Rawhide

“ Through more endless, age-long seconds there passed through Rawson's mind entrancing visions. An army of men like these White Ones, himself at their head. They were armed with strange weapons; they were invading the mole-men's world....
The girl was reaching toward him. She laid one hand upon his, then pointed overhead.
awson looked quickly above. The glowing bull's-eyes startled him, then he knew it was white-light he was seeing, not the red threat of glowing rock. Their speed had been steadily cut down as the air pressure lessened. "They're decompressing," he thought. ”

“ There was a silence, in which the gross impostor shifted heavily in his seat, while a hand twitched across the mouth and then caught at the breast of the threadbare black coat abstractedly.
Rawley leaned forward, one elbow on a knee, the cheroot in his fingers. He spoke almost confidentially, as to some ignorant and misguided savage—as he had talked to Indian chiefs in his time when searching for the truth regarding some crime.
“I’ve had a lot of revelations in my time. A lawyer and a doctor always do. ”

“ Rowjee Rajah thought he must be in a dream; but when he saw the Ranee drink some water from the tank and return towards the tomb, he sprang up and hurried after her. Sodewa Bai, hearing footsteps follow her, was frightened, and running into the tomb, fastened the door. Then the Rajah knocked at it, saying, 'Let me in; let me in.' She answered, 'Who are you? Are you a Rakshas, or a spirit?' (For she thought, 'Perhaps this is some cruel creature who will kill me and the child.') 'No, no,' cried the Rajah, 'I am no Rakshas, but your husband. ”

“ The first twelve years of his life had thoroughly accustomed Rawley to the sight of the fierce old man with long hair and his legs cut off at his knees, who sometimes appeared in a wheel chair on a porch of the west wing, attended by an Indian who looked savage enough to scalp a little boy if he ventured too close; a ferocious Indian who scowled and wore his hair parted from forehead to neck and braided in two long braids over his shoulder, and who padded stealthily about the place in beautifully beaded moccasins and fringed buckskin leggings. ”

“ The whole earth lay weltering in a fiery bath. With the drawing on of evening there would be movement. Flocks of parroquets would rush out of the tree-tops screaming discordantly: birds of prey would prune their wings and set off slowly, with harsh cries, in search of food; and the confused murmur of a restless humanity would begin again.
Then the rajah's heir would emerge from his shelter, and, while his tent was being taken down, and his camels laden, would stroll into the nearest village. ”

“ This little clay relief was discovered by Sir Henry Rawlinson at Birs-Nimrûd. A clean-shaven and semi-nude attendant is in charge of a large hound which he is leading by means of a strap. The attendant, who is armed with a stick, is more life-like than the attendants on the bas-reliefs of Ashur-bani-pal, but the dog, though spirited, cannot compare with those sculptured in hard stone on the palace walls of that same king. ”

“ Horn called to her:
'Skink us with the first,
The beggars ben athirst.'
She laid down her horn and filled him a gallon bowl; but Horn would not drink of that. He said, mysteriously, "Thou thinkest I am a beggar, but I am a fisher, come far from the East, to fish at thy feast. My net lies near at hand, and hath full seven year. I am come to see if it has taken any fish.
'I am come to fish;
Drink to me from thy dish,
Drink to Horn from horn!'"
Rymenhild looked at him, a chill creeping over her heart. ”

“ He then proceeded to drive them away, and to lure his own dogs to the stag; but whilst he was thus engaged, the owner of the strange pack arrived on a big horse of a dismal grey colour: he had a huntsman's horn hanging from his neck, and he was clad in a hunting-dress of a kind of grey cloth. 'Ah, prince,' said he, 'I know who thou art, and I will not salute thee.' 'In that case,' said Pwyỻ, 'perhaps thy dignity is such that thou shouldst not. ”

“ He stared angrily at the floor of ash, at the black, outcropping masses of tufa. He was angry with himself, angry and baffled and tired from his climb. Far down in the vast, shallow pit blazing sunlight glinted from massive blocks whose sides were mirror-smooth. A whirl of wind eddied there for a moment and lifted the dust into a vertical gray column—the only sign of motion in the whole desolate scene. Rawson turned and tramped back toward the long hot descent to the floor of the Basin. ”

