Myles Cabot

“ He had feared that such might be the case and might disincline the Cupians to accept the baby as their king; for, much as the country admired and respected, yea, even loved, Myles Cabot, they still regarded him as not one of them; a hero, even a demi-god perhaps, yet still not quite human.
But Cabot’s fears proved groundless. Baby Kew was earless, and had antennae, vestigial wings, twelve fingers, and twelve toes.
“I shall have to invent another line for ‘This little pig went to market,’” Myles remarked, and then explained to Lilla that rite of Anglo Saxon babyhood. ”

“ About fifty priests, dressed like Cabot’s conductor, were seated along the walls, some on special raised thrones; and in the center of the opposite side, on a raised platform, sat the leader of the faith, Owva, the holy father, who was the only cowled figure in the room. Owva’s face was the most serene and to-be-trusted that Myles Cabot had ever seen on any human being. One look at that face, and all Myles’s troubles passed away.
The holy father inspired him, as a mother inspires a child, to absolute trust and confidence in the future. ”

“ May the Great Builder bless Myles Cabot the Minorian.”
Cabot glanced at his burden, Quivven, the beautiful. No wonder she did not want to be seen. It always humiliates a lady not to look her best in public. But by the same token, no one could possibly recognize her. He might perfectly well have saved the sword.
So he passed on through the city streets. Finally he had to put the girl down, and ask her to help him find the way, which she did grudgingly. At the gate of Jud’s compound, Myles again swung her across his hip, before he demanded entrance. ”

“ Instantaneously the glance of Myles Cabot swept the black hordes which hemmed him in on each side. There was no escape!
Yet how can man die better,
Than facing fearful odds?
23
With a wild warwhoop, which was utterly lost on the radio-sense of the assembled Formians, Myles charged down the narrow way, straight into the muzzle of the rifle of his antagonist. The astonished ant-man hastily pulled the trigger. A shot rang out. But still the impetuous rush of Myles continued, and before the rifle could be discharged a second time, Myles had driven his spear deep into the leering insect face. ”

“ Cabot was manacled, and then was led into the presence of the king and queen: Yuri, the man with the heart of a beast; and Formis, the ant with the brains of a man. Together they stood beneath a scarlet canopy, which set off to perfection the shiny black naked body of the ant queen, and the black toga which her ally was wearing in honor of their alliance.
“Well, this is indeed a pleasure!” King Yuri exclaimed, rubbing his hands, as Myles Cabot entered the throne-room. “Welcome to Kuana, your cursed spot of sunshine. Formis, permit me to present to you the arch-enemy of your people.” ”

“ Well, even a chance to send to Cupia a message to the effect that he was free and safe, would be worth something. Myles Cabot tried the slitlike windows, and finding them too narrow, slid quickly down the near-by slope, soon to return laboriously with a twenty-pound rock, which he heaved against the door.
Again and again he heaved the rock, until he had the satisfaction of seeing the door crack and then give. Finally a large enough opening was effected to afford passage for a man, although not for a Formian; and through this breach Myles Cabot squeezed into the station. ”

“ Cabot passed the binoculars back to Lilla, and again all the Cupian searchlights became dark to him. It was most mystifying. He glanced at his companions in perplexity and suddenly saw the teeth and eyeballs of Nan-nan glow phosphorescent. Then, and not until then, did the truth dawn on Cabot.
“They are using the black light!” he gasped.
“The black light?” Lilla inquired. “What is that? How can light be black?”
“They are using the black light,” Myles continued, “just as my country, America, did to protect our convoys in the last great war on my own planet, Minos. ”

“ Whenever they sighted even a small group of Cupians, or wherever they had reason to suspect that some building was hostilely occupied, there they would drop one of their devastating bombs. Cabot’s forces were completely at the mercy of the Hymernians. There was but one thing to do—flee.
In vain, the earth-man and his able lieutenants tried to rally their troops. What was the use in assembling, when assembly was the signal for a bomb from above? What was the use of attacking the invincible bees?
Myles Cabot stood irresolute in one of the public squares. ”

