A Plunge into Space

Prologue

7 II. A FOREST FOUNDRY ig III. THE INDIAN'S FATE 32 IV. THE STEEL GLOEE 44 V. A TERRIBLE VENTURE ....... 56 VI. AN AWFUL PLUNGE 70 VII. SAILING THROUGH STACE 75 VIII. THE PLANET MAIfS 86 IX. PARADISE ! 99 X. A STRANGE VISION IO9 XI. MIGNONETTE I25 XII. THE OLD STORY I34 XIII. A MARTIAN DRAMA 143 XIV. A CITY OF DELIGHT . CONTENTS. 6 CHAP. PAGE XV. THE MILLENNIUM 170 XVI. THE PROFESSOR'S CHOICE lS6 XVII. POOR MIGNONETTE ........ I97 XVIII. GOOD-BYE TO MARS AND MIGNONETTE .... 215 XIX. THE STOWAWAY 224 XX. THE END

Chapter I. Prologue

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" It moves at last ! MacGregor, it moves .'" " Why not ? Let it move again, by all means." After a few moments' silence MacGregor said in the same careless voice, which contrasted strongly with the quivering breathless accents of the first speaker : " Come out of that wizard's cave, Barnett, and be social. Consider that it is more than three years since I have seen your profoundly scientific face. Let that thing, whatever it is, move as much as it likes, and let me have a look at you." From an inner room opening off that in which Mac- Gregor sat, the excited voice came nervously : " Hush, for mercy's sake ; just one minute more ! " Then, at the sound of MacGregor's footsteps crossing the room, there was almost a scream : " Don't come near me, MacGregor. Don't stir for your life. Remain where you are at your peril."

" I am not at all likely to visit you, I assure you," Alexander MacGregor muttered. " I don't want to blow up half the square by treading on the spring of one of your infernal machines, or by brushing my head inadver tently against some of your wires, knobs, buttons, or batteries — Beard a lion in his den ! What's a lion's den to a scientist's laboratory ! " With this reflection Mr. MacGregor settled himself comfortably on a low couch by a bright fire in the cosy little room, lit his pipe, and waited for his eccentric host to appear. It was pleasant enough to lie there and smoke, and listen lazily to the faint click — click — hiss — and anon a tiny explosion which sounded incessantly in the inner room, and watch with drowsy eyes the curious flashes of blue, red, or white light which sparkled through the curtained doorway.

The reclining guest was neither surprised nor hurt at the cool reception he had received. In fact, he was rather amused. It was so characteristic of Barnett. " What a strange creature he is ! " came dreamily through the smoke wreaths. " Here am I, just arrived in London from Tibet, where I have been exploring for three years, and have been reported as dead at least a dozen times. I enter the house of my oldest friend. He tells me not

PROLOGUE.

. 9 to stir for my life ; not to come near him at my peril ! Hospitable, certainly ! But it's all right ; he is inventing something ; he will have a lucid interval presently. Meantime, I am very comfortable." The explorer had almost dropped asleep, when a stifled exclamation, more like a sob than a sentence, in the laboratory aroused him. As he listened to the deep breathing of his friend, who was now oblivious of every thing but his experiment, MacGregor said half sadly to himself : " Poor Barnett ; what a splendid fellow he was at Cambridge long ago ! That den of his will be his death ! " The " den," indeed, was an excellent specimen of those factories incidental to civilisation, where you put in raw material, in the shape of human beings, at one end, and turn out an equal number of perfect machines at the other — excepting, of course, those brittle souls which go to smash in the process.

Henry Barnett had spent the best years of his life in this room. He had disappeared into it, some twenty years before, a straight, muscular young man, with a rather large head. He now emerged from it to greet MacGregor, a stooped and wasted middle-aged man, with a head out of all proportion to his shrivelled frame. "Whatever is the matter with you, Barnett?" Mac- Gregor asked anxiously. The singular host did not shake hands with his guest, nor extend to him the slightest form of welcome. He trembled visibly, and his breath came in broken gasps as he said, without a word of explanation : " MacGregor, you have arrived at an opportune moment." " Humph ! It looks like it. I have been here an hour." "Yes, MacGregor," Henry Barnett went on, without noticing the interruption; "I am grateful for your visit this evening of all ethers."

