(II)
The clocks of London were all striking the single stroke ofmidnight as the two priests stood on the wind-sheltered platformof the volor, waiting for the start.
To Monsignor Masterman the scene was simply overwhelming. Therewas hardly a detail that was not new and unfamiliar. From wherehe stood on the upper deck, grasping the rail before him, hiseyes looked out over a luminous city as lovely as fairyland.There were no chimneys, of course (these, he had just learnt,had altogether disappeared more than fifty years ago), butspires and towers and pinnacles rose before him like a dream,glowing against the dark sky, lit by the soft radiance of thestreets beneath. To the right, not a hundred yards away, roseSaint Edward's tower, mellowed now to clear orange by the lapseof three-quarters of a century; to the left a flight ofbuildings, of an architectural design which he did notunderstand, but which gave him a sense of extreme satisfaction;in front towered the masses of Buckingham Palace as he seemedalways to have known it.
The platform of the flying ship on which he stood hung in dock atleast three hundred feet high above the roads beneath. He hadexamined the whole vessel just now from stem to stern, and hadfound it vaguely familiar; he determined to examine it againpresently. There was no gas-bag to sustain it--so much he hadnoticed--though he could not say whence he had the idea thatgas-bags were usual. But it seemed to him as if the notion ofairships did carry some faint association to his mind, althoughfar less distinct than that of motor-cars and even trains. He hadenquired of his companion an hour or two earlier as they haddiscussed their journey as to whether they would not go by trainand steamer, and had received the answer that these were neverused except for very short journeys.
Here, then, he stood and stared.
It was very quiet up here; but he listened with considerablecuriosity to the strange humming sound that filled the air,rising and falling, as of a beehive. At first he thought it wasthe working of engines in the ship; but he presently perceived itto be the noise of the streets rising from below; and it was thenthat he saw for the first time that foot-passengers were almostentirely absent, and that practically the whole roadway, so faras he could make out from the high elevation at which he stood,was occupied by cars of all descriptions going this way and that.They sounded soft horns as they went, but they bore no lights,for the streets were as light as day with a radiance that seemedto fall from beneath the eaves of all the buildings that linedthem. This effect of lighting had a curious result of making thecity look as if it were seen through glass or water--abeautifully finished, clean picture, moving within itself likesome precise and elaborate mechanism.
He turned round at a touch on his arm.
"You would like to see the start, perhaps," said the old priest."We are a little late to-night. The country mails have only justarrived. But we shall be off directly now. Come this way."
The upper deck, as the two turned inwards, presented an extremelypleasant and reassuring picture. From stem to stern it ran clear,set out, however, with groups of tables and chairs clamped to thefloor, at which sat a dozen parties or so, settling themselvesdown comfortably. There were no funnels, no bridge, no break atall to the delightful vista. The whole was lighted by the samedevice as were the streets, for round the upper edges of thetransparent walls that held out the wind shone a steady, evenglow from invisible lights.
In the very centre of the deck, however, was a low railingthat protected the head of a staircase, and down this wellthe two looked.
"Shall I explain?" asked the old priest, smiling. "This isthe latest model, you know. It has not been in use for morethan a few months."
The other nodded.
"Tell me everything, please."
"Well, look right down there, below the second flight. The firstflight leads to the second-class deck, and the flight below to theworking parts of the ship. Now do you see that man's head, straightin the middle, in the bright light?--yes, immediately under. Well,that's the first engineer. He's in a glass compartment, you see,and can look down passages in every direction. The gas arrangementsare all in front of him, and the----"
"Stop, please. What power is it that drives the ship? Is itlighter than air, or what?"
"Well, you see the entire framework of the ship is hollow. Everysingle thing you see--even the chairs and tables--they're allmade of the metal _aerolite_ (as it's generally called). It'salmost as thin as paper, and it's far stronger than any steel.Now it's the framework of the ship that takes the place of theold balloon. It's infinitely safer, too, for it's divided byautomatically closing stops into tens of thousands ofcompartments, so a leak here and there makes practically nodifference. Well, when the ship's at rest, as it is now, there'ssimply air in all these tubes; but when it's going to start,there is forced into these tubes, from the magazine below, themost volatile gas that has been discovered----"
"What's it called?"
