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<h2 id="c24">XXIV THE LOBSTEROID CIRCUIT</h2> Myles could not help comparing his present ease of passage down the swath cut by the Cupians with his difficult grubbing through the shrubs a few feet an hour, or even with forcing his way behind the wedge-faced insect. Upon his arrival at the brink of the abyss, his first act was to test the black sand with an electric coil. As he had expected, it was magnetite, the only iron ore which will respond to a magnet. It was the same ore as he had used in his crucibles while making his radio set in Vairkingi. This preliminary disposed of, cables were quickly stretched back and forth across the pit, and from these cables large electro-magnets were hung close to the surface of the water. Wires were run from the lighting system of the near-by town to a master controller at the top of the cliff. When all was in readiness, the earth-man threw the current into all the circuits. The result was immediate. To the surface of the water there floated bottom side up, a score or more of lobsterlike creatures, each the size of a freight car. Poor beasts! The pellets of sand and cement, in the cavities of their gravity-sense organs, were composed of magnetite; and this being attracted upwardly by the suspended electro-magnets, gave the poor creatures the impression that up was down, and down was up. Consequently, reversing their position and floating to the surface, they imagined—with what little imagination their primitive brains were capable of—that they were resting peacefully at the bottom of the lake. Next there were turned on, in place of the suspended magnets, a number of magnets lying against the steep side of the pit near the surface of the water; and instantly all the lobsteroids rolled over, with their bellies toward that side of the pit. The experiment was a complete success. <div class="pb" id="Page_190">190</div> Grappling hooks and blocks and tackle were then brought, and dragging was begun for the airplane, the ant-rifle, and the bandoleer of cartridges which Myles had lost on the night of his landing in Cupia. The radio man himself, stationed at his switchboard, manipulated the instruments. Presumably all three of the sought articles were near the bank where Cabot had landed, so fishing was begun at that point, while energized magnets, across the pond, drew the huge crustaceans away. Even so, several of them swam back and snapped at the grappling hooks. This gave Myles an opportunity to practice his controls. Whenever one of the monsters of the deep would approach any of the dredging apparatus, the radio man would close the switch which controlled some near-by magnet, whereat the bewildered beast would be thrown completely off his balance, and would require several paraparths before he could orient himself to the new lines of force. By the time that this had been accomplished, Cabot would have switched on some other magnet, thus again upsetting the beast’s equilibrium. It was truly a weird and novel tune which this electrical genius of two worlds played upon his keyboard, while huge green shapes moved at his command. Finally Myles got so expert at this strange game, that it became safe for his workmen to descend into the pit without fear of the denizens of the deep. At last the ropes were securely fastened to the ant-plane, and it was drawn up the bank to safety. The fire-arm and ammunition followed shortly thereafter. The forces of the true king—Baby Kew—were now armed with one small airship, one rifle, and one bandoleer of cartridges. “You must attack at once!” Nan-nan asserted. The earth-man looked at the Cupian in surprise. “Why?” he asked. <div class="pb" id="Page_191">191</div> “Because,” the young cleric explained, “if you don’t some one of this village is going to get word to Prince Yuri of your return. Although no announcement has yet been made of your identity, this feat of yours of overcoming the scissor-beasts is as good as a verbal introduction. Runners will soon be notifying the usurper.” “Why runners?” Myles asked. “Why not radio?” “Because,” Nan-nan replied. “I took the precaution to throw an adjusting-tool into the local motor-generator set early this morning. One of the solenoids is hopelessly jammed, and it will take several days and nights of steady work to restore it.” “Great are the ramifications of the lost religion,” Cabot murmured approvingly. But the young cleric pouted, in spite of the tone of approval. Said he: “There were no ramifications to this accomplishment. I did it all myself.” “Have it your own way,” Myles returned conciliatorily. “But to get back to what we were discussing, how am I to attack the usurper with no troops, and only one plane, and one rifle?” “But you must