" Don't mention it, Barnett. Tour instinct of hos pitality is too keen," the explorer remarked coolly, as he refilled his pipe. Barnett went to a sideboard, poured out a glass of water, and drank it off, Then he mopped his forehead with his handkerchief and wiped his moist and trembling hands. " He's out of his mind, as sure as fate. I must carry him off to the seaside for a month," MacGregor reflected. The scientist recrossed the room, and said impres sively : " Alexander MacGregor, come with me into my work shop." This new trick of ceremoniously addressing the com panion of half a lifetime confirmed MacGregor's sus picions.

PROLOGUE.

. 11 " I — I — would rather not, Barnett. I am not much of a coward, but I — I don't like those confounded wires and springs and things. I'll be certain to blow up some of your electric devilries." " No, no, there is no danger. Come with me." " Ahem ! — Well, I suppose I must." The two men entered the inner room together. To the casual observer their movements would have suggested burglary. Barnett walked unsteadily ; his failing con stitution had just received a severe shock. His limbs hardly supported him. And MacGregor, great brown bearded, stern-eyed, leather-visaged traveller as he was — hero of a hundred sights with man and beast and natural forces, bears in the Rockies, blacks in the Congo, simooms in Arabia, and cyclones in the China seas — he wriggled along in a ridiculous tiptoe fashion.

The laboratory was not very terrifying in appearance. It was a dusty little chamber. " Cleaning up " was un known to it. The voice of the painter had not been beard in it for many a day, or year. Even the evidence of the more humble plasterer's handicraft was sadly lack ing. But what it wanted in decoration it made up for in the quaintness of its furniture. Here were tiers of little moth-eaten drawers. There lay great coils of wire. Wide-mouthed bottles, glass tubes of various shapes, air pumps, chemical balances, crucibles, and spirit lamps were strewn about in great confusion. Electric machines of novel design were ranged beside the types familiar to every student. Fragments of a curious grey substance were lying amid pieces of metallic leaf aud little balls of elder-pith and downy feathers.

The room was a medley of ordinary and extraordinary devices. "Read that," Barnett said, thrusting a paper covered with figures, letters, signs, and tokens, into MacGregor's baud. "It is very interesting — very interesting indeed," MacGregor remarked with a wise look. The paper was as unintelligible to him as Egyptian hieroglyphics. But poor Barnett's mind was evidently unhinged ; it was necessary to be gentle with him. " What do you think of it ? " Barnett asked eagerly. 11 Think of it ! " MacGregor exclaimed, driven into a corner. " Oh, as to that, I dare say it is all right." Then blankly, as he turned the paper upside down, looked at it on this side and on that : " What is it all about ? " Barnett snatched the paper back impatiently. " Do you see that ball?" he asked, with a shade of contempt in his voice which nettled MacGregor, in spite of bis previous compassion.

Whereupon the explorer declared, with some asperity, that his intelligence was equal to the moderate task appointed. The ball, a tiny sphere, was lyiDg in a tube of glass. This tube stood in an upright position on a plate of that strange grey material; whether it was vegetable or mineral, MacGregor could not decide.

PROLOGUE.

. 13 " Watch it now!" Barnett laid the end of a thin wire on the grey substance. The ball within the tube flew to its upper end and remained there, suspended, as it were, by a magnet. The scientist literally shook in his shoes with excite ment. The explorer politely pretended to admire the experiment, but privately thought it uninteresting. " Ha ! Very pretty ! " he remarked by way of compliment. " Pretty, MacGregor ! Think what you are saying ! " " Well, I mean that it is " Barnett interrupted with a gesture. " Listen to me," he said in a voice that strengthened as he went on, while his bent frame straightened out, and his pale, deep-lined face flushed red. " In this room I have worked for twenty years." " More fool ! " MacGregor muttered. " Twenty years devoted, consecrated to a glorious work !

