A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay (reading strategies book TXT) 📗

was cloudless and terrifically hot; but where the blue sun had sunk, a sombre shadow seemed to overhang the world. Maskull had a feeling of disintegration—just as if two chemically distinct forces were simultaneously acting upon the cells of his body. Since the afterglow of Alppain affected him like this, he thought it more than likely that he would never be able to face that sun itself, and go on living. Still, some modification might happen to him that would make it possible.

The sea tempted him. He made up his mind to bathe, and at once walked toward the shore. The instant he stepped outside the shadow line of the forest trees, the blinding rays of the sun beat down on him so savagely that for a few minutes he felt sick and his head swam. He trod quickly across the sands. The orange-coloured parts were nearly hot enough to roast food, he judged, but the violet parts were like fire itself. He stepped on a patch in ignorance, and immediately jumped high into the air with a startled yell.

The sea was voluptuously warm. It would not bear his weight, so he determined to try swimming. First of all he stripped off his skin garment, washed it thoroughly with sand and water, and laid it in the sun to dry. Then he scrubbed himself as well as he could and washed out his beard and hair. After that, he waded in a long way, until the water reached his breast, and took to swimming—avoiding the spouts as far as possible He found it no pastime. The water was everywhere of unequal density. In some places he could swim, in others he could barely save himself from drowning, in others again he could not force himself beneath the surface at all. There were no outward signs to show what the water ahead held in store for him. The whole business was most dangerous.

He came out, feeling clean and invigorated. For a time he walked up and down the sands, drying himself in the hot sunshine and looking around him. He was a naked stranger in a huge, foreign, mystical world, and whichever way he turned, unknown and threatening forces were glaring at him. The gigantic, white, withering Branchspell, the awful, body-changing Alppain, the beautiful, deadly, treacherous sea, the dark and eerie Swaylone’s Island, the spirit-crushing forest out of which he had just escaped—to all these mighty powers, surrounding him on every side, what resources had he, a feeble, ignorant traveller from a tiny planet on the other side of space, to oppose, to avoid being utterly destroyed?... Then he smiled to himself. “I’ve already been here two days, and still I survive. I have luck—and with that one can balance the universe. But what is luck—a verbal expression, or a thing?”

As he was putting on his skin, which was now dry, the answer came to him, and this time he was grave. “Surtur brought me here, and Surtur is watching over me. That is my ‘luck.’... But what is Surtur in this world?... How is he able to protect me against the blind and ungovernable forces of nature? Is he stronger than Nature?...”

Hungry as he was for food, he was hungrier still for human society, for he wished to inquire about all these things. He asked himself which way he should turn his steps. There were only two ways; along the shore, either east or west. The nearest creek lay to the east, cutting the sands about a mile away. He walked toward it.

The forest face was forbidding and enormously high. It was so squarely turned to the sea that it looked as though it had been planed by tools. Maskull strode along in the shade of the trees, but kept his head constantly turned away from them, toward the sea—there it was more cheerful. The creek, when he reached it, proved to be broad and flat-banked. It was not a river, but an arm of the sea. Its still, dark green water curved around a bend out of sight, into the forest. The trees on both banks overhung the water, so that it was completely in shadow.

He went as far as the bend, beyond which another short reach appeared. A man was sitting on a narrow shelf of bank, with his feet in the water. He was clothed in a coarse, rough hide, which left his limbs bare. He was short, thick, and sturdy, with short legs and a long, powerful arms, terminating in hands of an extraordinary size. He was oldish. His face was plain, slablike, and expressionless; it was full of wrinkles, and walnut-coloured. Both face and head were bald, and his skin was tough and leathery. He seemed to be some sort of peasant, or fisherman; there was no trace in his face of thought for others, or delicacy of feeling. He possessed three eyes, of different colors—jade-green, blue, and ulfire.

In front of him, riding on the water, moored to the bank, was an elementary raft, consisting of the branches of trees, clumsily corded together.

Maskull addressed him. “Are you another of the wise men of the Wombflash Forest?”

The man answered him in a gruff, husky voice, looking up as he did so. “I’m a fisherman. I know nothing about wisdom.”

“What name do you go by?”

“Polecrab. What’s yours?”

“Maskull. If you’re a fisherman, you ought to have fish. I’m famishing.”

Polecrab grunted, and paused a minute before answering.

“There’s fish enough. My dinner is cooking in the sands now. It’s easy enough to get you some more.”

Maskull found this a pleasant speech.

“But how long will it take?” he asked.

The man slid the palms of his hands together, producing a shrill, screeching noise. He lifted his feet from the water, and clambered onto the bank. In a minute or two a curious little beast came crawling up to his feet, turning its face and eyes up affectionately, like a dog. It was about two feet long, and somewhat resembled a small seal, but had six legs, ending in strong claws.

“Arg, go fish!” said Polecrab hoarsely.

The animal immediately tumbled off the bank into the water. It swam gracefully to the middle of the creek and made a pivotal dive beneath the surface, where it remained a great while.

“Simple fishing,” remarked Maskull. “But what’s the raft for?”

“To go to sea with. The best fish are out at sea. These are eatable.”

“That arg seems a highly intelligent creature.”

Polecrab grunted again. “I’ve trained close on a hundred of them. The bigheads learn best, but they’re slow swimmers. The narrowheads swim like eels, but can’t be taught. Now I’ve started interbreeding them—he’s one of them.”

“Do you live here alone?”

“No, I’ve got a wife and three boys. My wife’s sleeping somewhere, but where the lads are, Shaping knows.”

Maskull began to feel very much at home with this unsophisticated being.

“The raft’s all crazy,” he remarked, staring at it. “If you go far out in that, you’ve got more pluck than I have.”

“I’ve been to Matterplay on it,” said Polecrab.

The arg reappeared and started swimming to shore, but this time