, to move a certain switch and I should die instantly and painlessly. Nor would my body bear any mark of violence. This was how Hans Pfal died. And this, you see, is how we assure secrecy.”
He reversed the lever. The spot of light descended and disappeared.
“You’re surely privileged,” Dr. Nestor declared. “Only chosen members of the order are ever admitted to this laboratory.”
The queer, X-ray light of the place faltered momentarily.
“Chief chemist!” Nestor exclaimed. “This ends my watch, Mr. Woodville. I now go to change. Don’t think I’m discourteous: I’m just obeying orders. The Chief will be with you in a moment. Stay right where you are… and don’t touch anything! Good-bye, sir!”
I watched Dr. Nestor’s white-clad figure receding among mazes of apparatus. He walked silently.
Came an interval. It was ended by a sound which I knew—that of an ascending elevator. I turned. Right at my elbow, beside the huge indicator, a panel opened.
Mme. Yburg stepped out!
Moments come in everybody’s life which, because they are so numbing, leave no definite impression whatever. This was one of them.
I saw that she wore a long white jacket of the kind affected by surgeons. Beneath it, her silk-clad legs struck an incongruous note. But I observed, my first shock of amazement over, that she had substituted rubber-soled slippers for the chic shoes which I associated with those slim, delicately arched feet.
“You look frightfully surprised!”
She was regarding me amusedly. The elevator panel had closed, the whine had died away.
“I am!”
“Why? Your brilliant friend, Mr. Lonergan, has told you of my association with the Hartford mystery. And that fascinating Frenchman, Gaston Max, assured you, did he not, that I was in the Pyrenees on a certain occasion? You must surely know I am a woman with a mission!”
She was mocking me—or so I thought; holding her head proudly erect and watching, under half-lowered lids, with those calm, slightly oblique eyes. One slender, psychic hand rested on her hip.…
It fascinated me—that hand. I found myself wondering why it was so white, and not sunburned… the poise of the body, the pose of the head…
She smiled, a red-lipped smile which at once irritated and caressed.
“Well? What are you thinking about? You say nothing.”
“I’m thinking about Apollonius of Tyana.” She ceased to smile. “That great philosopher declared that ‘loquacity has many pitfalls—but silence, none.’ ”
Her level gaze caught and held my own.
“You are not so clever as John Lonergan,” she said quietly, “and you have none of the subtlety of Gaston Max. But although I never liked the English, I think I like you.”
“A somewhat equivocal compliment!”
Mme. Yburg laughed outright. She pressed her hand lightly on my shoulder and as lightly withdrew it.
“Anubis never makes mistakes. I understand why, of three, he has selected you to make the choice.”
“But I want to know——”
She checked me.
“Kindly ask no questions which I’m unable to answer. Ask any you like about the laboratory.”
Her calm eyes held an unspoken warning.
“Sorry,” I returned.
I forced myself back to a state of passivity. I washed my hands of speculations, and determined from now on to behave like a visitor being shown around an explosive factory. The feat was one of mental acrobatics. But I achieved it.
“Very well. I’ve had personal and unpleasant experience of the sound zones. Their principle defeats me. But I’m curious to know how an intruder is spotted. I ask for this reason: Your third barrage or zone wasn’t laid down when Lonergan and myself recently penetrated to the woods. You trapped us with it. How did you know we were there?”
Mme. Yburg smiled again.
“I can explain very easily, my friend. Follow me closely. Touch nothing. Be careful.”
Her solicitude was real. In this it differed from the sentiments of Dr. Nestor. Plainly, the latter disliked me. Yet, whilst I recognized Mme. Yburg’s friendship, I knew unmistakably that sex had no place in it. All the time she was weighing me up, calmly. I wondered why.
Following her, fearful of stumbling on the slippery floor, of brushing against any one of the strange mechanisms right and left, I watched the lithe, swaying figure and tried in vain to pin down a memory which taunted me.…
She led me through intricate ways to a place roughly centre of the laboratory, where a magnified green lampshade overhung a low, circular table. The top was covered with that same sort of opaque glass upon which I had seen the map of the sound zones.
Some change was made in the lighting. I gave a start of amazement.
As if from an airplane, I looked down upon the castle of Felsenweir!