You, my friend MacGregor, like all my neighbours, have, I doubt not, pitied me as a poor enthusiast — a mere theorist, whose dreary years dragged slowly by in a useless sequence of drivelling dreams." MacGregor made a deprecating gesture. " You have pitied me because I rotted within these four walls while you climbed the snowy mountain peak, or sailed the heaving seas. You have wondered, I am sure, how slowly passed my lonely days in such a dismal a den. Bah ! My years were as days, and my days but moments." MacGregor became attentive. There may have been some strong purpose in this weak-minded dreamer after all. He listened intently as Barnett, carried away by his own thoughts, declaimed with unconscious dramatic force : "You, MacGregor, have done good service to your country and, indeed, to your race.

You have tracked many a mighty river to its hitherto unknown source ; you have plunged into gloomy forests, impenetrable until your restless feet had gauged their depths ; and you have your reward. I ask, do you now regret the lonely years spent in Africa, Asia, on the Pacific, Arctic and Antarctic seas ? " " No," said MacGregor emphatically and with increas ing interest. Barnett might be mad, but even a madman must be unconscionably silly to render his praise of one's own hobby unwelcome. " Are you better satisfied to stand here, the greatest explorer the world has known (MacGregor shook his head negatively, but not displeased), or, for the saving of a few streaks of grey in your hair and lines on your face, would you prefer to have passed your life in the sodden atmosphere of ignoble ease ? " " No ! " MacGregor shouted fiercely. " Then, do you pity me now when I tell you that I have discovered "

PROLOGUE.

. 15 He sprang to the window, and tore the curtains aside. The night was clear. A white hoar-frost lay on the patch of trampled grass which the genteel suburban residents called a park. The sky glistened with starry brilliance. " Look, MacGregor ! " Both men gazed up at that vast sidereal host of heaven, whose fearful immensity appals a finite mind. Barnett lowered his voice to a solemn cadence, and con tinued : ' ' Do you pity me now when I tell you that after twenty paltry years of work, I have discovered the origin and essence of that law which, before me, never man did aught but name, or, at best, did but chronicle its known effects — the law which makes that universe of worlds a grand well-ordered army instead of a helpless mob of mu tually destroying forces ; when I tell you that within this ragged room, there stands a man who — grant him but ten years of human life — could sway a star in its course, could hurl a planet from its path ?

Man, I have discovered the mightiest secret of creation ! " He stopped abruptly, his deep emotion had overcome his power of speech. He clasped and unclasped his hands nervously. His face worked convulsively. The man was overwhelmed by the majesty of his own discovery, now that the end — notwithstanding it had long been foreseen — was come. " Barnett, Barnett, are you really mad ? " " Yes, mad enough, for I hold in my brain that which a human soul may hardly keep and hope to live." "To drop this rhodomontade, Barnett, what the devil is it you have discovered ? You said my visit was opportune — I assume you mean to tell me." " I do." " Then out with it in plain English. In what have your experiments culminated ? " " I have discovered the origin " He bent lower, and whispered hoarsely " Of— force !

" " Come out, Barnett. This room is suffocatiug," Mac- Gregor exclaimed feverishly. They sat down in the adjoining room. Neither spoke for some time. In a sense, the silence was oppressive, but each man was too busy with his own thoughts to break it. The fire burned low ; neither replenished it. A gas jet flamed and fumed. Neither attended to it. And yet both felt the room grow cold, and both were wearied by the persistent whistle of the gas jet. MacGregor spoke at last. " Will you describe to me exactly, Barnett, how you expect to use this great discovery ? " " I am unable as yet to collect my thoughts suffi ciently to be intelligible. I am still dazed, stupefied. Remember that, after twenty years of work, the actual climax of the discovery is hardly an hour old,"

PROLOGUE.

