Part 23

"Yes, that is it! No one was there--except Radium, the influence from the great globe hanging above us. Here, you see, it does many more things than it does in your outside world. It is really the eye of the cave--and sometimes the arm. Although its light does not, as you know, extend into the outer cave, it reflects here, within this circle, whatever is lighted up beyond there. When you came in with your torches I was able to follow you by this means--very obscurely, of course, because torches throw only a small circle of light. I could hardly make you out, but I felt sure who you were. I was expecting you. And then, because I needed you here and feared you might grow tired of so long a journey, I shut the entrance to the cave so you could not escape. That is where radium works like an arm. It can carry an electric force, an irresistible current, without using wire. For our own safety we have this force connected with the entrance to the cave. When that entrance is open and we want to close it, this force is released and moves a great rock that glides into place across the passageway, where it seems to be a part of the wall on either side."

This dissertation from Sajipona on the uses to which radium had been put in her kingdom was amazing enough to Leighton's trained, careful mind. In his own studies of radium activity he had failed to find any indication of the possibility even for the development of the sensational features that were now given to him as accomplished, familiar fact. For one thing, science was restricted in its experiments by the small quantity of radium within its reach. Here the amount, estimating the size of the fiery globe above him, was measured by the hundreds of tons--a fact, of course, that must greatly increase the field over which radium might be made to operate. Nevertheless, except for this vague theory that an unknown power could be developed from a great mass of this marvelous substance, suspended in a great chamber, or series of chambers, not subject to the ordinary outside influences of heat and light and air, it was difficult to find a reasonable explanation for the things that Sajipona told him and that he himself had seen. Most astounding it was, also, to a modern scientist, brought up in the methods and limited by the views of his age, to discover here a development in physics, beyond the dreams of the most daring investigator, that actually belonged to a primitive race, and was first practiced by them in a period and country without scientific culture. The whole affair, indeed, furnished an instance where science seemed to overstep the borderland of the miraculous. It was as marvelous, after all, as the familiar achievements of wireless or the cinema would have been if suddenly presented to the world of half a century ago.

Enjoying the savant's bewilderment, Sajipona described more of the cave's wonders. Her forefathers, she said, had discovered a way to imitate the changes from day to night by a simple process of veiling and unveiling the ball of radium. This was found necessary in order to create the right variations between growth and a state of rest in vegetation. When circumstances made it desirable to use the cave as a permanent habitation, it was found that this variation from light to darkness was indispensable to human welfare. Without it there could be little of the happiness that comes from the storing up and the subsequent expenditure of human energy. Discovering this, certain wise Indians among the cavemen of the past made further experiments in the regulation of light and heat. Among other things, these pioneers in a new science found that the color rays emanating from radium had different properties--some being more life-giving than others--and that by controlling these rays it was possible to create and develop various kinds of subterranean plants. They firmly believed, also, that by working along these lines it would be possible to arrive at new animal forms. Some remarkable experiments were made in this direction, but the results were too indefinite for practical purposes. The whole problem was therefore abandoned years ago, its unpopularity having been increased by the religious prejudice excited against it. This intrusion of what he regarded as blind superstition upon the profitable labors of science incensed Leighton, who muttered imprecations on the idolatries of barbarians. But in this he was checked by Sajipona, who declared that the religious beliefs of her people were in no sense more idolatrous than many of the beliefs current in the outside world. They had their fantastic legends, it is true--like the story of the god who, through the ascendancy of an evil rival, had been imprisoned for ages at the bottom of the Sacred Lake, whence he had been released by the prayers and sacrifices of his followers. Such legends the more enlightened regarded purely as fables, within which were conveyed certain truths that were of lasting value to mankind. The ignorant probably failed to recognize these truths underneath their coverings of legend. But it was not merely the ignorant, it was those who possessed a higher religious sense who were revolted by the effort to create animal life through artificial means. This feeling of antagonism arose simply because in the last of the experiments attempted by the Indian wise men, certain forms were developed, giving feeble signs of life, and indicating unmistakably that if they were ever endowed with a complete, independent existence, they would become a race of malevolent beings, a menace to all existing institutions and peoples. Hence, these wise men were counseled by the more practical and simple-minded of their contemporaries to abandon the rôle of creator, leaving the production of life to the rude and bungling methods to which Nature was accustomed. They were loath to yield in this, but public opinion became too strong for them; the religious element conquered--and these savants of old turned their attention to a new problem that had already been suggested by their partial experiments in the creation of life, and that promised something really worth while. This new problem involved the regulation of man's moral and intellectual natures, not through the teaching of ideas, but by the employment of physical and chemical forces.