"I forget the real name. It's generally called _aeroline_. Well,this is forced in, until the specific gravity of the wholeaffair, passengers and all, is as nearly as possible the same asthe specific gravity of the air."
"I see. Good Lord, how simple!"
"And the rest is done with planes and screws, driven byelectricity. The tail of the boat is a recent development.(You'll see it when we're once started.) It's exactly like thetail of a bird, and contracts and expands in every direction.Then besides that there are two wings, one on each side, andthese can be used, if necessary, in case the screws go wrong, aspropellers. But usually they are simply for balancing andgliding. You see, barring collisions, there's hardly thepossibility of an accident. If one set of things fails, there'salways something else to take its place. At the very worst, wecan but be blown about a bit."
"But it's exactly like a bird, then."
"Of course, Monsignor," said the priest, with twinkling eyes,"it isn't likely that we could improve upon Almighty God'sdesign. We're very simple, you know. . . . Look, he'ssignalling. We're going to start. Come to the prow. We shall seebetter from there."
The upper deck ended in a railing, below which protruded, fromthe level of the lower deck, the prow proper of the boat. Uponthis prow, in a small compartment of which the roof, as well asthe walls, was of hardened glass, stood the steersman amid hiswheels. But the wheels were unlike anything that the bewilderedman who looked down had ever dreamed of. First, they were notmore than six inches in diameter; and next, they were arranged,like notes on a keyboard, with their edges towards him, with thewhole set curved round him in a semicircle.
"Those to right and left," explained the priest, "control theplanes on either side; those in front, on the left, control theengines and the gas supply; and on the right, the tail of theboat. Watch him, and you'll see. We're just starting."
As he spoke three bells sounded from below, followed, after apause, by a fourth. The steersman straightened himself as thefirst rang out and glanced round him; and upon the fourth, benthimself suddenly over the key board, like a musician addressinghimself to a piano.
For the first instant Monsignor was conscious of a slight swayingmotion, which resolved itself presently into a faint sensation ofconstriction on his temples, but no more. Then this passed, andas he glanced away again from the steersman, who was erect oncemore, his look happened to fall over the edge of the boat. Hegrasped his friend convulsively.
"Look," he said, "what's happened?"
"Yes, we're off," said the priest sedately.
Beneath them, on either side, there now stretched itself analmost illimitable and amazingly beautiful bird's-eye view of alighted city, separated from them by what seemed an immeasurablegulf. From the enormous height up to which they had soared thecity looked like a complicated flat map, of which the patcheswere dark and the dividing lines rivers of soft fire. Thisstretched practically to the horizon on all sides; the lighttoned down at the edges into a misty luminosity, but as thebewildered watcher stared in front of him, he saw how directly intheir course there slid toward them two great patches of dark,divided by a luminous stream
in the middle.
"What is it? What is it?" he stammered.
The priest seemed not to notice his agitation; he just passed hishand quietly into the trembling man's elbow.
"Yes," he said, "there are houses all the way to Brighton now, ofcourse, and we go straight down the track. We shall take inpassengers at Brighton, I think."
There was a step behind them.
"Good evening, Monsignor," said a voice. "It's a lovely night."
The prelate turned round, covered with confusion, and saw a manin uniform saluting him deferentially.
"Ah! captain," slipped in the priest. "So we're crossing withyou, are we?"
"That's it, father. The _Michael_ line's running this week."
"It's a wonderful thing to me----" began Monsignor, but a sharppressure on his arm checked him--"how you keep the wholeorganization going," he ended lamely.
The captain smiled.
"It's pretty straightforward," he said. "The _Michael_ line runs thefirst week of every month; the _Gabriel_ the second, and so on."
