CHAPTER XXIX
_A Woman's Scream_
"The black Cloud of Death!"
We stood there at the casement of the palace, gazing with a growingterror at the visible evidence of the tragedy which threatened. A blackcloud off there in the distance, spreading out, rolling inexorablytoward us. And then came the wind, and with it a breath of the blackmonster--a choking, horrible suggestion of the death rolling alreadyover the city.
We must have been fascinated at the casement for some considerable time.Elza's thought messages had ceased. Abruptly I came to myself.
"The Black Cloud of Death!" I turned to Georg and Maida. "Alarm thecity! Arouse them all! Alarm--"
Maida's face was white: she flung off Georg's arm which had beenprotectingly around her. "The siren--"
Terrible moments, those that followed. Confusion; panic; death!
The public siren in the tower by the lagoon entrance shrilled itswarning. The danger lights blazed out. The city came to life. Lightssprang up everywhere. People--with the daze of sleep still uponthem--appeared at the casements; on the roof-tops; on the canal stepsthey appeared, fumbling with their boats. Panic!
A pandemonium. Aircraft, such as could so hastily be mustered, sweptoverhead. A glare of lights everywhere. The shrill voice of the sirenstilled, to make audible the broadcast warnings--stentorian tonesscreaming: "The Black Cloud of Death! Escape from the city! Escape toIndustriana!"
Warning, advice, command! But over it all, the breath of the black cloudnow lay heavy. The lights were dimmed by it. Everywhere--to everydeepest recess of the city--to every inner room where to escape it manyhad fled--its deadly choking breath was penetrating.
Within the palace was turmoil. We had an air-vehicle on a landing-stagenearby; but Georg and Maida would not leave at once. Rulers of theCentral State, as a Director might stick to his crumbling Tower, theystayed now in the Great City. Encouraging the people. Maida's voice,futilely attempting to broadcast over the uproar. Georg commanding theofficial air-vessels to load with refugees; himself struggling to directthe jam of boats toward the embarking stages.
We were in the instrument room of the palace. The air was pale-blue,though I had closed every casement. Ourselves, choking already; thengasping; and with no time or thought to procure a mask. The chemicalroom, from whence we might have secured apparatus to purify our air, hadbeen abandoned before we thought to seek it out. I dashed into it, mybreath held. Its casements were open; its air thick-blue with the fumes;its staff long since fled. I ran back to Georg and Maida, gasping, mylungs on fire, my head roaring.
"No use! Abandoned!"
The department of weather control where--had we been forewarned--wemight have found means to divert the wind by another of our owncreation--was deserted by its staff at the first alarm.
"No use! Georg--Maida--let us go!"
The mirrors all about us in the instrument room were going dark; thehorrible scenes of death throughout the city which they pictured werevanishing. The public lights were going out; the broadcast voices wereceasing.
The city now was out of control. But still the lagoon outside waspacked with boats--overloaded boats.... Screams of terror, choked intosilence ... boats with frenzied occupants leaping into the water to finda quicker, happier death ... a woman with a babe in her arms on ahousetop across the lagoon--the infant already dead; the crazed motherflinging it down into the water, herself following with a long, gaspingscream...
At last Georg pulled at me--no longer could we speak--pulled at me, andwith Maida between us, we fled. The air outside was worse. In thedimness, our landing stage seemed _belans_ away. The flagged areabetween us and the stage--a space of square-cut metal flagging,bordering the lagoon--was littered with bodies. Dead--or dying. Peopleeven now staggering from landed boats--staggering blindly, stumblingover bodies, falling and lying always where they had fallen.
With our own senses fading, we groped our way forward. Soon we wereseparated. I saw Maida fall and Georg pick her up, but I was powerlessto reach them.
The landing stage seemed so far away. The dead and dying beneath my feetobstructed me as I staggered over them. A woman, reeling toward me,flung her arms about my neck with an iron grip of despair. I stared intoher face, purple almost with its congested blood, her mouth gaping, herblood-shot eyes bulging; and even with the terror distorting them, I sawbeneath it their look of despairing appeal...
Her arms clinging to me desperately; but with a curse I flung her to theground and reeled onward.
Without knowing it, I had come to the brink of the water's edge. Theflagging seemed to drop away. I fell. Dimly I heard the splash as Istruck the water; and felt a grateful cooling sense as it closed overme.
I am a strong, instinctive swimmer. I did not breathe, and when I roseto the surface, the single swift breath I took was purer than any I hadhad for half an hour past. My head cleared a little; swimminginstinctively, and with cautious breaths, I found that I was able to goon.
I know now that by some vagary of chance--of fate if you will--I hadstruck a surface area where breathable air still remained. I swam,striving to plan, to think where I might be swimming. Yet it was all aphantasmagoria, with only the strength of my muscles and the instinct topreserve my life remaining to direct me. Swimming endlessly ... swimming... taking a half-gasp of breath ... swimming ... trying to think ... ordreaming ... was it all a dream?...
When I came to myself I was lying upon a bank of ferns in the outskirtsof the city. It was still night; the black cloud of death had passed on;the air was pure. Like a man for days bereft of water, I lay and drankin the air, pure at last, as the Almighty distils it for us.
Bodies were lying around me on the bank. A dark, silent house stoodnearby; and a deserted boat. All darkness and silence--the broodingsilence of death. I was still dazed. Maida--Georg; they seemed likepeople in a dream long faded. Industriana! They were going to the_Rhaal_ City of Industriana. _I_ had been trying to get there. I mustget there now--join them. I climbed to my feet; the edge of a forest wasnearby and with wavering steps I started toward it.
Looking back on it now I realize that I was even then half crazed. In adaze I must have stumbled through the forest for hours. Unreasoning,with only that one idea--to get to Industriana; and in the background ofmy consciousness the vague belief that Elza would be there to greet me.Into the depths of the untrammeled forest with unguided steps Iwandered.
At last I found myself wondering if the dawn were coming; the tri-nighthour was long since passed; the auroral lights as I could sometimes seethem through the tangle of vegetation overhead, were low in the sky.Insects--and sometimes larger beings--leaped and slithered unseen beforemy advance. But I did not heed them. Eyes may have peered at me as Istumbled through the blackness of the undergrowth; but if they did, Idid not notice them.
And then at last I was brought abruptly to full rationality andconsciousness. Stumbling through a tangle of low growth--a black thicketwhich tore at my garments and scratched my flesh--I was transfixed by awoman's scream. It came through the darkness from near at hand. Acrashing of the underbrush, and a woman's scream of terror. It stoppedmy breath, turned me cold.
Elza!