Latest / The H. G. Wells Library / Men Like Gods Book 1 Chapter 2 - The Wonderful Road

Transcript

Men Like Gods Book 1 Chapter 2 - The Wonderful Road · The H. G. Wells Library

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Section two of Men Like Gods by H. G. Wells.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. This is a recording by Brian Powell,
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Portland organ Men Like Gods, Chapter the second, The Wonderful Road.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: For a time, mister Barnsuable's attention was very unequally divided
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: between the limousine, whose passengers were now descending, and the
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: scenery about him. This latter was indeed so strange and
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: beautiful that it was only as people who must be
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: sharing his admiration and amazement, and who therefore might conceivably
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: help to elucidate and relieve his growing in quite overwhelming perplexity,
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: that the little group ahead presently arose to any importance
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: in his consciousness. The road itself, instead of being packed
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: together pebbles and dirts, smeared with tar, with a surface
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: of grit, dust and animal excrement of a normal English
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: high road, was apparently made of glass, clear in places
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: as still water, and in places milky or opalescent, shot
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: with streaks of soft color or glittering richly with clouds
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: of embedded golden flakes. It was perhaps twelve or fifteen
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: yards wide. On either side was a band of greensward
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: of a finer grass than mister Barnstable had ever seen before,
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: and he was an expert and observant mower of lawns.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: And beyond this a wide border of flowers, where mister
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Barnstable sat agape in his car, and perhaps for thirty
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: yards in either direction, this border was a mass of
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: some unfamiliar blossom of forget me not blue. Then the
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: color was broken by an increasing number of tall, pure
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: white spikes that finally ousted the blue altogether from the bed.
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: On the opposite side of the way, these same spikes
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: were mingled with masses of plants bearing seed pods equally
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: strained to mister Barnstable, which varied through a series of
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: blues and moths and purples to an intense crimson bed.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: On this glorious colored foam of flowers spread flat meadows
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: on which creamy cattle were grazing. Three close at hand,
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: A little startled perhaps by mister Barnstable's sudden apparition, chewed
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: the cud and regarded him with benevolently speculative eyes. They
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: had long horns and dewlaps, like the cattle of South
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: Europe and India. From these benign creatures, mister Barnstable's eyes
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: went to a long line of flame shaped trees, to
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: a colonnade of white and gold, and to a background
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: of snow clad mountains. A few tall white clouds were
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: sailing across a sky of dazzling blue. The air impressed
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: mister Barnstable as being astonishingly clear and sweet. Except for
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: the cows and a little group of people standing by
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: the limousine, mister Barnstable could see no other living creature.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: The motorists were standing still and staring about them. A
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: sound of querulous voices came to him. A sharp crepitation
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: at his back turned mister Barnstable's attention round. By the
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: side of the road, in the direction from which conceivably
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: he had come, were the ruins of what appeared to
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: be a very recently demolished stone house. Beside it were
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: two large apple trees, freshly twistened and riven as if
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: by some explosion, And out of the center of it
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: came a calm of smoke, and this sound of things
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: catching fire and the contorted lines of these shattered apple
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: trees helped mister Barnstable to realize that some of the
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: flowers by the wayside near at hand were also bent
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: down to one side, as if by the passage of
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: a recent violent gust of wind. Yet he had heard
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: no explosion nor felt any wind. He stared for a time,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: and then turned, as if for an explanation, to the limousine.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: Three of these people were now coming along the road
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: towards him, led by a tall, slender, gray headed gentleman
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: in a felt hat and a long motoring dust coat.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: He had a small, upturned face with a little nose
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: that scarce sufficed for the springs of his gilt glasses.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: Mister Barnstable restarted his engine and drove slowly to meet them.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: As soon as he judged himself within hearing distance, he
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: stopped and put his head over the side of the
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: yell apparel with a question. At the same moment, the tall,
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: gray headed gentleman asked practically the same question. Can you
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: tell me at all, sir, where we are? Five minutes ago,
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: said mister Barnstable, I should have said we were at
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: the Maidenhead Road near Slough exactly, said the tall gentleman,
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: in earnest argumentative tones. Exactly, and I maintain that there
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: is not the slightest reason for supposing that we are
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: not still on the Maidenhead Road. The challenge of the
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: dialectician rang in his voice. It doesn't look like the
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Maidenhead Road, said mister Barnstable.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: Agreed, But are we to judge by appearances, or are
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: we to judge by the direct continuity of our experience?
