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The First Men in the Moon Chapter 12 - The Selenite's Face · The H. G. Wells Library

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  Speaker 1: Chapter twelve of the First Men in the Moon. This
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  Speaker 1: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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  Speaker 1: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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  Speaker 1: LibriVox dot org. This recording is by Mark Smith of Simpsonville,
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  Speaker 1: South Carolina. The First Men in the Moon by H. G. Wells,
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  Speaker 1: Chapter twelve, The Selen Knight's Face. I found myself sitting
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  Speaker 1: crouched together in a tumultuous darkness. For a long time,
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  Speaker 1: I could not understand where I was nor how I
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  Speaker 1: had come to this perplexity. I thought of the cupboard
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  Speaker 1: into which I had been thrust at times when I
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  Speaker 1: was a child, and then of a very dark and
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  Speaker 1: noisy bedroom in which I had slept during an illness.
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  Speaker 1: But these sounds about me were not the noises I
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  Speaker 1: had known, and there was a thin flavor in the air,
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  Speaker 1: like the wind of a stable. Then I said, posed,
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  Speaker 1: we must still be at work upon the sphere, and
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  Speaker 1: that somehow I had got into the cellar of Kavoor's house.
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  Speaker 1: I remembered we had finished the sphere, and fancied I
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  Speaker 1: must still be in it and traveling through space. Cavore,
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  Speaker 1: I said, cannot we have some light. There came no answer.
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  Speaker 1: Cavore I insisted. I was answered by a groan my head,
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  Speaker 1: I heard him say, my head. I attempted to press
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  Speaker 1: my hands to my brow, which ached, and discovered they
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  Speaker 1: were tied together. This startled me very much. I brought
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  Speaker 1: them up to my mouth and felt the cold, smoothness
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  Speaker 1: of metal. They were chained together. I tried to separate
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  Speaker 1: my legs and made out that they were similarly fastened,
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  Speaker 1: and also that I was fastened to the ground by
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  Speaker 1: a much thicker chain about the middle of my body.
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  Speaker 1: I was more frightened than I had yet been by
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  Speaker 1: anything in all our strange experiences. For a time I
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  Speaker 1: tugged silently at my bonds. Cavore I cried out sharply,
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  Speaker 1: Why am I tied? Why have you tied me hand
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  Speaker 1: and foot? I haven't tied you, he answered, It's the Selenites,
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  Speaker 1: the Selenites. My mind hung on that for a space.
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  Speaker 1: Then my memories came back to me, the snowy desolation,
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  Speaker 1: the thawing of the air, the growth of the plants,
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  Speaker 1: our strange hopping and crawling among the rocks and vegetation
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  Speaker 1: of the crater, all the distress of our frantic search
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  Speaker 1: for the sphere returned to me finally the opening of
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  Speaker 1: the great lid that covered the pit. Then, as I
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  Speaker 1: strained to trace our later movements down to our present plight,
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  Speaker 1: the pain in my head became intolerable. I came to
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  Speaker 1: an insurmountable barrier, an obstinate, blank cavore. Yes, where are
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  Speaker 1: are we? How should I know? Are we dead? What
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  Speaker 1: nonsense they've got us? Then he made no answer but
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  Speaker 1: a grunt. The lingering traces of the poison seemed to
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  Speaker 1: make him oddly irritable. What do you mean to do?
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  Speaker 1: How should I know what to do? Oh? Very well,
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  Speaker 1: said I, and became silent. Presently I was roused from
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  Speaker 1: a stupor. Oh lord, I cried, I wish you'd stop
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  Speaker 1: that buzzing. We lapsed into silence again, listening to the
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  Speaker 1: dull confusion of noises, like the muffled sounds of a
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  Speaker 1: street or factory that filled our ears. I could make
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  Speaker 1: nothing of it. My mind pursued first one rhythm and
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  Speaker 1: then another, and questioned it in vain. But after a
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  Speaker 1: long time I became aware of a new and sharper element,
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  Speaker 1: not mingling with the rest, but standing out as it were,
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  Speaker 1: against that cloudy background of sound. It was a series
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  Speaker 1: of relatively very little definite sounds, tappings and rubbings, like
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  Speaker 1: a loose spray of ivy against a window, or a
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  Speaker 1: bird moving about upon a box. We listened and peered
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  Speaker 1: about us, but the darkness was a velvet pall. There
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  Speaker 1: followed a noise, like the subtle movement of the wards
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  Speaker 1: of a well oiled lock. And then there appeared before me,
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  Speaker 1: hanging as it seemed, in an immensity of black, a
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  Speaker 1: thin bright line. Look, whispered Cavor, very softly. What is it?
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  Speaker 1: I don't know. We stared. The thin bright line became
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  Speaker 1: a band, and broader and paler. It took upon itself
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  Speaker 1: the quality of a bluish light falling upon a whitewashed wall.
