The Girl in the Golden Atom by Ray Cummings (buy e reader txt) 📗

feet and facing the judge bowed low, with hands to her forehead. Then she spoke a few words, evidently addressing the women before her. Each of them raised her hands and answered in a monosyllable, as though affirming an oath. This performance was repeated by the men.

The accused still stood silent, smiling sardonically. Suddenly his voice rasped out with a short, ugly intonation and he threw his arms straight out before him. A murmur rose from the spectators, and several attendants leaned forward towards the platform. But the man only looked around at them contemptuously and again folded his arms.

From one of the enclosures a woman came, and mounted the platform beside the man. The Chemist whispered, "His wife; she is going to speak for him." But with a muttered exclamation and wave of his arm, the man swept her back, and without a word she descended the steps and reentered the railed enclosure.

Then the man turned and raising his arms spoke angrily to those seated in the enclosure. Then he appealed to the judge.

The Chemist whispered in explanation: "He refuses any witnesses."

At a sign from the judge the enclosure was opened and its occupants left the floor, most of them taking seats upon the balcony.

"Who is he?" the Very Young Man wanted to know, but the Chemist ignored his question.

For perhaps ten minutes the man spoke, obviously in his own defence. His voice was deep and powerful, yet he spoke now seemingly without anger; and without an air of pleading. In fact his whole attitude seemed one of irony and defiance. Abruptly he stopped speaking and silence again fell over the room. A man and a woman left the other enclosure and mounted the platform beside the accused. They seemed very small and fragile, as he towered over them, looking down at them sneeringly.

The man and woman conferred a moment in whispers. Then the woman spoke. She talked only a few minutes, interrupted twice by the judge, once by a question from Lylda, and once by the accused himself.

Then for perhaps ten minutes more her companion addressed the court. He was a man considerably over middle age, and evidently, from his dress and bearing, a man of prominence in the nation. At one point in his speech it became obvious that his meaning was not clearly understood by the jury. Several of the women whispered together, and one rose and spoke to Lylda. She interrupted the witness with a quiet question. Later the accused himself questioned the speaker until silenced by the judge.

Following this witness came two others. Then the judge rose, and looking up to the balcony where the Chemist and his companions were sitting, motioned to the Chemist to descend to the floor below.

The Very Young Man tried once again with his whispered question "What is it?" but the Chemist only smiled, and rising quietly left them.

There was a stir in the court-room as the Chemist crossed the main floor. He did not ascend the platform with the prisoner, but stood beside it. He spoke to the jury quietly, yet with a suppressed power in his voice that must have been convincing. He spoke only a moment, more with the impartial attitude of one who gives advice than as a witness. When he finished, he bowed to the court and left the floor, returning at once to his friends upon the balcony.

Following the Chemist, after a moment of silence, the judge briefly addressed the prisoner, who stolidly maintained his attitude of ironic defiance.

"He is going to ask the jury to give its verdict now," said the Chemist in a low voice.

Lylda and her companion leader rose and faced their subordinates, and with a verbal monosyllable from each member of the jury the verdict was unhesitatingly given. As the last juryman's voice died away, there came a cry from the back of the room, a woman tore herself loose from the attendants holding her, and running swiftly across the room leaped upon the platform. She was a slight little woman, almost a child in appearance beside the man's gigantic stature. She stood looking at him a moment with heaving breast and great sorrowful eyes from which the tears were welling out and flowing down her cheeks unheeded.

The man's face softened. He put his hands gently upon the sides of her neck. Then, as she began sobbing, he folded her in his great arms. For an instant she clung to him. Then he pushed her away. Still crying softly, she descended from the platform, and walked slowly back across the room.

Hardly had she disappeared when there arose from the street outside a faint, confused murmur, as of an angry crowd gathering. The judge had left his seat now and the jury was filing out of the room.

The Chemist turned to his friends. "Shall we go?" he asked.

"This trial—" began the Big Business Man. "You haven't told us its significance. This man—good God what a figure of power and hate and evil. Who is he?"

"It must have been evident to you, gentlemen," the Chemist said quietly, "that you have been witnessing an event of the utmost importance to us all. I have to tell you of the crisis facing us; this trial is its latest development. That man—"

The insistent murmur from the street grew louder. Shouts arose and then a loud pounding from the side of the building.

The Chemist broke off abruptly and rose to his feet. "Come outside," he said.

They followed him through a doorway on to a balcony, overlooking the street. Gathered before the court-house was a crowd of several hundred men and women. They surged up against its entrance angrily, and were held in check there by the armed attendants on guard. A smaller crowd was pounding violently upon a side door of the building. Several people ran shouting down the street, spreading the excitement through the city.

The Chemist and his companions stood in the doorway of the balcony an instant, silently regarding this ominous scene. The Chemist was just about to step forward, when, upon another balcony, nearer the corner of the building a woman appeared. She stepped close to the edge of the parapet and raised her arms commandingly.

It was Lylda. She had laid aside her court robe and stood now in her glistening silver tunic. Her hair was uncoiled, and fell in dark masses over her white shoulders, blowing out behind her in the wind.