I saw the woods which hemmed it in, the old military road winding through them. Every detail was sharp, clear, as if bathed in sunlight. I saw other roads surrounding the crag; the very spot at which I had been captured by that nude inhuman Thing! I saw the path down to the abandoned village.…
“Whoever is on duty here is responsible, you see. I don’t know if Dr. Nestor showed you the insulated path? … Well, there is such a path through all three barrages. Hans Pfal, returning from the town, meant to use this. But our clever French friend overpowered him.…
“This mechanism operates in moonlight also. Dr. Nestor saw John Lonergan and yourself enter the woods. He was on duty at the time. He laid down the second barrage. Then the third.
“Frankly, you defeated us on that occasion. Dr. Nestor is frightfully sore! … Pfal, by the way, was one of our engine room staff. By the time communication was established with Anubis, other measures were useless. He ordered the poor Pfal to be silenced. Look! There’s a man driving a cart along the highroad.”
I looked. Crystal clear, I saw the horse, the vehicle, the driver, moving along a road below the castle. I judged it all of a mile distant.
That wondrous panorama vanished. The green light in the laboratory flickered—and became steady again.
“Anubis is ready to see you,” said Mme. Yburg.
In complete darkness, I found myself speeding upward. This was my longest journey by elevator, and I decided that I was ascending the ancient watch tower by the only available route. The staircase I knew to be ruinous.
A panel opened as the elevator stopped. I saw a small, square lobby, dimly lighted with an amber light. I heard the elevator descend, knew that the panel had closed behind me, that I was alone with—what?
Immediately before me hung a curtain of bright and barbaric colouring, ancient Egyptian in scheme. Over it upon a ledge projected a figure of the god Anubis. I closed my eyes tightly for a moment. Silently I told myself, “You are Brian Woodville. You are in the Black Forest of Germany. Remember this—and fight! Fight!”
I opened my eyes. I stared at the gaudy curtain, when:
“Please come in, Woodville,” said the Voice.
I walked to the curtain, drew it aside, and stepped through.…
Quite still I stood, and looked. I had been tricked or had deceived myself. This was not the summit of the watch tower. I was in a very large room, so large that I thought it must have been the banqueting hall of the old fortress. Part of it was queerly illuminated from no visible source by a light resembling moonlight. Walls and ceiling were masked in shadow, so that I could only guess at its dimensions. I stood in darkness. Before me, in a deep, carved chair, a figure sat.
I had never seen a more magnificent head. The great domed brow, which appeared to be quite hairless, displayed a tremendous frontal development. The hawklike but pallid face was lighted by a pair of such beautiful eyes as I had never met with in man or beast. They were phenomenally large and golden: they seemed to be inspired by an inner fire of genius—or of madness.
They were watching me, those wonderful eyes. And I knew instinctively that, masked though I was in shadow, they could see me clearly.…
Grotesquely supporting that terrible, wonderful head was a tiny, black-clad body, slender, feeble, and seated cross-legged in the great chair. Talonlike hands rested upon the knees.
I heard the curtain’s rustle as it dropped behind me. There was no other sound.
The carved chair I saw now to be raised from the floor upon a sort of dais or platform. This platform was richly carpeted and bore two singular decorations: a pair of life-sized kneeling figures.
That right of the chair was wrought in ebony, surely by a great master: the figure of a Nubian girl, hands crossed upon her breast; her head, upon which appeared a close-wrapped turban of gold, lowered; upon one arm a golden bangle. The corresponding figure left of the chair was identical in every way, except that it seemed to be carved in ivory. Gold turban and armlet appeared again.
I had never seen such exquisite pieces of statuary. Yet, whilst I visualized these wonders, not once did I wholly withdraw my gaze from amber eyes looking out at me searchingly from beneath that great brow.
I was in the presence of Anubis.…
And Anubis was a dwarf!
“We meet at last, Woodville!”
Anubis spoke. And I knew the Voice!
“Please come and talk to me. We have much to say to one another.”
Those beautiful, dreadful eyes never moved in their regard. I came out of the shadow into blue light and at last stood less than a pace from the chair.
“Your work is familiar to me, Woodville.” Thin lips under a hawklike nose scarcely seemed to move. “We shall understand one another presently.”
He raised one of the talonish hands and snapped his fingers.
I abandoned speculation again and became a detached watcher. I was in a world where ordinary laws had ceased to operate.… In some way I had strayed over the border line.
The ebony statue stood up.
