The Greatest Sci-Fi Books of Erle Cox. Erle Cox
Are there none amongst the whites who are unfit? If you follow your theory to its conclusion where does it stop?"
"We found the means to eradicate the unfit, even amongst the white races," came the answer serenely. "But it took a man who could stamp his will on the world before it could be done. Dick, your ideas strike me as being absurd. You would hold in honour as the greatest of your citizens a soldier who would lead his countrymen to kill another people by hundreds of thousands and send as many of his own to their death, merely on account of an international squabble, right or wrong. He is a hero. A national demigod almost. But is he any better than Odi, or any different from him, who dared to save a civilisation? To my mind Odi is the better man. He had a reason for his 'Death Ray.' As often as not your soldier is wrong in the cause he fights for. Even putting the best construction on his deeds he frees the world of an overburdening population, only the worst of it is that the finest type of man is killed in warfare, and the weeds are left to breed. Pity you couldn't form your armies of the unfit."
"Earani, I don't surrender I merely won't argue with you any more," and Barry sat down, pursing his lips sourly.
The woman walked to his side, and laid her hand lightly on his shoulder. "Wise boy, Dick," she said gently. "Come, I must put you in a better humor. Why should we quarrel because millions of years ago some people died? Listen to this and forget your worries." She moved to the keyboard, and a moment later a burst of heavenly music throbbed through the great gallery. It held the listening group spell-bound while it lasted, and when the last grand notes had echoed away there were tears in the eyes of the two men. There was a long silence, as though no one cared to break the spell, until Earani spoke. "That was one of our greatest choirs and the work of one of our master musicians. Tell me, Dick, was the price we paid for that, and all it means, too great? That is but an infinitesimal part of what we owe Odi?"
Barry made no answer, but rose to leave, and at a gesture from Earani, Alan followed his example. When they walked from the shed to the homestead that evening Dick spoke very soberly. "Dun, God send we have not done an evil thing for the world. If I could read her mind my own might be easier."
"I don't think we have cause to worry, Dick, though I'll admit she looks at things from a different point of view. Earani would be influenced by us in her actions."
"I'm not thinking so much of Earani as of that cold-blooded devil in the Himalayas. How far is he likely to be influenced by us?"
"Sufficient to the day–let us hope that Andax can't be found. It seems a pretty tall order to me."
Barry shook his head. "Dun, if Earani says she can do a thing, she can do it, and I'm perfectly certain that she can and will resurrect that damned friend of her youth, and, what's more, we can't stop her."
Chapter XXI
If Alan Dundas had forgotten his world, his world had by no means forgotten him. A man in a comparatively small community cannot entirely disappear from it without exciting comment. In the club at Glen Cairn men talked, and asked questions that were not answered. Over afternoon teacups tongues wagged and heads nodded. Hector Bryce was uneasy, but kept his thoughts to himself, even from Mistress Doris. A girl who went amongst her friends giving no sign carried a sore and sad heart with her. Why, she thought, was Alan behaving so queerly? Before that night when they had looked into one another's eyes in the moment of danger no week passed that did not bring its meeting. Since then he had gone out of her life. Why? Why? Why? The question racked her day and night. True to him even in her thoughts, she would not believe that the man who had held her hand that night, and spoken her name so, had done it lightly and then ridden away. She felt that it was no small thing that had come between them, but she felt she could only wait until he gave a sign. That he would come to her again she would not let herself doubt.
Rickardson, who was wasting High Court abilities in a country town, sat in the club and smoked placidly. To him entered George MacArthur. Rickardson gave no greeting to the newcomer beyond pushing a chair over to him with his foot. MacArthur pressed the bell, and while the steward brought the necessary bottles he stared gloomily at the fire, while Rickardson stared at him. The steward departed. MacArthur sipped the whisky, and turned abruptly to his friend. "I'm damned if I know what to make of it!" Then he turned back to the fire again.
Rickardson took his pipe out of his mouth and spoke. "You went out there, George?"
"Yes," absently, "I went out." There was a long silence. Then he went on. "This is just between ourselves, Rick. He hasn't pruned a single vine, much less put a plough onto the place. The house was open, and the dogcart was in the shed. Billy B.B. was in the paddock, and I'm ready to swear that Dundas was about the place somewhere. I raised no end of a row, but that was all I did raise. Never saw a vestige of him. Now what the deuce does it mean?"
Rickardson tapped the ashes from his pipe into his hand, and uttered one brief word, "Skirt."
MacArthur snorted. "Skirt! Rot! You're one-eyed on that idea, Rick. I hate this damned gossiping, and you're about the only one I'd open out to about Dun. But I've a pretty fair idea that Mrs. Bryce was working Dun for Miss Seymour, and Dun wasn't unwilling. Now, I know he hasn't been near Seymour's for months. I got that from Seymour himself. Now who else could there be? McCarthy's women are the nearest to him, two miles away, and I'd stake my life Dun isn't one of that sort. He's got some pretty highfalutin' notions about women."
"Did you try, Barry?" asked the lawyer presently.
"Humph! I did!" answered the other with a chuckle. "You know Dick. He told me nothing, with strictly professional politeness. Got nothing there, though the wily old beggar knows things, I'll swear. I didn't want to risk being told to mind my own dashed business. What about Bryce?"
"Bryce knows about as much as we do. That yarn about the study was all tosh. He was trying to pump me the other day, so I bluffed I was in the know, and said Dun was doing well. I expect he is, or Barry would come to light with something."
"Well," said MacArthur, in the end, "I suppose if Dun wanted to let us in he would, so we had better sit tight. Only I hate to think that he was in a hole and we were not on hand to help."
"Same here," replied Rickardson. "But, Mac, I'm prepared to bet a cigar to a brick house that when it comes out 'it' will be a woman of sorts."
Barry was neither blind nor deaf to what was going on. That 'Cootamundra,' usually one of the best-worked properties in the district, had been left to its own devices was a matter of small moment to Alan, he knew. He realised that, as things stood, Alan's future was elsewhere. But until he would be able to come into the open and show his hand, his present unusual existence was at least open to comment. To leave a valuable vineyard unpruned and unploughed to the end of August was inviting comment on his sobriety or his sanity. MacArthur was not the only one who had noticed. So Barry took counsel with himself, and one evening, as they sat smoking before his departure, he broke into his friend's reverie: "Dun, when were you in Glen Cairn last?"
Alan came to himself with a start. "Blessed if I know, Dick. It's so long ago that I've almost forgotten. Eight or ten weeks. Storekeeper sends out everything I want–no need to go in. Think of piffling about at the club or anywhere else, when there is what you and I know here."
"Just so, Dun. I know why you are lying low, but others don't. People are talking."
Alan looked across at his friend in mild surprise. "Talking? How? What are they saying?"
"Nothing to me. They know better. But think how it looks, Dun. You were not an inconspicuous figure in our little crowd. Suddenly, and without any apparent cause, you disappear. People know you are still here. They know that there has not been a stroke of work done on the place since vintage. Then they know I'm here a good deal. Think how it looks from the outside."
Alan frowned thoughtfully. "Come to think of it, it must start them guessing a bit." He stood up and took a note from his mantelpiece and handed it to Barry. "I found that pinned to the door the other day."
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