Sherlock Holmes's War of the Worlds Read online

  The fellow strove helplessly against a myriad of metal tentacles that cross-latched upon his body. He was naked, and his mouth gaped wide open as though he screamed in terror. One invader hunched above him. Challenger saw a wink of light on metal, some­thing like a long slender pipestem. A steel tentacle drove this down into the struggling victim. The bladder-bulk stooped close above it, making contact at the free end of the pipe.

  Challenger forced himself to watch the process through. Now he knew how the invading monsters fed.

  "A drawing of living blood," he muttered. "Living blood, from a living victim. Holmes is right. We are lower animals, and to them we mean food."

  "Jessie," he called out, "we must make plans to leave London soon.

  She came from the drawing room. "Why leave Lon­don?" she asked.

  "Those invaders may well be heading this way," he said soberly. "I, for one, have no intention of serving on a reception committee. I have just seen, in the crystal, their way of treating us—and I prefer not to elaborate upon it, even to you. I shall keep in touch with events, and we must plan on being gone when those events approach too embarrassingly near."

  "You have heard from Mr. Holmes. Is he at home now?"

  "He was when he wrote to me."

  "Will you go to visit him?"

  "Not now. I would do well to be reachable here."

  14

  Night came, and with it a great torrent of rain and the crashing of thunder. Challenger wondered how in­vaders from arid Mars, if indeed they were native to that planet, might deal with such a storm. The tele­phone rang. Someone was calling Professor Challenger from London University, but the connection was so faulty that he could not tell who the speaker was or what he wanted. Then the sound of the nervous voice broke off. Challenger spoke disdainfully into the dead instrument and hung up the receiver.

  Sunday morning was bright again, and the street out­side was thronged with excited people. Challenger came out and approached a knot of men, all of them talking at once.

  "Have you any news of the invaders?" he addressed them, and his ringing bass voice riveted their attention.

  "Here's my mate, what was there at the time and place, guv'ner," said one of the group, pointing at a pallid-faced oldster in a checked coat and cloth cap.

  "It's the truth, sir, and I don't never want to go back there no more," said this man earnestly. "Swelp me, they can set the 'ole world afire, they can."

  "Yes, yes, I saw the beginning of that," said Chal­lenger. "What can you tell me of their operations?"

  "Operations?" repeated the other. "Bless you, sir, alt I can say is, I don't want them operatin' on me, and that's whatever. I caught the mornin' train in from Woking, and be'ind me I seen my old 'ouse blazin' away like a fire in a grate. Thank the Lord I ain't got no wife nor child to 'old me back. Now I'm for catchin' another train, as it might be for Glasgow."

  "When I spoke of operations," said Challenger, with what he thought was patient calm, "I meant their modus operandi. How they move and fight, how they maneuver."

  The old man blinked at him. "I don't understand you, sir."

  "As Dr. Samuel Johnson said in a conversation similar to this, I am not obliged to provide you with an understanding. Tell me what you saw of their machines in action."

  "I seen only a little of that, and it was ample. They go walkin' round in great tall things, taller than church steeples, with three legs-—-"

  "Three legs?" repeated Challenger.

  "Like a milkin' stool, with a hood at the top, turnin' here and there and flashin' their devilish heat-rays, I 'eard say they wiped out a whole regiment. I'm fair glad I wasn't there to see that."

  Challenger turned heavily away and returned to his telephone. Once more he tried to call Holmes, then rang up the War Office, intent on offering his services. The overworked operators could put him through to neither. As he hung up the receiver with an angry snort, church bells tolled outside. Austin came to Challenger's study with a special edition of a news­paper, shakily printed and with big screaming head­lines. A third cylinder was reported as having arrived, also in Surrey. The Martians were abroad in their vaguely described machines, of which the paper said only that they were towering structures of intricate workmanship and operation, running on three jointed legs with the speed of an express train. Artillery units had been obliterated by the incomprehensible heat-ray. Not much more could be learned from anything in the journal.