With a sense of amazement such as I cannot hope to convey, I realized that the figure lived! She disappeared into shadow but almost immediately returned carrying a low, tapestried stool.
In barefooted silence she approached, placed the seat for me, and returned to her place on the dais, resuming that pose in which I had first seen her.…
“Mizmûn surprises you?” Anubis suggested. “She is a Nubian Arab, Woodville, and was born just outside Assouan. I procured her at the age of four. Is she not a beauty? Her companion”—with one talon hand he indicated the motionless ivory figure—“Isa, is a Georgian, as no doubt you had guessed from the texture of her skin.”
He snapped his fingers and spoke rapidly in a tongue which sounded unfamiliar. The ivory statue stood upright. Raising white arms, she turned slowly, dreamily, like a mannequin. I was conscious of definite embarrassment, and I suppose I showed it, for:
“Pray do not consider the feelings of my attendants,” said Anubis. “They have none.”
He snapped his fingers again. Isa resumed her former pose.
“That unpleasant quality which women are fond of referring to as their soul is absent in Isa, Mizmûn, and the others. Twelve in all, Woodville, and as nearly perfect as Nature will permit Science to rear a human being. The members of my Corps of Pages approximate as closely to the hourïs of Mohammed’s paradise as one could reasonably expect to approach.”
He went on to tell me in his cold, cynical voice how he had procured these results—a mixture of surgery and dietetics which sickened me as I listened. My horror grew and grew—and my gorge rose against him.
“Every page, in addition, is mistress of some useful profession or pleasurable art. But perhaps I bore you. You may not share my passion for beauty—my hatred of all that is coarse in humanity, notably its proclivity for multiplying. I am personally unbeautiful. If I showed myself to the world, the world would mock at me. Therefore I hide and accumulate power. I am to-day, Woodville, the most powerful man living.” He extended gaunt crooked fingers. “I hold that mocking world in the hollow of my hand!”
He paused, watching me, and I sought for composure—composure to retain the regard of those beautiful, wild-animal eyes.
“Your work in Brazil interested me deeply. Particularly, your account of certain native tribes on the upper reaches of the Rio Negro suggested possibilities. Later, I shall ask you to mark on a map the exact territory occupied by them. I wish to convince you of the futility of your opposition. I shall then give you ample time to decide—for yourself and for your friends.
“You may all join our company if you wish. Indeed, I have urgent need of you. In your very dissimilar mental developments you are, all three, unique—but useful. I rather think you find our little Marusa attractive?”
I clenched my fists and bent forward.
“No melodrama, Woodville, I beg! Directly you have made your decision, I will give her to you with pleasure.… But I see you regard this as bribery. I wish your conclusions to be based upon an appreciation of my aims, purely. For this reason, and for no other, you have been permitted to see the laboratory and to interview me in person. Few of my company have enjoyed these privileges.”
He snapped his fingers.
“But let us forget worry and women, and consider wine!”
The girl Isa, in whom I had observed not the slightest indication of life since she had returned to her kneeling pose, stood up and disappeared in shadow. Mizmûn followed. A few moments later they returned silently as they had stolen away.
One set a high table at the edge of the dais between myself and Anubis, the other laid a tray upon it. Right and left of the table they stood, the ebony and the ivory statue.
I saw before me a large bowl of fruit, glasses, some very delicate-looking sandwiches, a bottle of Bollinger, a flask of white wine, some pre-war whisky, a syphon, and a plain black box.
Raising my eyes, they were caught and held by the fixed gaze of Anubis. He spoke softly.
“Your suspicions are… an insult, Woodville! Even the clumsy Borgias disdained drugged wine!”
“But… !”
“Those were your thoughts! Your suspicion I forgive. That you so gravely misunderstand my powers is disappointing. Would you be good enough to open the black box for me?”
I tore my gaze away from those golden eyes and looked at the box. Standing up, I raised the lid.
For self-possession I had been fighting all the time; but now, in spite of this hard-won control, a cry, a shriek, was torn from me.… A blinding light shone out of the box, searing my eyes! I was blind! This devil had… The cry was cut short upon my lips.
“Obey!” said Anubis.
And suddenly I could see again! …
But I was powerless, paralyzed! I tried to raise my eyes from the box to the speaker. It was impossible. I could not move a muscle of my body. I was tongue-tied—a dead man, save for my powers of sight and hearing. Bending over the box I stood rigid, until:
“Look at me,” the Voice commanded.