. 17 " Granted ; but at least you can name some main tendency of the inventions which you will found on this knowledge." " Yes, I could name one." " And that is- "The experiment with the glass tube shows that the law of gravitation may be diverted, directed, or destroyed. I can elaborate and perfect the mechanism necessary for the development of this discovery. The results must be such as would at present appear inconceivable." MacGregor leaped to his feet. It was his turn now. " listen to me, Henry Barnett," he said, unconsciously imitating the other man's stilted style and melodramatic tones. " You shall develop that mechanism." Here he brought down his great brown fist with a bang on the table near which Barnett sat. This table was not a costly piece of furniture, and that portion of it which met the impact of MacGregor's fist was a movable leaf, not very strongly supported.

The moth-eaten woodwork gave way and fell on the scholar's slippered feet ! " Oh bother it ! I did not know it was so flimsy. I beg your pardon a thousand times, Barnett." But the scholar would not be comforted — and he who could hurl a planet from its path confessed to corns. It was impossible, MacGregor felt, to renew the heroic style. So he described in simple but vivid language, the scheme which had flashed into his active brain, whereby the grand discovery might be grandly used. Several hours passed in an eager discussion, and it was very late when the men thought of sleep. Before retiring to their rooms, they seized each other's hands in a long and meaning clasp, and each man pledged himself to devote his life to the furtherance of the great scheme, to record the history of which this book has been written.

Then, after some trivial remarks on current topics, they said " Good-night," in the most conventional accents, and separated. Thus simply ended the prologue to the strangest drama ever enacted by mortal man. CHAPTER EL A FOREST FOUNDRY. Within an Alaskan forest, Henry Barnett and Alexander MacGregor are seated on a pine trunk, conversing with languid interest. Their eyes turn frequently towards a pass in the lofty mountains by which their sheltered valley is surrounded on all sides. They are expecting visitors. It is the month of June. The mountains are still snow-capped, but in the valley the air is very warm ; roses are budding on the slope which faces due south. A year ago this valley had rarely borne a human footmark — once in a season, perhaps, a half-starved Indian may have crossed it.

Now hundreds of men live in it. It is situated in the richest mineral region of Alaska. Thfe mountain ranges around it contain the head waters of three of the Territory's most important rivers — the Copper, the White, and the Tanana. MacGregor has not changed one iota since that night when he visited his friend in a commonplace London suburb, and learned a fateful secret. His tanned face and hands could not have well become browner or more weather-beaten. His keen grey eyes could hardly havo sparkled with a brighter light than a lifetime of adventure had long since burned into them ; his frame could not have grown more stalwart, nor could his physical courage have been intensified. With Barnett it is different. His figure is more erect, his cheek less pale, his eyes brighter, and his whole bearing more robust than of old, when he spent all his days and half his nights in that little room, fittingly d'escribedby MacGregor as a " wizard's cave."

For nearly twelve months he has hardly opened a book, and instead he has wielded sledge and hammer. He has roamed the gorges of the Alaskan mountains while puzzling out some knotty point of science, instead of stewing in a musty room with an eight-foot ceiling. Above all, there is stamped upon his features the consciousness of success. The fitful conversation which the two men were keep ing up gradually ceased, until absolute science reigned — absolute silence only in so far as the speakers themselves were concerned, for from the woods behind there came noise enough for a shipyard. The din, which was at times almost deafening, did not seem to disturb either of the men. In fact they were not aware of it. They had grown accustomed to it. " See, here they come ! " MacGregor suddenly ex claimed, in great joy, pointing at the same time to a cleft in the mountain, through which a rough track ran.

In numbers they were a strong party, but their pace was slow, and every horse and every horseman showed symptoms of extreme fatigue. Five gentlemen rodo together in front. In the rear struggled a band of tired men on tired animals, driving, flogging, cursing on, a heavily loaded mule train. " Bravo, Sir George ! We shall dine to-night, Barnett," the brawny Scotchman said, with unction. " Trust Sterling to bring his larder— ay, and his cellar — with him. I would know those cases anywhere. Come, let us ride down and meet them. The least we can do is to bid them welcome to our Arcadian forest. Ugh ! hear that ! " A scream more demoniacal than usual had flung its nerve-splitting crash over the pine tops. " You had better go, MacGregor, and make my excuses. You know I do not ride comfortably." " Very well.