It had been discovered long before that the Radium Sun controlled the subterranean life coming within its influence. But as this sun was itself capable of regulation, many novel--and safe--departures in human development were made possible by an intelligent practice of the new solar science. Here again, as in the experiments with plants, it was the variation of colors, of light and darkness, that furnished the key to what the Indian savants were after. Thus, it was learned that certain radium colors had an affinity for certain moral attributes. These moral attributes could, for this reason, be greatly increased by placing the man or woman to be operated on in a properly regulated color bath. Unfortunately, these wise men had not continued their experiments with this Theory of Colors after reaching the first few crude results. They lost interest in the subject when its intensely practical nature became apparent. Hence, a complete classification of all the colors and combinations of colors, with their moral and intellectual affinities, was still lacking. But enough was discovered to be of real, positive benefit in the education of the cavemen and in keeping order among them. People who were harassed by domestic troubles, for instance, were put through a course of color treatment; wives who were tempted to leave their husbands, or husbands who got tired of their wives (as, it seems, they sometimes did in the Land of the Condor) were plunged into color-baths, varied according to the exact nature of the complaint from which they were suffering, and kept in these baths until they were brought back to a reasonable frame of mind. And then, in matters that affected the well-being of the whole community--matters that in the outside world would give rise to various political panaceas--it was a simple application of the Color Theory that would straighten things out. It was found, for instance, that yellow rays from the Radium Sun stimulated generosity. Thus, in the case of a man whose intense acquisitiveness threatened to monopolize the wealth of the community, a steady application of yellow rays was sure to be beneficial, if not to him, at least to those about him.

A case of this kind, indeed, had been recently operated on in this way. The patient had accumulated such vast wealth that he had grown to be a public inconvenience. As his business dealings, however, did not come within reach of the criminal law, and as his wealth was thus due to his natural bent for finance, the courts could not touch him. He was, therefore, placed--not by way of punishment, but as a mark of public esteem--in a bath of yellow light. The effect was extraordinary and bore out all the claims of the originators of the Color Theory. He had not been in this yellow bath more than a few hours before he began to part with his wealth. On the second day he became more reckless in his benefactions, and this frenzy for giving away what he had before so jealously guarded from his neighbors, increased at so rapid a rate that by the end of a week his entire fortune had passed, through his own voluntary act, into the hands of the government and various benevolent institutions. When he had nothing more to give, it was decided that he had had enough of the yellow treatment. He was then released from the honors the State had showered upon him, and passed the rest of his life rejoicing in his penniless condition.

Then, there was the case of a man who had grown tired of his wife, and who had outraged the sense of the community by leaving her. He was captured and placed in a bath of green light. In a very short time he got over his roving propensities and became so persistent in his attentions to his wife that, in order to give her some peace, he was put into another bath having a slightly neutralizing effect on the first, or green, bath. Thus, the marital troubles of this couple were completely and finally straightened out and they lived amicably together without the tiresome intervention of mutual friends, or of the law courts.

