Daybreak; A Romance of an Old World Read online

  CHAPTER III.

  TWO MEN IN THE MOON.

  "Well, Doctor," said I, as soon as our feet touched the ground, "themoon is inhabited now if never before."

  "Yes, yes," he answered, "and I am glad to find the inhabitants are ofsuch a lively disposition."

  "Oh, who can help being light-hearted," I rejoined, "when one's body isso light?"

  For as soon as we left our car we began to have the queerest sensationsof lightness. We felt as if we were standing on springs, which the leastmotion would set off and up we would go toward the sky. Everything wehandled had but a small fraction of the weight it would possess on theearth, and our great air-condensing machines we carried about with ease.But however high we might jump we always returned to the ground, andwhether we were on top of the moon or on the bottom of it, it was prettycertain that we could not fall off, any more than we could have fallenoff the earth before we voluntarily but so rashly left it.

  My exhilaration of spirit did not last, for I could not help thinking ofour condition. The law of gravitation surely held us, although with lessforce than we had been accustomed to, on account of the smaller size ofthe moon; and how were we to get away from it?

  I again appealed to my companion.

  "I do not like the idea of spending the rest of our lives on the moon,Doctor, but can you tell me how we are to prevent it? Can we ever getback within the earth's attraction again?"

  "I have been pondering the subject myself," he replied, "and I think Ican give you some hope of seeing home once more. If our old measurementsof the moon are correct, and if we are, as I suppose, somewhere nearthe equator, we must be about fifteen hundred miles from the earth,following the curve of the moon's surface. Now, after we have finishedour investigations here, we can start for home on foot. We can cover agood many miles a day, since walking can be no burden here, and we caneasily tow our balloon along. As we approach the earth, my impressionis that we shall become more and more light-footed, for we shall begradually getting back to the earth's attraction. Somewhere between thispoint and our planet there must be a spot where the attraction of bothbodies will be equal, and we can stay on the moon or drop off and returnto the earth in our balloon as we please."

  "What a curious idea," I answered; "and yet, considering the strangebehavior of our sand bag, I don't know but you are right. And I haveonly one suggestion to make; that is, that we start earthward at onceand try the experiment. Let the investigations go. If there are anyinhabitants here they will never miss us, since we haven't made theiracquaintance yet. Science or no science, I object to remaining anylonger than necessary in this uncertainty in regard to our future.You know very well we couldn't live long in this temperature and withnothing for our lungs but what comes through these horrid machines. Andwhat good would come of our discoveries if we are never to get back tothe earth again? I profess to have as much courage left as the ordinarymortal would have, but in the present circumstances I believe no onewould blame us for wanting to settle this question at once."

  "It would seem a trifle ridiculous," said the doctor in reply to thisharangue, "for us to return to our planet without any further effortto accomplish our errand. But I will not deny that I share something ofyour feeling, and I will start with you right away, on condition thatyou will return here if we find that I am correct in believing we canleave the moon at our pleasure."

  "Agreed," I cried, and we were soon on our way.

  So far we had been exposed to the sun and were almost scorched by theintensity of its rays. We had never experienced anything like such heatand would not have supposed the human body could endure it. But now,soon after we had started to find the place where the moon would letgo of us, the sun set and, with scarcely a minute's warning, we wereplunged into darkness and cold. The darkness was relieved by theexceedingly brilliant appearance of the stars, the sky fairly blazingwith them, but the cold was almost unendurable even for the few momentsin which we were exposed to it. We secured our car as speedily aspossible, climbed into it, and got a little warmth from our gas heater.

  These extremes of temperature convinced us that no life such as we wereacquainted with could exist a great while on the moon.

  We found we could make no progress at all by night. We could only shutourselves up and wait for the sun to come. In trying to keep warm wewould work our air-condensers harder than usual, and the water thusproduced we would freeze in little cakes, and have them to help mitigatethe burning heat a short time the next day.

  The country through which we were traveling was made up of bold mountainpeaks and deep ravines. There was no sign of vegetation and not eventhe soil for it to grow in, but everywhere only hard, metallic rock thatshowed unmistakably the action of fire.