  In the afternoon, Challenger walked the street, trying to learn something from those who had come up from Surrey. He talked to a young man, who stopped to wipe sweat and rest in front of the house. At Chal­lenger's word, Austin fetched out bread and beef and a glass of ale, and the man told of his adventures, shakily but understandably.

  He was an attorney's clerk and had been visiting friends at a country house in Surrey for the weekend. He said that he had seen the Martians in action and that he counted himself fortunate in being able to flee back to London. The Martians, he told Challenger, had effortlessly and mercilessly struck houses and villages, but had seemed rather to concentrate their attention on various communications. Railroads and telegraph lines had been systematically destroyed.

  "To be brief," summed up Challenger, "they seek to disrupt us rather than exterminate us outright."

  "From what little I saw, that seems to be their policy," said the clerk, eating the last of the sandwich. "Thank you, sir, for your kindness. I had best be getting along now, my rooms are near Primrose Hill."

  He mumbled his thanks and walked away. Challenger walked slowly along the street, then back. When he returned home, it was time for the evening meal, and he was thoughtful as he ate.

  "George," said his wife at last, "what are we to do?"

  "I am coming to a decision on that, Jessie. By this time in our relationship, you have learned to depend on my decisions. Tomorrow morning we leave London."

  "To go where, George?"

  "That is still problematical. Please pack a change of clothes for us and bring your valuables—your jewels and so forth."

  He himself was awake in the early summer dawn, dressing himself in comfortable tweeds. He filled his pocket case with banknotes and into his trousers pockets dropped twenty gold guineas along with silver and copper coins. When he had finished with break­fast, he went to the door. Austin had stepped out at the cry of a newspaper hawker, and Challenger saw him standing on the pavement, the paper in his hand, talking to a short, heavyset man with gray sidewhiskers and a visored cap. Beside them at the curb waited a spotted horse in the shafts of a two-wheeled cart.

  Austin handed Challenger the paper. Challenger glanced at the front page, while people hastened past him, jabbering to each other. LONDON IN PERIL, said the big black headline, and there was an account of military units wiped out at Kempton and Richmond and great destruction of suburban communities, also a new perilous weapon, which the paper called "black smoke." This was described as a discharge of "enor­mous clouds of a black and poisonous vapor by means of rockets."

  Challenger turned to where Austin was arguing with the man in the cap. "I can't go without Professor Challenger's word," said Austin.

  "Go where?" Challenger demanded.

  "I'm an old friend of Austin's, sir," said the strange man, touching his visor in something of a military salute. "Knew him when we was both railroad men. Now the train crews are refusing to work, and we're getting up a volunteer crew to carry off these crowds of frightened folk to the north."

  "My duty is to you and Mrs. Challenger, Professor," said Austin, but Challenger waved the words away.

  "Go with him, Austin, if he needs you. You can be of great use in helping with the train. But," and he faced the railroad man, "if you take Austin from me, you leave your horse and cart."

  He looked at the horse. It was a gelding, perhaps eight years old at a guess, short-limbed but seemingly healthy and strong.

  "What's his name?" asked Challenger.

  "Dapple, sir. But it
wouldn't hardly be regular if—"

  "Nonsense!" Challenger broke in, so loudly that a passerby turned to stare over his shoulder. "What regularity is there in the present situation? These are excessively irregular times, my good man, and a certain irregularity is implicit in the meeting of them. Come now, you want Austin, I want your horse and cart. I call it more than a fair exchange!"

  Again his voice rose to a roar as he spoke the last words. The railroad man almost quailed before him and held out a palm. "Well then, sir, shall we say ten pounds?"

  Challenger fished out a banknote and handed it over. "Go pack whatever you need, Austin," he directed his manservant. "Take cook with you, and Jane the maid, and may all of you have good luck and find safety."

  "Won't Mrs. Challenger go on the train with us, Professor?" Austin asked.

  "On an overcrowded, overworked train, manned by volunteers?" Challenger blared at him. "I value her too much for that. But ask her to step out here for a word with me. Hurry along, now."