The interesting possibilities of this Color Theory in penology and in the regulation of domestic affairs, did not escape Leighton. He had himself believed that in the latest discoveries in physics there might be found a connecting link between the science of matter and the science of mind. His natural skepticism, however, did not allow him to accept too readily all of Sajipona's amazing statements. He doubted her real knowledge of these abstruse subjects. She spoke of these matters, indeed, crudely, not with the familiarity as to detail of a trained scientist. What she said had all the simplicity, and much of the fantastic absurdity, of a fairy tale. But beneath its extravagance there was enough substance to her story, and the theory upon which it was based, to make it worthy a scientist's consideration. For one thing, it changed completely the notion Leighton had already formed of this subterranean world. The story, for instance, of the chastened millionaire took into account a complex social system that was utterly unthinkable in a region so confined territorially, so limited, by reason of its peculiar situation, as regards human activity, as this so-called Land of the Condor. The inhabitants of the cave, from what he had seen of them--in the straggling village they had passed through with Narva, and among the followers of Raoul--gave no indication of a culture superior to that shown by people just emerging from savagery. These cavemen, certainly, had not reached that stage of enlightenment from which is developed the millionaire capitalist of whose interesting ventures in monopoly Sajipona had told them. In the ill-fated Anitoo, however, and his men, and in the people surrounding Sajipona, there was evidence of social and mental superiority. The two men who served as the queen's ambassadors in the garden, and who were distinguished from the rest by their red robes, belonged either to a priesthood, or to some order that placed them intellectually above the common rank. They were undoubtedly learned far beyond the Indian average. One of them, indeed, was with Sajipona in the court, and prompted her more than once during her explanation of the Radium Sun and its uses. He spoke in a low voice, and in a language unintelligible to the Americans. From his bearing and fluency of speech, Leighton concluded that he was one of the commonwealth's so-called "wise men," an investigator, possibly, in those physical and psychological phenomena that held out such tantalizing promise of new conquests in the domain of human knowledge.

Sajipona was quick to perceive the difficulties arising in Leighton's mind in regard to her narrative, but she referred to another occasion a description of the science, religious beliefs, social institutions and customs of the subterranean people. In attempting such a task, she declared that the priest at her side, whom she addressed with befitting reverence as Omono, Teacher of Mankind, would be far more capable than she. For it was Omono, with his companion, Saenzias, who received and carried out the laws and traditions of their race--always subject, of course, to her own authority--and it was by them that these laws were further perfected before being passed on to the two priests who would succeed them in administering the affairs of the kingdom.

"You are puzzled, naturally," she said, "to hear of the existence of wealth and poverty, charitable institutions and governments, science and religion, in a kingdom whose boundaries are within the walls of a cave. But you have seen only a small part of this Land of the Condor. On every side it extends many miles further underground. And in the South from here, not a great distance, there is a vast region--unknown to the rest of the world--filled with mountains, fertile valleys, rivers, and bodies of water strewn like jewels over plains that yield an abundance sufficient for all mankind. This land is at the mouth of our subterranean world. It lies in the heart of that region marked 'unexplored' by your mapmakers. We have no fear that it will ever pass from our hands, that it will ever be more than a blank patch on your maps, for on every side it is defended by unscalable cliffs of snow and ice. It can be reached only through this ancient cave. Perhaps, in the ages to come, when the people of the outside world and of this race that has lived here in an unbroken line as far back as the memory of man can go, have been perfected, these barriers will be thrown down. Such has been the prophecy of some of our wise men; and to-day Omono and Saenzias tell us that this final period of perfection is rapidly approaching. It may be that before you go out again into your own world, you will see more of the wonders of this Land of the Condor, and of the unknown Land of the Sun that lies at its door. There are cities out there, built with an art that is only rudely possible in our underground home. Here, you are amazed at the cunning of some of our work. You wonder that a race of moles could conjure wealth and beauty out of a cavern that is never opened to the airs of heaven. But in our Land of the Sun there are marvels far greater than these. In both regions you will see the work of the same people; but here where you stand is the center of our race, or--as you would call it--our seat of government. It is here, because of the Radium Sun above us, that we find our strength. But it is outside, in the Land of the Sun, that the millions who call me their queen, are working out the destinies of future generations. Before these last years your people and our people have kept apart. You were ignorant of our existence, and we held aloof from you, remembering the cruelty and injustice of which you were guilty centuries ago. But the time has come, so Omono and Saenzias declare, when our two worlds must venture the first step in the knowledge of each other. Through me this experiment will take place. You are instruments in it. To-day decides the success or failure of our plan. The wealth of our kingdom we have guarded all these centuries, not for ourselves only. To increase it we must share it with the outside world. But if the outside world is not ready, if it still exists merely to plunder the wealth others have gathered, we will wait, if need be, for another flight of centuries."