The crowd hesitated at the sight of her, and quieted a little. She stood rigid as a statue for a moment, holding her arms outstretched. Then, dropping them with a gesture of appeal she began to speak.

At the sound of her voice, clear and vibrant, yet soft, gentle and womanly, there came silence from below, and after a moment every face was upturned to hers. Gradually her voice rose in pitch. Its gentle tone was gone now—it became forceful, commanding. Then again she flung out her arms with a dramatic gesture and stood rigid, every line of her body denoting power—almost imperious command. Abruptly she ceased speaking, and, as she stood motionless, slowly at first, the crowd silently dispersed.

The street below was soon clear. Even those onlookers at a distance turned the corner and disappeared. Another moment passed, and then Lylda swayed and sank upon the floor of the balcony, with her head on her arms against its low stone railing—just a tired, gentle, frightened little woman.

"She did it—how wonderfully she did it," the Very Young Man murmured in admiration.

"We can handle them now," answered the Chemist. "But each time—it is harder. Let us get Lylda and go home, gentlemen. I want to tell you all about it." He turned to leave the balcony.

"Who was the man? What was he tried for?" the Very Young Man demanded.

"That trial was the first of its kind ever held," the Chemist answered. "The man was condemned to death. It was a new crime—the gravest we have ever had to face—the crime of treason."

CHAPTER XXIII LYLDA'S PLAN

Back home, comfortably seated upon the broad balcony overlooking the lake, the three men sat waiting to hear their host's explanation of the strange events they had witnessed. Lylda busied herself preparing a light noonday meal, which she served charmingly on the balcony while they talked.

"My friends," the Chemist began. "I tried to give you this morning, a picture of this world and the life I have been leading here. I think you understand, although I did not specifically say so, that all I said related to the time when I first came here. That you would call this life Utopia, because of the way I outlined it, I do not doubt; or at least you would call it a state of affairs as near Utopian as any human beings can approach.

"All that is true; it was Utopia. But gentlemen, it is so no longer. Things have been changing of recent years, until now—well you saw what happened this morning.

"I cannot account for the first cause of this trouble. Perhaps the Malite war, with its disillusionment to our people—I do not know. Faith in human kindness was broken: the Oroids could no longer trust implicitly in each other. A gradual distrust arose—a growing unrest—a dissatisfaction, which made no demands at first, nor seemed indeed to have any definite grievances of any sort. From it there sprang leaders, who by their greater intelligence created desires that fed and nourished their dissatisfaction—gave it a seemingly tangible goal that made it far more dangerous than it ever had been before.

"About a year ago there first came into prominence the man whom you saw this morning condemned to death. His name is Targo—he is a Malite—full-blooded I believe, although he says not. For twenty years or more he has lived in Orlog, a city some fifty miles from Arite. His wife is an Oroid.

"Targo, by his eloquence, and the power and force of his personality, won a large following in Orlog, and to a lesser degree in many other cities. Twice, some months ago, he was arrested and reprimanded; the last time with a warning that a third offence would mean his death."

"What is he after?" asked the Very Young Man.

"The Targos, as they are called, demand principally a different division of the land. Under the present system, approximately one-third of all the land is in the hands of the government. Of that, generally more than half lies idle most of the time. The Targos wish to have this land divided among the citizens. They claim also that most of the city organizations do not produce as large a dividend as the Targos could show under their own management. They have many other grievances that there is no reason for me to detail."

"Why not let them try out their theories in some city?" suggested the Big Business Man.

"They are trying them," the Chemist answered. "There was a revolution in Orlog about six months ago. Several of its officials were assassinated—almost the first murders we have ever had. The Targos took possession of the government—a brother of this man you saw this morning became leader of the city. Orlog withdrew from the Oroid government and is now handling its affairs as a separate nation."

"I wonder——" began the Big Business Man thoughtfully. "Well, why not let them run it that way, if they want to?"

"No reason, if they were sincere. But they are not sincere nor honest fundamentally. Their leaders are for the most part Malites, or Oroids with Malite blood. And they are fooling the people. Their followers are all the more unintelligent, more gullible individuals, or those in whom there lies a latent criminal streak.

"The thing doesn't work. Sexual license is growing in Orlog. Crimes against women are becoming more and more frequent. Offences committed by those prominent, or in authority, go unpunished. Women's testimony is discredited, often by concerted lying on the part of men witnesses.

"Many families are leaving Orlog—leaving their land and their homes deserted. In other cities where the Targos threaten to gain control the same thing is happening. Most of these refugees come to Arite. We cannot take care of them; there is not enough land here."

"Why not take your army and clean them up?" suggested the Very Young Man.

They were seated around a little table, at which Lylda was serving lunch. At the question she stopped in the act of pouring a steaming liquid from a little metal kettle into their dainty golden drinking cups and looked at the Very Young Man gravely.

"Very easy it would be to do that perhaps," she said quietly. "But these Targos, except a few—they are our own people. And they too are armed. We cannot fight them; we cannot kill them—our own people."

"We may have to," said the Chemist. "But you see, I did not realize, I could not believe the extent to which this Targo