  Austin trotted in, and after a moment Mrs. Chal­lenger appeared. Her husband smiled triumphantly at her.

  "Observe the equipage with which we will take our little jaunt into the country," he said. "Now, I must stand by here with our new friend Dapple; someone might be tempted to drive him away. Can you manage to bring out our bags, and my straw hat and those Alpine boots? Pack us a dinner basket, too. Cold meat for today, and tinned things for later—sausages, perhaps, and sardines and pickles. Off with you, my dear, we must be quick."

  She bustled away obediently. Austin came out carry­ing a battered satchel and accompanied by the two womenservants, and they departed with the trainman. Challenger examined the cart. It was lightly and plainly made, but serviceable, the sort of vehicle used around railroad stations to carry luggage and express packages. The floor of the bed was lined with straw, and the seat could hold two. He stroked Dapple's flecked nose, and Dapple responded with a soft whinny.

  "You and I begin to know each other already," said Challenger.

  Minutes passed, and Mrs. Challenger appeared again, weighted down with a wicker picnic basket. Challenger met her on the steps and bore the basket to set in the cart.

  "I must ask pardon for sending you to carry heavy things," he said, "but I cannot leave our conveyance alone."

  He gestured to the growing stream of bustling pe­destrians.

  "Might you be in danger if someone wants to take the horse?"

  "Let someone try! But I dislike to see you struggling with burdens."

  "I don't ask for apologies," she said. "I have always tried to act upon your judgment of things."

  "And with good reason," he nodded, with a smile of approval. "There are husbands in this world upon whose judgments it is folly to act my dear, but I am not one of them. Now, the clothing."

  "I have already packed it. I will go and fetch it."

  She went back into the house. Challenger bent and examined the basket with dignified relish. It was filled with sandwiches and fruit, some tinned things, and two bottles of wine. Mrs. Challenger came out again with a satchel, returned, and brought another. Into the cart went the stout boots Challenger had speci­fied, and upon his head he set a round, stiff hat of straw with a bright ribbon. Mrs. Challenger herself wore a sensible brown dress and sturdy walking shoes. She bound down her hat with a veil that tied under her chin and flung a cape around her. Once more, at her husband's direction, she went into the house and filled a gallon earthenware jug with water.

  "Now we are ready, as I judge," he said as he stowed this with the other supplies. "Up you get, my dear. It has been five years and more, if memory serves me, since I have taken you on a drive."

  He helped her to the seat and mounted ponderously to sit beside her. The springs creaked beneath his weight. "Gee up, Dapple," he commanded, flicking the reins.

  Away they rolled, sitting together like a massive tame bear and a gazelle. They had to wait at a crossing while a close-jammed throng of people passed, feet hurrying and faces frightened. Then they continued, along the Uxbridge Road. They fared westward, slowed down by traffic both on the street and on the sidewalks. Challenger drove with careful attention, his great hairy hand light but authoritatively firm on the reins. The sun was well up, and the crowds were thicker at every crossing. Policemen tried to control the rush, but the policemen, too, looked frightened.

  "I hazard the speculation that our Martian visitors are closer at hand," said Challenger. "Whatever they are doing, it" stimulates the desire to stay well away from them."

  Checking his horse, he leaned down to call to one of the crowd. "What news have you?" he asked.

  "It's all up with the soldiers," was the panting reply. "And they're scorching the whole country with their heat-ray, and drowning it with their Black Smoke."

  Waiting no longer, the man ran ahead to northward along a cross street, Challenger clucked Dapple into a trot.

  "Heat-ray," he rumbled. "Black smoke. I have seen something of the one and have heard something of the other, and Holmes suggests that they may have deadlier weapons. I doubt if Holmes is being unduly pessimistic. Well, these considerations impel me not to seek a possible ship on the Thames. We'll keep going out of town. Perhaps we can get beyond this rush."

  "If we stayed in London, George—"

  "If we did, it would be like staying in a burning house, or possibly worse than that."