Sajipona's announcement aroused an immense curiosity among the explorers. What did she mean? they asked each other. How was this working out of their mutual destinies to be accomplished at this particular time and through them? From Narva they had heard vaguely of a festival that was to be celebrated--and now they learned that the hour for it was at hand. Sajipona told them this, and as the information followed immediately upon what she had let them know of her aspirations regarding the future of her people, they concluded that in some mysterious way, the festival and the fate of this subterranean kingdom were bound together. They waited to hear more but, apparently, Sajipona had finished all she had to say to them. Turning to Una, she led her apart from the others. The two talked earnestly together, the one protesting, the other entreating. Finally, Sajipona appeared to succeed in her request, whatever it was, and taking Una's hand walked with her to a distant part of the hall. Here a door was thrown open. Una entered the apartment beyond, the door closing behind her. It was all so quickly done, the others barely realized that Una had left them before they were rejoined by Sajipona, who spoke to them as if nothing had happened.

"Let us go," she said. "The festival is ready. There is no time to lose."

XXIII

THE GILDED MAN

After leaving Sajipona, Una found herself in an apartment small compared with the spacious courts and chambers she had seen elsewhere in the palace. This apartment differed, also, in its furnishings--a few uncompromising stone benches along the walls and nothing more--while the dim light gave to everything a gloomy, uninviting character. But Una was in no mood to linger; the queen's words had filled her with an anxiety that must be appeased at once. Hurrying down the middle of the long room, she reached, at the further end, a sort of staircase, or ramp, leading upward in long, sweeping spirals to a height that was lost in intervening walls and clustered columns. Mounting this ramp, she noted with pleasure that as the ground floor receded everything lightened. Judging by the splendid upward curve of the walls, she concluded that she must be ascending a gallery winding around the great central dome of the court where, a moment before, she had listened with the others to Sajipona's account of the mysteries of the cave. On the inner side of the gallery, the side overhanging the court, the wall was semi-transparent, and through it sparkled flashes of the radium light flooding the great chamber within. Light came, also, from the opposite side, filtering downward, apparently through another medium, from the central luminary above. The air grew warmer; there were faint perfumes, as if of essences distilled from tropical flowers, that thrilled with a delightful drowsiness. Soft echoes from distant music increased this feeling of restfulness. Sound and fragrance were so subtly united, they seemed so completely an irradiation from the inner spirit brooding over the place, that one accepted them as being utterly natural, utterly free from the startling or the marvelous.

Una could not guess the source of the liquid, musical notes. They might have come from the quaint instruments she had seen so deftly played upon by the cavemen marching with Anitoo, or from the lyre that, at Sajipona's touch, gave forth such plaintive melodies. But the music she listened to now was not continuous; its lack of formal melody, unity of theme, gave it a quality different from anything she had ever heard. In the outer world it might have been taken for the windsong sweeping through tossed branches of forest trees. But here there was neither wind nor forest. The air was motionless, and had ever been so; the vast spaces seemed filled with the unruffled sleep of centuries. Down below, in the great court, and even in the palace garden, saturated with light and beauty though both were, one felt something of the chill mystery that penetrates all underground places. Here there was mystery, but it was a kind that soothed rather than terrified. Tier by tier, as Una passed along the slender white columns enclosing the gallery up which she was ascending, the sense of gloom, foreboding, that had weighed upon her until now, was weakened. She felt the magic of a new world of romance and adventure. She was at the very heart of its secret. Flashes of color in paneled niches along the walls piqued her curiosity. Robes of vivid scarlet, hiding limbs of sparkling whiteness, it might be, hung just beyond her reach. Further on these niches were filled with glittering masses of gold, heaped high in barbaric scorn of art or fitness. Rudely fashioned crowns, massive enough to have burdened their wearers with more than the traditional care that goes with royalty; armlets, breastplates, tiaras heavy with emeralds--in deep recesses, row on row, from story to story, these witnesses of the pomp and pride of fallen nations, were thrown together in a careless profusion possible only in an Aladdin's palace of marvels.

As Una hurried past she realized with a thrill that she was in the ancient treasure-house of a once mighty empire. The fruit of the earth's richest mines, brought here by the labor and cunning of centuries, lay at her hand. It seemed impossible that all this jeweled splendor could have escaped the fires of war and crime that had kindled within the breasts of millions who had sacrificed their lives merely to grasp some small portion of it. Fascinating baubles now were these relics of past greatness, dainty or rude, meaningless, or eloquent of forgotten faiths and legends. Innocent of harm they seemed, a passing feast for the eye, trophies to celebrate and adorn feminine loveliness, but no longer a madness in the bones of men.