I looked.
“When Gaston Max and yourself left your room at the Regal to wire to Paris, London, and New York, such a box was brought under the notice of John Lonergan. Since that moment he has been my slave. You understand?”
“I understand.”
I was helpless. This devilish mechanism had robbed me of personality!
“It is my intention, however,” Anubis continued, “that you shall be your own master. Therefore, close the box.”
I obeyed.
“You are free.”
It was so!
A sense of pressure like that of a steel helmet became removed from my brain. Anubis’s talon fingers were delicately skinning a peach.
“I might bind you to me for ever. But I always fulfil my promises. Your part is to choose. John Lonergan enjoys that oblivion which I undertook to impose upon him. He is a mere echo. I can so check corruption of the flesh, Woodville, that a human body would survive for many generations—a condition under which the brain dies slowly. I believe I spoke of a thousand years? Allow me to illustrate what I meant. But first, whilst I can commend the wines, I feel that your choice will fall upon whisky?”
“Thanks! A whisky and soda would be acceptable.”
And I was proud that I could speak, and speak unfalteringly!
A few phrases in that strange, guttural tongue Anubis uttered, and Mizmûn poured out a glass of white wine whilst Isa prepared whisky and soda.
I tried in vain to catch the girl’s eyes. She looked beyond me, through me.
Anubis spoke again.
I shuddered, drank, and hastily set my glass upon the floor. The two girls disappeared into shadows.
“This was the condition to which I referred, Woodville. I have fulfilled all my promises.” …
A curtain was drawn aside.
In the dim bluish light I saw a crystal coffin, not upright, but tilted slightly backward. In it, naked as he was born, lay Gaston Max. His hands were clasped upon his breast, his sightless eyes stared straightly before him.…
Like a caged animal I paced up and down my room. Snatches of the dwarf’s conversation haunted me.…
“So he would remain, Woodville, for many generations”—this had referred to Gaston Max—“but his brain would live on for an undeterminable period. He would watch himself die. This fate he may avoid.…
“Certain indiscretions of the Watch master have created quite a local legend. Felsenweir is reputed to be haunted. But the trust which holds the property is influentially backed. Glimpses have been obtained of my Black Watch.…”
The very sibilance of the soft, mocking voice seemed to be repeated in my ears.…
“So named after a famous regiment of your British Army. Their armour, composed of metal unfamiliar to most metallurgists, renders them immune to the zones. They can patrol where no living thing could penetrate. My bodyguard, Woodville. They operate within a mile radius of the Watch master’s quarters. Stripped of their armour they are unpleasant, but capable of swift movement under suitable direction. A lobster out of its shell would be a ghastly object, would it not? Owing to an unforeseen accident, I was compelled to despatch one of them to pursue you.…”
Those creatures were not human—they were not human! It beat upon my brain with hammer blows: they were not human!
The monstrous dwarf in that blue-lighted room had even begun to tell me something of the life history of the Things composing his Black Watch. He invited me to visit a subterranean dungeon in which, in his own words, “these useful servitors are perfected.”
But, rising supreme among all the horrors I had witnessed and had heard of, was that one of the girls to whom he referred as his Corps of Pages… “Recruited, Woodville, from many nations, in infancy.…”
They had no souls!
I thought I knew what he meant. Selected for their beauty and trained with that one object in view (his details respecting this training had maddened me dangerously), they were, I deduced, permanently under that influence which I had experienced, and which I believed enthralled Lonergan. They were soulless in the sense that Anubis controlled their destinies.
Yet, sometimes, I reasoned, they must be permitted to leave the castle. On such occasions, by means of his devilish arts, he would temporarily relieve them of the control. Meeting one, she would seem to be a beautiful but a normal girl!
I clutched my head, pacing more and more rapidly up and down that narrow apartment.
Marusa! I could not believe it! Yet how could I dare to doubt so palpable a truth?
I saw her, as I had seen the others, in that shameful servitude—her shapely head bound by a golden turban, her lithe, sun-browned body.…
Marusa was one of the Corps of Pages!
I had given my heart to a shadow! I loved a beautiful phantom, incapable even, if Anubis now willed it, of being my woman as I longed to be her man!
