The Panchronicon Part 5

He paused helpless before the very thought of description.

"Oh," he said, weakly, "et's like--et's a--why--Oh, it's a machine!"

"Hez it got wings?"

"Not exactly wings," he began, then, more earnestly, "why don't ye come and see it, anyway! It can't do ye any harm to jest look at it!"

Rebecca dropped her hands into her lap and replied, with a hesitating manner:

"I'd like to fust rate--it must be an awful queer machine! But I don't get much time fer traipsin' 'round now days."

"Why can't ye come right along now?" Droop asked, eagerly. "It's dry as a bone underfoot down in the swamp now. The's ben no rain in a long time."

She pondered some time before replying. Her first impulse was to reject the proposal as preposterous. The hour seemed very ill chosen. Rebecca was not accustomed to leaving home for any purpose at night, and she was extremely conservative.

On the other hand, she felt that only under cover of the darkness could she consent to go anywhere in company with the village reprobate. Every tongue in the place would be set wagging were she seen walking with Copernicus Droop. She had not herself known how strong was the curiosity which his startling theories and incredible story had awakened in her.

She looked up at her visitor with indecision in her eyes.

"I don't see how I could go now," she said. "Besides, it's mos' too dark to see the thing, ain't it?"

"Not a mite," he replied, confidently. "The's lights inside I can turn on, an' we'll see the hull thing better'n by daylight."

Then, as she still remained undecided, he continued, in an undertone:

"Cousin Phoebe's up in her room, ain't she? Ye might not get another chance so easy."

He had guessed instinctively that, under the circ.u.mstances, Rebecca preferred not revealing to Phoebe her own continued interest in the wonderful machine.

The suggestion was vital. Phoebe was in all probability sulking in her own bedroom, and in that event would not quit it for an hour. It seemed now or never.

Rebecca rolled up her knitting work and rose to her feet.

"Jest wait here a spell," she said, rapidly. "I won't be a minute!"

Shortly afterward, two swiftly moving, shadowy figures emerged from the little white gate and turned into a dark lane made more gloomy by overhanging maples. This was the shortest route to Burnham's swamp.

Copernicus was now more hopeful. He could not but feel that, if the elder sister came face to face with his marvellous machine, good must result for his plans. Rebecca walked with nervous haste, dreading Phoebe's possible discovery of this most unconventional conduct.

The night was moonless, and the two stumbled and groped their way down the lane at a pace whose slowness exasperated Rebecca.

"Ef I'd a-known!" she exclaimed, under her breath.

"We're 'most there, Cousin Rebecca," said Copernicus, with deprecating softness. "Here, give me holt o' yer hand while we climb over the wall.

Here's Burnham's swamp right now."

Accepting the proffered aid, Rebecca found herself in the midst of a thicket of bushes, many of which were th.o.r.n.y and all of which seemed bent upon repelling nocturnal adventurers.

Droop, going ahead, did his best to draw aside the obstinate twigs, and Rebecca followed him with half-averted head, lifting her skirts and walking sidewise.

"'Mighty lucky, 'tain't wet weather!" she mumbled.

At that moment her guide stood still.

"There!" he exclaimed, in a low, half-awed voice.

Rebecca stopped and gazed about. A little to the right the dark gray of the sky was cut by a looming black ma.s.s of uncertain form.

It looked like the crouching phantom of some shapeless sea-monster.

Rebecca half expected to see it dissolve like a wind-driven fog.

Their physical sight could distinguish nothing of the outer characteristics of this mysterious structure; but for this very reason, the imagination was the more active. Rebecca, with all her directness of nature and commonplace experience, felt in this unwonted presence that sense of awed mystery which she would have called a "creepy feeling."

What unknown and incomprehensible forces were locked within that formless ma.s.s? By what manner of race as yet unborn had its elements been brought together--no, no--_would_ they be brought together? How a.s.sume a comfortable mental att.i.tude toward this creation whose present existence so long antedated its own origin?

One sentiment, at least, Rebecca could entertain with hearty consistency. Curiosity a.s.serted its supremacy over every other feeling.

"Can't we get into the thing, an' light a candle or suthin'?" she said.

"Of course we can," said Droop. "That's what I brought ye here fer. Take holt o' my hand an' lift yer feet, or you'll stumble."

Leading his companion by the hand, Copernicus approached the dark form, moving with great caution over the clumps of gra.s.sy turf. Presently he reached the side of the machine. Rebecca heard him strike it with his hand two or three times, as though groping for something. Then she was drawn forward again, and suddenly found herself entering an invisible doorway. She stumbled on the threshold and flung out her free hand for support. She clutched at a hand-rail that seemed to lead spirally upward.

Droop's voice came out of the blackness.

"Jest wait here a minute," he said. "I'll go up an' turn on the light."

She heard him climbing a short flight of stairs, and a few moments later a flood of light streamed from a doorway above her head, amply lighting the little hallway in which Rebecca was standing.

The hand-rail to which she was already clinging skirted the iron stairs leading to the light, and she started at once up this narrow spiral.

She was met at the door by Copernicus, who was smiling with a proud complacency.

"Wal, Cousin Rebecca," he said, with a sweeping gesture indicating their general surroundings, "what d'ye think o' this?"

They were standing at the head of a sort of companion-way in a roomy antechamber much resembling the general cabin of a luxurious old-time sailing-packet. The top of the stairs was placed between two windows in one side wall of the machine, through which there was just then entering a gentle breeze. Two similar openings faced these in the opposite side wall, and under each of the four windows there was a long wooden bench carrying a flat mattress cushion.

In the middle of the room, on a square deep-piled rug, stood a table covered with a red cloth and surrounded by three or four solid-looking upholstered chairs. Here were some books and papers, and directly over the table a handsome electric chandelier hung from the ceiling of dark-wood panels. This was the source of their present illumination.

"This here's the settin'-room," Droop explained. "An' these are the state-rooms--that's what he called 'em."

He walked toward two doors in one of the end walls and, opening one of them, turned the switch of the lamp within.

"'Lectric lights in it, like down to Keene," Rebecca remarked, approaching the cabin and peering in.

She saw a small bedroom comfortably furnished. The carpet was apparently new, and on the tastefully papered walls hung a number of small oil-paintings.

Droop opened the other door.