“ Like a sensitized plate when the camera's shutter is opened a merest fraction of a second, Rawson's brain took the imprint of every detail that was there. The black mouth of the shaft, and, on the rock beside it, something metallic, brilliantly gleaming—a flame-thrower! Beyond the pit was Loah, half crouching, her slim body tense as if checked in mid-flight. She had been running toward him, coming to warn him. And between her and the shaft, his back turned squarely toward Rawson, was the hideous figure of a mole-man, one of the Reds! ”

“ In a few moments Lucy, accompanied by her ayah, drove off, and Grace turned her pale face to Hoosanee. 'Go on,' she said. 'Your master has sent you. He is the Rajah of Gumilcund.'
'You are right, most noble lady. My master, the rajah, has sent me. He has only lately come to rule over us; but already he knows the hearts of his people. He loves the English, and he would, if he could, avert these troubles. But he knows it to be impossible. The storm has broken, and it will sweep over the land and devastate it, and none can stay its course. ”

“ The last of a once mighty people were marching to their death.
Rawson and Loah turned with one accord. Victory was theirs, but there was no time to taste the fruits of victory. They ran with straining muscles and gasping breath toward the distant mountain and the marching host beyond.
y plans are made," Rawson spoke quietly. "I must go. I shall take the shell—the jana—and go back to the mole-men's world. I shall go alone, and I shall die, but what of that?" His eyes lit up for a moment. "I'll try to find Phee-e-al first. If I can get him before they get me, that will help." ”

“ Are you ill? What is the matter?” Guy looked at her, as she said afterwards, as if he did not see her, and hurried in and upstairs without a word, and as she followed, scared and puzzled, she heard him shut and lock his bedroom door behind him. Turning away in distress and alarm, she met Godfrey strolling along in the sunshine, with Rawdie at his heels, and a book under his arm, a picture of idle holiday enjoyment.
“Oh,” he said, in answer to her appeal, “Guy is like that if he has a headache. ”

“ Godfrey was not coming home for Christmas. Nerves and brain would endure no longer the solitude—that was not solitude. He put his hand over his eyes.
“If Rawdie had not been there last night.” But Rawdie had been there—there always was something. As to the mill, there were flashes of certainty as to the right course, and a word or a kindly deed of old Cooper’s just gave strength to put them in practice. The sun struggled through the fog yesterday, and raised his spirits; the day before there was a letter from Cuthbert. ”

“ A wild journey, incredible, unreal. Rawson, as he met the countless staring white eyes of the creatures they passed, found his thoughts wandering. He had had wild dreams. Surely this was only another in that succession of phantom pictures. Then, seeing the cold, implacable hatred in those staring eyes, he would be brought back with sickening abruptness to a full knowledge of his own hopeless situation.
"Gevarro, the lake of fire which never dies"—what was it the white ones had said? ”

“ The strong hand of one stronger than man had taken him; and in a few days more, on February 23rd, hands tender and strong, the hands of an affectionate brother and true friends, bore the body of a shepherd, dead in his prime—for he was but 36 years old—down through the cow-pasture and over the gurgling Glenderaterra, and so through the silent Brundholme woods above the wailing Greta away to its rest in English earth beneath the shadow of the old church of St. Kentigern, in the Crosthwaite valley, within sight of that horned hill of Skiddaw he had loved so well. ”

“ Rawley stated challengingly. “A bit old-fashioned, maybe—a man couldn’t live in a wheel chair for fifty years or so, shut away from all companionship as he has been, and keep his ideas right up to the minute. If you ask me, I’ll say he’d make a corking old pal. Full of pep—or would be if he weren’t crippled. It’s a darned shame I never busted through the feud before. Why, fifty years ago he was all through Nevada—think of that! ”

