第15章

"The Shining Devil Took Them!"

MY COLLEAGUES of the Association, and you others who may read this my narrative, for what I did and did not when full realization returned I must offer here, briefly as I can, an explanation; a defense--if you will.

My first act was to spring to the open port.The coma had lasted hours, for the moon was now low in the west! I ran to the door to sound the alarm.It resisted under my frantic hands; would not open.Something fell tinkling to the floor.

It was the key and I remembered then that Throckmartin had turned it before we began our vigil.With memory a hope died that I had not known was in me, the hope that he had escaped from the cabin, found refuge elsewhere on the ship.

And as I stooped, fumbling with shaking fingers for the key, a thought came to me that drove again the blood from my heart, held me rigid.I could sound no alarm on the Southern Queen for Throckmartin!

Conviction of my appalling helplessness was complete.

The ensemble of the vessel from captain to cabin boy was, to put it conservatively, average.None, I knew, save Throck-martin and myself had seen the first apparition of the Dweller.Had they witnessed the second? I did not know, nor could I risk speaking, not knowing.And not seeing, how could they believe? They would have thought me insane--or worse; even, it might be, his murderer.

I snapped off the electrics; waited and listened; opened the door with infinite caution and slipped, unseen, into my own stateroom.The hours until the dawn were eternities of wak-ing nightmare.Reason, resuming sway at last, steadied me.

Even had I spoken and been believed where in these wastes after all the hours could we search for Throckmartin? Cer-tainly the captain would not turn back to Port Moresby.And even if he did, of what use for me to set forth for the Nan-Matal without the equipment which Throckmartin himself had decided was necessary if one hoped to cope with the mystery that lurked there?

There was but one thing to do--follow his instructions;get the paraphernalia in Melbourne or Sydney if it were possible; if not sail to America as swiftly as might be, secure it there and as swiftly return to Ponape.And this I deter-mined to do.

Calmness came back to me after I had made this decision.

And when I went up on deck I knew that I had been right.

They had not seen the Dweller.They were still discussing the darkening of the ship, talking of dynamos burned out, wires short circuited, a half dozen explanations of the ex-tinguishment.Not until noon was Throckmartin's absence discovered.I told the captain that I had left him early in the evening; that, indeed, I knew him but slightly, after all.It occurred to none to doubt me, or to question me minutely.

Why should it have? His strangeness had been noted, com-mented upon; all who had met him had thought him half mad.I did little to discourage the impression.And so it came naturally that on the log it was entered that he had fallen or leaped from the vessel some time during the night.

A report to this effect was made when we entered Mel-bourne.I slipped quietly ashore and in the press of the war news Throckmartin's supposed fate won only a few lines in the newspapers; my own presence on the ship and in the city passed unnoticed.

I was fortunate in securing at Melbourne everything Ineeded except a set of Becquerel ray condensers--but these were the very keystone of my equipment.Pursuing my search to Sydney I was doubly fortunate in finding a firm who were expecting these very articles in a consignment due them from the States within a fortnight.I settled down in strictest seclusion to await their arrival.

And now it will occur to you to ask why I did not cable, during this period of waiting, to the Association; demand aid from it.Or why I did not call upon members of the Uni-versity staffs of either Melbourne or Sydney for assistance.

At the least, why I did not gather, as Throckmartin had hoped to do, a little force of strong men to go with me to the Nan-Matal.

To the first two questions I answer frankly--I did not dare.

And this reluctance, this inhibition, every man jealous of his scientific reputation will understand.The story of Throck-martin, the happenings I had myself witnessed, were in-credible, abnormal, outside the facts of all known science.Ishrank from the inevitable disbelief, perhaps ridicule--nay, perhaps even the graver suspicion that had caused me to seal my lips while on the ship.Why I myself could only half believe! How then could I hope to convince others?

And as for the third question--I could not take men into the range of such a peril without first warning them of what they might encounter; and if I did warn them--It was checkmate! If it also was cowardice--well, I have atoned for it.But I do not hold it so; my conscience is clear.

That fortnight and the greater part of another passed be-fore the ship I awaited steamed into port.By that time, be-tween my straining anxiety to be after Throckmartin, the despairing thought that every moment of delay might be vital to him and his, and my intensely eager desire to know whether that shining, glorious horror on the moon path did exist or had been hallucination, I was worn almost to the edge of madness.

At last the condensers were in my hands.It was more than a week later, however, before I could secure passage back to Port Moresby and it was another week still before Istarted north on the Suwarna, a swift little sloop with a fifty-horsepower auxiliary, heading straight for Ponape and the Nan-Matal.