“What is it, Thorndyke? What are you looking at?” And the American
slowly left the bed and approached his friend.
Thorndyke only held the curtain further back and watched Johnston's face
as he looked through the wide plate-glass window.
“My gracious!” ejaculated the latter as he drew nearer. It was a
wondrous scene. The building in which they were imprisoned stood on a
gentle hill clad in luxuriant, smoothly-cut grass and ornamented with
beautiful flowers and plants; and below lay a splendid city--a city
built on undulating ground with innumerable grand structures of white
marble, with turrets, domes and pinnacles of gold. Wide streets paved
in polished stone and bordered with lush-green grass interspersed with
statues and beds and mounds of strange plants and flowers stretched away
in front of them till they were lost in the dim, misty distance. Parks
filled with pavilions, pleasure-lakes, fountains and tortuous drives and
walks, dotted the landscape in all directions.
Thorndyke's breath had clouded the glass of the window, and he rubbed
it with his handkerchief. As he did so the sash slowly, and without
a particle of sound, slid to one side, disclosing a narrow balcony
outside. It had a graceful balustrade, made of carved red-and-white
mottled marble, and on the end of the balcony facing the city sat a
great gold and silver jug, ten feet high, of rare design. The spout was
formed by the body of a dragon with wings extended; the handle was a
serpent with the extremity of its tail coiled around the neck of the
jug.
The air that came in at the window was fresh and dewy, and laden with
the most entrancing odors. Thorndyke led the way out, treading very
gently at first. Johnston followed him, too much surprised to make any
comment. From this position, their view to the left round the corner of
the building was widened, and new wonders appeared on every hand.
Over the polished stone pavements strange vehicles ran noiselessly, as
if the wheels had cushioned tires, and the streets were crowded with an
active, strangely-clad populace.
“Look at that!” exclaimed the American, and from a street corner they
saw a queer-looking machine, carrying half-a-dozen passengers, rise like
a bird with wings outspread and fly away toward the east. They watched
it till it disappeared in the distance.
“We are indeed in wonderland,” said the Englishman; “I can't make head
nor tail of it. We were on an isolated island, the Lord only knows
where, and have suddenly been transported to a new world!”
“I can't feel at all as if we were in the world we were born in,”
returned Johnston. “I feel strange.”
“The wine,” suggested the Englishman, “you know it did wonders for us in
that subwater thing.”
“No; the wine has nothing to do with it. My head never was clearer. The
very atmosphere is peculiar. The air is invigorating, and I can't get
enough of it.”
“That is exactly the way I feel,” was Thorndyke's answer.
“Look at the sunlight,” went on Johnston; “it is gray like our dawn, but
see how transparent it is. You can look through it for miles and miles.
It is becoming pink in the east, the sun will soon be up, and I am
curious to see it.”
“It must be up now, but we cannot see it for the hills and buildings. My
goodness, see that!” and the Englishman pointed to the east. A flood of
delicate pink light was now pouring into the vast body of gray and
was slowly driving the more sombre color toward the west. The line
of separation was marked--so marked, indeed, that it seemed a vast,
rose-colored billow rolling, widening and sweeping onward like a swell
of the ocean shoreward. On it came rapidly, till the whole landscape was
magically changed. The flowers, the trees, the grass, the waters of the
lakes, the white buildings, the costumes of the people in the streets,
even the sky, changed in aspect. The white clouds looked like fire-lit
smoke, and far toward the west rolled the long line of pink still
struggling with the gray and driving it back.
The sun now came into sight, a great bleeding ball of fire slowly rising
above the gilded roofs in the distance.
“By Jove, look at our shadows!” exclaimed Johnston, and both men gazed
at the balcony floor in amazement; their shadows were as clearly defined
and black as silhouettes. “How do you account for that?” continued
the American, “I am firmly convinced that this sun is not the orb that
shines over my native land.”
Thorndyke laughed, but his laugh was forced. “How absurd! and yet--” He
extended his hand over the balustrade into the rosy glow, and
without concluding his remark held it back into the shadow of the
window-casement. “By Jove!” he exclaimed; “there is not a particle of
warmth in it. It is exactly the same temperature in the shade as in the
light.” He moved back against the wall. “No; there is no difference; the
blamed thing doesn't give out any warmth.”
Johnston's hands were extended in the light. “I believe you are right,”
he declared in awe, “something is wrong.”
At that moment appeared from the room behind them a handsome youth,
attired in a suit of scarlet silk that fitted his athletic figure
perfectly. He rapped softly on the window-casement and bowed when they
turned.
“Your breakfast is waiting for you,” he announced. They followed him
into a room adjoining the one they had occupied, and found a table
holding a sumptuous repast. The boy gave them seats and handed them
golden plates to eat upon. The fruits, wine and meats were very
appetizing, and they ate with relish.
“I believe we are to be conducted to the palace of your king to-morrow,”
ventured the Englishman to the boy.
The boy shook his head, but made no reply, and busied himself with
removing the dishes. As they were rising from the table, they heard
footsteps in the hall outside. The door opened. It was Captain Tradmos,
and he was accompanied by a tall, bearded man with a leather case under
his arm.