“I will give her to you.…”
Dropping into an armchair, I lowered my head in my hands and clutched it frenziedly. So I sat facing a prospect which looked like madness when the Voice of Anubis addressed me.
“Truth is sometimes strong medicine, Woodville. But if we can assimilate it, it means new life. I have released John Lonergan of control. I suggest that you dine together. By the way, it is just seven o’clock. Lonergan has a brilliant brain. I could make use of him. Gaston Max has had also his experience. He is ready for the decision which I have demanded. I shall disconnect your room. Nothing that takes place in it during to-night will be known outside its four walls. You have the freedom of Felsenweir. This upon my word, which you may disbelieve, but which I never broke. You have five hours. At midnight I shall ask for your verdict.”
The Voice ceased.
I raised my head. I had heard that whining sound which told of an elevator ascending. The panel slid upward.
John Lonergan stepped into the room!
“Woodville!” A light of sanity shone in his keen eyes, the whole force of the man expressed itself in the grip of his hand. “Our time is short!”
The panel reclosed. The elevator descended. We were alone.
“Lonergan!”
“Woodville—we have five hours. In that time we’ve got to save the world!”
Lonergan’s story was simple enough.
“When you left me back there, in the hotel,” he explained, “to go send the telegrams, I heard a noise out on the balcony. I had the shutter up in a matter of seconds. Nobody was there. But I saw a little black box on the table. Right away, I guessed—a bomb!
“I guessed wrong. But I walked around it and didn’t touch it. When my back was to the gardens and my face to the apartment, the lid opened! I know now I must have been covered. There was a line to it. A blinding light shot into my eyes!”
“I know! I know!” I cried excitedly.
“Is that so?” He looked at me dully. “I just thought my guess was right and the bomb had exploded. Because I wasn’t given any more guesses until I found myself sitting in an armchair, Max and you looking at me.
“It’s all clear from there on right to the time it was arranged I shared Max’s room—beyond that, right to when I went to sleep. Then it’s a mix-up like a Navaho blanket… patterns that don’t seem to mean anything.
“I’ve got a hazy idea of climbing down some place—the balcony, I guess—and of running… some time later I sort of dreamed, Woodville, I was talking to you. Mostly I remember a pair of tiger eyes… but it’s all foggy. Until three minutes ago, when I found myself in a room the dead spit of this, empty, and the Voice directed: ‘Be good enough to step into the elevator.’ Said elevator arrived and I did as I was told. Here I am. I’ve certainly got a lot to learn!”
“You have! So have we all. You disappeared from that hotel bedroom, Lonergan, leaving a note behind.”
“My own handwriting?”
“Your own handwriting! Max and I followed you here, to this hell-hole. It was a trap!”
“As I see it,” Lonergan declared, “we’ve got just one hope… the copper-haired maiden.”
I heard the elevator ascending. I glanced at Lonergan.
“It’s all right,” he nodded. “You can still believe what I say. My brain’s clear.”
When the panel shot up and the tiny car arrived:
“I suppose, an invitation to explore?” I said, smiling very mirthlessly—“as we have the freedom of Felsenweir! Wait for me below.”
“Seems that way,” Lonergan agreed.
He stepped into the elevator. It immediately descended and the panel closed. I waited, listening to the weird whining in diminuendo. We were trapped! The organization of Felsenweir was automatic. Our courses were preordained. The elevator ascended again. The panel opened. I stepped in. In utter darkness I went down.
I found myself in that strange, sun-lighted hall with the futuristic square pillars—the amazing statue—the sense of emptiness—futility. Lonergan was awaiting me. By him stood a big blond man wearing white overalls. His fair, graying hair stood upright, stubble-fashion, his ruddy face was decorated by spectacles containing such powerful lenses that any character which may have rested in his eyes was not to be detected. He smiled and bowed.
“Mr. Woodville,” he said, speaking English with a marked accent, “I have already made myself known to your friend—but my name is Richter. I belong to the laboratory staff. At the moment I am instructed to act as your guide to Felsenweir. I may add, a pleasant duty.”
I exchanged glances with Lonergan. He nodded reassuringly.
“You have seen the laboratory, I understand? What then can I show you?”
“I guess,” said Lonergan, “we’ll leave it to you.”
“Very good!” Mr. Richter seemed to be delighted. “I shall explain to you therefore the system of the Black Watch. Follow me closely, gentlemen.”