  Her dark eyes were wider than ever. "Oh, George, what must England's scientists be thinking?"

  "I can tell you, my dear Jessie, exactly what they are thinking, if we may flatteringly apply such a term to their inadequate mental processes. They are thinking that they were wrong again, and that G. E. C. was right again, and they hope that they have not begun to think too late in the game."

  "Too late?" she repeated, her voice hushed in terror. "Is disaster upon humanity?"

  Challenger reined Dapple into the middle of the street to avoid a hastening wheelbarrow.

  "That, Jessie, is a question not susceptible of any but a qualified reply. It is quite plain that humanity has fought and lost its first battle and is in demoralized flight. But I reflect that such things have happened in past wars. Frederick the Great was obliged to fly from his first battle. So was Sherman, the American general, at Bull Run. Yet both of them proved victorious later."

  "Later," Mrs. Challenger said, almost dreamily. "Later."

  "We shall see what happens later. At present, sup­pose we emulate those other brilliant tacticians in the orderly swiftness of our retreat."

  But it was with no great swiftness that they drove westward into Clerkenwell. The sidewalks at the cross­ings were full of people, and a stream of vehicles clattered in the streets—cabs, private carriages, carts, heavy wagons, bicycles. The air shook with the roar of wheels, the louder roar of voices. Once a bulbously fat man in a derby hat tried to catch hold of the cart and climb up behind, and Challenger cut him across the face with the whip to make him let go. Beyond Clerkenwell they came into Shoreditch, and at last, as the sun rose to high noon in a hot blue sky, they found themselves on Mile End Road, on their way out of London.

  "Good horse, then," Challenger praised Dapple. "You have done nobly. How old are you, do you sup­pose? Jessie, it is fifty miles and better to the east coast and possible safety. Prepare for a long summer jaunt of it."

  "I feel perfectly safe with you, George dear."

  "And you do well to trust to me. But I believe I said something like that earlier today."

  Though they had come well past the center of town, traffic was heavier. The road seemed jammed from side to side, with horses and carriages all going eastward at a nervous trot.

  "I do hope that this great crowd of travel will grow thin again," said Mrs. Challenger, pressing her little body close to her husband's side.

  "A vain hope, Jessie," was his bleak reply. "Look there ahead."

  Pedestrians also moved into the road, so thickly pressed together that Challenger had to rein Dapple to a walk
. People shoved pushcarts, trundled perambu­lators heaped with cluttered possessions. As Challenger tried to make a way through without striking anyone on foot, a great carriage drawn by two glossy bays came rolling from behind and would have run upon the little cart had not Challenger swung around where he sat and whipped the nearer horse with all his strength. The animal emitted a startled, squealing neigh and reared so abruptly that the carriage was almost overturned. Challenger won through a knot of people, and beyond turned to the right along a side road, little more than a grassy-bordered lane.

  "Where are you taking us?" Mrs. Challenger cried out. "That is the direction of danger."

  "The direction of what may be better progress," he half snapped. "The main thoroughfare is too cluttered. At any moment, it could become impossible to travel there. Country ways may be better."

  He drove a full mile before turning again and travel­ing toward the east, through the outlying cottages of a little hamlet. As he had foreseen, it was less crowded, though vehicles moved here, too. Several hurrying people cried out to be taken into the cart, but Chal­lenger paid them no attention.

  At last he drew out his watch. It was three o'clock, and they had made gratifying progress. He allowed him­self to wonder how the invaders fared, how closely they might be pressing this tremendous retreat from London. A look into the crystal—

  "Oh, abomination!" he cried aloud, in something between a furious yell and a groan of self-accusation. "I left it in my study, in an old tea canister!"

  "In your study?" echoed his wife anxiously. "What, George?"

  "Oh, no matter now," he wheezed. "I suppose even the greatest, the most advanced of intellects, must sometimes overlook a matter."

  "George, you were too concerned in bringing me to safety."

  At that, he mustered a smile that stirred his beard like a wind in a dark forest.