Golden Age of Science Fiction Vol IX Read online

  "Thou understandest it already!" he exclaimed. "Pray tell us, then, how thou hast learned it."

  "The chief wise man hath declared it to me in my own tongue!" I exclaimed, with a meaning look toward the doctor, who had been speaking to me to urge caution. "He saith that the seven sleek kine are the Kemish people, and the two lean and ill-favoured are we two from the Earth--for are not thy people larger and plumper than we!--and the seven denoteth their much greater number. But the dream meaneth that we two, poor and hungry, might eat up all your people and become their masters."

  There was still more delighted jabbering and excited comment. Then Zaphnath arose, and turning graciously to the doctor said to him,--

  "Thy marvellous interpretation, O chief grey-beard, is most correct and wise, and it hath wholly eaten ours up! We quite agree with thy superior wisdom, for thou only hast read the dream aright!"

  CHAPTER IX

  Getting into the Corner

  The doctor's new official position carried with it the use of a spacious, rambling dwelling, situated just inside the gate where we had met Miss Blank. It was thus conveniently located for the doctor's duties at the observatories on the plateau. Another house would have been assigned to me, but I preferred to live with the doctor, and I desired to keep my eye on those enormous stone structures which our telescope had quickly relegated to scientific uselessness.

  We had established ourselves comfortably in this house, surrounded ourselves with a modest retinue of servants, and were rapidly becoming acquainted with Kemish life and manners. The doctor learned the language laboriously from the deposed wise man, who had no means of communicating with him except in the tongue he was teaching. Thus it happened that the doctor could teach me in a few hours in the evening what it had taken him all day to learn. Naturally I picked up the most common phrases used in receiving and handling the grain, by hearing them frequently; but I soon learned that I must pronounce them with exactly the same intonation and emphasis, or they were not understood. Knowing but one language themselves, they had no facility in recognising mispronounced words, or in guessing at the meaning of incomplete phrases on which I stumbled.

  The most difficult thing I encountered was their method of telling the time. During the day it was reckoned rationally enough by the passage of the Sun, which was never obscured by clouds and could always be seen. Every house had a small hole in the roof, at a fixed distance from the floor, and the daily track and varying shape of the spot of sunshine thus admitted gave names to the periods of the day. There seemed to be a settled superstition that no house was fortunate unless this spot of sunshine entered by the door in the morning. For this reason the principal door in nearly every house was built in the west, so that the rising Sun would cast its spot first on the porch outside and then gradually creep in through the door, across the floor, and up the opposite wall late in the afternoon. Of course there were daylight periods in the early morning and late afternoon when the Sun was too low to cast a spot, and these were known by terms which are best translated "before the clock" and "after the clock."

  No one dared to make a social call while the Sun was still outside the door, but friends were best welcome when the Sun was just entering it. Moreover, whoever slept until the Sun had entered the door was looked upon as an irredeemable sluggard. The track of the spot from the door-sill to the wall opposite was measured by linear distance from the centre or noon-position of the spot. As in different houses the apertures through which the clock-light was admitted were always the same distance from the floor, such expressions as "two feet before noon," or "a foot and a quarter after noon" (which I translate from the Kemish) always had a definite and exact meaning. The nearer the spot drew to noon the more exactly circular it became and the more slowly it moved. Therefore, very fine measurements were needed in the middle of the day, and an inch near noon represented nearly as much time as a foot in the morning or evening.

  But the daylight methods were simplicity itself compared with the night methods, which were calculated on an entirely different system, based on the combined movements of the two moons, neither of which agreed or coincided with the movement of the Sun in any close degree. I urged upon the doctor, as one of his earliest duties, the necessity of reforming their calendar and establishing a uniform method of denoting the time, to extend throughout the day and night. But on this point he failed to agree with me.