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  Speaker 1: It ceased to be parallel sighted. It developed a deep
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  Speaker 1: indentation on one side. I turned to remark this to Cavour,
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  Speaker 1: and was amazed to see his ear in a brilliant illumination,
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  Speaker 1: all the rest of him in shadow. I twisted my
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  Speaker 1: head round as well as my bonds would permit. Cavour,
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  Speaker 1: I said, it's behind His ear vanished gave place to
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  Speaker 1: an eye. Suddenly, the crack that had been emitting the
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  Speaker 1: light broadened out and revealed itself as the space of
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  Speaker 1: an opening door. Beyond was a sapphire vista, and in
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  Speaker 1: the doorway stood a grotesque outline, silhouetted against the glare.
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  Speaker 1: We both made convulsive efforts to turn, and failing, sat
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  Speaker 1: staring over our shoulders. At this my first impression was
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  Speaker 1: of some clumsy quadruped with lowered head. Then I perceived
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  Speaker 1: it was the slender, pinched body and short and extremely
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  Speaker 1: attenuated bandied legs of a Selenite, with his head depressed
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  Speaker 1: between his shoulders. He was without the helmet and body
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  Speaker 1: covering they wear upon the exterior. He was a blank
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  Speaker 1: black figure to us, but instinctively our imaginations supplied features
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  Speaker 1: to his very human outline. I at least took it
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  Speaker 1: instantly that he was somewhat hunchbacked, with a high forehead
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  Speaker 1: and long features. He came forward three steps and paused
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  Speaker 1: for a time. His movement seemed absolutely noiseless. Then he
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  Speaker 1: came forward again. He walked like a bird. His feet
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  Speaker 1: fell one in front of the other. He stepped out
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  Speaker 1: of the ray of light that came through the doorway,
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  Speaker 1: and it seemed as though he vanished altogether in the shadow.
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  Speaker 1: For a moment my eyes sought him in the wrong place,
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  Speaker 1: and then I perceived him standing facing us both in
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  Speaker 1: the full light. Only the human features I had attributed
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  Speaker 1: to him were not there at all. Of course, I
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  Speaker 1: ought to have expected that, only I didn't. It came
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  Speaker 1: to me as an absolute for a moment, an overwhelming shock.
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  Speaker 1: It seemed as though it wasn't a face, as though
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  Speaker 1: it must needs be a mask, a horror, a deformity
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  Speaker 1: that would presently be disavowed or explained. There was no nose,
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  Speaker 1: and the thing had dull, bulging eyes at the side.
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  Speaker 1: In the silhouette I had supposed they were ears. There
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  Speaker 1: were no ears. I have tried to draw one of
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  Speaker 1: these heads, but I cannot. There was a mouth downwardly
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  Speaker 1: curved like a human mouth, and a face that stares ferociously.
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  Speaker 1: The neck on which the head was poised was jointed
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  Speaker 1: in three places, almost like the short joints in the
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  Speaker 1: leg of a crab. The joints of the limbs I
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  Speaker 1: could not see because of the pettee like straps in
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  Speaker 1: which they were swathed, and which formed the only clothing
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  Speaker 1: the being wore. There the thing was looking at us
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  Speaker 1: at the time, my mind was taken up by the
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  Speaker 1: madden possibility of the creature. I suppose he also was amazed,
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  Speaker 1: and with more reason, perhaps for amazement, than we only
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  Speaker 1: confound him. He did not show it. He did at
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  Speaker 1: least know what had brought about this meeting of incompatible creatures.
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  Speaker 1: But conceive how it would seem to decent Londoners, for example,
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  Speaker 1: to come upon a couple of living things as big
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  Speaker 1: as men and absolutely unlike any other earthly animals, careering
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  Speaker 1: about among the sheep in Hyde Park. It must have
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  Speaker 1: taken him like that figure us. We were bound hand
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  Speaker 1: and foot, fagged and filthy, our beards two inches long,
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  Speaker 1: our faces scratched and bloody. Cavor you must imagine in
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  Speaker 1: his knickerbockers torn in several places by the bayonet's scrub,
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  Speaker 1: his jagger's shirt and old cricket cap, his wiry hair
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  Speaker 1: wildly disordered, a tail to every quarter of the heavens.
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  Speaker 1: In that blue light, his face did not look red,
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  Speaker 1: but very dark. His lips, and the drying blood upon
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  Speaker 1: my hands seemed black. If possible, I was in a
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  Speaker 1: worse plight than he, on account of the yellow fungus
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  Speaker 1: into which I had jumped. Our jackets were unbuttoned, and
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  Speaker 1: our shoes had been taken off and lay at our feet,
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  Speaker 1: And we were sitting with our backs to this queer
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  Speaker 1: bluish light, peering at such a monster as Durer might
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  Speaker 1: have invented. Kavor broke the silence, started to speak, went hoarse,
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  Speaker 1: and cleared his throat outside began a terrific bellowing, as
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  Speaker 1: if a moon calf were in trouble. It ended in
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  Speaker 1: a shriek, and everything was still again. Presently the Selenite
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  Speaker 1: turned about, flickered into the shadow, stood for a moment
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  Speaker 1: retrospective at the door, and then closed it on us.
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  Speaker 1: And once more we were in that murmurous mystery of
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  Speaker 1: darkness into which we had awakened. End of chapter