The explanation now was clear enough to me. I knew that the machine generated not only violet but ultra-violet rays of a penetrating power to reach the heart and check its action by tearing down the tissues.
Having seen enough for one day, I sank back upon a stone bench, clasping my aching forehead with both hands and telling myself that I had fallen amongst the most barbarous race ever known. True, they were wonderfully advanced scientifically, but would any civilized people execute a man with a death-ray? Would they not, rather, resort to humane devices, such as hanging, the guillotine, or the electric chair?
While absorbed in these ruminations, I was startled to see the prison door burst open once more, admitting the squad of ten soldiers who advanced with the same machine-like movements and prancing steps as before, singled out another of my cell-mates, bore the cringing victim away, and promptly executed him by means of the violet-ray.
Four times in the course of the next hour they returned, and each time withdrew one of my fellow prisoners, who shortly afterwards said his last farewell to this world.
What had these men done to justify such treatment? Surely, they were criminals of a desperate calibre!
With this reflection, I sought to console myself and to drive out a terrorizing premonition. But it was by no means consoling to find myself at length alone in the prison, while the last of my cell-mates was being crumpled to death by the violet rays.
Would I now be left to myself? Fervently I prayed to remain undisturbed for a time, so that the pulsing in my head might subside. But my prayer was not to be answered. Immediately after disposing of the last chalk-face, the soldiers returned. I heard the banging of the door, as it swung on its hinges with a rattling like the thunder of the gates of doom; I heard the warriors, with their clattering steely garments and triangular hatchet helmets as they solemnly approached; I saw their leader lift a black-clad hand and point in my direction with a motion as automatic as it was inexorable; and, cowering in the furthest dim recess of the prison, cornered beyond hope of escape, I felt as if I had already heard the summons of the Last Bugler trumpeting in my ears.