We followed him across the hall, which I remembered well, to a door upon the opposite side from that which gave access to the tower. It was open and unguarded. We descended a short flight of stone steps and found ourselves in a square room, obviously a survival of the original fortress. It was unoccupied and unfurnished, but an arched opening showed at the farther end. The room was more dimly illuminated than that above, and an effect of twilight was produced.
Herr Richter turned to us. His eyes, or what I could make out of his eyes through the thick lenses, were lighted up with the enthusiasm of the specialist.
“The secretary of the British Association of Chemists,” he said—“I more particularly address you, Mr. Woodville, although Mr. Lonergan also will be interested—recently pointed out that, since we understand the composition of protoplasm, there would seem to be no reason why chemistry should not ultimately accomplish its synthesis, thus causing life to manifest itself. He suggested that a modification of this mysterious substance, which gives rise on the one hand to the amœba and on the other to a more highly organized being, might in time, by a process which he described as yet undiscovered, enable us to incubate a human being resembling ourselves.”
“I read a report of his speech,” I replied. “It was delivered in Birmingham, I believe?”
“Quite correct,” Herr Richter confirmed. “He suggested—I quote from memory—that perhaps in a thousand years—somewhat pessimistic, I think—chemists might produce synthetic beings who could perform the workaday work of the world, thus setting free those naturally begotten to undertake fresh conquests of knowledge and of Nature. He added that this seemed to be an absurd dream, but that it would be unwise to dogmatize and to say that it could not be realized.”
He paused, staring alternately at Lonergan and myself. Then:
“It has been realized!” he added. “And those thousand years suggested by the English chemist have been bridged by the greatest scientist the world has ever produced. Be good enough to follow me.”
He stepped into shadow under the arched opening.
Exchanging a hasty glance with Lonergan, I followed.
My worst fears were realized! …
This was the incubating chamber referred to by Anubis, to which in fact he had offered personally to conduct me!
Over what I was now compelled to see I prefer to draw a veil. The enthusiasm of Richter was nauseating! I conceived a loathing for the man which I can find no words to express. Stage by stage, he showed us how the gigantic creatures known as the Black Watch were produced. Synthetic they were, undoubtedly—laboratory products. But, try as I would, my unscientific mind would not allow me to get away from the idea that in the end some spark of humanity animated those ghastly, hopeless creatures, controlled mechanically, as an engine is controlled, by a “Watch master.”
To him Herr Richter now proposed to introduce us.
“There are in Felsenweir,” he said, “a class of products, purely human, but subjected to scientific treatment, to whom I should be happy to draw your attention. But I am not free to do this. I refer to the Corps of Pages, more particularly attached to the Master, but frequently detailed for special duty when distinguished visitors are guests in the castle—as is the case at present.”
“Anubis, himself,” I interrupted harshly, “has been good enough not only to explain to me the education of these damsels, but also to introduce me personally to two of them. I think, Herr Richter, we may pass over this subject.”
Herr Richter shrugged his shoulders and smiled with unending amiability.
“As you wish,” he replied, “as you wish, I merely desire to carry out my instructions. Shall we visit the rare animals?”
“Say—what do you mean, exactly?” Lonergan demanded.
“Well,” Richter explained, “here in Felsenweir, since Felsenweir is our headquarters, we have the more rare and delicate beasts selected by the Master for survival. The more ordinary brutes, chosen by our experts, are, as no doubt you know, assembled at various spots, insulated, of course, all over the world. A series, Mr. Lonergan”—he turned to my companion—“of minor Arks!”
“I get your meaning entirely,” said Lonergan, speaking without humour, or indeed any other emotion whatever.
And so, presently, in a subterranean place deep below the rock of Felsenweir, in queer light, I found myself looking through thick plate glass at creatures whose homes were so widely separated as Borneo is from Iceland.
“All essential, you see,” Richter explained. “In the modified world, gentlemen, inimical life will find no place. That harmful phase will have been eliminated. What little remains in accidentally insulated spots it will be the duty of specialists like yourself, Mr. Woodville, to discover and exterminate.”
My brain reeled! And as we proceeded on that incredible tour of inspection, the borderland of sanity receded farther and farther.
Lonergan’s expression sufficiently indicated that he shared my frame of mind.