“You must undergo a medical examination,” the captain said smilingly.
“It is our invariable custom, but this is by a special order from the
king.”
Johnston shuddered as he looked at the odd-looking instruments the
medical man was taking from the case, but Thorndyke watched his
movements with phlegmatic indifference. He stood erect; threw back his
shoulders; expanded his massive chest and struck it with his clenched
fist in pantomimic boastfulness.
Tradmos smiled genially; but there was something curt and official in
his tone when he next spoke that took the Englishman slightly aback.
“You must bare your breast over your heart and lungs,” he said; and
while Thorndyke was unbuttoning his shirt, he and the medical man went
to the door and brought into the room a great golden bell hanging in a
metallic frame.
The bell was so thin and sensitive to the slightest jar or movement
that, although it had been handled with extreme care, the captives could
see that it was vibrating considerably, and the room was filled with a
low metallic sound that not only affected the ear of the hearer but set
every nerve to tingling. The medical man stopped the sound by laying his
hand upon the bell. To a tube in the top of the bell he fastened one end
of a rubber pipe; the other end was finished with a silver device shaped
like the mouth-piece of a speaking tube. This he firmly pressed over the
Englishman's heart. Thorndyke winced and bit his lip, for the
strange thing took hold of his flesh with the tenacity of a powerful
suction-pump.
“Ouch!” he exclaimed playfully, but Johnston saw that he had turned
pale, and that his face was drawn as if from pain.
“Hold still!” ordered the medical man; “it will be over in a minute;
now, be perfectly quiet and listen to the bell!”
The Englishman stood motionless, the sinews of his neck drawn and
knotted, his eyes starting from their sockets. Thorndyke felt the rubber
tube quiver suddenly and writhe with the slow energy of a dying snake,
and then from the quivering bell came a low, gurgling sound like a
stream of water being forced backward and forward.
Tradmos and the medical man stepped to the bell and inspected a small
dial on its top.
“What was that?” gasped the Englishman, purple in the face.
“The sound of your blood,” answered Tradmos, as he removed the
instrument from Thorndyke's flesh; “it is as regular as mine; you are
very lucky; you are slightly fatigued, but you will be sound in a day or
two.”
“Thank you,” replied the Englishman, but he sank into a chair, overcome
with weakness.
“Now, I'll take you, please,” said the medical man, motioning Johnston
to rise.
“I am slightly nervous,” apologized the latter, as he stood up and
awkwardly fumbled the buttons of his coat.
“Nervousness is a mental disease,” said the man, with professional
brusqueness; “it has nothing to do with the body except to dominate it
at times. If you pass your examination you may live to overcome it.”
The American looked furtively at Thorndyke, but the head of the
Englishman had sunk on his breast and he seemed to be asleep. Johnston
had never felt so lonely and forsaken in his life. From his childhood he
had entertained a secret fear that he had inherited heart disease, and
like Maupassant's “Coward,” who committed suicide rather than meet a
man in a duel, he had tried in vain to get away from the horrible,
ever-present thought by plunging into perilous adventures.
At that moment he felt that he would rather die than know the worst from
the uncanny instrument that had just tortured his strong comrade till he
was overcome with exhaustion.
“I never felt better in my life,” he said falteringly, but it seemed to
him that every nerve and muscle in his frame was withering through fear.
His tongue felt clumsy and thick and his knees were quivering as with
ague.
“Stand still,” ordered the physician sternly, and Johnston was further
humiliated by having Tradmos sympathetically catch hold of his arm to
steady him.
“Your people are far advanced in the sciences,” went on the physician
coldly, “but there are only a few out of their number who know that the
mind governs the body and that fear is its prime enemy. Five minutes ago
you were eating heartily and had your share of physical strength, and
yet the mere thought that you are now to know the actual condition of
your most vital organ has made you as weak as an infant. If you kept up
this state of mind for a month it would kill you.
“Now listen,” he went on, as the instrument gripped Johnston's flesh and
the rubber tube began to twist and move as if charged with electricity.
The American held his breath. A sound as of water being forced through
channels that were choked, mingled with a wheezing sound like wind
escaping from a broken bellows came from the bell.
“Your frame is all right,” said the medical man, as he released the
trembling American, “but you have long believed in the weakness of your
heart and it has, on that account, become so. You must banish all fear
from your thoughts. You perhaps know that we have a place specially
prepared for those who are not physically sound. I am sorry that you do
not stand a better examination.”
Tradmos regarded the American with a look of sympathy as he gave him a
chair and then rang a bell on the table. Thorndyke looked up sleepily,
as an attendant entered with a couple of parcels, and glanced
wonderingly at his friend's white face and bloodshot eyes.
“What's the matter?” he asked; but Johnston made no reply, for the
captain had opened the parcels and taken out two suits of silken
clothing.
“Put them on,” he said, giving a suit of gray to Johnston and one of
light blue to Thorndyke. “We shall leave you to change your attire, and
I shall soon come for you.”