_Back to the Ramapos_
It was dark when they reached the first swellings of the Ramapo Range.
It was dangerous to try and make their way through tangled brush and
mountain trails. All night they camped on the bare ground, sleeping
fitfully, cramped cold, shivering. They dared not light a fire; it
would draw instant unwelcome attention.
When dawn came, they were on the move, glad to stretch their sodden
limbs. Unerringly Grim homed for the invisible cleft. Nothing stirred
in the forests, even the birds seemed gone. The fog had lifted, the
sun blazed forth in unclouded majesty. The damp on them dried quickly.
But Grim shook his fist at the unwitting orb.
"Damn that weather machine," he growled. "Breaking it seems to have
made matters worse. Even the regular midnight shower has stopped. I'd
give ten years of my life for the sight of a cloud."
"It will never rain again," Hilary said wearily. "It has forgotten
how."
The bright sunny sky seemed a brazen hell to the footsore Earthmen. It
mocked and jeered at them with sparkling waves of warmth.
Before them was an unbroken mass of underbrush. The next instant they
were on the brink of the chasm.
"They haven't found us yet," said Morgan, surveying the looped end of
the rope ladder. They climbed swiftly down the swaying rungs. The rock
slanted with them, turned sharply and fell sheer. Below there was a
confused murmur, the sound of movement.
A voice came floating up to them, sharp, commanding.
"Stop where you are, you two. You're covered."
"It's Morgan," Grim bellowed, not pausing an instant in his descent.
The next instant he dropped lightly to the floor of the gorge. A
moment later Hilary stepped beside him.
Men were crowding about Grim, clean-cut, determined-looking Earthmen.
Nothing like the men he had encountered on his first trip on the
express conveyor. The bottom of the gorge had all the appearance of a
wartime camp.
There were at least a hundred men encamped in the narrow cleft,
crowded and crowding. A tall man thrust himself forward, spare,
angular.
* * * * *
"Welcome, Captain Morgan," he cried. "We had given up all hopes of
seeing you again."
"Hello, Waters," said Grim. "Where's Lieutenant Pemberton?"
The other looked shamefaced.
"He's, gone," he muttered. "Took two hundred men with him."
Morgan's face was awful. "Disobeyed orders, did he? Where did he go?"
"To join in the attack on Great New York. Reports came in that the
countryside was up in arms, moving to attack the Mercutians. I
couldn't hold him. Said you were crazy, never coming back. He went,
and two hundred of the boys went with him."
Grim said: "Know what happened?"
Waters shook his head. "Our radio communication went dead yesterday
afternoon."
"He's dead," said Grim softly. "The others too."
A groan went up as he described swiftly the holocaust of the day
before. "That was why I warned you all to wait. We can't fight them
yet. But I'm forgetting...." He turned to Hilary, who had remained
quietly aside. "This is Hilary Grendon, your Chief. He's the man who
is responsible for the revolt. I told you about him. We all take
orders from him hereafter. If anyone can beat the Mercutians, here's
your man."
A babel of sound burst about him like a bomb. Men patted him on the
back, shook his hand, crowded him until he was almost smothered. It
was a rousing reception. The kind Hilary had dreamed of on his return
from his tremendous flight through space--and had not received.
For his act of revolt, unwitting as it was, had fired the imaginations
of the Earth people, who in their degradation and despair had come to
believe the Mercutian overlords invulnerable. It had been the little
spark that touched off a far-reaching train of events. In the few days
that had elapsed Hilary had become a legendary figure.
The sparkle came back to his eyes, his brain cleared of the fog of
hopelessness as he took command. Joan was lost--yes--but there was the
Earth to be saved.
* * * * *
His orders crackled. The little gorge became a hive of activity. With
Grim and Waters as efficient assistants he soon whipped the tiny
company into ordered discipline. Absurdly few to fight the Mercutians,
but Hilary counseled patience. They were a nucleus merely, he told
them. When the time arrived to fight in the open, the peoples of the
Earth would swell their ranks.
To provide against the day, he sent scouts out to filter through the
surrounding villages and towns; unarmed, to all seeming meekest of the
Earthlings. They stirred the embers of revolt with muted whisperings;
they found trustworthy leaders in each community to organize secretly
all able-bodied men; they returned with tidings of the outside world,
with food and other necessities.
Sometimes they did not return. Then others went out to take their
places. It was the fortune of war. Day and night a sentinel was posted
in a dugout directly under the overhanging lip of the gorge. It was
his duty to warn of impending attack; above all, to rake the sky
ceaselessly with a crudely-contrived periscope for signs of gathering
clouds, be they no bigger than a handsbreadth.
But the heavens were a brass blaze by day and a glittering mask of
stars by night. Weather machine or none, in truth it seemed that it
had forgotten to rain.
* * * * *
Hilary was hard put to it to restrain the impatience of his men.
Reports drifted in from the scouts. The premature revolt had been
crushed in blood and agony. New York was deserted except for the
Mercutians. The country round had been ruthlessly rayed; not only had
the armed bands of Earthmen been ferreted out and destroyed, but
peaceful communities had been wantonly burned into the ground.
Strong reinforcements had been rushed to the Great New York territory
from more peaceful sectors of the world. There were three of the
terrible diskoids hovering within a radius of one hundred miles, ready
to loose their hideous destruction at the slightest sign of
disaffection.