  And so it was with the greatest difficulty that we made our wayearthward, although there was so little effort needed in walking. As Ipondered the doctor's idea, it seemed to me more and more that hemust be right. We were certainly held to the moon where we were bygravitation. It was just as true that near the surface of the earth itssuperior attraction would draw all objects to itself. Accordingly, ifwe kept on our way, why should we not in time come to a place where wecould throw ourselves once more under the influence of the old earth,now becoming very dear to us?

  Thinking chiefly of this subject and talking of it every day, we laboredon, and finally were wonderfully encouraged with the belief that we wereactually walking easier and everything was becoming lighter. Soon thisbelief became a certainty, and, since leaping was no effort, we leapedwith joy and hope.

  And now how shall I describe our sensations as we went bounding along,hardly touching the ground, until we finally came to the place where itwas not necessary to touch the ground at all? Now we knew that by goingonly a little further we should be able to mount our car and set sailfor the earth again. But with this knowledge we lost at once much ofour desire, and thought we would not hasten our departure. Here we were,absolutely floating in the air, and it maybe believed that the feelingwas as delicious as it was unique. Using our hands as fins we could withthe slightest effort sail around at pleasure, resting in any position wechose to take, truly a most luxurious experience.

  "How shall we make our friends believe all this when we try to tell themabout it, Doctor?" said I.

  "The best way to make them believe it," he replied, "is to bring themup here and let them try it for themselves. I propose to organize anexpedition on our return and bring up a large party. We could manage toland somewhere in this vicinity, I think, instead of going up as far asyou and I did. What a place this would be for summer vacations! The moonis a fixture now; it cannot get away. I am sure of that, for the law ofgravitation will never release it. So we may as well make what use ofit we can, and these delightful sensations will no doubt form themost important discovery that we shall ever make on this dried-up andworn-out satellite. You know many people are willing to put themselvesto much inconvenience and to undergo many hardships for the sake of achange from the monotony of home life. If we can induce them to comeup here for a few weeks, and if they can endure this rather erraticclimate, they will find change enough to break up the monotony for oneyear, I think."

  After enjoying this rare exercise to our content, we began preparingfor the night which was now coming on. The doctor had reminded me of mypromise to return to our former position on the moon, and we agreed toset out the next day. Having fastened our car securely to the ground,so that we might not drift off toward the earth, we entered it and madeourselves as comfortable as possible.

  Our resting place was near the center of what seemed to be an immensecrater, and some time before morning we were roused by a violent shakingof the ground beneath us, which startled us beyond expression.

  "What's that?" I exclaimed.

  "That feels very much like a moon-quake," replied my companion.

  I was terribly frightened, but resolved to follow the doctor's exampleand make light of what we could not help.

  So I said:

 
"But I thought the lunar volcanoes were all dead ages ago. I hope wehaven't camped in the crater of one that is likely to go off again."

  "My opinion is," answered the doctor, "that there is still water insidethe moon which is gradually freezing. That operation would sometimescrack the surface, and this has probably caused the quaking that we havefelt."

  While we were talking the wind began to blow, and soon, although it waslong before time for the sun to rise, we suddenly emerged from darknessinto bright sunlight. We sprang up instinctively to look about us andtry to discover what this could mean, when what was our consternation tofind ourselves adrift!

  There, in full view of our wondering eyes, was the whole, round earth,hanging in space, and where were we? Then we began to realize graduallythat the trembling of the ground was the grating of the moon againstthe earth as it left its resting place, and the wind was caused by ourmotion.

  The novelty of the situation took away for a time the sense of fear, andI exclaimed:

  "Another scientific certainty gone to smash! I thought you said the mooncould never get away from the earth. What are we going to do now?"

  "Well," replied the doctor, "this is certainly something I never dreamedof in my philosophy. I didn't see how the moon could be drawn away fromthe earth when once actually attached to it, but I suppose the sunand planets all happen to be pulling in one direction just now and areproving too much for the earth's attraction. But what concerns us moreat this time is covered by your question, 'What are we going to do now?'And I will answer that I think we will stick to the moon for a while.You can see for yourself that we are held here much more firmly thanwhen we were disporting ourselves in the air yesterday, and the earthis now too far away for us to throw ourselves and our balloon within itsattraction."