Thus we enjoyed the freedom of Felsenweir.…
There were parts of the rambling old fortress where synthetic sunshine did not prevail: dark, dimly lighted tunnels, worn stairs, and crumbling arches. At one such point, a narrow flight of steps descended on the left to impenetrable darkness, whilst rather farther ahead was an ascending flight, down upon which a dim light shone.
I had frankly lost my bearings. But from this indication and that, I had come to the conclusion we were in the base of the great keep.
An extraordinary desire to test this theory overpowered me.
Herr Richter, full of scientific enthusiasm, was leading Lonergan down the dark steps.
“Some noxious creatures,” I heard him say, his voice echoing hollowly around the vault-like place in which we were, “play a definite and a useful part in the scheme of the world, Mr. Lonergan.” …
He disappeared, Lonergan stumblingly following him.
I had just time to explore the stair on the right before I should be missed! I advanced, turned on to the stair, and above me saw what I took to be a spear of natural sunlight striking through an arrow-hole of some chamber to which the staircase led.
Standing still, I listened.
Richter’s voice was dying away, deep in the bowels of the fortress. I was taking risks. I might get lost. I might blunder into some death zone. But that I should peer into this chamber at the top of the steps was imperative. I felt like a schoolboy being shown around some historic spot, as I slipped away from my guide to do a little exploring on my own account.
Quietly, but swiftly, I mounted the stair. On the threshold of the room to which it led, I pulled up short.…
It was a large, rectangular, roughly paved chamber lighted by that one arrow-hole which really had been my objective. Yet, as I have said, on the threshold I pulled up. That part of the chamber immediately before me where the wall should have been—for the room plainly had once been square—now presented a black cavity into which the constrained light from the arrow-hole failed to penetrate!
This was queer enough, but not queer enough to have struck that chill to my heart which I had experienced at the moment I had reached the threshold.
Hanging from a beam not seven paces away were three monstrous bats!
I cannot express the horror and loathing which the nearness of the things induced. Seen in that dim light, they resembled at first glance, in every respect, bats in repose, for so, swung from some support, the bat sleeps.
Frankly, I think I should have bolted, but horror held me rooted to the spot. I was compelled to stare. Therefore my eyes slowly grew used to semi-darkness.
I noticed a peculiarity which distinguished these bats from any others with which I had come in contact (and on the Rio Negro my experiences in this respect had been ghastly and terrible: men wither and die there from nightly visitations of vampire bats).
The difference which had arrested my attention was this:
These bats hung upright and not head downwards!
They were monstrous creatures, at least as large as I had estimated when first I had sighted one in the cemetery above the town. They were of a fish-like colour. I imagined that in the light of the moon they would have been nearly invisible.
Dead, glassy eyes—of the size of the bottom of a tumbler—they had, flat and meaningless; attenuated bodies. But, peering more closely, I perceived that these bodies were quite flat. Mosquito-like wings drooped from the shoulders downward. But where the body—or, considering their abnormal size, the carcase—of the creature should have been, was this pendulous flatness, reminding me unpleasantly of a squashed beetle.
Courage was reborn. I advanced a step into the Room of the Bats; when:
“Mr. Woodville!” came dimly.
Herr Richter had missed me!
Quickly I stepped forward. I grasped the nearer of those three pendent forms.
“Mr. Woodville!”
The voice grew urgent, nearer.
“Woodville! For God’s sake, where are you?”
The latter voice was Lonergan’s.
Racing footsteps sounded. I turned as Herr Richter, his eyes glaring through the pebbles of his glasses, followed by Lonergan who looked very pale, ran into the room.
“You alarmed me, Mr. Woodville!” said Richter. “I am relieved to find you here.”
I was my own master again.
“I merely stepped aside, meaning to overtake you. But these…” I pointed… “interested me.”
“The flying suits?”
Richter nodded, and turning, drew Lonergan forward. For he too had been hesitating on the threshold, as I had hesitated.
“They function, gentlemen, on energy waves sent out at a sympathetic elevation of one mile above ground level. At suitable spots for alighting and departure are stations. Ascent and descent are vertical. These suits carry a simple steering gear, a radio attachment, and are absolutely fool-proof.”
Lonergan joined me, gingerly touching one of the suits.
“Our chief chemist,” Richter went on, “recently visited the United States to learn if energy waves functioned in the atmosphere of that continent. It is curious that even the brilliant brain of the Master has so far failed to solve the problem. Beyond cutting in on radio, those waves are powerless in America!”
