Next came two iron cooking pots. She gave those to Porith, because she would not be able to carry them away and he was host, and cook. He gibbered over them. And then—wonder of wonders! A leather-bound book—the Filoby Testament itself!
She beamed in joy and held it up for the others to see.
D'ward snatched it out of her hand.
A printed book, by George! A hide-bound, gold-embossed beautiful book! Nightmares of the Stone Age vanished, the Renaissance dawned in certainty, and even the Industrial Revolution began to seem possible.
Then the title jumped off the cover at him.
Vurogty Migafilo
Vurogty Migafilo! He flicked the pages. The language was jabber, but the letters were unmistakable. There were a few unfamiliar accent marks and obviously some of the pronunciations had changed—(beta) was V, as in modern Greek—but overall the alphabet used was too close to classical Greek to be coincidence.
He barely noticed as Eleal grabbed the book back from him. Creighton had said that the keys to the portals were very ancient. Edward had not understood the significance of that at the time. While the Earth had been inventing steam engines and hot air balloons and now aeroplanes, it had been forgetting the antique wisdom of the shamans and witch doctors. People must have been crossing between worlds for thousands of years. Not many of them, but enough to found races and influence culture. They could have brought nothing with them, no tools or domestic animals, nor even fillings in their teeth, but their memories had come.
Someone had brought the art of writing from Earth to Nextdoor, or someone had taken the art of writing from Nextdoor to Earth. The Greeks were supposed to have copied the alphabet from the Phoenicians and improved it, but perhaps both had come from outside. The Greek alphabet had spawned the Latin and the Cyrillic and many others. This language of Eleal's was written in yet another variant of the Greek alphabet.
What else, who else, had crossed between worlds? For example, Edward thought—wishing he had someone to argue this with—Prometheus, who had stolen fire from the gods, might be an ancient memory of some interworld traveler. Perhaps many myths would make sense as muddled records of people vanishing mysteriously or appearing even more mysteriously. Suppose a man, or woman, popped out of nowhere into the middle of a druid ceremony at Stonehenge—would not the newcomer be hailed as a god?
With a squeal of delight, Eleal found her name where someone had marked a passage. She showed it to Edward. He nodded and smiled, but his mind was busily chipping out a whole new view of human history.
49
BY EVENING, HE WAS FEELING MUCH STRONGER. WITH Porith's fumbling help, Eleal had pitched the tent in thick shrubbery on the east side of the stream. She probably hoped that any reapers who came snooping around would not venture to cross the gully. The old hermit was so delighted to have his own house back that he had become almost jovial; at sundown the three of them ate a celebratory feast outside his cave.
Edward's appetite had come back with a rush. He suffered a stabbing toothache in consequence, but did not inquire about local dentists. His muscles and joints were recovering from their bruising, so he no longer moved like a centenarian. Later he managed to scramble up the bank for the first time, and then Eleal led him to the edge of the cliff.
The sun had just set. The view was superb—not merely the breathtaking canyon and the waterfall plunging into it, but also the many little white farmhouses standing out clearly on the far bank as if arranged there by an artist. Each had its own cluster of heavy shade trees and lighter, feathery things like palms or frozen green fountains. A background of fertile countryside faded off into distant foothills and a jagged frame of mountains. The land was prosperous, and obviously either tropical or subtropical, because the sun had been overhead at noon. It was better watered than his Kenya birthplace, he decided, and probably at a lower elevation—judging by terrestrial standards, which might not fit the case at all. Westward the ranges were a dark saw-edge against the last glow of evening. To the east the icy summits burned in gold and pink, and some of those peaks could match anything the Alps had to offer. Another range loomed over the forest behind him. The basin itself was about the width of the Mittelland at Lausanne, but closed off to east and west. The river was much bigger than the Rhine, the largest he had ever seen.
Waving an all-encompassing arm, Eleal explained that this was Something-Suss, which he assumed was what Creighton had translated as Sussland. When Edward asked the names of the ranges to north and south, they were both Something-else-Suss. The river was Yet-Another-Suss, and so was the little town he could see in the distance. He had a lot to learn.
Still, the town was promising. A gleam of reflected light there was somehow related to another god, Tion—a good god, apparently. Nice to hear that some of them were not horrors! Having discovered that Eleal had strong religious convictions, Edward had resolved to be very cautious on the subject of gods.
She indicated that tomorrow she was going to take him to that Town-Suss. He could manage that, he thought, five miles or so. Then he asked with gestures about crossing the canyon and learned that there would have to be a detour to the east, to Maganot. Still thinking in English, he translated that to Village-Not ... Notham? Notting? Notby?
"Magathogwal,” she explained, pointing the other way, and then, “Magalame, Magajot."
He pointed straight down. “Query name."
"Ratharuat."
Ratha must be yet another geographical prefix, perhaps meaning “forest” or “place smaller than a village” or “old ruins, nobody lives there now.” Ruat? That name sounded familiar, but his memory was reeling from overwork and he could not place it.
The two of them sat in contented silence as the stars came out. Birds or something were making a strange racket in the trees and once in a while his stomach would rumble loudly, provoking Eleal to giggles. Then she began to sing. He could not follow the words, but the melody was pleasant. She was a competent little songstress.
She was a pretty girl, too, although she would never be a classical beauty; her nose tipped up and her hair was more frizzy than curled. She had a quick smile and a remarkable self-confidence. He suspected she was short for her age, but of course he was only guessing, for the local population might be stunted by twentieth century European standards. He wondered what had happened to her leg. It could not be rickets in this climate.
The song ended. The singer glanced up to see what her audience thought of it. Edward clapped, not sure if that was the local sign of applause. Apparently it was, because she beamed. On impulse he smiled, took her hand, and squeezed it. She blushed. He released it quickly, recalling Miss Eleal's dramatic tendencies. She was probably old enough to start having romantic notions also. He had no wish to provoke an embarrassing juvenile crush. Call me in five or six years, perhaps.
Five or six years? Five or six days ago, he had been on the boat train from Paris. Now he seemed to be stranded for the rest of his life on a world unknown, more exotic than anywhere Haggard ever Rode or Rudyard ever Kipled.
The giant green moon, Trumb, seemed to have disappeared. A small blue light just above the sunset was Ysh, Eleal said, and then she became excited and pointed to a brighter, yellow star. That was Kirb'l, and apparently seeing Kirb'l was an honor, or a good omen, or something. Kirb'l Tion, she said, and gestured toward Suss town.