“Now this month of May is almost over – the loveliest May in recorded times. A perfect May in a wonderful period. You have no way of knowing what a good, gay period you live in, Oliver. The very feeling in the air of the cities – that wonderful national confidence and happiness – everything going as smoothly as a dream. There were other Mays with fine weather, but each of them had a war or a famine, or something else wrong.” She hesitated, grimaced and went on rapidly. “In a few days we are to meet at a coronation in Rome,” she said. “I think the year will be 800 – Christmastime. We—”
“But why,” Oliver interrupted, “did you insist on this house? Why do the others want to get it away from you?”
Kleph stared at him. He saw the tears rising again in small bright crescents that gathered above her lower lids. He saw the look of obstinacy that came upon her soft, tanned face. She shook her head.
“You must not ask me that.” She held out the steaming cup. “Here, drink and forget what I have said. I can tell you no more. No more at all.”
* * *
When he woke, for a little while he had no idea where he was. He did not remember leaving Kleph or coming to his own room. He didn’t care, just then. For he woke to a sense of overwhelming terror.
The dark was full of it. His brain rocked on waves of fear and pain. He lay motionless, too frightened to stir, some atavistic memory warning him to lie quiet until he knew from which direction the danger threatened. Reasonless panic broke over him in a tidal flow; his head ached with its violence and the dark throbbed to the same rhythms.
A knock sounded at the door. Omerie’s deep voice said, “Wilson! Wilson, are you awake?”
Oliver tried twice before he had breath to answer. “Y-yes – what is it?”
The knob rattled. Omerie’s dim figure groped for the light switch and the room sprang into visibility. Omerie’s face was drawn with strain, and he held one hand to his head as if it ached in rhythm with Oliver’s.
It was in that moment, before Omerie spoke again, that Oliver remembered Hollia’s warning. “Move out, young man – move out before tonight.” Wildly he wondered what threatened them all in this dark house that throbbed with the rhythms of pure terror.
Omerie in an angry voice answered the unspoken question.
“Someone has planted a subsonic in the house, Wilson. Kleph thinks you may know where it is.”
“S-subsonic?”
“Call it a gadget,” Omerie interpreted impatiently. “Probably a small metal box that—”
Oliver said, “Oh,” in a tone that must have told Omerie everything.
“Where is it?” he demanded. “Quick. Let’s get this over.”
“I don’t know.” With an effort Oliver controlled the chattering of his teeth. “Y-you mean all this – all this is just from the little box?”
“Of course. Now tell me how to find it before we all go crazy.”
Oliver got shakily out of bed, groping for his robe with nerveless hands. “I s-suppose she hid it somewhere downstairs,” he said. “S-she wasn’t gone long.”
Omerie got the story out of him in a few brief questions. He clicked his teeth in exasperation when Oliver had finished it.
“That stupid Hollia—”
“Omerie!” Kleph’s plaintive voice wailed from the hall. “Please hurry, Omerie! This is too much to stand! Oh, Omerie, please!”
Oliver stood up abruptly. Then a redoubled wave of the inexplicable pain seemed to explode in his skull at the motion, and he clutched the bedpost and reeled.
“Go find the thing yourself,” he heard himself saying dizzily. “I can’t even walk—”
Omerie’s own temper was drawn wire-tight by the pressure in the room. He seized Oliver’s shoulder and shook him, saying in a tight voice, “You let it in – now help us get it out, or—”
“It’s a gadget out of your world, not mine!” Oliver said furiously.
And then it seemed to him there was a sudden coldness and silence in the room. Even the pain and the senseless terror paused for a moment. Omerie’s pale, cold eyes fixed upon Oliver a stare so chill he could almost feel the ice in it.
“What do you know about our – world?” Omerie demanded.
Oliver did not speak a word. He did not need to; his face must have betrayed what he knew. He was beyond concealment in the stress of this night-time terror he still could not understand.
Omerie bared his white teeth and said three perfectly unintelligible words. Then he stepped to the door and snapped, “Kleph!”
Oliver could see the two women huddled together in the hall, shaking violently with involuntary waves of that strange, synthetic terror. Klia, in a luminous green gown, was rigid with control, but Kleph made no effort whatever at repression. Her downy robe had turned soft gold tonight; she shivered in it and the tears ran down her face unchecked.
“Kleph,” Omerie said in a dangerous voice, “you were euphoric again yesterday?”
Kleph darted a scared glance at Oliver and nodded guiltily.
“You talked too much.” It was a complete indictment in one sentence. “You know the rules, Kleph. You will not be allowed to travel again if anyone reports this to the authorities.”
Kleph’s lovely creamy face creased suddenly into impenitent dimples.
“I know it was wrong. I am very sorry – but you will not stop me if Cenbe says no.”
Klia flung out her arms in a gesture of helpless anger. Omerie shrugged. “In this case, as it happens, no great harm is done,” he said, giving Oliver an unfathomable glance. “But it might have been serious. Next time perhaps it will be. I must have a talk with Cenbe.”
“We must find the subsonic first of all,” Klia reminded them, shivering. “If Kleph is afraid to help, she can go out for a while. I confess I am very sick of Kleph’s company just now.”
“We could give up the house!” Kleph cried wildly. “Let Hollia have it! How can you stand this long enough to hunt—”
“Give up the house?” Klia echoed. “You must be mad! With all our invitations out?”
“There will be no need for that,” Omerie said. “We can find it if we all hunt. You feel able to help?” He looked at Oliver.
With an effort Oliver controlled his own senseless panic as the waves of it swept through the room. “Yes,” he said. “But what about me? What are you going to do?”
“That should be obvious,” Omerie said, his pale eyes in the dark face regarding Oliver impassively. “Keep you in the house until we go. We can certainly do no less. You understand that. And there is no reason for us to do more, as it happens. Silence is all we promised when we signed our travel papers.”
“But—” Oliver groped for the fallacy in that reasoning. It was no use. He could not think clearly. Panic surged insanely through his mind from the very air around him. “All right,” he said. “Let’s hunt.”
It was dawn before they found the box, tucked inside the ripped seam of a sofa cushion. Omerie took it upstairs without a word. Five minutes later the pressure in the air abruptly dropped and peace fell blissfully upon the house.
“They will try again,” Omerie said to Oliver at the door of the back bedroom. “We must watch for that. As for you, I must see that you remain in the house until Friday. For your own comfort, I advise you to let me know if Hollia offers any further tricks. I confess I am not quite sure how to enforce your staying indoors. I could use methods that would make you very uncomfortable. I would prefer to accept your word on it.”
Oliver hesitated. The relaxing of pressure upon his brain had left him exhausted and stupid, and he was not at all sure what to say.
Omerie went on after a moment. “It was partly our fault for not insuring that we had the house to ourselves,” he said. “Living here with us, you could scarcely help suspecting. Shall we say that in return for your promise, I reimburse you in part for losing the sale price on this house?”