Over the polished stone pavements strange vehicles ran noiselessly, as if the wheels had cushioned tires, and the streets were crowded with an active, strangely-clad populace.
“Look at that!” exclaimed the American, and from a street corner they saw a queer-looking machine, carrying half-a-dozen passengers, rise like a bird with wings outspread and fly away toward the east. They watched it till it disappeared in the distance.
“We are indeed in wonderland,” said the Englishman; “I can't make head nor tail of it. We were on an isolated island, the Lord only knows where, and have suddenly been transported to a new world!”
“I can't feel at all as if we were in the world we were born in,” returned Johnston. “I feel strange.”
“The wine,” suggested the Englishman, “you know it did wonders for us in that subwater thing.”
“No; the wine has nothing to do with it. My head never was clearer. The very atmosphere is peculiar. The air is invigorating, and I can't get enough of it.”
“That is exactly the way I feel,” was Thorndyke's answer.
“Look at the sunlight,” went on Johnston; “it is gray like our dawn, but see how transparent it is. You can look through it for miles and miles. It is becoming pink in the east, the sun will soon be up, and I am curious to see it.”
“It must be up now, but we cannot see it for the hills and buildings. My goodness, see that!” and the Englishman pointed to the east. A flood of delicate pink light was now pouring into the vast body of gray and was slowly driving the more sombre color toward the west. The line of separation was marked—so marked, indeed, that it seemed a vast, rose-colored billow rolling, widening and sweeping onward like a swell of the ocean shoreward. On it came rapidly, till the whole landscape was magically changed. The flowers, the trees, the grass, the waters of the lakes, the white buildings, the costumes of the people in the streets, even the sky, changed in aspect. The white clouds looked like fire-lit smoke, and far toward the west rolled the long line of pink still struggling with the gray and driving it back.
The sun now came into sight, a great bleeding ball of fire slowly rising above the gilded roofs in the distance.