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: The Maidenhead Road led to this was in continuity with this,
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: and therefore I hold that this is the Maidenhead Road.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: Those mountains, consider, mister Barnstable, whensre Castle ought to be there,
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: said the tall gentleman, brightly, as if he gave a
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: point in a gambit. Was there five minutes ago, said
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: mister Barnstable. Then obviously those mountains are some sort of
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: a camouflage, said the tall gentleman triumphantly. And the whole
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: of this business is, as they say nowadays, they put
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: up thing. It seems to be remarkably well put up,
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: said mister Barnstable. Came a pause during which mister Barnstable
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: surveyed the tall gentleman's companions. The tall gentleman he knew
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: perfectly well. He had seen him a score of times
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: at public meetings and public dinners. He was mister Cecil Burley,
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: the great Conservative leader. He was not only distinguished as
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: a politician, he was imminent as a private gentleman, a philosopher,
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: and a man of universal intelligence. Behind him stood a short,
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: thick set, middle aged young man, unknown to mister Barnstable,
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: the natural hostility of whose appearance was greatly enhanced by
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: an eye glass. The third member of the little group
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: was also a familiar form, but for a time mister
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: Barnstable could not place him. He had a clean shaven, round,
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: plump face and a well nourished person, and his costumes
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: suggested either a high Church clergyman or a prosperous Roman
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: Catholic priest. The young man with the eye glass now
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: spoke in a kind of impotent falsetto. I came down
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: to Tableaux Court by road not a month ago, and
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: there was certainly nothing of this sort on the way.
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: Then I admit there are difficulties, said mister Burley, with gusto.
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: I admit they are considerable difficulties. Still, I venture to
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: think my main proposition holds. You don't think this is
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: the Maidenhead road, said the gentleman with the eyeglass flatly
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: to mister Barnstable. It seems too perfect for a put
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: up thing, said mister Barnstable, with a mild obstinacy. But
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: my dear sir, protested mister Burley, This road is notorious
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: for nursery seedsmen, and sometimes they arrange the most astonishing
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: displays as an advertisement. Then why don't we go straight
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: on to Tapleau Court now, asked the gentleman with the eyeglass, Because,
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: said mister Burley, with a touch of asperity. Natural when
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: one has to insist on a fact already clearly known
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: and obstinately overlooked. Rupert insists that we are in some
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: other world and won't go on. That is why he
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: has always had too much imagination. He thinks that things
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: that don't exist can exist, And now he imagines himself
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: in some sort of scientific romance, and out of our
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: world altogether, in another dimension. I sometimes think it would
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: have been better for all of us if Rupert had
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: taken to writing romances instead of living them. If you,
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: as his secretary, think that you will be able to
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: get him on to Tableau in time for lunch with
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: the windsor people. Mister Burley indicated by a gesture ideas
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: for which he found words inadequate. Mister Barnstable had already
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: noted a slow moving, intent sandy complexioned figure in a
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: gray top hat with a black band that the caricatrists
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: had made familiar exploring the flowery tangle beside the limousine.
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: This then, must be no less well known a person
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: than Rupert Catskill, the Secretary of State for War. For once,
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: mister Barnstable found himself in entire agreement with this all
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: too adventurous politician. This was another world. Mister Barnstable got
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: out of his car and addressed himself to mister Burley.
