IX
I Have Doubts
Thus ended the strangest and most fascinating narrative that I had ever heard in my entire career as a newspaperman. I sat breathless at the very fearlessness with which the man narrated it and I could not help but believe him. It seemed impossible for him to conjure in his imagination, in so short a time, such a weird story. It could not have been done even by the most versatile tellers of fabricated stories!
Long before he had finished his narrative, night had fallen and with it had come its myriads of brilliant stars glowing overhead. So entranced were Professor Bloch and I as he told it, that we failed to notice that the shrouds of night were lifting in the east as the sun cast its first vermilion rays into the darkened heavens.
Through the night the foreman had continued his tale uninterrupted and when he eventually finished, mumbling his thanks to us, the desert world had suddenly become brilliant with the everchanging colors of a desert dawn. I stared intently into the glowing coals of the camp-fire, fascinated over the strange experiences he had unfolded to us. It was hard, very hard, to believe that tale, but somehow, it rang true. I shuddered at the thought of the grotesque Jovians and their uncanny powers.
The Professor remained silent lost in deep thought, apparently mulling over the story in his scientific way. I glanced at him quickly, expecting to see doubt written plainly on his features. Instead they were more serious than I had ever beheld them. The foreman hung his head in a stupor of exhaustion.
"Dowell!" Professor Bloch suddenly called to me as I sat staring into the fire. The abruptness of his voice caused me to jump nervously.
"Yes, Professor," I answered, very glad that the awesome silence which had settled over us after the foreman had finished his narrative, had been broken. "I'm very much awake sir."
"My friend," said the Professor, seriously, "you have heard this gentleman's weird story. Tell me plainly just how you have taken it. Do not be afraid to express yourself."
"Well, Professor," I said, nervously. "It is difficult for a layman to accept such a story without basic facts, yet I feel that certain portions of it are true. Taking into consideration the fact that astronomers have just about proven that life exists on certain distant planets, it is not difficult to believe their assertions that its development there could be much further advanced than our own in scientific achievements. It seems quite natural that any form of life on Jupiter would differ greatly from our own due to atmospheric conditions and environment. As for radium, it seems quite possible that a great quantity of it would contain more qualities than are found in the small amounts of the metal that we have been able to obtain. However, in my opinion there seems to be but one factor in the narrative that has caused me to doubt a certain portion of it."
Pausing, I cast a quick glance at the mine-foreman. His head still hung in the stupor of exhaustion. He appeared to be sleeping soundly in a squatting position. I looked at Professor Bloch. He was regarding me thoughtfully, chin resting on his sun-tanned fists. Then I continued:
"It seems to me, Professor," I said, eyeing him, "that if the Jovians were immortal and could not be killed as this gentleman has related, there could be no existing skeletal remains. You say that Dr. Jamesson has recovered a huge skull. This man claims it fits perfectly with the facial characteristics of the Jovians. Under those conditions it is hard to accept that part of the narrative due to the fact that this man says that the Jovians cannot be destroyed and yet identifies a skull as being in exact conformity with the cranial structure of the nonterrestrial beings. How could it be possible to recover the skeletal remains of any creature that is allegedly immortal and therefore immune to death?"
"Your scientific observations and opinions, my friend," Professor Bloch said, enthusiastically, "are great for a newspaperman! I congratulate you! Your City Editor told me that you were the best hand on the Outstander at scientific matters and I believe him. However, I have gone over the narrative thoroughly and find in it the very same faults you have mentioned. But I actually believe this man told the truth! The green tint which marks his skin was undoubtedly caused by radium. I have seen radium affliction several times and its power discolors the human skin permanently when it is exposed to its rays for any length of time. I agree with you when you say that radium in large quantities must have more qualities than are known to exist in the small amounts recovered.
"As for the huge skull which Dr. Jamesson recovered. It is my opinion that the Jovians were not entirely immortal—that is, when they are outside of their accustomed atmospheric conditions. It is easy to believe that they achieved immortality on their own planet, for we today, on this globe, are slowly approaching a period when longevity will be increased to an astonishing degree. It is my prediction that we, too, will some day have achieved immortality to a certain degree inasmuch as radium is already known to have removed the cancerous tissues of the human anatomy that cause death.