  I knew by the feeling of increasing weight that what my companion saidmust be true, but we could not then appreciate the dreadful natureof our condition, so wrapped up were we in the grandeur of the objectbefore our eyes. To those who have never been on the moon in suchcircumstances it will be impossible to adequately describe our feelingsas we gazed upon our late home and knew that we were fast drifting awayfrom it.

  There the round globe hung, as I had often pictured it in myimagination--oceans and continents, mountains, lakes, and rivers, allspread out before us--the greatest object lesson ever seen by the eyeof man. As we studied it, recognizing feature after feature, landsand waters that we knew by their familiar shape, the doctor broke ourreverie with these words, evidently with the endeavor to keep up myspirits:

  "That looks as natural as a map, doesn't it? You have seen globes withthose divisions pictured on them, but there is the globe itself. Ifour summer tourists could take in this experience also, it would make avacation worth having. Isn't it grand? I see you are thinking about ourpersonal peril, but I think I know men who would take the risk and putthemselves in our place for the sake of this magnificent view."

  "If you know of any way to send for one of those friends, I wish youwould do so," I replied. "I would willingly give him my place."

  It may be believed that we were all this time anxiously watchingthe earth, and it did not lessen our anxiety to realize that we weretraveling very rapidly away from it. I had reached a point now where Idid not place much dependence upon the doctor's science, but to get someexpression of his thoughts I said to him:

  "Well, have you any opinion about our fate? Are we doomed to pass theremainder of our lives circling around our dear old earth, looking uponher face day by day but never to approach her again?"

  "I think you have stated the case about as it is," said he, "if,indeed, this rate of speed does not carry us entirely beyond the earth'sattraction, out into illimitable space."

  The thought of such an additional catastrophe silenced me, especiallyas I could not deny its possibility. Life on the moon, if we could onlykeep the earth in sight even, seemed almost endurable now, beside theidea that we might be cast out to shift for ourselves, without atie save such as the universal law of gravitation might find for ussomewhere.

  It must not be imagined that our conversation was carried on with easeor that we were half enjoying our novel situation. We were simply tryingto make the best of a very bad matter. Not long after we had started thewind had taken away the balloon part of our air ship, and now threatenedevery moment to tear the car from its moorings and end our unhappycareer at once. Besides this impending catastrophe, it was with thegreatest difficulty that we could get air enough to fill our lungs, butthe cold was so intense whenever our side of the moon was turned awayfrom the sun that we needed the severe labor on our condensers to keepus from freezing.

  Meantime, our speed increasing every hour, the planet that had once beenour home was growing smaller before our eyes. At length we were flyingthrough space at such a rate that we could not suppress our fears thatthe terrible suggestion of the doctor's would be realized. We had bothmade a mental calculation as to how large the earth ought to look fromthe moon at its normal distance, and as it approached that size we couldnot hide our anxiety from each other. Without a word from the doctor Icould see by his face that hope was fast leaving him, and as we were nowgoing more rapidly than ever I felt that we had nothing to do but acceptour fate.

  In regard to such intensity of feeling at this stage of our experience,it maybe objected that our condition was hopeless anyway, and it couldmake no difference whether we remained within the earth's influenceor not. But in spite of our desperate situation we had some sentimentremaining. The earth was the only home we had ever known, and I am notashamed to say that we did not like to lose sight of it; especiallyas there was not the slightest possibility that we should ever see itagain, unless, indeed, our moon should turn into a comet with eccentricorbit, and so bring us back at some future day--a very unlikelyoccurrence, as all will admit who know anything about moons and comets.

  Our speed did not lessen but rather increased as we gradually broke awayfrom the earth's attraction, and the dear old earth was fast becominga less significant object in our sky. If our situation was lonesomebefore, it was now desolation itself.

  "Doctor," said I, when I could control my emotions enough to speak,"where now?"

  "Well," he replied, with a grim attempt at a smile, "my opinion is notworth much in our present strange circumstances, but it seems to me weare on our way either to the sun or one of the large planets."

  I did not reply, and we both soon found it wise to expend no unnecessarybreath in talking. The ether was now so thin that it took oceans of it,literally, to make enough air to keep us alive.

  Our provisions were nearly exhausted, our strength was failing, andI really believe we would not have lived many days had not somethingoccurred to divert our minds and to relieve some of our physicaldiscomforts.