Horsley aimed beady eyes and the chauffeur coughed.
“I mean yessir. Sorry, sir.”
“Fetch the luggage and stop muttering.”
The chauffeur obeyed, but he went on muttering—under his breath. Stumping his heavy stick on the gravel of the driveway Horsley advanced to the hotel, passed under its ancient archway, and so into the main hall where the proprietor was washing his hands with invisible soap.
“Delighted to see you again, Mr. Horsley. Delighted! How are you?”
“Rotten—and stop blabbering. What rooms did you reserve for me?”
“Same as before, Mr. Horsley. I think you—”
“They won’t do. There are bats in this place and I can hear them at night. Change the rooms.”
“But, sir, I—”
“Change ’em!” Horsley nearly shouted, and the proprietor fled behind his reception desk to make hasty alterations in his allocations. Finally he smiled.
“I have just the right place, Mr. Horsley, if you’ll come with me. You’ll like it. Overlooking the countryside. As you say, most of the upper rooms do carry the sound of bats at night. They’re in the old disused belfry on the top of this building. It used to be a church, you know.”
“I didn’t know and I don’t care. Show me the room.”
Still growling and grumbling Horsley crept up the stairs and into the room the proprietor indicated. No man—not even Horsley—in his right senses could have found fault with its clean freshness and country-aired linen.
“Not bad,” he grunted. “And what provisions have you made for this nonsense which is supposed to happen later his afternoon?”
“Provision?” The proprietor looked vague.
“From the look on your face, man, I begin to wonder if you know what I’m talking about!”
“Oh, yes, sir, I know. This strange business in space. The newspapers are calling it an ‘ether-warp’. Most unusual, I suppose. Certainly I haven’t made any particular provision. I don’t see how one can. I don’t even know what ether is.”
“I do. I’ve had it numberless times with these blasted operations of mine. So you’ve made no preparation. Not much use me coming here, was it? I came specially to get away from this ether-thing.”
“I’m sure you’ll be as safe here as anywhere, sir,” the proprietor said, hopefully if not convincingly.
“I’d better be. Otherwise I’ll hold you responsible! And where’s Dawson with the luggage?”
“Right here, sir,” the chauffeur answered, coming in with the first consignment.
* * * * * * *
At about this time in the depths of the African jungle Henry Brand, an illegal trader in protected animal species, was turning a possible cosmic disaster to his own unscrupulous uses. At the moment he was seated in his bungalow, his base of operations, with his black head boy at the other side of the crude table. And M’Bonga was looking startled, the whites of his eyes dilated against the shiny coal-black of his skin.
“I don’t believe you can’t get near the animals,” M’Bonga,” Brand said deliberately, pointing a finger at him.
“It’s true, bwana. This strange weather is affecting them. They hide from us—”
“If you and those lazy devils out there don’t start getting results, I’m going to use white man’s magic and do things to the sunlight that will make your ears drop off!”
“Bwana do—do things to—that?” asked M’Bonga, glancing through the crude glassless window towards the hot stillness of the forest, the sun glinting occasionally amidst the foliage.
“Correct,” Brand agreed solemnly, and swallowed some whiskey. “You and the rest of those boys have been too lazy lately. It’s over a week since you’ve brought me any animals, and my buyers are getting impatient. If you don’t start getting results I’ll frighten the lives out of you.”
M’Bonga hesitated, not quite sure what to make of the situation. He was fairly educated and, within limits, loyal, but he had within him the profoundly superstitious fear of his ancestors and the thought of the white man doing something to the lord of day genuinely frightened him. Then he remembered something and half turned as he was about to leave the bungalow.
“Bwana blot out sun?” he asked, with strong memories of a solar eclipse he had witnessed.
“No, my friend. I’ll make it three, four, twenty times brighter, and shrivel your souls to Hades!”
M’Bonga bolted, genuinely scared, to get some action out of his boys. Brand grinned and glanced towards the silent radio. He was much too obtuse to realise that the radio warnings were serious, yet, surprisingly enough, he had spoken a great truth to M’Bonga when he had said what he would do to the sun.
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