attack!” Nan-nan objected. “As for planes, every plane in the kingdom, save only yours, is under lock and key at Wautoosa, the old naval air base, which now is the headquarters of the whistling bees. Every firearm, save two, your rifle and Prince Yuri’s automatic, is under heavy guard at the Kuana arsenal. Only the pretender himself and the arsenal guards—who are trusted henchmen of his—are permitted to be armed.” “And I suppose,” the earth-man interjected, with a shrug, “that you expect me, alone and single-handed, to seize the Kuana arsenal, and distribute arms to my people.” “Not exactly,” the priest replied. “You see—” At which point the conversation was interrupted by a body of troops, four abreast, which came marching toward them down the aisle which had been cut through the trees. Cabot stepped back aghast. Trapped! The soldiers swung along in the perfect cadence which had been taught them by generations spent in the marching clubs—or “hundreds”—of Cupia. True, they were unarmed, but what could one armed human do against such numbers? Cabot glanced down the path, and saw hundred after hundred turn into it at the farther end. <div class="pb" id="Page_192">192</div> There was only one possibility of escape, his plane. But the plane was still dripping from its submergence in the pond. Would its trophil-engine start while wet? Had enough water leaked into the alcohol tanks to damage the fuel? He would see. Shouting to Nan-nan and Emsul to follow, he started toward his craft; but the young cleric blocked his way. Treachery. No. For the young priest cried: “Fear not, defender of the faith. These be friends! They are the armies which you are to lead against Yuri. They are marching clubs of the loyal hill towns, which have been called together here, ostensibly for an athletic tournament.” Cabot stopped his mad scramble of retreat, and smiled. With such men he would reconquer Cupia, Yuri or no Yuri, bees or no bees! The foremost hundred debouched and formed in company-front. Then from the ranks there stepped a Cupian, who snatched off his blond wig, revealing ruddy locks beneath. Onto his own right breast he pinned a red circle, the insignia of Field Marshal. It was Hah Babbuh, Chief of Staff of the Armies of Cupia, who had been Cabot’s right-hand man in the two wars of liberation. Facing the troops he gave a crisp command. Up shot every left hand. Then, wheeling about, he held his own hand aloft and shouted: “Yahoo, Myles Cabot! We are ready to follow where you lead!” “Yahoo!” the troops echoed in unison. Then, giving his men the order “at ease,” Hah strode up to the earth-man. Warmly, the two friends patted each other on the cheek. It was many sangths since they had seen each other, and much had happened in the meantime. A council of war was immediately held between Myles, Hah, Nan-nan, and Emsul, at the plane. <div class="pb" id="Page_193">193</div> “Won’t this gathering come to the attention of Yuri?” Myles asked. “And won’t he at once suspect its cause, in view of its nearness to Luno Castle, and in view of my recent radio announcements from Vairkingi?” “I doubt it,” the Babbuh replied, “for we have wrecked every radio set in the vicinity.” But, this did not reassure the earth-man as much as it might. “It would seem to me,” he asserted, “that this very fact would put Prince Yuri on his guard.” “Possibly so,” Nan-nan ruefully admitted, “but it will take four days for investigators to cover the thousand stads from Kuana to here by kerkool, two days by bee.” “And in the meantime,” Myles countered, “it will take our plane two days to reach Kuana, and our kerkools four.” “Then,” Emsul suggested, “had we not better march openly and at once?” This suggestion was accepted, with the reservation, however, that the return of Cabot and the existence of their plane were to be kept as secret as possible. Accordingly the main body of the troops were put on the march toward Kuana, under Emsul, with instructions to requisition every available kerkool, wreck every radio set, and place every settlement under martial law. The kerkools, as fast as seized, were to be manned by the best sharpshooters, and sent ahead. The local village and the lobster pond were placed under heavy guard, and the earth-man with his plane and rifle remained under cover. That night, just at sunset, he started forth. The airship had been stripped to its lightest, and in it were crowded Myles Cabot, Hah Babbuh, Nan-nan, and half a dozen sharpshooters. Long before morning, they came up with the lights of the foremost kerkools, and so were forced to cease their advance, whereupon they landed, and encamped for the rest of the night and the following day. <div class="pb" id="Page_194">194</div> All day long, kerkools passed them on the road, stopping to