I shall not be long away." In a few moments MacGregor was mounted and canter ing smartly down the slope to meet the coming cavalcade. Barnett remained seated on the pine trunk. For some time his face had an anxious expression, and his brows were knit. Once or twice he muttered aloud, " How will it end ; how will it all end ? " Presently the look of care passed away, and he was just settled com fortably to some mental feat of strength — approximating the length of line required to sound the stellar depths, or some such simple conundrum — when MacGregor's loud voice brought him back with a jerk to terrestrial tri vialities. "Now then, gentlemen, come this way, and I shall pre sent you to the greatest man living, or who has ever yet lived. Afterwards you shall have your tubs, and we shall dine.

Delicious word ! So far we have only fed. To night we shall dine, thanks to your admirable commis sariat, Sterling." The men dismounted, and assembled in a group around Barnett, who had risen to meet them. By this time the sky was gloaming with the failing light of the setting sun. The pine trees threw gigantic shadows over the withered and down-trodden prairie grass. From behind the line of trees, to the astonishment of the new-comers, came that strange rumble and roar, and sounds as of mighty hammers crashing. Long streamers of leaping flame shot up blood-red against the sombre clouds, and played havoc with the stillness of the primeval forest. There was an eerie air of mystery about that mountain glen which every man acknowledged, save one — Mac- Gregor. He was in boisterously good spirits.

" Gentlemen," be said, facetiously, " you will please answer to your names." A look of amused consent flitted over the faces of the tired travellers. " Mr. Barnett, this is Sir George Sterling," waving bis hand towards a powerful man of full habit, dark whiskers, and a business-like air. " A financier in search of a new speculation. We shall be able to provide that. Don't you think so, my colleague ? " Barnett smiled gravely, and murmured some words of welcome as he shook hands with the capitalist. The man of money having been presented, MacGregor was less precise in his ceremonial with the other persons of the baser sort. "He merely ran over their names, and indicated their personality with a nod, thus : "Mr. Walter Durand" — a tall, handsome, dark-haired, dark-eyed man — " a literary man in search of a new plot." ' ' Mr. Victor Graves " — a fair-haired, bearded man, with a pipe — " an artist in search of a new subject."

" Mr. Charles Blake " — a mirthful-looking Irishman — " a politician in search of a post." "And Mr. Frederick Gordon" — a wiry, fleshless man, with a determined cast of features — " a special corre spondent in search of copy. " Barnett exchanged a courteous bow with each as his name was mentioned, and the introductions were over. MacGregor then led the way along a pathway through the trees. In a few minutes they reached a wide clearing, and found a long, low, wooden house, surrounded by a neatly kept grass plot. Hero they were to live for some pleasant, idle weeks. When the travellers had exchanged their wayworn clothes for fresh garments, they assembled in the large common room, or dining-hall. Dinner was served with something of the pomp and circumstance naturally attend ing that important ceremony.

It was a plentiful meal, if wanting in the more delicate details which turn a mere animal necessity into an important social function. The forest and the river, a tributary of the Copper, had been requisitioned for their very best. Salmon fresh run, river trout, rabbits, shoulder of tcbtiy, joint of caribou, moose nose, blue grouse, wild duck, and such toothsome viands, added to the vast array of cunningly preserved meats, and drinks, and relishes furnished by the baronet's huge packages, made no poor show upon the festive board. To men who had been in the saddle for a week in the lively air of the Alaskan hills, it was a royal feast. And it must not be forgotten that from the depths of Sir George's packages had also proceeded divers bottles, square in shape, and adorned with much sealing-wax about the corks, the contents of which not even a mule trot could spoil.

These seals were quickly broken, and the bottles square passed gaily round. Barnett sat silent and thoughtful, but MacGregor kept the company alternately thrilled and amused by well-told stories of his wild, rambling life. Under his genial in fluence, assisted possibly by the well-matured spirit in those great bottles, the men who had spent the previous week in vicious grumbling and almost openly avowed distaste for each other's society, began to wonder at their own stupidity. When had they enjoyed such a feast, or met such pleasant company? Why, every man was a prince of good fellows — now that they knew themselves aright ! When dinner was over, and cigars lighted, the com pany divided into two parties. One consisted of the baronet, MacGregor and Barnett. They, it was evident, had matters of business to discuss, and if one might judge from the long rows of figures, every row having on its left margin that mighty symbol £, their business was finance.