"However, I have reasons to believe that some of the Jovians were destroyed by the peculiar atmosphere of this earth when they arrived here. Naturally they could not be accustomed to our atmospheric conditions and results were that only the fittest survived the rigors of an alien planet. We must consider that years must have been consumed before they actually succeeded in locating the underground source of the radium deposit. Those who were unable to keep up the strenuous pace, weighted down by the earth's own atmosphere, were quite naturally cast aside. Some of them could not survive. Hence the skeletal remains recovered by Dr. Jamesson!"
"But, Professor," I argued, seriously, "How could they survive the slugs from this gentleman's gun? Such a slug as shot from his calibre of gun would kill an elephant instantly."
"That, my friend, is one of their secrets of immortality. I do not know how they could survive. I can merely hazard an opinion. This man narrated that a peculiar green liquid poured from the wounds. I am convinced, then, that a radium compound instead of blood, coursed through their veins with power enough to heal even the most gaping wounds instantly. Radium flowing through their anatomies would have the power to banish the leaden slugs even as they entered. The lead, like other lesser metals, would vanish into invisible atoms under the embrace of radium and would therefore have no more effect upon the Jovians than would pulverized dust. But great heat, alien atmospheric conditions or some tremendous violence, would actually destroy a Jovian if he were not of the most hardy sort. I feel certain of that, my friend!"
We remained all that day at the camp by the Mesquite Springs. After a hurried breakfast we lay down and slept until late afternoon. The heat was terrific and it beat down upon me with deadening effect. I slept through it, dreaming terrible dreams. Eventually I was awakened by Professor Bloch who had already prepared a light lunch. The mine-foreman was holding a pan of sizzling bacon over a tiny fire while the Professor set other victuals on the tail of the buckboard. I rubbed my eyes sleepily and tilted my hat forward to keep the burning sun from searing my face.
"We almost left you, Dowell." Professor Bloch laughed, good naturedly. "You were sleeping so sound and dreaming so pleasantly that I hated to disturb you, but our friend here thought it best to take you along."
"I'd just as soon die from the heat there, I guess, as melt completely here. Let's eat! I want to get back to Los Angeles. The City Editor is reserving a room for me in the ice-house!"
"Very well, we're starting now."
Immediately after lunch we started across the Valley toward the mysterious red streak of table-land that marked the Manalava Plain. For hours we rode in the bouncing buckboard—for hours, it seemed, we walked along side of it to relieve the laboring animals. The sun beat down with terrific intensity and the heat waves danced blindingly from the sand.
Eventually we found it necessary to continue on foot, leaving the burros and the buckboard in a little, partly sheltered arroyo. About noon we arrived at what the foreman claimed to be the spot where he and Sands had located the radium pool. The surface of the Manalava Plain was a jumble of broken rocks and a maze of wide crevices. We stared at a deep crater-like depression before us but it was void of anything in the form of liquid. Nothing but boulders lay in its basin and the sides had crumbled in steep, loose rock-slides!
For what seemed ages, we searched around the surface for some opening that might lead us down into the deserted tunnels and chambers of the Jovians. None could be found. Evidence of some great, recent upheaval was everywhere and search as we did we could locate no avenue by which we might enter the strange underground world.
Presently Professor Bloch decided that the underground domain had been destroyed completely by the upheaval, caused no doubt, by the tremendous force of the radium in propelling the space-traveler from this earth. Disconsolately we trailed back to the buckboard.
When we eventually returned to Los Angeles, Professor Bloch refused to make a public statement regarding the foreman's strange experiences, and I was henceforth unable to submit the narrative for publication in the Outstander. I did, however, write an account of Dr. Jamesson's discovery of the peculiar skull and hinted indirectly at its remote connection with the chain of evolution on this globe, and the possibility of this world being invaded at some future period by Martians, Jovians or Venusians, but the Outstander published only a few garbled paragraphs that were unintelligible and valueless.
One thing Professor Bloch did say was that if money and inventive skill could be obtained an attempt might be made to go to Jupiter to rescue the unfortunate trio. If such a thing were to happen I will be one of the crew.