“Moura-weit was confident now that if there was another passenger in the rocket with the woman, he had died in the flames. He did not know that Ubca had mistaken the reddish hair and tanned skin of Richard Dorr for one of the barbarians, whose skin is likewise bronze. Turning the plane about, they headed for Carajama, the capital of their own country.

  “So came Dana Gleason and Richard Dorr to Abrui, my friends.” Our host smiled down upon us. During this narration he had been pacing back and forth before us.

  “Surely, you are going to tell us more?” demanded the Professor.

  “It grows late, sir. Already the sky is becoming light!” he protested.

  “What does that matter? I insist that you tell us all.”

  THE STORY OF SA DAK

  The other shrugged his shoulders. “It will delay our departure, but since you wish it, sir … First, however, I should suggest a swim in the pool to refresh us, and a bit to eat and drink.”

  Rollins said he did not swim, but the bath would be welcome. Miss Rollins was delighted. I was declared unfit for swimming because of my shoulder, yet I would be allowed to take a dip. The golden slave appeared without a summons and escorted us to the various bedrooms. Swimming suits were brought. These consisted of one-piece affairs of a strange white material that was silky to the touch and as heavy as jersey. The trunks reached halfway down the thigh, and the neck and armholes were cut low. The slave aided me in undressing, and insisted upon rubbing my shoulder again with his salve.

  Neither the thin frame of the Professor, nor my own, already inclined to corpulency, cut a very fine figure, but the sight of the two silver men held the eye. Never have I seen two finer-looking men, both over six feet tall and with the smooth, flowing muscles of highly developed bodies. Both wore no more than short trunks. Miss Rollins looked pretty in her suit.

  Rollins and I descended into the pool by way of a flight of steps, but the other three dived off the side of the pool into the deep water. They had a race. The stroke used by the silver men was strange. It mostly resembled the breaststroke, except that it was more “frog fashion,” both propelled the body through the water by jerks, hands and feet moving in unison in one great effort, and each stroke carried the men almost twice their length through the water. Naturally enough, Miss Rollins, with her pretty sidestroke, was left a considerable distance behind.

  They joined us, and as the two men stood beside us I saw that the water ran from their broad chests and shoulders without seeming to wet them. “That,” said Sa Dak reading my thought, “is due to the oil with which we polish our bodies. It is a matter of pride to keep our bodies highly polished. The bronze man who neglects this vanity is not a pretty fellow with his dull ochre body. We have a saying that ‘a well-oiled body gives evidence of a well-ordered mind.’ And the poorest of men oils his body.”

  Our bath finished, we returned to the dressing rooms and were given great towels that were very absorbent. I noted how well I felt, how my body glowed, and how the spirit of well-being pervaded me. Later, we were informed that a small quantity of a solution of radium in the water produced these effects. My shoulder seemed completely healed, so that I was never to feel more discomfort from it.

  In the atol we found food awaiting us on small tables set beside our couches. There was a fresh fruit that had the taste of both apple and peach and looked like a melon, some sort of cooked meal, and a hot beverage that had the taste of many flowers. After eating, we settled ourselves on our couches once more to hear what remained to be told of the story of Dana Gleason and Richard Dorr.

  “I am telling this in the third person,” began our host, “to avoid any unnecessary personal references, and for easier sequence. Perhaps first I had better explain a little about the planet, its peoples, its geography, its history.”

  THE NARRATIVE

  On Abrui there are three races. The Tabora, who hold in their grasp the single ocean of the planet, and esteem themselves the only civilized people of the planet, though once they were barbarians occupying the “backlands” into which they drove the Gora, the simple-minded. From the Moata, a more ancient race than themselves, they got their culture, their science and their social codes, subjugating these people to their will and enslaving them.

  The Tabora is the silver man of Abrui, a fine upstanding man, taller in stature than men of the other races, with well-formed features and a quick, ready, clear-thinking mind. The Moata are golden, smaller than their masters, weaker, and with fear bred in their minds. The Gora is the barbarian, made so by circumstances. He is bronze-colored, bronze-skinned, bronze-haired, and brown-eyed. He is not quite so tall as the Tabora, but he has a stockier, more powerful body; is fearless, though superstitious; and his imagination peoples his country with hobgoblins and god-things. He has little science, since all his days are spent in forcing his barren plains and swamps and deserts to yield him a livelihood.