The other party fast increased and multiplied in their own and their companions' esteem. An interchange of confidences, which had been rigorously withheld for many weary days was now inevitable. " I say, Durand," the artist broke out; " suppose you tell us what your plans are — what brought you here, in point of fact." " You heard MacGregor," Durand answered, laughing. " A new plot." " Rubbish ! You don't expect a new plot in this primeval region. Blake might as well look here for his post." " What, then, about your new subject ? " " And what about my ' copy ' ? " Gordon put in. "Suppose we all give our experiences," Blake suggested. " Perhaps in that way we may find out what brought us all here. You begin Durand." " Well, then," Durand said, " I got a letter from Mac- Gregor consisting of about four lines, telling me that if I wanted to make the sensational writers green with envy, I must come out by the S.S. Arizona, which sailed, as you know, on the 15th of last month.

Of course he gave me particulars as to where the guides would meet us when the little steamer from Vancouver Island, which he had chartered, set us ashore. I knew the man so well that I never doubted but he had his eye on some new ground in China, or Central Asia, or some other out landish place. I had nothing else to do. The beaten track of the British novelist is inconveniently crowded at present, so here I am." "I received a similar note," Gordon said. "Mac- Gregor told me that if I wanted to lay the names of all the ' specials ' who have gone before me in the dust, I should book my passage in the Arizona. I did feel that I should like to carry out this suggestion, and so here I am. Graves, the artist, had a similar experience. In his case, he was to put the entire school of artistic masters, old and young, in the shade, and as he found that to hit off his ambition pretty closely, he came likewise.

" Faith," said Blake, " he promised me a post, and, as things go nowadays, I never dreamed of asking what it was." "Nor whether you were qualified to fill it?" Durand asked drily. " Qualified ! My dear fellow, I am qualified for any thing ; " hastily, " I mean any post. I am a politician." " If we did not know MacGregor so well," Gordon said again, " don't you think we might all feel rather silly now that we are here and have found — a wooden house, or hut, and a primeval forest enlivened only by that infernal din of hammering somewhere near." " Don't be afraid of losing your time. MacGregor is sure to keep his word," Durand said positively. " I venture to say he will surprise us all before long." He certainly did surprise them, and that too before ten minutes had elapsed. His voice broke in upon their conversation.

" Now gentlemen, the night air is cold, although the days at this season are very warm here. Light fresh cigars, put on your heavy cloaks, aud we shall show you our works." "Your what?" " Our works." " What sort of works, in the name of wonder ? " " Smelting works, foundries, coal mines, iron mines, steam hammers, furnaces, winches, cranes, tool shops and all the rest. Come along." MacGregor walked out followed by Barnett and Sir George Sterling. For some moments the other men looked at each other in amazement. Then they followed their hosts. A short avenue ran through a dense wood which clothed one of the low sloping hills near the hut. This should have been as dark as midnight. To the wonder of the bewildered strangers it was as bright as noon. Two rows of powerful electric lights lined the pathway, one on either side, and between them the party walked.

What might be called the solid men of the company — that is, the scientist, the explorer, and the capitalist — walked in front. The others — who, take them as you will, but look on and talk about, write about, paint about, or report about what men of action achieve — walked, as in duty bound, behind. As might be expected, each party criticised the other. " What do you fellows think of our scientific friend ? " Durand asked. " He seems a nice sort of man, if he were not so supernaturally calm and quiet. Still, there is something out of the common about him," Gordon replied. " I wonder where MacGregor picked him up, and what he means to do with him. That introduction was pretty strong — ' the greatest man who ever lived ' — and so forth ! " "Oh, he is MacGregor's trump card in this business, whatever it is," Blake declared.