WE SEE THE STARS
When facing the dangers, mysteries, horrors (and other things) of our
descent to this strange and wonderful subterranean land of Drome, how
often did I say to myself:
"If ever I get out of this, never anything like it again!"
And I truly believed it at the time, though I should have known
better. I should have known--I _did_ know that adventure and mystery
have inexplicable and most dreadful charms. Indeed, the more fearful
the Unknown, the more eager a man (one who has heard the Siren song
which adventure and mystery sing) is to penetrate to its secret
places--unless, indeed, the charms of some Lepraylya or Drorathusa
entwine themselves about the heart. In my case--well, _Amor ordinem
nescit_.
Here was I in the Golden City; here was everything, _it would seem
to another_, that could conduce to contentment, to that peace of mind
which is dearer that all. And yet I was restless and very unhappy.
And the Unknown was calling, calling and calling for me to come. To
what? Perhaps to wonders the like of which Science never has dreamed.
Perhaps to horrors and mysteries from which the imagination of even
a Dante or a Doré would shrink, would flee in mad terror--things
nameless, worse than any seen in a horrible dream.
But I wanted to go. Yes, I _would_ go. I would go into that fearful
land of Grawngrograr--discover its mysteries or perish in the attempt.
And I am going, too. That journey has not been abandoned, only delayed.
It was like this.
I was drawing up, in my mind, tentative plans (my purpose was yet a
secret) when one day Milton Rhodes came in, and, after smiling in
somewhat enigmatic fashion for some moments, he suddenly asked:
"I say, Bill, how would you like to see the stars, the sun again?"
"The sun? Milton, what do you mean?"
"That I am going back to the surface, out onto the snow and ice of
Rainier, back to Seattle. I thought that you would want to go along."
"What in the world," I exclaimed, "are you going back for?"
"There are many things that we ought to have here in Drome; a book of
logarithms, the best that I can get, is one of them. We'll get those
things, or as many as we can, for it would, of course, be impossible
to bring them all. We'll wind up our sublunary affairs, and, hurrah,
then back to Drome! What do you say to that, old _tillicum_?"
"What does Lepraylya say?"
"That I may go; otherwise, of course, there would be no going. At first
she wouldn't even hear of it. She feared that it might be impossible
for us to maintain secrecy--that some of our precious politicians might
get down into Drome. I am sure she believes that the kingdom would
have more to fear from half a dozen of those sons of Proteus than from
an army of sixty thousand men. And, bless her heart, when I think
of some of their blunders, asininity, hypocrisy, lying, stupidity,
coat-turning and sheer insanity, I am of opinion that there is not much
exaggeration, if any, in that idea of hers.
"But I have at last gained her consent. With our large party, there can
not be any danger."
I was not sure of that, but I kept those thoughts to myself.
"Of course, I want to go," I told him. "But I want to come back to
Drome."
"Most assuredly, Bill, we'll come back to Drome."
"But," said I, "there is something that I don't understand."
"Which is what?"
"We _can't_ keep our great discovery a secret. And, as soon as our
world has it, adventurers, spoilers, crooks, thieves and worse will
come swarming down that passage. We'll loose upon our poor Dromans a
horde of Pizarros."
"Did I think for one single moment that what you say, or anything like
it, would follow, never one step would I take towards the sun. You
say that we can not keep the discovery of Drome a secret; we can,
and we will--until such time as it will not matter. We will come out
onto the glacier in the nighttime. Our ways of egress--I suppose we'll
have to tunnel our way out through the ice, that there will not be
any accommodating crevasse--will be most carefully concealed. No one
will see us come out. No one will know of our journeys to and from the
Tamahnowis Rocks, for they will be made under cover of darkness. No one
will know.
"Fortunately, by the way, as it now turns out," he added, "when we
adopted the Droman dress, we did not throw away our pants et cetera,
and so, though those clothes are somewhat the worse for wear, our
appearance up there on Mount Rainier will cause no remark."
"But our showing up at home," I said, "after so long an absence will
cause plenty of remarks and more than remarks. How will we answer all
the questions that they will surely ask us?"
"Tut, tut!" smiled Milton. "If all our difficulties could be so easily
resolved as that!"
"But how will we do it?"
"We won't answer them, Bill; we'll keep them guessing."
"But suppose we find that Scranton has let out something that will give
them a pretty good idea as to what has happened?"
"That might be bad," answered Rhodes. "But I have every confidence
in Scranton's discretion. He will, I feel sure, maintain that utter
silence which I requested, until the period designated expires.
Possibly he may never tell what he knows.
"I believe, however," he went on, "that we ought to leave the world,
our world, a record of the discovery. I will set down to the extent
that time permits those things which, in my opinion, will interest the
scientific world. As for the discovery itself, the journey and our
adventures, yours, Bill, is the hand to record that."
"A record?" I exclaimed. "Then why all this secrecy, this moving
under cover of darkness and pussy-footing around if you are going to
broadcast the discovery of Drome to the whole world?"
"Because we will then have left that world and the way to this will
have been blasted up and otherwise closed."
"That," I told him, "will never keep them out."
"I believe that it will. And, if any one ever does find his way down,
he'll never return to the surface; he'll spend the rest of his days
here in Drome, even if he lives to be as old as Methuselah. Be sure
that you put that into the record! The Dromans are human, and so they
are not quite saints. But their land is never going to be infested with
plunderers or any of our sons of Proteus if I can prevent it, and I
feel confident that I can.
"This closing of the way will not mean complete isolation. At any
rate, I hope that it will not. For I feel confident that ere very long
the two worlds will communicate with each other by radio. There is a
possibility, too, though that possibility is indeed a very remote one,
that each will even _see_, by means of television, the inhabitants and
the marvels of the other."
One or two weird things befell us during our return journey, but time
presses and I can not pause to record them here.
The party was composed of picked men, one of whom was Ondonarkus. We
had one ape-bat.
This going up was a more difficult business, I want to tell you, than
our going down had been. There was one consolation: we did not get lost.
Onward and upward we toiled, and at last, on the 28th of June, we
reached the Tamahnowis Rocks. Thanks to Rhodes' chronometer-watch and
the very careful record which he had kept, we knew the very hour.
This was about ten o'clock in the morning. The way out was completely
blocked by the ice. Cool air, however, was flowing in through fissures
and clefts in the walls and the roof of the tunnel.
We waited until along towards midnight, for fear some one might be
about, that some sound might reveal the secret of the rock.
It was about ten o'clock when we began to dig our way out through the
ice. The tunnel was not driven out into the glacier but up alongside
the rock wall, through the edge of the ice-stream.
Hurrah! At last our passage was through!
And, as old Dante has it,
"_Thence issuing we again beheld the stars._"