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Lethe, whole no. 5, January 1947
Page 8
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Rand and Sharp looked up simultaneously. The silence was broken by a tinkling sigh, faint and far away and echoing dimly through the long gloomy corridors. Faintly, oh so faintly, they discerned a melodious tinkling, an alien pulsing rhythm only half heard. "It... it's music," Bret's voice whispered. His face gleamed strangely white beneath his space tan, and he was suddenly afraid. The doctor listened intently, his head cocked. A hand poised in mid-air, was arrested half-way to his chin. "Yes, it's music," his voice sounded tired but with a note of triumph in it. "Perhaps our search is over. Perhaps it is life at last. Perhaps...… but no that is impossible. What could be causing it don't like....." his whispered introspection faded as the inexplicable sound faded into the deadly silence. Both men now arose and dominated by a single thought, they left the room and turned down old unexplored hallways, as though hypnotized. Once more they moved downward. Swiftly now. The walls, gleaming with their faint light slipped by. Imperceptably the music grew louder. Definite, strange melodies pervaded their minds like groping fingers, and seemed to guide them deeper and deeper still into the very bowels of the planet, ever beckoning like a lorelei. They entered regions without light. Neither spoke... Their head lamps cut a bright swath through the blackness almost profanely disturbing the sleeping aeons. Melodies sounded loud now; entwined their slender tendrils about the Terrans. Strange, bizzare, they enthralled the men; kept them striding forward through the pall of darkness. An overpowering compulsion, an overwhelming desire to gaze on the maker of the weird rythms. A longing, a hunger crept stealthily into their minds. Unaccountably Rand's mind was filled with a blonde vision. A week in New York. The pleasures of that week became one with the complex, entwining rythms of the music. They rounded a bend. The music crashed out with the sound of a thousand chimes, the roll of a thousand drums, while a single piercing note climbed higher and higher through it all and vanished beyond the range of hearing; and yet they were conscious of it still, their soul vibrated in sympathy with the narcotic note. They stood before a huge doorway that loomed massive, menacing, in the light of their lamps. Around them the compelling sounds, soft and loud at the same time, echoed and rebounded from the walls. Expressions of longing touched with ecstacy turned the faces into a strange mask. They passed through the entrance. There were chaotic impressions that the two thralls vaguely noted. A soft golden radiance. An impression of depth, of vast, incalculable distance. A pillar of shimmering light. Swirling, many-hued mists dotted with winking flashing jewels. Ecstatic music dominating all. page eight
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Rand and Sharp looked up simultaneously. The silence was broken by a tinkling sigh, faint and far away and echoing dimly through the long gloomy corridors. Faintly, oh so faintly, they discerned a melodious tinkling, an alien pulsing rhythm only half heard. "It... it's music," Bret's voice whispered. His face gleamed strangely white beneath his space tan, and he was suddenly afraid. The doctor listened intently, his head cocked. A hand poised in mid-air, was arrested half-way to his chin. "Yes, it's music," his voice sounded tired but with a note of triumph in it. "Perhaps our search is over. Perhaps it is life at last. Perhaps...… but no that is impossible. What could be causing it don't like....." his whispered introspection faded as the inexplicable sound faded into the deadly silence. Both men now arose and dominated by a single thought, they left the room and turned down old unexplored hallways, as though hypnotized. Once more they moved downward. Swiftly now. The walls, gleaming with their faint light slipped by. Imperceptably the music grew louder. Definite, strange melodies pervaded their minds like groping fingers, and seemed to guide them deeper and deeper still into the very bowels of the planet, ever beckoning like a lorelei. They entered regions without light. Neither spoke... Their head lamps cut a bright swath through the blackness almost profanely disturbing the sleeping aeons. Melodies sounded loud now; entwined their slender tendrils about the Terrans. Strange, bizzare, they enthralled the men; kept them striding forward through the pall of darkness. An overpowering compulsion, an overwhelming desire to gaze on the maker of the weird rythms. A longing, a hunger crept stealthily into their minds. Unaccountably Rand's mind was filled with a blonde vision. A week in New York. The pleasures of that week became one with the complex, entwining rythms of the music. They rounded a bend. The music crashed out with the sound of a thousand chimes, the roll of a thousand drums, while a single piercing note climbed higher and higher through it all and vanished beyond the range of hearing; and yet they were conscious of it still, their soul vibrated in sympathy with the narcotic note. They stood before a huge doorway that loomed massive, menacing, in the light of their lamps. Around them the compelling sounds, soft and loud at the same time, echoed and rebounded from the walls. Expressions of longing touched with ecstacy turned the faces into a strange mask. They passed through the entrance. There were chaotic impressions that the two thralls vaguely noted. A soft golden radiance. An impression of depth, of vast, incalculable distance. A pillar of shimmering light. Swirling, many-hued mists dotted with winking flashing jewels. Ecstatic music dominating all. page eight
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