“ Imagine tackling single-handed an ant with the brain of a man, the size of a horse, with razor-sharp mandibles! But it was Cabot’s only hope. If he could get the better of the Formian before the latter fully came to his senses, Myles had a bare chance of victory.
As bad luck would have it, the ant man came to his senses before Cabot did get the better of him. But not before Cabot had placed both hands under the edge of the ant’s head, preparatory to twisting his neck, which is the weakest and most vulnerable spot on a Formian, the spot always sought in their frequent duels. ”

“ OLD FRIENDS
“Doggo!” he cried. “Doggo! They told me you were dead!”
But of course all this was lost on the radio speech sense of the prisoner. Vairking soldiers interposed their spears between Myles Cabot and what they believed was sure destruction at the jaws of the black beast. Cabot recoiled.
“Jud,” he called out, “order off your henchmen! I am not crazy, nor do I court death. This creature is the only one of the Formians whom I can control. He will prove a valuable ally for us, if I can persuade him to forgive the indignities which your men have already heaped upon him.” ”

“ This looked like a good safe specimen to experiment upon, so he reached for its pad, which, to his great surprise, the creature promptly handed him without demur, together with its stylus.
Remembering the inscription above the arched doorway, Myles wrote in Porovian shorthand: “Most Excellent King—Myles Cabot, a weary sojourner, craves protection for himself and the golden one who now stands before you. We are from Cupia and Vairkingi respectively. What country is this?” ”

“ The young priest smiled. “Great are the ramifications of the lost religion. For instance, I might tell you who it was that loosed your pet woofus in the arena this morning when you appealed unto the God of Minos. But, for the present, my duty is merely to lead you to the princess. Follow me.”
And back he led Myles Cabot, down again into the depths from which the earth man had so laboriously fought his way. ”

“ Like a purple streak of lightning, the newcomer shot across the arena with a long-drawn crescendo howl!
The sound of a woofus is indescribable. Myles Cabot has tried many times to describe it to me, but has failed. The nearest that he can come to it is to say that it resembles the noise obtained by placing the receiver of a telephone-set over the mouthpiece, when one wishes to get even with the girl at Central for being particularly and unusually ornery. ”

“ Oya Buh then stepped forward and greeted his former chief.
“Yahoo, Cabot!” he cried. “May the dead rest beyond the waves. We, the living, have work to do. Look—the sky turns pink and silver in the east! Morning has come. What do you propose?”
“Morning means that the whistling bees will soon be upon us,” Myles answered. “We must capture the arsenal before they arrive.”
The party then took inventory of their supplies. There were thirty-eight rifles, forty Cupians, and Myles Cabot. One man was promptly sent to the roof with crossed sticks. ”

“ Beyond the fields lay the rocky foothills of a mountain range. Caution dictated that Cabot remain under the shelter of the city walls until the Formian disappeared among the rocks. Then he ran lightly across the plain to take up the trail once more.
As he, too, gained the rocks, he glanced back to see if his departure had been noted. No, there was no sign of life. Evidently the fighting had drawn all the inhabitants to the interior of the city. So, with a sigh of relief, Myles hurried after the messenger ant. ”

“ The Minorian lied when he told you that he had affairs well in hand, for even at that moment he was a fugitive.
“He is now with the furry Cupians who live to the north of New Formia. Today our forces are attacking their city. It is only a matter of a few parths before he will be in our hands. I have spoken, and shall now stand by to receive.”
This was the supreme test. Could Myles Cabot hear the reply? Adjusting his set to the extreme limit of its sensitivity, he waited, his hands on the wave-length dials. ”

“ And that will be about all of Poros for the present. Let us now turn our attention to Myles Cabot on earth.
His life with us was very regular. From Monday until Friday of every week he attended Harvard. His week-ends he devoted to study and, with some slight assistance from myself and family and farmhands, to erecting the two huge steel towers on Cow Hill, and to installing his apparatus in a shack which we built at their base. This apparatus comprised a long-range long-wave-length sending and receiving set, and a matter-transmitting set. ”