"Then----"
"Yes," put in Father Jervis. "Whose idea was it to dedicate thelines to the archangels? I forget."
"Ah! that's ancient history to me, father. . . . Excuse me,Monsignor; I think I hear my bell." he wheeled, salutingagain, and was off.
"Do you mean---?" began Monsignor.
"Of course," said Father Jervis, "everything runs on those linesnow. You see we're matter-of-fact, and it's really ratherobvious, when you think of it, to dedicate the volor lines tothe angels. We've been becoming more and more obvious for thelast fifty years. . . . By the way, Monsignor, you must takecare not to give yourself away. You'd better not ask manyquestions except of me."
Monsignor changed the subject.
"When shall we get to Paris?" he asked.
"We shall be a little late, I think, unless they make up time.We're due at three. I hope there won't be any delay at Brighton.Sometimes on windy nights----"
"I suppose the descending and the starting again takes some time."
The priest laughed.
"We don't descend at places _en route_," he said. "The tendercomes up to us. It'll probably be in its place by now. We aren'tten minutes away."
The other compressed his lips and was silent.
Presently, far away to the southward beneath the soft starlit sky,the luminous road down which they travelled seemed to expand oncemore almost abruptly into another vast spread of lights. But asthey approached this did not extend any farther, but lay cut offsharp by a long, curving line of almost complete darkness.
"Brighton . . . the sea . . . And there's the tender waiting."
At first the prelate could not make it out against the radiancebelow, but an instant later, as they rushed on, it loomed up,sudden and enormous, itself blazing with lights against the darksea. It looked to him something like a floating stage, outlinedwith fire; and there were glimmering, perpendicular lines beneathit which he could not understand, running down to lose themselvesin the misty glow three hundred feet beneath.
"How's it done?" he asked.
"It's a platform, charged of course with _aeroline_. It runs onlines straight up from the stage beneath, and keeps itself steadywith screws. You'll see it go down after we've left again. Cometo the stern, we shall see better from there."
By the time that they had reached the other end of the ship, thepace had rapidly diminished almost to motionlessness; and as soonas Monsignor could attend again, he perceived that there wassliding at a footpace past their starboard side the edge of thehuge platform that he had seen just now half a mile away. For amoment or two it swayed up and down; there was a slight vibration;and then he heard voices and the trampling of footsteps.
"The bridges are fixed," remarked the priest. "They're on thelower deck, of course. Pretty prompt, aren't they?"
The prelate stood, staring with all his eyes; now at themotionless platform that hung alongside, now at the gulf belowwith the fairy lights strewed like stars and _nebulae_ at itsbottom. It seemed impossible to realize that this station in theair was not the normal level, and the earth not a strange foreignbody that attended on it. There came up on deck presently a dozenfigures or so, carrying wraps, and talking. It was amazing to himthat they could behave with such composure. Two were evenquarrelling in subdued voices. . . .
It was hardly five minutes before the three bells rang again; andbefore the fourth sounded, suddenly he saw drop beneath, like astone into a pit, the huge immovable platform that just now hehad conceived of as solid as the earth from which it had risen.Down and down it went, swaying ever so slightly from side toside, diminishing as it went; but before the motion had ceasedthe fourth bell rang, and he clutched the rail to steady himselfas the ship he was on soared again with a strange intoxicatingmotion. The next instant, as he glanced over the edge, he sawthat they were far out over the blackness of the sea.
"I think we might go below for a bit," said the priest in his ear.
There was no kind of difficulty in descending the stairs; therewas practically no oscillation of any kind in this still andwindless summer night, and the two came down easily and lookedround the lower deck.
This was far more crowded with figures: there were padded seatsfully occupied running round all the sides, beneath the enormouscontinuous windows. In the centre, sternwards, ran a narrowrefreshment bar, where a score of men were standing to refreshthemselves. Forward of the farther stairs (down the well of whichthey had seen the engineer's head), by which they were standing,the deck was closed in, as with cabins.
