“These must certainly be the canoes of the attacking force from northward, the force that fought the Horde the night before we took a hand in the matter; fought, and were beaten, and—devoured,” said Stern.
And with a practical eye, wise and cool even despite the pain of his wounded arm, he examined three or four of the boats as best he could by moonlight.
The girl and he agreed on one to use.
“Yes, this looks like the most suitable,” judged the engineer, indicating a rough, banca-like craft nearly sixteen feet long, which had been carved and scraped and burned out of a single log.
He helped Beatrice in, then cast off the rope. In the bottom lay six paddles of the most degraded state of workmanship. They showed no trace of decoration whatsoever, and the lowest savages of the pre-cataclysmic era had invariably attempted some crude form of art on nearly every implement.
The girl took up one of the paddles.
“Which way? Up-stream?” asked she. “No, no, you mustn’t even try to use that arm.”
“Why paddle at all?” Stern answered. “See here.”
He pointed where a short and crooked mast lay, unstopped, along the side. Lashed to it was a sail of rawhides, clumsily caught together with thongs, heavy and stiff, yet full of promise.
Stern laughed.
“Back to the coracle stage again,” said he. “Back to Caesar’s time, and way beyond!” And he lifted one end of the mast. “Here we’ve got the Seuvian pellis pro velis, the ‘skins for sails’ all over again—only more so. Well, no matter. Up she goes!”
Together they stepped the mast and spread the sail. The engineer took his place in the stern, a paddle in his left hand. He dipped it, and the ripples glinted away.
“Now,” said he, in a voice that left no room for argument, “now, you curl up in the tiger-skin and go to sleep! This is my job.”
The sail caught the breath of the breeze. The banca moved slowly forward, trailing its wake like widening lines of silver in the moonlight.
And Beatrice, strong in her trust of him, her confidence and love, lay down to sleep while the wounded man steered on and on, and watched her and protected her. And over all the stars, a glory in the summer sky, kept silent vigil.
Dawn broke, all a flame of gold and crimson, as they landed in a sheltered little bay on the west shore.
Here, though the forest stood unbroken in thick ranges all along the background, it had not yet invaded the slope that led back from the pebbly beach. And through the tangle of what once must have been a splendid orchard, they caught a glimpse of white walls overgrown with a mad profusion of wild roses, wisterias and columbines.
“This was once upon a time the summer-place, the big concrete bungalow and all, of Harrison Van Amburg. You know the billionaire, the wheat man? It used to be all his in the long ago. He built it for all time of a material that time can never change. It was his. Well, it’s ours now. Our home!”
Together they stood upon the shelving beach, lapped by the river. Somewhere in the woods behind them a robin was caroling with liquid harmony.
Stern drew the rude boat up. Then, breathing deep, he faced the morning.
“You and I, Beatrice,” said he, and took her hand. “Just you—and I!”
“And love!” she whispered.
“And hope, and life! And the earth reborn. The arts and sciences, language and letters, truth, ‘all the glories of the world’ handed down through us!
“Listen! The race of men, our race, must live again—shall live! Again the forests and the plains shall be the conquest of our blood. Once more shall cities gleam and tower, ships sail the sea, and the world go on to greater wisdom, better things!
“A kinder and a saner world this time. No misery, no war, no poverty, woe, strife, creeds, oppression, tears—for we are wiser than those other folk, and there shall be no error.”
He paused, his face irradiate. To him recurred the prophecy of Ingersoll, the greatest orator of that other time. And very slowly he spoke again:
“Beatrice, it shall be a world where thrones have crumbled and where kings are dust. The aristocracy of idleness shall reign no more! A world without a slave. Man shall at last be free!
“’A world at peace, adorned by every form of art, with music’s myriad voices thrilled, while lips are rich with words of love and truth. A world in which no exile sighs, no prisoner mourns; a world on which the gibbet’s shadow shall not fall.
“’A race without disease of flesh or brain, shapely and fair, the wedded harmony of form and function. And as I look, life lengthens, joy deepens, and over all in the great dome shines the eternal star of human hope!’”
“And love?” she smiled again, a deep and sacred meaning in her words. Within her stirred the universal motherhood, the hope of everything, the call of the unborn, the insistent voice of the race that was to be.
“And love!” he answered, his voice now very tender, very grave.
Tired, yet strong, he looked upon her. And as he looked his eyes grew deep and eager.
Sweet as the honey of Hymettus was the perfume of the orchard, all a powder of white and rosy blooms, among which the bees, pollen-dusted, labored, at their joyous, fructifying task. Fresh, the morning breeze. Clear, warm, radiant, the sun of June; the summer sun uprising far beyond the shining hills.
Life everywhere—and love!
Love, too, for them. For this man, this woman, love; the mystery, the pleasure and the eternal pain.
With his unhurt arm he circled her. He bent, he drew her to him, as she raised her face to his.
And for the first time his mouth sought hers.
Their lips, long hungry for this madness, met there and blended in a kiss of passion and of joy.
CHAPTER I. BEGINNINGS
A THOUSAND years of darkness and decay! A thousand years of blight, brutality, and atavism; of Nature over. whelming all man’s work, of crumbling cities and of forgotten civilization, of stupefaction, of death! A thousand years of night!
Two human beings, all alone in that vast wilderness—a woman and a man.
The past, irrevocable; the present, fraught with problems, perils. and alarms; the future—what?
A thousand years!
Yet, though this thousand years had seemingly smeared away all semblance of the world of men from the cosmic canvas, Allan Stern and Beatrice Kendrick thrilled with as vital a passion as though that vast, oblivious age lay not between them and the time that was.
And their long kiss, there in sight of their new home-to—be—alone there in that desolated world—was as natural as the summer breeze, the liquid melody of the red-breast on the blossomy apple-bough above their heads, the white and purple spikes of odorous lilacs along the vine-grown stone wall, the gold and purple dawn now. breaking over the distant reaches of the river.
Thus were these two betrothed, this sole surviving pair of human beings.
Thus, as the new day burned to living flame up the inverted bowl of sky, this woman and this man pledged each other their love and loyalty and trust.
Thus they stood together, his left arm about her warm, lithe body, clad as she was only in her tigerskin. Their eyes met and held true, there in the golden glory of the dawn. Unafraid, she read the message in the depths of his, the invitation, the command; and they both foreknew the future.