Lonergan grasped my arm so tightly that I winced. The mystery of Hartford had been explained in one sentence!
“Energy waves have a limited range.” Herr Richter was speaking again. “One station is insufficient. Unlike sound. Sound can be transmitted from the laboratory here, all around the world, and sound can kill.”
His enthusiasm carried him away.
“I will demonstrate, gentlemen, while we are here, this revolutionary system of flying. Imagine a series of overhead cables, a mile above the earth—invisible, as radio waves are invisible. No cumbersome mechanism is necessary. We carry no juice. Through the observation openings known as the ‘eyes,’ we can study our course. Within the limitations of the route, this course is not constrained. There is a simple control. A child could master it. These suits are ready for use: allow me to show you.”
Lonergan and I watching with all our eyes, Herr Richter stepped to a sort of narrow trench running parallel with the beam above from which the “bats” were suspended.
“Movement one!”
He pulled a lever—and stepped aside.
The suit above slowly dropped. As it dropped, it opened out its pendulous belly.
“Standing beneath the flying harness,” Herr Richter explained, “it would have enveloped me. All I should have to do would be this——”
He dived into the suit. It closed upon him.… It opened. Sweating with enthusiasm, he dived out again.
“Then,” he continued, “this happens——”
He moved sundry things, and the “bat” sank to the paved floor.
“Note the launching rail.” He indicated it—a steel bar along the floor. “If I were now inside the suit, I should press my elbows outward, and the wings would expand! I should then watch for a blue light beyond the pit, there, and when I saw it, I should thrust hard against the launching rail.”
“Gee!” said Lonergan. “That’s marvellous!”
“I regret,” Herr Richter continued, “that Nicholson, the flight controller, is not on duty. Otherwise, I could complete my demonstration. But—please be very careful—we can peep down to the control platform from which he directs outgoing and incoming flights.… He is a Canadian. You would like him, Mr. Lonergan.”
“I never met a Canadian I liked,” Lonergan growled. “May be my misfortune. But it’s a fact.”
Back in my room I tried to marshal in some order the incredible facts which I had learned.
Not the least of the wonders was that of the Black Watch, those caricatures of humanity having each definite but limited functions, and controlled by the Watch master. His duties resembled those of the captain of the Guard in ancient days. But how much more intricate they were!
The troops under his command responded to a sort of amazing keyboard by means of which he could control them, limit their actions, follow their courses!
It was science gone mad—or, rather, it was a small piece of the world in charge of a superman whose genius had leaped many centuries into the future. I tried to review what Richter had told me about the “neutral zones,” in charge of local officials all over the globe. The Brothers of Anubis all were armed with some sort of contrivance which insured immunity from that sound blast which was to destroy humanity.…
Here at last was the explanation of those vampire rumours which had brought me to the Black Forest! Lonergan’s mission and the tragedy of the Pyrenees appeared in a new light.
With these data in my possession, plus what Lonergan, Max, and I had learned from personal observation, it was obvious that the creature who called himself Anubis held the fate of millions of lives in the hollows of those talonlike hands!
I was assured—I dared not doubt—that the sound waves which he proposed to send around the globe in geometrically considered directions, so that no inhabited territory was left out of the design, must end life… whenever he willed!
Anubis, whoever he might be, possessed the brain of six men of genius. He was a dreadful phenomenon!
Curious to reflect that with such gigantic intelligence he yet was not immune from the vice of ambition. He aspired to rule the world, but recognized that, with the millions now populating it, such an aspiration was futile. Therefore, coldly logical, he had determined to reduce his vast kingdom to controllable dimensions.
Frenziedly, I paced up and down my silent apartment. I believed myself free temporarily from the ever watchful Master. Richter, that cold-blooded enthusiast with the eyes of a child, had said something which had led me to believe that the dreaded Lord of Felsenweir was resting. After all, the most gigantic brain cannot dispense entirely with sleep!
But I knew that I was very near to the borderland—for why otherwise should I drop on the bed and clutch my head with twitching fingers?
To be defeated, helpless, with one’s future in pawn, was a condition calculated to madden any man of action. Yet, at this moment, such was my state.
I heard the familiar whine of an ascending elevator. I raised my face. I don’t doubt it was haggard. The panel lifted. The elevator reached floor level.
Marusa stepped out.…