  Moura-weit and Ubca-tor were of the Tabora. They were Doatans, and Doata is the most powerful of the three nations of Tabora. Of Tabora there are three countries, Doata, Zoada, and Loata, all bordering on the one ocean, Sehti. Sehti covers a little more than a third of the planet. Rich, fertile plains border the sea, and beyond the plains are the great mountains, Hopli, which almost entirely encircle the ocean and are the backbone of Tabora, separating one fertile plain from another. Deserts, swamps, wide rivers, all help to separate Gora from Tabora. Tabora has thousands of cities on the broad plains, in the rolling tablelands and foothills, and in the mountains themselves, which are not overly high but are great irregular chains.

  In the ocean, Sehti, lies Ora, a large island, with a few smaller ones near it. Ora is the seat of all learning; it existed in the day of the Moata. Here any man or woman is welcome to study, to forward science, to teach. Ora belongs to no nation, having a government of its own. It is a place of refuge for the exile, the outcast. Once within its bounds, the malefactor is safe and can in no way be extradited.

  To the south of the ocean lies Zoada, extending over a thousand miles from east to west and several thousand miles to the low-lying swamps that separate her from Gora. Beyond her boundaries is the ice cap of the southern magnetic pole. To the west of her lies Loata. Loata’s west coast fronts all of the eastern shore of the ocean, and extends over a great part of the northern coast besides.

  One might wonder how Abrui, which lies so far from the sun as to have a solar year of 365 Earthly years, can be inhabited. The answer is simple; for, whereas all her sister planets depend solely upon the common sun for their heat and light, Abrui is fortunate enough to have a sun of her own. Dana Gleason is certain that on Earth astronomers have never conceived the possibility of a planet possessing a sun of its own in the same manner as Abrui possesses one, although the phenomena of twin suns encircling each other, as well as triple suns, have been observed. Taboran astronomers have observed many planets with satellite suns exactly like Abrui’s companion.

  Still the satellite sun is no rival of Sol, so called by Earth people, but named Coe by Abruians. Tradr, the second sun, gives off a warm, rosy pink glow; unlike Sol it does not send out sharp rays but shines more like the glow from a lamp, so that it is possible to look directly at the satellite without discomfort. It is believed that once Tradr was nothing more than a moon shining only by reflected light. Then the planet must have been cold, unable to foster life in the poor warmth from the distant sun. However, something warmed the moon’s core so that its center seethed as a furnace, and gradually the heat penetrated the whole shell, turning its solids into gases. Many theories have been brought forth from Ora concerning the reason of this strange occurrence of a sphere, once dead, coming to life. The most prevalent and the most generally believed theory is that on Tradr is a vast quantity of the element radium. They understand the power of this element, and it is certain that its presence accounts for the “catching afire” of the satellite.

  Tradr, therefore, controls the day of Abrui, and it encircles the entire globe in a little less than thirty hours while the planet, which turns slowly on its axis, has a solar day of almost one hundred hours. Sol, therefore, is like unto a moon to Abrui in the nights when it still lingers in the heavens while the planet depends entirely upon its satellites for both heat and light.

  Tradr never alters its course; it gives an even heat, day after day, with no change of climate year in and year out, a pleasant warmth and, except at the southern pole, extreme cold is unknown. It is toward the northern pole that Sol directs his rays, and the warmth is enough to keep that part of the globe from freezing.

  The planetary year is naturally reckoned according to the phases of the satellite sun, counting ten phases to a year. A phase is of twenty-two days, while the length of each day is thirty hours.

  A VISITOR FROM THE VOID

  It was night when the Earth rocket dropped into the unfruitful land of the Gora. Sol had been hidden for many hours behind clouds, but now he was drawing himself out of the blanket. In size he looked not as large as an orange, and the light that came from him was silvery. All about him were myriads of stars that tried to rival his splendor, great brilliant stars that twinkled and winked and refused to be extinguished in the light that Sol shed about him.