report as they passed. Apparently a surprising number of these swift two-wheeled Porovian autos had been captured. The following night the plane again took wing, and continued until it caught up once more with the advance guard of the “taxi-cab army.” These men reported that, at the last radio station seized, they had learned that Prince Yuri had put censorship on the air, thus showing conclusively that the usurper had learned something of what was going on. Then the kerkools swept ahead, and Cabot encamped as before. He was now halfway to Kuana, his loved ones, and Prince Yuri. Toward the end of the day which followed, the advancing kerkools met a bombing squadron of whistling bees, and were forced to halt and take cover as best they could. Most of the men escaped, but many of the machines had to be left on the road, where they were demolished by the bombs of the enemy. During all this confusion, a kerkool from the capital, bearing crossed sticks as a flag of truce, drew up at the vanguard, with the following message: “King Yuri cannot but regard the steady procession of kerkools toward Kuana as a menace directed against him. If it is not so intended, then let a delegation in one kerkool proceed under crossed sticks to convince him of your sincerity. From now on, if more than one kerkool advances, it will be taken as a hostile act, and Prince Kew, the heir to the throne, will be sacrificed as a hostage.” Upon receiving this message, Emsul at once directed his followers to stay where they were until Myles Cabot should catch up with them. Then, with a picked body of men, in one kerkool, under crossed sticks, he took up the road toward Kuana, preceded by the delegation which had brought the message from Yuri. Not a word would he give them as to the purpose of the advance. <div class="pb" id="Page_195">195</div> “Your message was from Prince Yuri,” he said, “and therefore to Prince Yuri shall be the reply. But it does seem a bit thoughtless of the Hymernians to drop bombs on our men, before even attempting to ascertain whether or not our advance was intended to be peaceful.” To this, they in turn made no answer. About midnight, Myles Cabot, in his airplane, reached the point where the kerkools had halted. He found the Cupians confused and more or less leaderless. He, as they, was horrified at the threat which the usurper Yuri held over the head of the little king. But while he and Nan-nan and Hah Babbuh were conferring on the situation, word was brought in, by a party who had just demolished a near-by radio set, that they had picked the following unaddressed and unsigned message out of the air: <blockquote> Fear not. Baby Kew has been kidnaped from the palace, and is safe. </blockquote> Somehow this news carried conviction. The longer they considered it, the more authentic it appeared. Certainly, it could not have emanated from Yuri, for he could have no possible object in deceiving them into thinking that the little king was safe, and thus encouraging them to proceed with whatever they might have afoot. But they could not imagine who was their informant. It might be any one of a number of the leaders in Cabot’s two wars of liberation, Poblath the Philosopher, mango of the Kuana jail; Ja Babbuh, Oya Buh, and Buh Tedn, professors at the Royal University; Count Kamel of Ktuh, the ex-radical; or even the loyal Prince Toron, Yuri’s younger brother, whom Cabot had left in charge as regent, upon embarking on his ill-fated visit to the earth. All these loyal Cupians had been driven into hiding, when the renegade Yuri had returned across the boiling seas and had usurped the throne with the aid of the Hymernians. Where they now were, no one knew. This message might be from any one of them—or it might not. <div class="pb" id="Page_196">196</div> Anyhow, it served to hearten Cabot and his two companions. Said Myles: “Undoubtedly there were some of Yuri’s Cupian henchmen on the backs of the bees which bombed our kerkools. These have probably reported by wireless that our advance has stopped. I do not believe that Yuri yet knows that we have a plane; accordingly, he will not expect immediate trouble, so long as our vanguard remains here, four hundred stads from Kuana. “You, Hah Babbuh, remain here in charge of our troops. I seriously doubt if the usurper will attack you, for he does not dare trust enough Cupians with rifles for that purpose. Nan-nan and I and our sharpshooters will proceed as rapidly as possible in the plane, until daybreak, when we will encamp as usual. “To-morrow afternoon, send scouts ahead to destroy the wireless and start your whole kerkool army on the move at sunset. Bend every effort to join me as soon as possible at the capital, where I expect to arrive some time to-morrow night. Beyond that, I