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: I think we may get a lot of light upon
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: just where we are, sir, if we explore this building
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: which is burning here close at hand. I thought just
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: now that I saw a figure lying on the slope
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: close behind it, if we could catch one of the hoaxers.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: He left his sentence unfinished because he did not believe
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: for a moment that they were being hoaxed. Mister Burley
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: had fallen very much in his opinion in the last
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: five minutes, all four men turned their faces to the
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: smoking ruin.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: It's a very extraordinary thing that there isn't a soul
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: in sight, remarked the eyeglass gentleman searching the horizon. Well,
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: I see no harm whatever in finding out what is burning,
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: said mister Burley, and led the way, holding up an
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: intelligent anticipatory face, towards the wrecked house between the broken trees.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: But before he had gone a dozen paces, the attention
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: of the little group was recalled to the limousine by
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: a loud scream of terror from the lady who had
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: remained seated therein. Really this is too much, cried mister Burley,
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: with a note of genuine exasperation. There must surely be
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: police regulations to prevent this kind of thing. It's out
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: of some traveling menagerie, said the gentleman with eye glass.
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: What ought we to do? It looks tame, said mister Barnstable,
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: but without any impulse to put his theory to the test.
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: It might easily frighten people, very seriously, said mister Burley,
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: and lifting up a bland voice, he shouted, don't be alarmed, Stella,
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: It's probably quite tame and harmless. Don't irritate it with
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: that sunshade. It might fly at you, Stella. It was
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: a big and beautifully marked leopard which had come very
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: softly out of the flowers and sat down like a
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: great cat in the middle of the glass road at
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: the side of the big car. It was blinking and
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: moving its head from side to side rhythmically with an
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: expression of puzzled interest. As the lady, in accordance with
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: the best traditions of such cases, opened and shut her
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: parasol at it as rapidly as she could. The chauffeur
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: had taken cover behind the car. Mister Rupert Catskill stood
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: staring knee deep in flowers, apparently only made aware of
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: the creature existence by the same screen that had attracted
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: the attention of mister Burley and his companions. Mister Catskill
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: was the first to act, and his act showed his metal.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: It was at once a screet and bold Stop flopping
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: that sunshade, Lady Stella, he said, let me I will
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: catch its eye. He made a detour around the car
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: so as to come face to face with the animal.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: Then for a moment he stood as it were, displaying
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: himself a resolute little figure in a gray frock coat
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: and a black banded top hat. He held out a
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: cautious hand, not too suddenly for fear of startling the creature. Possy,
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: he said. The leopard, relieved by the cessation of Lady
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: Stella's sunshade, regarded him with interest and curiosity. He drew closer.
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: The leopard extended its muzzle and sniffed. If it will
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: only let me stroke it, said mister Catskill, and came
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: within arm's length. The beast sniffed the extended hand with
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: an expression of incredulity, then with a suddenness that sent
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: mister Catskill back several paces. It sneezed again, much more violently,
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: regarded mister Catskill, reproachfully for a moment, and then leaped
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: lightly over the flower bed and made off in the
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: direction of the white and golden colonnade. The grazing cattle
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: in the field, Mister Barnstable noted, watched its passage without
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: the slightest sign of dismay. Mister Catskill remained in a
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: slightly expanded state in the middle of the road. No animal,
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: he remarked, can stand up to the steadfast gaze of
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: the human eye not one. It is a riddle for
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: your materialist. Shall we join mister Cecil Lady Stella. He
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: seemed to have found something to look at down there.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: The man in the yellow car may know where he is.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: He assisted the lady to get out of the car,
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: and the two came on after mister Barnstable's party, which
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: was now again approaching the burning house. The chauffeur, evidently
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: not wishing to be left alone with a limousine in
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: this world of incredible possibilities, followed as closely as respect permitted.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: End of chapter two. This was a recording by brah
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: Eyon Powell, Portland, Oregon, September twenty nineteen,