"Like to see the oratory?" asked Father Jervis.
"The what?"
"Oratory. The long-journey boats, that have chaplains, carry theBlessed Sacrament, of course; but there is only a little oratoryon these continental lines."
Monsignor followed him, unable to speak, up the central passagerunning forwards; through a pair of heavy curtains; and there, tohis amazed eyes, appeared a small altar, a hanging lamp, and animage of St. Michael.
"But it's astounding!" whispered the prelate, watching a man anda woman at their prayers.
"It's common sense, isn't it?" smiled the priest. "Why, thecustom began a hundred years ago."
"No!"
"Indeed it did! I learnt it from one of the little guide-booksthey give one on these boats. A company called the Great Westernhad mosaic pictures of the patron saint of each boat in thesaloon. And their locomotives, too, were called after saints'names. It's only plain common sense, if you come to think of it."
"Are lines like this--and railways, and so on--owned by the Statenow? I suppose so."
The other shook his head.
"That was tried under Socialism," he said. "It was one of theirsmaller failures. You see, when competition ceases, effortceases. Human nature is human nature, after all. The Socialistsforgot that. No; we encourage private enterprise as much aspossible, under State restrictions."
They paused as they came out again.
"Care to lie down for a bit? We shan't be in till three. TheCardinal engaged a room for us."
He indicated a small cabin that bore his own name on a card.
Monsignor paused.
"Yes, I will, I think. I've a lot to think about."
But he could not sleep. The priest promised to awaken himin plenty of time, and he slipped off his buckled shoes andtried to compose his mind. But it was useless. His mindwhirled with wonder.
Once he slipped to a sitting position, drew back the littlecurtain over the porthole, and stared out. There was little to beseen; but by the sight of a lake of soft light that slid past atsome incalculable depth a dozen miles away, he perceived thatthey had left the sea far behind and were spinning over the landof France. He looked out long, revolving thoughts andconjectures, striving to find some glimmer of memory by which hemight adjust these new experiences; but there was none. He waslike a child, with the brain of a man, plunged into a new mode ofexistence, where everything seemed reversed, and yetastonishing
ly obvious; it was the very simplicity that baffledhim. The Christian religion was true down (or up) even to theArchangels that stand before God and control the powers of theair. The priesthood was the priesthood; the Blessed Sacrament wasthe God-Man tabernacling with men. Then where was the cause foramazement that the world recognized these facts and acted uponthem; that men should salute the priest of God as Hisrepresentative and agent on earth; that air-ships (themselvesconstructed on the model of the sea-gull--hollow feathers andall) should carry the Blessed Sacrament on long journeys, thatcommunicants might not be deprived of their Daily Bread, and evenraise altars on board to the honour of those Powers under whoseprotection they placed themselves. It was curious, too, hereflected, that those who insist most upon the claims of Divinityinsist also upon the claims of humanity. It seemed suggestivethat it was the Catholics who were most aware of the competitivepassions of men and reckoned with them, while the Socialistsignored them and failed.
So he sat--this poor man bewildered by simplicity and almostshocked by the obvious--listening with unheeding ears to thesteady rush of air past the ship, voices talking naturally andeasily, heard through the roof above his head, an occasionalfootstep, and once or twice a bell as the steersman communicatedsome message to one of his subordinates. Here he sat--JohnMasterman, Domestic Prelate to His Holiness Gregory XIX,Secretary to His Eminence Gabriel Cardinal Bellairs, and priestof the Holy Roman Church, trying to assimilate the fact that hewas on an air-ship, bound to the court of the Catholic FrenchKing, and that practically the whole civilized world believed andacted on the belief which he, as a priest, naturally also heldand was accustomed to teach.
A tap on his door roused him at last.
"It's time to be moving, Monsignor," said Father Jervis throughthe half-open door. "We're in communication with St. Germains."
CHAPTER IV