“ Rawder’s old troop was running forward to finish him—Tarrant in the lead. I tried to make them hear—these white men, as they rushed in, full of the hang-over hell of a fight. But they would not hear me. The men saw only the crown of a great day—to kill the deserter [28] who had led the Tagals against them in Luzon—Rawder, the renegade, whom they believed stood also behind the deaths of last night and this day. To kill him after whipping the Mindayans would call down the glory of the Pantheon.... Rawder stepped back, smiling, empty of hand. ”

“ Beyond it the passageway was alive with crowding red figures. Above their heads the nozzles of a score of flame-throwers spat jets of green fire. Rawson drew back in sudden uncontrollable horror as they came crowding into the room.
The familiar feel of the bailer's cold metal had given him a momentary sense of oneness with his own world. Now this inrush of hideous, demoniac figures beneath the flare of green flames was like a fevered vision of the infernal regions come suddenly to actuality. ”

“ Rawley was rolling the nuggets in his hand, staring at them abstractedly.
“It’s queer—the whole thing,” he said finally. “I feel a sort of leaning toward Grandfather. It was something in his eyes. You know, Mother, it must be darned tough to have both legs chopped off at the knees when you’re a young husky over six feet in your socks and full of pep. I—believe I can understand Grandfather King. ‘A hunk of meat in a wheel chair’—that’s what he called himself. ”

“ But he knew instinctively that Lord Nehmon, anticipating his return, would not be at the concert.
Riding the shuttle over the edges of Jungle-land toward the shining bright beauty of the city, Ravdin settled back, trying to clear his mind of the shock and horror he had encountered on his journey. The curves and spires of glowing plastic passed him, lighted with a million hues. He realized that his whole life was entangled in the very beauty of this wonderful city. Everything he had ever hoped or dreamed lay sheltered here in the ever-changing rhythm of colors and shapes and sounds. ”

“ She will not be happy until she has told what is on her mind. Will she then? God help my darling and send her rest and peace!' From Bâl Narîn, who would not go back to his native valley until he had seen his friends at the end of their journey, I learn that the young rajah, who travelled in semi-Oriental dress, but who did not now disguise from anyone that he was of European origin, won hearts wherever he went by his grace and dignity. ”

“ Beside him a priest swept the metal table clear. Rawson's clothing, the gun, the radio receiver, all were snatched up and hurled into one of the massive chests. Phee-e-al was still shouting shrill commands. An instant later Rawson was lifted in air, rushed to the barrier and thrown bodily from the sacred premises he had invaded. Then the hands of the red guard closed about him before he could struggle to his feet. A shining object swung down above his head. It was the last he knew.
is dreams were of falling. ”

“ Guy sat down when his brother left him, in his old corner in the study, with Rawdie on his knee, and looked round him. The sense of constant effort slipped away from him.
“I can do here,” he said to himself, in his northern idiom, “I’m used to it. One must pay the price.”
Part 3, Chapter IX. The Arch-Fear. One sunny afternoon towards the end of August, Florella was sitting on the wall of old Peggy Outhwaite’s garden, sketching a tuft of house-leek that adorned the roof of the ancient and ill-kept cottage. ”

“ The rajah’s procession was beautiful; not so large as some of Runjeet’s, but more regularly handsome, as all his followers were equally well dressed, and their riding was very striking. Runjeet’s men cannot ride at all. Some of the men we saw this morning put their horses into a gallop and then stood up on their saddles, stooping down to the right and left to cut away the weeds with their swords, very much what people do at Astley’s, only there the horses go round in a circle, which makes it more easy. ”

“ As the sick unto death long for the morning, so have we longed for it, and how can I help being triumphant?'
'Your—master?' says the girl, fixing her large, fever-bright eyes upon his face.
'My master—the Rajah of Gumilcund. He is on his way. He will be here soon, if—now the demons of the jungle guide him! Here! here!' he cries, lapsing into his native Ghoorka in his overpowering excitement. 'Look for the cotton-tree! Ah! what a fool I am! He does not know my tongue. Lady, you have a light within?'
Trembling with excitement, Grace ran inside and caught up a little rush-candle—their last! ”