The Greatest Sci-Fi Books of Erle Cox. Erle Cox
covered the whole floor space with the exception of the spaces left for access, and where room had been left at regular intervals for tables. The lighting was the same as in the other galleries, but so arranged that no shadows fell in any of the narrow gangways between the shelves. Alan walked from one end of the gallery to the other, whistling cheerfully. He tried the great doors leading to the vestibule in a perfunctory way, and, as he expected, they were immovable. One thing puzzled him. He could see no ladder nor any apparent means of gaining the higher shelves beyond his reach. It might have been an oversight, he thought, but if it were it would be the only oversight he had so far come upon. He approached the nearest book shelf and examined it closely.
Equi-distant from the two ends, and about five feet from the floor, was a small metal disc set in the framework. On the disc were two small buttons, one red and the other white.
Alan looked at them thoughtfully for some time, then, summoning up his courage, he pressed the red one with tentative finger. Nothing happened. Then he tried the white. The instant his finger touched it the whole case subsided silently, but quickly, until the disc was on a level with the floor. The movement was so swift that he had no time to step back before the case had come to rest, but so perfect was the controlling mechanism that there was not the slightest jar when the motion stopped. "By Jove!" he muttered, "no need for ladders here. Ripping idea. There's another disc in reach now. I'll try it again." Obedient to his touch, the case again subsided, and when it came to rest with the second disc on the floor level, he found that the top row of books was within easy reach. "Good business," said Alan aloud, cheerfully. "Now it follows logically that the shelves will come up again, and if I'm not mistaken that is what the red button is for." He stooped and put his theory to the test. In a moment the case rose in answer to the pressure of his finger to its original position, leaving him lost in admiration at the wonderful skill that had carried out the idea. In spite of the temptation to examine the books, he curbed his curiosity. It was growing late, and he determined, if possible, to have a glimpse of the last gallery that day. Closing his ears to the siren call of the close-packed shelves, he paced slowly back to the corridor. At a rough estimate that gallery must have held a million books, and he smiled grimly at the thought of an attack against such odds, backed, as he well knew, by the fact of their being indecipherable. The thought of the latter fact brought forth a sigh of irritation. "All the care for nothing–all the work lost. What light on the dark places of the world's knowledge lay buried there." He put the thought from him impatiently.
Perhaps after all there would be a key. Surely the vast intelligence that had planned it all had left some connecting link. The idea eased his mind, and he turned in the doorway with hopeful eyes on the array of silent witnesses.
Six o'clock. For a while he hesitated in the corridor. Then he made up his mind. At least he would take one look at the last gallery. Turning, he walked down the corridor, fully expecting to find the last entrance similar to the others, but his hopes were banished abruptly.
Round the curving corridor from the library door the passage terminated in an unexpected obstacle, a wall pierced with a doorway and a closed door. It was the door itself rather than the unexpected ending of the passage that brought an astonished ejaculation to his lips. The door was not large, but was set deep in the massive wall. It was made of metal of some kind, and on it was carved or moulded the figure of a man, and in the figure Dundas recognised the domineering presence of the statue in the vestibule There was the same fierce relentless face staring into his, and the whole attitude of the figure standing with folded arms seemed to warn the explorer against further progress. On the lintel above again occurred the three sets of characters which he had come to regard nor only as the names of the figures in the vestibule, but also as a danger signal. "Now, whatever in the name of all that's wonderful is the meaning of this? From the look of it I should say that the last gallery will be the most interesting, and, if I'm not mistaken, the most exciting. But, my regal-looking friend"–here he nodded familiarly at the figure on the door–"I don't propose to start asking you for admittance at this hour of the day. I'm too tired and hungry to tackle the riddles you are likely to ask, and I guess I'm likely to want all my wits about me when I do start. So if you'll pardon my very brief visit I'll leave you until the morning."
Alan was not altogether disappointed. As he scrambled over the debris in front of the machinery gallery he told himself that he was more tired than he realised. The final climb up the winding stairway to the shed convinced him of this, and when he at last locked the door behind him and stood in the fading daylight he felt he had done a good day's work.
How little and insignificant his house looked after what he had been through, and yet, he thought, if he chose to speak now, that home would become for the time being the centre of the whole world. The eyes of every nation would be turned on it, and its name and his would be on every tongue.
Chapter XIII
Early next morning Dundas returned to the absorbing mystery. The extra precaution taken to guard the sixth gallery assured him that it contained something that would compensate him for the trouble he expected in gaining access to it. His first visit was to the doorway he had discovered on the previous evening. In spite of an heroic resolution that he would make his way to the spot with his eyes closed to the allurements of the galleries he had already investigated, the attraction of the various wonders he had to pass proved irresistible, and the journey, which should have taken no longer than two minutes from the vestibule to the corridor, occupied two full hours instead.
Arrived at his destination, Alan made a cautious and exhaustive examination of the door and its surroundings. An hour spent in a minute scrutiny of every inch of its surface left him without the slightest inkling to its secret. There was nothing in its appearance to indicate which way it opened or to suggest that it was only a blind to induce the unwary to waste time and temper over. He sounded the surrounding wall with painstaking care, in the hope of finding a device similar to that which had first given him entrance from the surface, but without success. Whatever mechanism existed for gaining the mysterious beyond, it was a mechanism that so far he had not encountered.
Another hour went by, and leaning against the wall of the corridor, Alan told the fierce-eyed image on the door just exactly what he thought of the methods used by him and his friends to keep the gallery inviolate. The outburst of temper relieved him somewhat, and was received with perfect equanimity by the image. The futility of his anger made Dundas smile in spite of his irritation He told himself that, brave as he was in the face of the graven image before him, such a demonstration before its original in the flesh would have been quite another matter. "I'm quite prepared to bet that even his most intimate friends, if he ever had an intimate friend, wouldn't have cared to take a liberty with him." After a pause, he went on, still regarding the figure with a frown, "Yes, your Majesty, you have exhausted my resources at this end for the present, at any rate. The only thing to be done is to return to the vestibule and try the main doorway, and I doubt if I'll get much satisfaction out of that."
Since the day of his narrow escape in the vestibule, he had trodden only a carefully marked course from the foot of the stairway to the entrance of the art gallery. He felt there was no use in taking any unnecessary risks with that beautiful but treacherous pavement. Now, however, he determined to examine it thoroughly. Working his way from the centre, he carefully approached the door of the sixth gallery, which was the one next to the art gallery on the right. He was not long in finding he had need for all his care. As in the previous attempt to find a path for himself, a noiseless chasm opened at his feet under pressure from the stick he carried with him. Alan stepped back alarmed.
After considering the situation, he again sounded the floor before him, with a view to ascertaining the extent of the trap. The device, he found, consisted simply of a nicely balanced section of the pavement that occupied the whole front of the doorway, with a margin of about three feet on either side. By working round one end of it he found that it tipped either way, and that it came so close to the doorway as to leave only a bare three inches of firm footing. Even if by a lucky jump he could reach this doubtful coign of vantage, he would be able to do very little in the way of testing the door, and, further, would