have no definite plans. May the Great Builder speed our cause.” Then he said good-night, and took off once more in his plane. As he soared aloft with his noisy trophil-motor, earth-men would have heard it for stads in every direction, but these Cupians were earless and hence possessed no sense of hearing as we know it. The noisy plane could make no impression upon their antenna-sense, for its engines being of the trophil variety—or Diesel, as we call a somewhat similar device on earth—had no electrical ignition. Throughout the remainder of the night the plane sped southward, deviating from its course only when whistling sounds warned them of the presence of bees. With the first faint tinge of pink in the east, they landed and hid their airship at the edge of a wood, two hundred and sixty stads from Kuana. <div class="pb" id="Page_197">197</div> A small town lay near by. To it went several of the crew in search of food and information, while the rest took turns guarding the plane and sleeping. During Cabot’s turn at watch, he noted a figure slinking across a neighboring field. There was something strangely familiar about this figure, so Myles hid himself in a tartan bush and awaited its approach. It walked with a peculiar limp, very much like that which had characterized Buh Tedn, ever since he recovered from the shell wound which he had received in the Second War of Liberation. But the face and the hair of the approaching Cupian bore no resemblance to that of Professor Tedn. Nevertheless, Cabot took a chance. Stepping suddenly from his place of concealment, he shouted: “Buh Tedn!” Thereat, the Cupian emitted a shriek of terror from his antennae, and started running away across the fields. “Stop!” the earth-man called. “I am Myles Cabot.” The fleeing man halted abruptly and peered at Myles inquisitively; then he smiled and snatched off his wig, and straightened out his expression. It was none other than Buh Tedn! “So you are the cause of all the rumpus,” he ejaculated, returning and patting his friend warmly on the cheek. “What rumpus?” Miles inquired with interest. “Wireless won’t work,” the other replied, “and no messages on the air anyhow. Nothing but bees; the air is full of them anyhow—also full of vague rumors of all sorts. As Poblath would say: ‘Where there’s wind, there’s a storm’.” “Speaking of Poblath,” Myles said, “where is the philosopher?” “Kuana, the last I heard,” Buh Tedn replied. “Ja Babbuh and Oya Buh are somewhere in the west. Prince Toron has disappeared completely. Hah Babbuh and Emsul are supposed to be in the northern part of the Okarze Mountains. Kamel Bar-Sarkar has gone over to Yuri. I am here. That about completes the list of our former leaders.” <div class="pb" id="Page_198">198</div> “Hah Babbuh is in charge of my unarmed forces one hundred and sixty stads north of here,” 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. How do you do it?” “It’s a gift!” Myles laughed. “But ‘trees have antennae’, as Poblath would say. Let us proceed to the plane and wait for evening.” At the plane, Cabot awakened one of the Cupians to take his place on guard. Then, in low tones, he and Buh Tedn each related to the other all that had occurred since the matter-transmitting apparatus had shot the radio man earthward. Along toward night the absentees returned from the village, bringing provision, but scarcely any news except that the place was seething with suppressed excitement, and that they had succeeded in getting into the radio station and “pying” the apparatus. “Let us start then at once,” Buh Tedn counseled. “No one can now get word to Yuri, and perhaps they will mistake us for a Hymernian, anyhow.” But impatient as he was, Myles would hear none of this. “They could easily dispatch a runner to some near-by town to send the message from there,” he said. “Furthermore, a plane looks very little like a whistling bee.” So the group feasted, and waited until the last streaks of red had died in the west, before they shot into the air and southward. The plane was driven to its utmost, but it was later than 1:00 o’clock before the lights of Kuana loomed ahead. <div class="pb" id="Page_199">199</div> Turning to the right, Cabot skirted the city and landed near the arsenal. Nan-nan promptly left them. “I have church affairs to attend to,” he explained. “Great are the ramifications of the lost religion,” the earth-man replied, laughing, “and I hope that you pick up some useful information.” After the young cleric had gone Buh Tedn asked: “Surely you don’t plan for us to attack the arsenal? It is heavily guarded by the only men whom Yuri permits to carry fire-arms in this entire kingdom.” <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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