  Moura-weit and Ubca-tor had no time for the light of the sun. They were busy with their patient, trying to bring her to consciousness; yet she seemed to be fighting them. This bothered the two men. “She is seeking for the other one who accompanied her on her journey,” observed Moura. “Were it not for those ropts (rodent-like creatures)* we could search for the remains of the other traveler; for, no doubt, he was caught within that debris. Were the Gors to find him they would only kill him, thinking him a demon or whatnot. Well, at least we have this one.”

  Ubca said nothing, his eyes fastened on the strange being in her queer clothing. He had come on this adventure because Moura-weit had so directed. He was no more than a boy, who had taken Moura-weit as his hero and who followed blindly wherever the other might lead. He was a younger son of the brother of Kirada Walti (king of Doata), as the suffix tor added to his name implied. And as Moura was merely of the Weitas, the lowest rank of Taboran nobility, it was surprising to find the boy in his train. However, Moura-weit was not a common man. He was ambitious.

  Already it was whispered that Moura-weit had attained enviable power behind the throne of Doata. He was beloved of the masses for it, and hated by his superiors—the nobility. Abrui is not unlike Earth. It has its kings to rule, its common people to rave and rant and dictate, its slaves to suffer. And Moura-weit’s ambition was to be a dictator not only to Doata but also to Zoada and Loata.

  Moura-weit’s social rank can be compared to that of the English baronet. People declared that this Moura was not born of woman as are all men but of the Unkonatas, a group of scientists, who years before taught that the foundation of life was not flesh but mind. It was said that they had produced a child by means of thought with the aid of a woman. Their next step was to bring forth a child without women’s help. The Wukonuals, a second group that were materialists, preached against the Unkonatas, calling them traitors to the state. Consequently the sect was sought out, many were killed and the rest dispersed. What happened to the child, if there was a child, was not known; but the masses liked to believe that the Unkonatas, on dying, had bequeathed to the child their brains, so that the child, should he grow to manhood, would possess their collective consciousness entire. And it was said that Moura-weit was that child!

  Moura-weit liked to foster that thought. True, he had a great mind; none could best him in any line of endeavor. His oratory, his science, abstract and concrete thought, his knowledge of diverse things, his understanding of all that went on in the world marked him as a man apart. Nothing that he set himself to do was left undone, either in art, mechanics, science, or athletics. And it was always he who did it best.

  On Abrui man has learned more about the brain than he has on Earth. He has solved the secret of thought transference from mind to mind. And in a world that finds it a common thing to know another’s thought, Moura-weit surpassed them all. He not only read his fellow man’s thoughts, his secrets, his desires, he followed the train of thought of the thinker and knew what his next move would be ere that man himself knew it. And no man could close his mind to his penetrating gaze. He could know what a man separated from him by a wall was thinking. Consequently, he was feared by those who hated him and while many would willingly have done away with this man of power, they dreaded his prying brain, knowing that Moura-weit would forestall any attempt made on his life.

  And it was this man alone who knew that there was a living person in the rocket that came swimming into the atmospheric belt of Abrui. So it was he who was thereafter to have Dana Gleason in his keeping.

  His attention was now focused on the woman. Her breath was still coming in gasps, due to a slight difference in the atmosphere of this planet from that of her own. Soon, however, her breathing became easier as her lungs adjusted themselves to the change. Moura-weit studied her strange covering, her coloring, her appearance, her strange mind.

  Dana Gleason knew nothing of mental telepathy, though she had heard its theory expounded on Earth; she knew nothing of closing her brain, even had she been conscious of the fact that Moura-weit was searching out its nooks and corners. She was at that moment living over again all that had passed in the last two months. Many nightmarish dreams swept across and clouded out the actual memories from time to time, but the man knew how to differentiate between the two.

  Recurring time and time again, he saw the figure of a man, a figure that at first had puzzled Moura, for the complexion of the figure seemed to Moura to be that of a bronze Gora. Then, as the figure became clearer to him, he realized that the tall, handsome man was not an inhabitant of Abrui, that he had neither the squatness of the Gora nor the broad face and features of the barbarians; his eyes, too, were the color of the sky, while Goran eyes were brown.