“ In the morning Myles Cabot was to be brought before Att the Terrible, king of the Roies—for execution in the diabolical manner common to these furry aborigines, namely by being strung up by the heels and then used as a target for the archery of the king.
In spite of this, he slept soundly and dreamed of radio sets and blast furnaces and galena mines, until he was awakened by a soft furry paw shaking his shoulder.
A voice spoke close to his ear: “A life for a life.”
“So you have that proverb on this continent as well as in Cupia?” was his reply. “Who are you, and what do you want?” ”

“ Gradually the chase lengthened out, until each pursuer was separated from the next by almost as many parastads as lay between their leader and the beast which fled before them. Cabot sat down in the center of the sands and watched the race with a feeling of strange detachment, scarcely conscious of the fact that, at the end of all this, he was destined to be torn to bits. His only sentiment was sorrow that his pet should have proved a craven, and anxiety for its safety. Why couldn’t the woofus die fighting, as befitted a creature trained by Myles Cabot, the Minorian? ”

“ A live man was no concern of theirs.
Myles felt of his head. His left earphone was smashed and there was a welt on his left temple. He had been merely stunned, rather than killed, or even seriously wounded.
By the aid of the rapidly fading pink glow in the western sky, the weary man picked his way across the battlefield to the little ravine through which he had entered it. There the Cupian bar-pootah took him in charge and dispatched him by kerkool to the nearest army hospital. In a few days he was himself again.
Then Myles Cabot took the field in person, with Poblath as his aide. ”

“ I, and I alone, know the secret of that door. I am not afraid to die, though it is a bit unpleasant to be killed by a coward; but, unless you spare my life, neither you nor the princess will ever leave this room.”
“‘Better a wise coward than a brave fool,’” Myles quoted from one of Poblath’s proverbs.
“That may be,” the king testily resumed, “but, as I have said, if you kill me, you will never leave this room. Your only hope of escape is to spare my life.”
Cabot considered for a moment. Naturally he did not believe Yuri, yet how simple to test him by trying the door. ”

“ Cabot answered. “Emsul is on his way to Yuri under crossed sticks. I am here in a plane, with one rifle, Nan-nan the cleric, and six unarmed sharpshooters.”
“What is the idea?” Tedn asked.
“The idea is to fly to Kuana to-night,” the earth-man replied, “and raise as much rough-house as possible for Prince Yuri. Will you come with us? There is one vacant place in the plane.”
The Cupian looked at him admiringly, and said: “You are still the same old Myles Cabot! You propose to capture Kuana practically without arms and single-handed. And the joke is that you will probably succeed. ”

“ With this thought in mind, Myles jumped to his feet, and hastening over to one side of the stadium, stood directly in the path of the oncoming beasts. He heard Lilla gasp in the stands above, and then the woofuses were upon him. His own pet, tired and frantic as it was, saw and recognized its master, and paused to turn to one side and so avoid running him down; and, at this instant, Cabot shouted peremptorily: “Sic ’em, Tige! Sic ’em!”
Habit proved stronger than fear. The woofus wheeled, and in an instant had laid its surprised pursuer in the dust. ”

“ But how is it that you, Myles Cabot, have arrived here on this continent in exactly the same manner and condition in which I discovered you in old Formia eight years ago?”
When Myles reached the end of reading this narrative, he in turn took the pad and stylus and related how he had gone to the planet Minos (which we call the Earth) to learn the latest discoveries and inventions there, and how his calculations for his return to Poros had been upset by some static conditions just as he had been about to transmit himself back. ”

“ We use the dot-dash code, of course.”
“Toron,” exclaimed Myles Cabot, “you are a genius! Your invention has probably saved the day. Send word to Kuana that Myles Cabot has returned to life and is about to march to do battle against his foes. I guess that that will not give too much information as to our plans. ‘March’ is good, for they will never suspect that it means ‘fly.’ Eh, Portheris?”
The bee wiggled his antennae in appreciation.
Hah Babbuh, Buh Tedn and Poblath were then called in, and the plans were laid for the attack. ”