He shook his head. "You haven't quite learned Palos yet, Murray. I'll hit a tract of uninhabited country, of course. If I were a Zollarian, I could pull the same stunt in the desert outside Himyra's walls. Now, do you understand?"
I said I did, and he left me. And that is the way in which I came to witness the ending of the duel between Zollaria and Tamarizia, but more particularly between Kalamita and Jason, the Mouthpiece of Zitu, I shall endeavor to describe.
Of what intervened during the next five days I know of course only by hearsay. Briefly, Croft made Niera on time, and came down. The airplanes—five of them, that is—arrived. The other had come to grief and been compelled to remain behind. He did not wait for it, but pressed on. The final stopping-place was reached.
Croft, to Robur's horror, made use of a parachute with which he had equipped each ship, and dropped safely to the ground. Robur sailed into the north, and Croft, waiting until the planes had filled their fuel-tanks for the final stage of the journey, rose to follow just after the noontide hour of prayer.
Afterward he told me that the thing held a strange significance for him at the time. There was a prayer in his heart as the plane soared up swiftly—a prayer for success and the safety of those he loved—and he knew that, back in Himyra, Gaya was praying in a similar fashion for Robur, for Naia and Jason, and himself. And he knew that, even if in less definite fashion, the same prayer was in the heart of the nation whose manhood drove the blimps before him—one of whose daring sons controlled the rising plane on which he rode.
The hour of prayer. Eight hours he had allowed himself to cover the last four hundred miles. If nothing went wrong he would come in sight of Berla about dusk—and he would keep the blimps in sight, of course. One hour, two, three passed with the steady drone of the motur in his ears—four, five, six. Another, and the blimps paused and began a majestic circling.
Berla was in sight from their greater elevation, and twilight was falling. Across it he winked his signal—and was answered by a responsive flash. The plane fled on, swerving to one side to find the spot where it should lie waiting. Like a great bat swooping, it sank and went skimming across the darkening landscape, seeking a place to alight. In the end it grounded far out beyond the now shadowy outlines of Berla's walls.
Croft leaned back in his seat. Briefly he spoke to his pilot and seemed to rest, sagging inside his supporting straps. But, as aboard the blimp that first night, his spirit sought the chamber beneath Helmor's palace—found Naia and Jason on the couch together watching the blue girl of Mazzeria, who was busy weaving patterns out of straws. Naia of Aphur—and Jason, Son of Jason—on this night of all nights—safe!
Croft opened his eyes and lifted his body more stiffly in its seat. "Zitu—I thank thee," he whispered, raising his face to the now night-darkened heavens, and then—he sent the call for which I was listening on earth.