But this time the spirit of the Earthmen was not broken. Their gait
was springier, their glance more forthright than heretofore. For every
one knew that Hilary Grendon, the prime mover, the defier of the
Mercutians, had escaped. The invaders sought him ceaselessly, offering
huge rewards for knowledge of his whereabouts. But there were no
traitors. Even these few who knew would suffer unimaginable tortures
rather than reveal him to the enemy.
"Patience," Hilary counseled his little band. "I know it is hard; I
have my own scores to even. But we could only bring disaster upon
ourselves and the cause of Earth's freedom by premature action. What
have we? A handful of men, poorly armed. A few pistols; only, three of
which can use the dynol pellets; a little ammunition. The rest of you
have knives, axes, pitchforks. Poor enough weapons against the
terrible rays of the Mercutians. We must wait."
Someone grumbled. "For what? Until the Mercutians finally trace our
hideout and ray us out of existence?"
"We must take that chance," Hilary told him quietly. "Let it but rain,
and we move at once."
"It never will," someone averred with profound conviction.
* * * * *
It began to seem so as the days passed, and the sun blazed pitilessly
as ever. The brief night showers had ceased completely. That seemed
the only effect of the weather machine's destruction. Some of the
weaker spirits among the men were for disbanding. They were afraid of
eventual discovery; anxious about their families, left to the tender
mercies of the outlanders. Hilary argued, dissuaded, but to no effect.
They were determined to go. If by the end of the week there was no
action, they said, they would leave. It was Wednesday then.
Thursday and Friday passed. No change. On Saturday a scout brought
breathless tidings. One of the great diskoids had crashed to the
ground from its station fifty miles up in a smother of flame and
flying fragments. No one knew what had happened; the Mercutians of
course threw a strict censorship about the affair.
But rumors flew on winged whisperings. Some war vessel from space had
attacked the Mercutian, brought it down. More diskoids were rushed to
New York; there were five now menacing the territory.
Grim looked steadily at Hilary when the news was brought to them. A
momentary wild hope flared in his friend's eye that died out quickly.
"I know what you're going to say," said Hilary. "You think it is Wat
Tyler and Joan, somehow escaped in the _Vagabond_."
The giant nodded slowly. "Why not?" he challenged.
"It's impossible," muttered the other. "Where could they have been all
this time? Surely they would have returned to this place. And you
forget that Mercutian guard who was freed. No, my friend, they have
been killed, the _Vagabond_ seized, and that was the end to that."
Morgan shook his head skeptically.
* * * * *
Saturday was cloudless. Sunday morning the malcontents were to leave,
to dribble back quietly to their homes. They were sullen, defiant in
the face of the openly expressed scorn of the loyal men, but
determined.
"No use getting ourselves killed for nothing," they muttered.
Double sentries were posted that night. A gloom hung over the camp.
Hilary went to sleep heavy-hearted. This seemed the end of all his
visions. Joan dead, Wat too; no hope of freeing the Earth from its
slavery. If only he had the _Vagabond_, he'd take off again for the
uncharted reaches of spaces, find some little habitable asteroid, live
out the rest of his meaningless life there. With these gloomy thoughts
he fell at last into fitful slumber.
He was awakened, hours later by a sudden uproar. The camp was in
confusion. Sleepy voices tossed back and forth in inextricable babble.
Hilary was on his feet in an instant, instinctively slipping his
automatic into his blouse. Grim looked huge at his side, unperturbed.
"What's happened?" Hilary shouted to make himself heard.
"Don't know," grunted the other, "but we'll soon find out."
He pushed massively through the milling crowd of sleep-frightened men
like a ship shouldering the waves, Hilary in his wake. One of the
sentinels appeared suddenly before them.
"You," spat Hilary, "why aren't you at your post?"
The man saluted automatically and gasped.
"The Mercutians have come."
"What do you mean?" Hilary demanded, as a groan went up.
* * * * *
"One of the weak-kneed men, sir," the sentry ejaculated, "wouldn't
wait until morning to make his get-away. We found him climbing out.
Said it would be dangerous in broad daylight. He was in a terrible
funk. We had no orders to stop anyone who wanted to leave, so we just
jeered him, and let him go. My comrade leaned out to watch.
"As he hit the ground, he was bathed suddenly in light. The next
instant the blackness of the night was split by a sizzling flame. It
crisped the poor fellow to a cinder, and sheared the head of my
comrade clean off. I caught the body, pulled it back into the dugout,
but it was too late.
"I knew what had happened, sir. Some damned Mercutian flying patrol
had spotted us with their search beam. I didn't wait for more, but
scrambled out of the dugout as fast as I could. Up above I saw a
one-man flier slanting down for me. It was a-sparkle, ready for
another ray. I came down the ladder in a hurry, I tell you."
The man was panting, white-faced. Someone cried: "It's all over;
they'll smother us in now."
Hilary swung around. It would take very little to start a panic.
"Stop that," he said sharply. "Now is no time to play the coward." He
turned again to the sentinel.
"A one-man flier, you said?" he reflected aloud.
"Yes, sir," the other answered, "and I'll bet he's calling for help
right now."
"That's just what I intend putting a stop to," said Hilary grimly. He
shifted his gun to an easier drawing position, swung himself aloft on
the ladder. "Take over, Grim, until I come back," he shouted down.
"If I don't, send others up to get that Mercutian."
"Come down," Grim yelled after him, alarmed. "I'll go up; you're the
leader here."
"That's why it's my job. So long."
The men stared up after the tiny ascending figure, lumps in their
throats. They would die gladly for Hilary Grendon now; he was proving
himself. Grim fumed and waited. Hilary had disappeared above the
angled bend.