  Covertly Moura flashed a look at Ubca. Had he seen anything of this? Did he read Moura-weit’s mind? But no, his eyes were on the quiet figure on the couch, his thoughts were elsewhere. So Moura kept his own counsel. He might then have told Ubca that the man he had found and thought to be a Gora was in truth the companion traveler of Dana Gleason, but he said nothing of that. Had he told him, the train of events might have turned out differently.

  Moura-weit had not as yet shaped his plans. He realized that he had indeed a find. Doata and Ora would do him honor when he brought the news of this voyage from Out of the Void. Science would be forwarded. And Moura would prosper.

  Ubca-tor broke the line of his thoughts. “What planet could this creature have come from, Moura? They must have progressed far, to be able to send a vehicle through space. And to send a woman!”

  “Yes, the planet must be far advanced. Yet it must be one of the four planets upon which our observatories have discovered life, one of the four planets that lie close to the Great Sun. The other four we know to be either too hot or too cold to sustain life. It was a long journey to make! And it is indeed lucky that we discovered this woman in time. If she had a companion, as I believe she had, he must surely have perished in the flames of the exploding machine. But it will be a great day for Ora when we take her thither!”

  “Surely you will take her to Doata first?” said the boy.

  “Naturally to Carajama first! Are we not Doatans?”

  Moura had really been wondering which would be the best course—to take the woman first to Doata or to Ora. He knew that by presenting her to the Orans he would gain favor with the people of Zoada and Loata, who would appreciate the fact that he had not first given Doata the honor of greeting the space traveler. On the other hand, the advantage it would give him in Doata was to be considered. Yes, it would be better so. Zoada and Loata must wait.

  The woman had not as yet regained consciousness. Moura continued to minister to her from time to time, and was rewarded to find that the heartbeat was becoming stronger. A glow was coming into the waxen skin; her lips, which seemed to have been drained of blood, were red now. They had only to wait until the brain was ready to resume the burden of consciousness once more. Slowly she opened her eyes and glanced about, breathing the name “Dick” once; then she slipped back into her unconscious state.

  Moura was again looking into her mind. “Ah,” he suddenly exclaimed, “she lives again on her own planet: I see a city, a ship, airplanes, a battle, strange engines. I see men, men very unlike us on Abrui. Ah, I see, I think, the machine by which they shot their rocket into space.” Ubca sat staring uncomfortably at Moura. It is one thing to read the mind of the man to whom you are talking, but another thing to peer into the sleeping brain of an unconscious being from another world.

  “She awakes!”

  The voices had disturbed Dana Gleason, for suddenly she opened her eyes and was staring around the cabin wildly. “Dick, Dick, where are you? Why do you not come?”

  Then, as her eyes focused upon Moura-weit’s strange face and stranger eyes, a cry of surprise escaped her. “My God, where am I?” she asked. “Who are you, and what have you done with Richard Dorr? Oh God—the heat, the explosion, the fall …” Then she covered her face with her hands.

  The Taborans could not understand her words, but they could read her agitation and understand her emotions. They knew hysteria, and Moura was not anxious to have a hysterical woman on his hands. He did not know that Dana Gleason was not given to hysteria. Had he the words, he could have spoken and reassured her; but not having these, he sat quietly by, and a force transferred itself from his mind to that of the woman. A calm came over her.

  When she looked up again, she was rational. She wondered at this feeling that had crept through her. She knew that all was well. For the first time she saw the strange appearance of things about her. She saw she was no longer in the living quarters of the rocket. She was now in another room. Through the sensation of a gentle vibration she knew that she was in a machine that was moving. She saw that she was surrounded by a glass wall, and that below lay the darkness of a sleeping country. She saw that she had been made comfortable on a couch, and that she was being cared for by these two men of such strange appearance. She looked down upon her own person and saw where the khaki of her trousers and shirt had been scorched, where a sleeve had been torn, a boot partly burned. She looked more closely at the man seated opposite her on a low stool. She had a knowledge of men, and in this one she saw a leader.