  "What are our seconds, minutes, hours, and weeks after all?" he queried. "They are only arbitrary and meaningless divisions of time, which we have found necessary because we have a very meagre heavenly clockwork; but here they have a very elaborate one. Our day is a rational period based on the Sun's revolution. Here they have seen fit to give up the Sun-day to simplify matters and stick to a Moon-day. Their two contrary moons furnish a rational, if rather intricate, method of telling the time at night. They are best understood by imagining them to represent the two hands of a clock. The smaller moon is what may be called a 'week hand,' completing its revolution in five and a half Sun-days; which they have for convenience divided into six Moon-days of twenty-two hours each. The larger moon makes two complete revolutions in a day, just as the hour hand of a clock does; and it really makes but little difference that it travels around the dial in an opposite direction to that of the 'week hand,' or that they both gain two hours a day on the Sun. These are mere details, that one gets used to in the end."

  "Doctor, you argue like the old farmer I used to know, who stuck to the clock handed down by his grandfather, and maintained that no new-fangled arrangement kept as good time. It was true that the striking apparatus had long ago failed to agree with the hands; and the hands themselves, owing to the accumulated inaccuracies of years, no longer denoted the real time; nevertheless, whenever it struck seven he could always be sure that the hands were pointing to a quarter-past twelve, and it was then just twenty-two minutes to three. This was something he could depend upon with a certainty which quite compensated for the annoyance of incessant calculations and mental corrections."

  "Pray leave joking aside and consider the wonderful nightly clockwork here, which makes automatic time-keepers unnecessary. This accommodating inner moon, within the brief space of five hours, goes through the phases of a thin crescent, first quarter, and just as it approaches fulness it submits to a total eclipse, followed by a waning quarter, then the reverse crescent of an old moon, and finally it sets where the Sun must soon rise. It is a wonderful heavenly clock, which is never obscured by clouds, and turns its face toward every one alike."

  "Yes, but one must remember that this hurrying moon gains two hours a day on the Sun, and therefore goes through her performance that much earlier each night. Besides, she is capable of rising twice in the same night occasionally."

  "Those are mere details that one learns to allow for. Moreover, consider the convenience of being able to tell the day of the week by the smaller moon. If it is just risen, we know we are on the eve of the first day of the week; if it is high or eclipsed, it must be the second day; and if it is sinking in the west, it is the third day----"

  "But for the last half of the week it is not seen at all, and one is free to guess which day it is," I interrupted. "Then no two days of the week begin at the same hour. The first day begins with sunrise, the second two hours before sunrise, the third four hours before, and the fourth at midnight, and so on--two hours earlier each day till the week ends, when they throw in a whole night for good measure and begin the next week at sunrise again!"

  "Yes, that arrangement is made necessary because their Moon-day will not agree with their Sun-day in any other manner. But it is rather remarkable that the two moons agree with each other so well, the larger one making twelve revolutions while the smaller makes one, so that at the end of every week they both rise together, but on opposite sides of the horizon, which is the signal for that night to be disregarded in the count. The next week begins on the following morning, the first rising of the larger moon being disregarded, and her se
cond rising being the one reckoned from."

  We were discussing this during our noon-day meal, and, when we had finished, I walked with the doctor out to the plateau, where I was supervising some important work on the Gnomons; for I had not been ten days in Kem until I attempted to buy, with my gold coins, a large amount of wheat from the Pharaoh. Through the interference and objection of Zaphnath, however, I failed utterly in getting any. But the gold had its effect just the same, and later the Pharaoh showed an evident willingness to part with anything in his possession in order to get a liberal number of the smaller coins. But I put a very high value upon the gold, comparing closely with the worth of diamonds upon Earth, and refused to part with any, until one day the wisdom of buying the Gnomons occurred to me. I considered the project carefully, and finally made him an offer of a hundred half-eagles for them. Many of the small ones had been built to watch the course of the birth-stars of his various ancestors, and these were now in a sense monuments to his dynasty. He reserved these and a small one, built to observe his own star of nativity, and finally sold me all the large important ones, upon the doctor's representation that they were no longer needed for astronomical purposes. He specified only that they must not be torn down, but that I might use them as I should see fit.

