In the air above the city an uncountable number of very small objects darted hither and thither like sparkling fireflies. It was difficult to realise that they, too, were aircraft.
To the west lay an immense expanse of silver, melting smoothly into the horizon. Watson took it to be the Thomahlian ocean. Then he looked up at the sky directly above him, and breathed a quick exclamation.
It was a single, small object, perfectly white, dropping out of the amethyst. Tiny at first, amost instantly it assumed a proportion nearly colossal—a great bird, white as the breast of the snowdrift, swooping with the grace of the eagle and the speed of the wind. It was so very large that it seemed, to Chick, that if all the other birds he had ever known were gathered together into one they would still be as the swallow. Down, down it came in a tremendous spiral, until it gracefully alighted in a splash of molten colour on the bosom of the silver sea. For a moment it was lost in a shower of water jewels—and then lay still, a swan upon the ocean.
“What is it, Geos?”
“The Kospian Limited, my lord. One of our great airships—a fast one, we consider it.”
“It must accommodate a good many people, Rhamda.”
“About nine thousand.”
“You say it comes from Kospia. How far away is that?”
“About six thousand miles. It is an eight-hour run, with one stop. Just now the service is every fifteen minutes. They are coming, of course, for the Day of the Prophet.”
Watson continued to watch the great airship, noting the swarm of smaller craft that came out from the Mahovisal to greet it, until the Jan Lucar suddenly altered the course. They stopped climbing, and struck out on a horizontal level. It left the Mahovisal behind them, a shimmering spot of fire beside the gleaming sea. They were travelling eastwards. The landscape below was level and unvaried, of a greenish hue, and much like that of Chick's own earth in the early spring-time—a vast expanse, level and sometimes dotted with opalescent towns and cities. Ribbons of silver cut through the plain at intervals, crookedly lazy and winding, indicating a drainage from north to south or vice versa. Looking back to the west, he could see the great, golden sun, poised as he had seen it that morning, a huge amber plate on the rim of the world. It was sunset.