Steampunk Prime_ A Vintage Steampunk Reader - Mike Ashley [59]
By this time Zorlin had straightened himself up, and seemed to have grown perceptibly in height and breadth. He was conquering the atmosphere of earth; and after a single sip of sparkling tinted water, he spoke.
“I would have found a way to come,” he said easily, yet with a strange accent; somewhat as though his words were snowflake crystals, cold at first but melting as they fell. “We had not thought it worth while; but you have made so much advance lately that it seemed best to help you. We Kurols move by will-power. It is said many of our people have come to you secretly before. We know a great deal about your life. But until just now it was against the law for our people to visit earth; it lowered them, and always did you harm, and caused wars among you, much against our will and desire. Even now, I fear my coming will make disturbance.”
He was like a man, but endowed much above a man, and with something weird and incomprehensible about him.
“Will you not tell us something about Kuro?” Asked Graemantle serenely. He was the only one of our group who seemed anywhere near equal to Zorlin. “Or would you prefer to rest?”
“The first duty of a missionary,” Zorlin made answer, “is to learn about the country or the world he comes to. After that he can tell things. Not now. I learned much of your speech from our star-talk, the rest from Bronson. But now let us wait.”
We waited accordingly, for the hour was near dawn and streaks of morning were faintly hinting at day in the east through the windows, and even Glissman’s spectacular eyes looked a trifle dim and weary.
When we rose some three hours later in the glory of a crisp and cool forenoon of autumn it was decided that we should begin a jaunt of observation through the country, back to New York. This was partly for Zorlin’s benefit, but it suited me equally well, since I was almost as much a stranger as he. For convenience we took the walking balloon down the mountains, as this was the pleasantest conveyance over rough ground where there were no large air-ships handy.
This vehicle is a shallow car with small hollow sails of silk above it, containing just enough gas to keep it about thirty feet above ground, assisted by a small electric engine in the centre. From the bottom of the car two long rods or mechanical legs, made of aluminum — the lightest metal known — extended down to the ground, where they are reciprocated at regular intervals by an electrometer, which enables them to imitate the motion of walking, and carry the balloon along at the rate of some fifteen miles an hour. They are not meant for high speed, and can travel only, of course, on prepared routes, but are very convenient in certain places.
Air-cutters and the larger air-ships are employed for flying in any direction and with much greater velocity. They are on an entirely different plan from the flying machines which were announced but had not yet come into use when I was last alive. The present air-ships apply the principle shown, for example, in the rapid flutter of the bumblebee’s wing. This is the “shutter” principle. The ship itself is built of latticed aluminum strengthened with a small amount of copper, and enclosed with transparent celluloid for protection against weather (celluloid now being generally used in place of glass). Through the centre of the floor are thrust four short aluminum tubes three feet in diameter with three feet of length below, and these are each filled with 2000 very thin celluloid shutters, so arranged that they can be thrown upward, presenting only their thin edges to the air, offering no resistance to it. The instant they are turned down flat they prevent the passage of air from below, and so compress it into great density. “The inertia of the air in the tubes, you see,” Hammerfleet remarked, “makes it like a rigid column — more rigid than steel. This forces the car upward when it starts, and it ascends on the top of a continually heightening pillar of air that holds it up buoyantly and firmly. The 2000 shutters in each tube work between balanced springs,