  As I have said before, the Gnomons contained numerous large, long chambers, and it only became necessary to put a permanent bottom in these to convert them into enormous warehouses. All the storage places inside the city were rapidly filling with grain, which poured in at every gate on tens of thousands of mules. The plenteous crop, already ripening, would have to be housed somewhere, and even if I did not succeed in buying a large store of grain for myself, I knew how to make a storehouse eat up a large portion of the value of the grain it housed. I had seen wheat, stored year after year, finally become the property of the elevator owner, by virtue of his charges.

  I was not only putting a bottom to the storage chambers, but converting the inclined slopes of the largest Gnomons into a passable mule-trail, by roughening and corrugating the surface to give the patient animals a surer foot-hold, so they might climb to the top to discharge their cargoes. This was a simple form of elevator, and I laughed to think what some of my former acquaintances would think of it! One of the smaller Gnomons had already been completed to receive my share of the grain which I earned in the Pharaoh's service, and to this I was adding such meagre purchases as I could make from the small farmers. These, however, were not numerous, for the land was mostly in the hands of the Pharaoh and of a few large owners, more or less bound to him. I was therefore not a little surprised now upon approaching to see a long line of mules picking their way up the inclined side of the finished Gnomon, and as they reached the top their drivers emptied the pair of sacks they bore into my storehouse. Including the drove of unladen animals at the bottom of the Gnomon, there must have been a hundred in all, and I was awaited by the chief driver, who rode one sleek mule covered with a soft blanket of feather texture, and had another similarly saddled by his side. After a slow salute of each hand upon his cheek, he said to me,--

  "My master, the glorious Hotep, sendeth to the keeper of the Pharaoh's grain a present of two hundred bags of wheat, and wisheth to know if it be true that thou desirest to buy a large store of grain with gold? For hath not Hotep the gathered harvests of two full years in his bins, and upon his fertile lands the largest crop in all Kem (save only that of the Pharaoh) is nodding and awaiting the warm, ripening breath of the Snowless Month! Yet Hotep hath no use for iron money, for he is weighted and fettered with it already; but if thou desirest to bargain with him for as much yellow gold as thou hast bartered to the Pharaoh, he will be most pleased to treat with thee, and sendeth me with this ambling mule to fetch thee. Will it please thee to come with me now to his palace within the city?"

  "What do you think, Doctor? This Hotep must be almost a rival to the Pharaoh, if he has stored so much grain and owns so many ripening fields. He must have seen the new gold ornaments upon the Pharaoh's women, which have rendered him envious. If, indeed, he has such a vast quantity of grain to sell, I will deck him out with gold, such as will turn the Pharaoh green with envy! I shall lose no time in seeing him;" and so saying I mounted the mule, and assured the chief driver I would express my thanks in person to the great Hotep.

  He conducted me to the opposite side of the city, and, as we crossed a height near its centre, he pointed out to me the long fields of his master lining the left bank of the river. There were miles of waving grain just beginning to turn from a luxuriant green to the lighter yellow tints of harvest. Presently we approached a large palace, which I had often before seen from afar against the distant wall of the city, but had never known. Upon entering, I observed every sign of the same idle luxury which marked the Pharaoh's dwelling, but none of that regal disdain or imperial haughtiness which separated every one but his favourite women from the immediate presence of the monarch.

  I was graciously received in a large, lighted chamber, where Hotep reclined lazily upon a billowy heap of downy cushions, surrounded by many women. He only arose from his elbow to a sitting posture when I saluted him. Without saying a word to him, I approached, and, loosening my belt from about my waist, I unbuckled its mouth and poured out upon a large cushion by his side my three hundred shining golden eagles. The effect was electrical, for they were twice the size and three times as many as the coins I had given the Pharaoh. It must have seemed impossible to him that I could possess larger coins, and more of them, than he had seen upon the monarch's favourites. He was simply delighted with the mere view, and his women crowded around or ran out in haste to bring in their absent sisters to behold a marvel of riches such as Kem had never seen. But though they wondered and gloated over the sight, none of them touched a coin until I spoke.

