“Well, I’d still like to go through one of these buildings. There’s no telling what we’ll find that might prove useful, and anyway I’m curious.”
Dar found that he was curious too, in spite of the weight of eight centuries of tradition, and he followed Kruger without objection as the boy walked over to a nearby building, dropped to his hands and knees, and crawled through one of the openings in the wall. Inside, Dar was able to stand up with reasonable head clearance; he walked around freely while Kruger remained on his knees for some time looking about him.
The open structure of the outer wall had the advantage of letting in plenty of light, but it also meant that they had seen most of what there was to see from outside. In this case that was very little. A room, or hallway, about fifteen feet wide ran the full length of the building parallel to the street; it was completely devoid of furnishings of any sort. The inner wall of this passage possessed doors similar in size and shape to those leading from the street but not nearly so many of them. Kruger chose one at random and crawled through. Dar followed.
This room was also long and narrow, but its longer dimension was away from the street rather than parallel to it; the door through which they had entered was in one end. It was much smaller than the outer hall. At the far end was a dais raised about a foot from the floor. At four points, seemingly at random, on the floor itself were dome-shaped structures about two feet high and eighteen inches in diameter with fluted sides that made them look like inverted jelly-molds. They were made of some light-colored stone; Kruger was just barely able to slide one along the floor when he got between it and the wall and used his legs. Their purpose was certainly not obvious. Other furniture seemed easier to explain; there was a rectangular metal affair with sliding drawers and a mirror- smooth surface made of highly polished obsidian set into one of the side walls. The mirror, if that was its intended function, was about the same size and shape as the doors.
The drawers of the bureau, or filing cabinet, or whatever it was were fastened by simple latches. The top one was empty. The second was nearly full of metal objects, about half of which had no obvious function, while the others might very well have been drawing instruments. There was a pair of dividers, a straight edge marked off as a scale, a semicircular protractor divided into eighteen major parts by deep engraving in the metal, and several tools apparently for both cutting and engraving. One of these, a scalpel-like affair with a double-edged blade and a handle about three inches long, he pointed out to Dar with the suggestion that he take it along; he had been using Kruger’s knife on his meat ever since he had discovered the advantages of a metal blade. The handle was not of a shape to fit his hand very closely, but neither was that of Kruger’s knife, and this at least was nearer to the proper size.
Further examination of the room disclosed a small pipe emerging from one wall, with what appeared to be a burner nozzle at the tip. Kruger deduced a gas lighting fixture, with the corollary that the builders of the city possessed eyes.
The dais at the rear of the room contained two shallow, bowl-shaped depressions a little under four feet in diameter which might have been flower pots or bathtubs for all Kruger could guess. Approaching it, however, he seemed to feel an increase in temperature. Since he was always soaked with perspiration anyway, he wasn’t sure at first, but when he touched the wall he jerked his hand away again with a startled exclamation; the surface was burning hot.
Dar preserved himself from hysterics only by a major exercise of will. He wanted nothing to do with sources of heat, artificial or not, and he withdrew to the door while Kruger finished his investigations alone. These took some time, for just as he had decided that there was nothing more to see, his eye caught a metal plate set flush with the floor. This was only about an inch square, and almost featureless, but careful examination disclosed a pair of tiny perforations near each of its sides.
Kruger went back to the drawer that held the drawing instruments, secured the dividers, and by inserting their points in two of the holes finally managed to pry up the plate. Its metal took no visible damage from what was presumably unorthodox treatment. This fact, however, did not hold Kruger’s attention at the time.
What caught his eye was simple enough — merely a dull-colored surface with two small holes. After regarding these silently for several seconds Kruger went to work once more with his improvised pry-bar, and in a few minutes the dull plate came out beside its cover. Underneath it was exactly what the boy had expected to see — two silvery wires surrounded and separated by a black, flexible coating and leading to metal cups. With all due respect to the possibilities inherent in different culture backgrounds Kruger felt safe in concluding that he had been dissecting a plug receptacle designed to deliver current to whatever the inhabitant of the room chose. In short, an electric socket.
He looked at the wires, and up to the pipe and jet on the wall, and back to the wires, whistling tunelessly. Then he replaced the covers and relieved Dar’s mind by leaving the room.
Kruger was not frightened but was sorely puzzled by what he had seen. A city, still in good repair although without any present inhabitants, presumably abandoned not long ago — yet running down into the ocean for a distance that implied centuries of land sinking, equipped with gas-lighting and electric wiring in the same building.
Dar was not able to throw light on the question. He recognized the weight of his friend’s arguments in all matters except the gas-electricity question and was willing to accept a qualified opinion there. Kruger explained that situation as well as he could while they rested in the shade of the building’s entrance hall. Theer was practically at his closest, and travel was impractical anyway. Dar understood without any trouble that a gas light was a form of fire and led the conversation hastily on to the question of electricity. Kruger did not expect to get much of this concept across and was pleasantly surprised to discover that Dar appeared to be following quite well. The explanation was long, of course, but by the time Theer had dropped once more behind the hills the boy was as sure as he ever became that he was understood.
The question then arose of just what they should do about it all. Kruger thought it would be best for them to examine at least one or two more buildings to make sure that the one they had seen was typical; then they would have some more or less organized information, which Dar could give to his people. Kruger’s chance to report it to
Dar had a more serious problem. His interest had been aroused, of course; he would like, in one way, to bring a group of his people and perhaps some Teachers back to this place so that they could learn more about the electricity that Kruger had described. At the same time there was the fact that he had violated firm and long- standing instructions — not merely orders of the Teachers but written material handed down in books from the time before his people were born — against having anything to do with fire. There could be no doubt that whoever had built this place had never heard of those laws. If Dar made a complete report at the Ice Ramparts would the result be an expedition, or censure? This was his problem, of course; he could not ask Kruger for advice. The human being obviously had never heard of the law either but could hardly be blamed for that; his background was different.
Still, what he was to do with the information made little difference in what he should do now about acquiring more. He followed Kruger’s lead, therefore, and some hours were spent in going through a number of the structures.
These were no more identical than the buildings of a terrestrial city would have been, but none of the variations were particularly startling. The gas pipe-electric wiring anomaly seemed to exist everywhere; Dar pointed out that the pipes were only in inner rooms, whereas electrical outlets frequently appeared in entrance halls and even on outer walls. There seemed to be some prejudice on the part of the city dwellers against the use of electricity for lighting. Kruger refused to credit Dar’s suggestion that they might not have invented electric lights. His opinion was that anyone who could construct a dependable current source, sufficient for a city, could at least strike an arc with it. He may have been right.
Although Theer had not been down very long, several thunder showers had passed over the city while they were investigating. When the two decided that they had seen enough and should probably continue their journey they found that another of the storms was just breaking. It would not have been impossible to travel in the rain — Kruger was usually soaking wet anyway — but visibility was not good and they decided to wait.
Like most of the others the shower did not last too long, and presently the sky began to lighten. Dar replaced his pack on his shoulders and they started out while rain was still hissing down. It struck the pavement loudly enough to make conversation difficult, and rivulets of water gurgled down the slope of the gutterless street toward the sea. Probably this was what kept Dar’s ears from warning them. At any rate that was what he claimed later.
Whatever the reason, neither of them knew they were not alone until the company showed itself deliberately. The interruption to their journey involved both word and action; the word was “Stop!” and the action took the form