  "I pray thee, most gracious Hotep, examine all these coins, and pass them among thy women to see if they be pleased with them. Observe their regularity of form and beauty of design, and test the music they give forth when cast upon thy floor of stone. Mayhap, thou wouldst rather own all these than to be cumbered with so much grain."

  Thereupon Hotep seized a heaping handful, which he poured jingling from one palm to the other, and all the women delved their pretty fingers into the shining heap and passed the coins to their admiring sisters, until not one was left upon the cushion.

  "Thy Chief of Harvests hath made known to me, O Hotep, that thou still hast the full crops of two years. Wilt thou tell me how many bags of grain grow upon thy fields at a single crop?"

  "Are not the number of my mules a thousand and one, and bear they not two bags each? To gather a single harvest, each faithful animal must make five trips each day for the period of an hundred days."

  I had often estimated an average mule-load at five bushels, upon which basis each crop would aggregate two and a half million bushels. This seemed impossible for a single farmer, but his fields wearied the sight to follow down the left bank of the Nasr-Nil.

  "If thou wilt leave all this gold with me, I will deliver by my mules to thy storehouses upon the plateau all the grain of my past two crops with which my whole palace here is cumbered."

  "I fear thou holdest thy grain too dearly, and that thou knowest not the value of this gold. What is more plenteous in Kem than wheat? There be more bags of it than the stars in heaven. But this gold I bring is more than all the store of it upon Ptah before I came. Pray give it back again," I said, gathering up the few pieces which had been returned to the cushion, and glancing about among the women as if searching for the rest. They returned them slowly, but Hotep still held his handful. After a brief pause, I continued,--

  "Hast thou not a fair crop growing which thou mightest also give me, so that no other than Hotep shall receive any of these coins?"

  "In truth, I have never ridden as far as my waving fields stretch down the Nasr-Nil; but one cannot sell what hath not fully ripened, for who knoweth what it may turn out to be?"

  "Then I must beg thee to
return my coins," I answered slowly; but, unbuckling the other end of my belt, I poured out upon another cushion the hundred magnificent double eagles which I was holding in reserve. Then, taking a particularly bright one of these, I continued,--

  "But as thou hast been generous and thoughtful enough to send me a present, O Hotep, I desire to return one to thee, such as no man in Kem ever possessed before. Will it please thee to accept this disc of gold as large as the lesser moon that creeps across the sky? And with it go my wishes that Hotep's crops may always be great and plentiful."

  Slowly and unwillingly the women returned the eagles to the cushion, while they stared in wonder at the heap of larger coins. Hotep filtered the handful through his fingers to the cushion, and accepted the double eagle with gladness. With his eyes fixed on the second heap he seemed to be thinking deeply and making calculations.

  "The people are wont to call thee Iron Man, but I believe thou art golden!" he ruminated, and then suddenly, "For these heaps of riches, large and small, what desirest thou of all my possessions? Wilt thou have all my grain and half my land? Shall I give to thee all my fields which cannot be seen from the palace here?"

  "Why should I wish thy land when I have no cattle to till it, nor mules to gather the harvest? In lieu of the land, give me only a share of what it should produce for a few years. Now give heed to the bargain I will make with thee. If thou wilt deliver to my storehouses, upon the plateau, all the gathered grain of thy past two crops, and all the grain thou shalt gather from this growing crop (save only what thou needest for seed), and half of each of the crops of the three succeeding years,--provided, however, that you assure me each year as much as thy thousand mules can carry in an hundred journeys;--then thou mayest keep all this store of gold, which is, indeed, all that both of us from the Blue Star possess."